Hold the applause...here is the update

It's always hard to know where to start. I don't feel like my life is all that exciting, but I do actually do things....it's just hard to make them sound exciting sometimes. These past few weeks have been busy with construction at our house. The kitchen was completly demolished last week and then after that they put up the new beam, wired all the new lights, put in the new sliding glass door and window, and the initial inspections are done and now they are putting in insulation and then the driwall guy starts friday! Whew. It's moving at a pretty good pace. We are in week 3 so pretty much half way. Mom and I looked at paint and then ran it by everyone and it's all picked out and purchased so we are ready when the drywall guy is done.

So what have I been doing? Well....
*Trips to the Alsea Cabin to fix the water heater (or rather to take care of a tree that had fallen down while my dad fixed the water heater)
*Trip to Deleware for my cousin Lora's wedding! It was so fun to see so much of the Glasmann family and hang out at the beach house. We had beautiful weather. I have to scan in the picture and mooch some off my dad because I didn't remember my camera so I will have to post on this later.
*Lots of online care shopping in the evenings leading up to the eventual purchase of my 2005 Toyota Highlander Limited!! (more info on this later)
*Working in the lab on a few samples for my dad
*Helping my limping mother (yep threw that in there for ya mom) run errons, prepare for the whole family being here, clean, and pick out last minute things for the kitchen.
*Dinner with my old work buddies in Portland.
*Some online job investigating.

It's all sounds like it wouldn't take up so much time but you know how that goes. I have enjoyed spending some evenings with friends and having lunch with my visiting teaching girls. I had the opportunity to help my friend Katie make some flower arraingments for her house and that was very enjoyable. It was fun to do an arraingment with flowers that someone else had picked out because a lot of the things were different then what I have worked with before, even though I was a little unsure about how I could make them work the arraingments turned out really cool. Sorry, no pictures.
It seems like I have been really tired these past few weeks but when I stop and think about it I'm not sure why. My dad doesn't have all that much work for me to do so I have been trying to figure out if I should get a job or if there is a way I can reactivate my subsitute clarical worker status for the school district. I think trying to figure out what I'm supposed to do has been a little stressfull. I feel like I need to stay in Oregon until I hear back from Portland State in April. I also feel like there is a lot I can do to help out my mom while the kichen remodel is going on and when she has her knee surgery...so I guess that is where the stress comes in. I feel ok when things are busy and hopping but when they slow down I doubt and find the need for reassurance that I'm doing the right thing. I'm grateful for a loving Heavenly Father with whom I can communicate and recieve guidance. Last week as I was preparing a lesson I found an old notebook I had used when I was trying to figure out some things in Utah and I had made myself a list of goals that I wanted to work on. It was interesting to review that list and see how coming back to Oregon has definitly helped me work on a lot of the goals that I didn't do so well on while I was still in utah. I felt like that was a little answer meant to give me peace.
As for my new car, I love it! I loved my 4Runner....a lot! I was in no way dissatisfied with my old car but I had been wishing for a 6cylender now that I wasn't doing so much around town driving. Anyway my brother Josh got accepted to BYU and as were were discussing his situation it became apparent that it would be nice for him to have a car. At this point my dad started joking about buying my car and then giving it to Josh. After a lot of that joking I said if he was serious I was ok with that and I would start looking for a new car. Well, he was serious, so I started looking. I did a lot of research and decided that I wanted something 2005 or newer and made a list of priorities of things I wanted and things that would be nice, but not necessary. When I found the 2005 limited it had everything I wanted, but didn't necissarily need, and it was in my price range. The only thing the 2005 didn't have was rear air with seperate controles. Anyway I went to go look at th 2005 and test drove the 2005, and the 2008, and then I decided that as a driver there was pretty much no big difference except for price. The only major differences in the 2008 would have affected my passengers in the back, mostly 3rd row, which wouldn't get used that much. So I decided that it wasn't worth the price difference when I'm not using the back all that much at this stage of my life. So despite the fact it wasn't my first choice of color the 2005 was pretty much perfect for me. So far it has gotten great gas milage and everyone who gets in talks about how it looks brand new on the inside, even though it's a 2005. It's a certified vehicle so it still had warrenty coverage and all kinds of nice perks. It's got leather interiour, heated front seats, 8way power adjust driver seat and 4 way front passenger seat. Reclining 2nd row and 3rd row seat. Auto climate control, auto/day time running lights, fog lights, remote adjust mirrors, auto ajust rear view mirror, tow package, sun/moon roof,....and lots of other technical stuff that is pretty cool. It's fun to drive and quite, and it has the super speaker pack...so it has amazing sound.
We just had Jayme & Virginia, and Jackie and her family down here for Presidents Day weekend and Jayme's birthday. We had a great time. I think Jayme was a little dissapointed that we ended up at the outlet malls in the evening on his birthday but we did go to the beach in the morning. We had great weather both days we went to the coast and we had fun at the cabin. Mom and Dad treated us to some amazing meals! Thanks! I will post a slide show later.