Random

Hmm...what have I been up to these days?

I am glad to report that I have been fine since my kidney stone.

Been keeping busy with school.

And really busy with church stuff.

Last weekend was great, I loved Conference. So uplifting.

The weekend before that was so FULL of church stuff that I was hardly home!

Singles dinner, RS luncheon, YW broadcast, Branch Council mtg, Church and YSA testmony meeting all in two and a half days!

Yikes!

No single guys came to the Single Adult dinner...just six gals including me and also a bunch of married leaders.

Anybody wondering why I'm still single?

Hmmm...in other news...

Dad cleaned out his coat pockets:

We keep getting dustings of snow:

The Jr High kids are doing great with the projects we do with them:

And Laura got another puppy to raise to be a guide dog a couple days ago:

Randy is very flexible! Let's hope he'll be a good puppy. Grant had the nickname "Tasmanian Devil" for a reason.

We don't have babies at the Chaney house. We have puppies!

I did get to be a mom for 30 min this weekend during conference- held a 6 mo old baby so his mommy could use the potty and get their stuff together. He spit up on me too, I got the whole mommy experience! And it was funny how many compliments I got when I was holding the baby in one arm and using the rug sweeper in the other! I can multitask. Sometimes.

His mommy said "Will you take the baby for me?" and I said "I will take any baby I can get!"

And yay I got my student teaching packet turned in! Gotta love paperwork. And paying for clearances. And taking Praxis exams. And gotta love it when your advisor forgot to sign a paper and you have to track him down or pay a $100 late fee!

My semester is over with in about a month!

I hope I have a fun summer!

That is, if Spring ever comes!

Why Wait?

One of my sweet friends saw the embroidered dishtowels I had posted on FB recently and said something to the effect of "I'd love something special like that when I get married."

And that comment broke my little heart- why do us single gals put off the joys in life simply because we don't have a special someone?

So I asked her what her desired future kitchen colors were and made her a matching suite of embroidered dishtowels, towels, and a hotpad:

Sometimes the rules of life make me laugh- I'm not allowed to have matching, nice or cute things because I'm single and haven't had a bridal or baby shower? Where did I sign up for that?

Sometimes I swear I'm going to start throwing showers for my single galpals and myself...um, we like nice things too! Do we not matter?

It's all too easy to put off happiness and say "Well I'll have a cute kitchen when I'm married" or "Well I'll be happy when I'm married" or "I'll be happy when I have kids." But what in the meantime? You should allow yourself to be happy now. You are a worthwhile person now. Don't waste your time here on earth just because you're single and/or childless. Life's too short for that. It's easy to focus too much on the future and forget about today.

I don't discriminate- I made a different set of kitchen stuff for my friend who got married. Her desired kitchen colors were red, green, black and tan. She is in her early 30's and just married a great guy in the temple- gotta reward that.

So married or single, have a cute kitchen and seize the day.

Coming Soon to a store near you...

I often joke that I want to write a handbook for Old Marrieds on how to deal with us YSA (cause we're a different species, don't ya know).

In my frustrations in dealing with people, I decided to turn my pain around...into something funny.

So here we go- the books I long to write:

And then I decided that us singles needed books too:

We need to educate the young people so that these prejudices don't continue:

{I started laughing so hard I was crying when I thought of that last one in my car.}

Keep an eye out- if things keep going as they are then one day these will be at your local church bookstore ;)

Four Hours of Motherhood

No makeup- this is reality!

No, I didn’t have a baby, but I babysat a 15 month old little boy the other Sunday. Remember me talking about The Latebloomers and their adopted baby? That’s who we babysat for the first time- at our house. Well, the Latebloomers moved into our branch this summer and Bro Latebloomer just became our branch president which I’m hoping means less inquiries about my love life. The Corry branch now has a baby in it, which is pretty unusual. And entertaining- it’s nice to have something to watch during Sacrament meeting!

Laura was off babysitting her Primary kids, so Mom and I tag teamed for Lil’ Droopsnoot. He screamed for a couple minutes after his parents dropped him off at our house, but that’s to be expected. And there’s just something about Mom that makes every baby within 10 yards of her cry- it’s been our family joke for the last 20 years. I joked with Dad that 15 months is the best of both worlds- he’s mobile AND not potty-trained! Oh, joy.

I picked him up from Mom and wiped his nose and he settled down. I spent most of the four hours that he was at our house on the couch with him on my lap, he was happy there and we weren’t about to disturb that. We watched Toy Story movies and some old Muppet Shows- he was mesmerized by the Muppets singing and dancing! I know you shouldn’t have the tv babysit your kids, but it made our experience a lot easier!

I fed him Cheerios and soon learned that if I had too many in my hand that they went all over the couch. He ate applesauce while on my knee at the table and Mom was daring and fed him sweet potatoes while he was on the couch with me. Miracle of miracles, we didn’t get sweet potato everywhere!

There for awhile we played with him in his pop up tent, he had these colored plastic balls that he liked to throw out of his tent and have us throw them in his tent. He got a big kick when I would put a plastic ball under his shirt or up his pant leg and then work to get them out. I opened up my pant leg to him to see what he would do and he stuck a plastic ball up there, what a funny kid. I had fun- I am such a big kid myself. His mother said she'd never thought to stick the plastic balls up his pant leg, I guess I am creative. LOL

And then four hours had come and gone and his parents picked him up and things went back to normal. I was a bit apprehensive about us watching him but things worked out really well. The little tyke laughed and cooed most of the time.

So why write about this? Well it’s not every day that I deal with little babies. If I’m around kids then they’re usually over the age of 5. Like I said, there’s no little ones in our branch (until now), just the older Primary children. I have to go to Stake Conference to see little ones! I don’t really have friends out here that have kids- I’m mainly friends with YSA or my college peers or my adult YSA advisors (who have kids but they’re grown ups!). My friends with kids are out West.

But even before moving out here, I wasn’t around babies very much. My only sibling is only 4 years younger then me, so by the time I was old enough to babysit, she wasn’t much behind. We lived out in the boonies, so I didn’t babysit much anyhow- few people wanted to drive all the way out to pick me up, drive to their house, and take me back home. I only have two cousins that are younger than me and they live in CA. Most of my experience with babies comes from serving in Nursery for the 3 months before I left on my mission and also the Rodarte twins that got passed around in RS before we moved. And we moved over three years ago!
There’s nothing like having a tyke come over to make one realize how unbabyproof our house is- clearly we have no babies around here! There’s the wood stove (which had a fire in it), electrical cords and outlets, the three big dogs, and countless sharp objects and things not suitable for babies. Like the space heater with the pointy metal corners that was right by where he was playing in his tent. I was right there with him to make sure he didn’t hit it.

My mother took a the photo above- I think she wanted to document that I do have some motherly instincts. My poor mother- I know she wants grandchildren.


It felt good to know that I can take care of a youngin’. And that babies can like me. It’s nice to know that I have some motherly instincts in me and it was nice to see them come out. I wanted to keep him! It feels natural when I pick him up and hold him. Maybe someday the stork will bring me one or two.

Latebloomers

I'm totally a Latebloomer. I'm sure a lot of people are, but I think I take the cake. I don't think I've done very much when I was "supposed" to.

Consider:

• I was born two weeks late
• I was baptized four months after I turned 8...had to wait for Dad to get home
• I never did earn my YW medallion (working on it now!)
• I got my driver's license when I was 19
• It took 3.5 years to get a 2 year degree
• I was essentially 22 when I left on my mission
• I was late entering the dating world
• We're STILL unpacking from the move nearly 3 yrs ago
• I'm 29 and still working on a Bachelor's degree
• I have yet to have a real job
• And oh yeah, no man/babies either

I think the only thing I ever did early was graduate at age 17 (I turned 18 later that summer).
I joke that one day I'll be grown up. Right now I'm Peter Pan, being a big kid. And I love it. I'm happier than I've been in awhile.

It's easy to compare yourself to others and go "What's wrong with me?" but I've found that that just leads to unhappiness. I have to remember that everyone's timeline isn't the same- and thank heavens it's not or else the world would be so boring. Not to mention we couldn't get advice from people who've done it before.
It's easy to feel like there's an expiration date on me that says "Must Get Married By Age 30", but there isn't. At least I haven't found it in the shower.

I enjoy keeping in touch on fb, but at the same time I find out about a lot of marriages/children of those much much younger than I (that I probably wouldn't have heard of otherwise) which can get depressing if I let it. It's really easy to say THEY'RE getting married?!? or They've got HOW many kids now? but I try not to. It gets worse when they're kids you used to babysit, or if they were the little children of your YW leader back in the day. When I compare myself to others, it just makes me sad, and who needs that? The race is against ourselves, not against others.

I didn't realize until I left how sad I was being in my home ward (which I'd been there for like 20 years). I miss people back home but it's very good for my mental health not to be around all the kids getting married and all the people who compare me to them. I love being in YW here, but I was always so fearful of being put in it back home- I think I would have gone crazy from comparison.

I tell myself that I'm doing what I'm supposed to and I think I'm where I'm supposed to be for the time being, so I should be happy. And I am. I can't help if my timeline is different than others. It drives me crazy when people need to "fix" me because they think my timeline is wrong.

That being said, I love it when I see other Latebloomers succeed in the whole marriage/babies thing. One of the guys that I knew in the singles ward forever ago recently got married (for the first time!)- and he's 10 years older than I. He finally found the right girl. One of the older guys I know out here is getting married in June, he's in his early 30's and is so happy. Not many marry out here, so I love seeing people succeed.
I saw a blog by an LDS girl who was 31 and decided to go on 31 dates with 31 different boys in 31 days and spend a total of $31. And you know what? She found her man by doing that and their wedding pics were posted on Style Me Pretty. Her blog is down while she's writing a book about it. Sadly, the whole 31 dates/days thing isn't an option for me-I don't know 31 eligible men out here- or really, any.

One of the couples that I know in the stake are older- probably in their later 40's or early 50's. Both real nice, normal people. I was surprised to find out that they'd only been married a couple of years- and neither had been married before. They had finally found their person. They grinned, "Yeah, we're Latebloomers." And I was thrilled to see that they had adopted a tiny baby last fall. I hadn't seen the wife since the adoption, but I saw her when I crashed another ward's RS birthday party last month. And it was wonderful to see her so incredibly happy being a mother. She glowed and I could see the joy in her eyes. When I see people like this, it gives me hope.

One of my personal heroes is Kristen Oaks, the second wife of Elder Dallin H. Oaks. He married her after his first wife had passed away. I believe she was in her 50's when she married Elder Oaks (Side Note: I can't imagine dating an apostle!) and she had given up on getting married. She had devoted herself to her family and service. I enjoyed the CES fireside that Elder Oaks spoke at (I believe it was in 2008) and I enjoyed what she said during that fireside as well. She said that if you can't handle being single, then you'll never handle being married. I was excited to hear that she has a book out, it's on my To Read list.

All of us are on our own paths, and it's important to remember that Heavenly Father has a plan for each of us. He knows and loves us individually and he knows what is best for us. I'm hoping that I'll be a good wife/mom when the time comes because I've had longer to prepare for it.