Trust in Him

I did something hard today. And then I remembered the words of President Hinckley from the Feb. 2006 Ensign:

Put Your Trust In God

By President Gordan B. Hinckley

It isn't as bad as you sometimes think it is.

It all works out. Don't worry.

I say that to myself every morning.

It will all work out.

Put your trust in God,

and move forward with faith

and confidence in the future.

The Lord will not forsake us.

He will not forsake us.

If we will put our trust in Him,

if we will pray to Him,

if we will live worthy of His blessings,

He will hear our prayers.

Remember this Amy.

Soccer Update

This was one of the indoor soccer leagues I played in during my first semester.

I was playing in 3 soccer leagues during my last semester. Mondays, Tuesdays and Thursdays.

Thursday League

So I maaaaay or may not have been on the roster for this team (picture above and below)... but I just kind of mooched my way onto the team... but to be fair.. they needed me! There were a couple girls on that team, but none of them ever showed up. And there were only ever 2 girls present in every game that I played so we both ended up playing full hour games because there has to be 2 girls on the field at all times. It was fun though! (*Side note. I dont think any of the girls in these pictures were actually registered on this team... haha oops) I dont know where we placed in any of our indoor leagues unfortunately. Ricky was my #1 fan and came to all my games with me and cheered everyone on... so obviously he got to be in all our team pictures


Thursday League again... and yes.. Nick (on the far right) is picking his nose.

Tuesday League

Tuesday League again

Southern Alberta weather is crazy... It likes to give us a taste of the summer... and then slam us with blizzards or rain storms... but this is what I have to say to you Mother Nature... Your torrential downpours and snow storms won't keep us from playing soccer!!

A bunch of us thought we were going out to play a nice
round of soccer on what looked like a beautiful afternoon,
 but 2 minutes after we started playing... well..
I'm sure you can guess what happened.

Snow?! 2 weeks into April?!

Whatevs! That won't stop me!

The weather was insane this night! We had a game at the end of April and it was a torrential downpour the WHOLE time!! My shoes got so heavy that it felt like each shoe was like 10 pounds! I kid you not, I had puddles in my shoes that I could dump out by the end of the game! It was so fun/cold/crazy! I love how no matter the weather in SoAB... games will hardly ever get cancelled! haha


So this summer I'm playing in 3 soccer leagues. I'm playing on a Co-ed league on Tuesday evenings... and I'm actually in charge of that team so I have been pretty busy! I'm playing on the Womens Panthers team again on Wednesday evenings, and I'm also playing on the Cardston Co-ed team on Thursday evenings! I'm loving it so far! Between games, practices, and fun kick-abouts with friends, I get to play soccer like 6 days/wk =)

Oh, and I'm doing summer school for massage therapy Monday-Thursday while working at Aldo on the weekends. As well as squeezing in time to hang out with my boyfriend who lives an hour away in Cardston. I'm a busy busy bee!!

Cross Country Skiing

This one time, Ricky and I went cross country skiing. It was my first time going.  I didn't really like it at first. Mainly because I was frustrated that I couldnt get my boot onto my skii for the first 20 minutes, only to find that there was a rock stuck in my boot that was preventing my boot and the skii to clip together. It took me a little bit to get used to it, and I didn't like that Ricky and I were skiing on one trail, him in front, me behind. It made it impossible to talk to eachother. I enjoyed it alot more when Ricky ended up skiing beside me in a less prominent trail, and I got the hang of the skiing motion, and actually figured out how to pick up speed without falling down as much haha 

Ready. Set. Go!

It was a little windy

We made it to Cameron Lake! Instead of turning right around and heading back to town, we decided to stay and play a bit.

The snow was so high that we could climb the houses! Pretty cool eh?

Can you see Ricky all the way up there??

Snow angles on top of a house

The day turned out to be a complete success and we had so much fun! The skii back into town was alot funner too! If you havn't tried cross country skiing before, you should go out of your bubble and try it! It's really not that hard, and if I can get the hang of it, you could too!

Wisdom Teeth, Soccer, Dreams

Wisdom teeth suck.  I decided I might as well get mine pulled while I am still covered under my parents, even though I didn't need to get mine pulled in the near (or far) future. I just wanted to get it out of the way regardless.  Turns out, I don't have bottom wisdom teeth (fist pump!) and apparently those are the worst to get pulled and the ones that make your face swell the most. So I was pretty happy that my face wasn't likely to swell much. Anyways.. as soon as I got to the dentist office, I started to shake and got so scared! This was the closest I've ever been to a surgery and I was WILLINGLY going into it, knowing I was going to get sliced open and have my teeth pried out of my face... I was definitely having second thoughts about this wisdom tooth business...

The dentist mentioned a couple things while digging in my face. 1. My gums were super healthy and strong which was making his job alot more difficult. 2. That he was getting a workout trying to get my one tooth out. 3. That I have a little mouth and a little stubborn tooth that didn't want to come out.

As soon as he pulled it out, the dentist and the hygienist both cooed over my "cute baby wisdom tooth" "Aww that's the cutest little wisdom tooth I've ever seen!" "That is the smallest wisdom tooth I have ever pulled out! It's so cute!" I was having a little trouble showing my excitement over my "cute baby wisdom tooth" considering the dentist was digging around all up in my grill for the past hour. BUT they gave my teeth to me, so I could show them off. So here they are folks... you're welcome?

The little one still has a little meat on it. Sorry if that grosses anyone out hah

The only swelling I got was right after the surgery and it was only on my right side. It wasn't that bad, really. 

Swelling on my face. My right, your left

Attempted smile

I had slept for 12 hours the night before but I was completely wiped after an hour at the dentist office! All I wanted to do was lay down.  I ended up going out to Cardston to hang out with Ricky. He had play practice, so I just hung out and read my book/slept on the couches.  I ended up being too loopy to drive home, so I slept over at the girls house. I didn't mind because that meant I got to hang out with Ricky all the next day too! Once again, I mostly just read my book and slept on the couch down in the green room.  My T3s were making me really loopy and nauseous so I didn't want to eat anything because I would have thrown up! All I had in those 2 days were 3 slurpees (2 in one day! yum!) and one bowl of icecream. I ended up losing 5 pounds in 2 days. Yuck. I felt so sick, so Ricky made me spend the night again and then I would have to drive home early so I could get to work on time.  I really wasn't feeling up to working because I was in pain, and then when I took my T3s, I would be so out of it and sick to my stomach, and I was just so tired!

I got done work, went grocery shopping (mainly for frozen yogurt tubes because that is all I have been craving lately! That and slurpees) and then I planned on coming home to sleep and sleep and sleep! (I was feeling SO crappy and tired!). I ate some ichiban and then realized that I had a soccer game in like 20 minutes! I wasn't planning on playing because of the state I had been in for the past couple days and I was still feeling pretty out of it. I had my soccer stuff in my bag just in case though. I got there at 10 to and there was hardly anyone there... and no girls!! Our team is usually pretty good about showing up early so it was weird that like, no one was there. I didnt want our team to be playing 3 players short with no subs, so I decided right then that I was going to play so I hurried and got my gear on, and ran out onto the field 1 minute before the game started. The other girls showed up like 10 minutes late, but I just stayed on the field.  I would have played the whole game too, had some guy not rake-stomped my leg.  Like right on the achilles part. It hurt so bad! I took a sub, just thinking my leg was sore, but when I took off my shoe and sock, I found my leg was bleeding and you could see the cleat marks as well as the swelling and bruising already appearing.

This picture really doesnt do it justice

The good news was that I was fine playing and I didn't hurt my face anymore.  The bad news was that I got what I deserved for playing when the guy killed my ankle considering I shouldnt have been playing in the first place. 

Annnnnyways... On to what I was actually meaning to blog about...

Ever since I have been on T3s, I have not been able to control my sleeping! I am like an old person. You know the old men who sit on the couches in the mall and they are fast asleep in less than 30 seconds? I have never been the type of person to fall asleep in a car, sitting up, in public places... etc... but with the help of T3s, I have mastered the art of sleeping anywhere, any time! Along with my narcoleptic tendencies, I've also been having an increased measure of dreams! Especially the kind of dreams where I'm floating in between consciousness and sleep. For example. The other night, Ricky and I were cuddling on the couch, watching Prison Break. I could feel that I was pretty out of it. I was dozing in and out of consciousness as we watched and my dreams started incorporating what we were watching into my dreams. As Michael Scofield and Sucre attempted to break out of prison in my semi-sleeping dreams, something happened that scared me and made me jump big enough to wake me up. I looked beside me, and who was laying beside me?? Not Ricky... but Michael Scofield! Seriously... It wasn't Ricky! But I knew it was Ricky that I had been laying down with on the couch... so what was going on?! I don't remember exactly what I said to Ricky, but I know I told him that he was Scofield. I even pushed myself up off the couch to get a better view and focus my eyes a little better so that I could see that it really was, indeed, Ricky. But no. It was definitely Micheal. I was SO confused!!

There have been so many times this past week where I have had nightmares that have made me jump so bad that I wake myself up! It's been a little embarassing because I have been with Rick the majority of the week, so I have to try to explain that its a mix of the T3s and my dreams that have been making me act this bizarre. This isn't how I normally act. I swear.
So then last night, I woke up feelin pretty sore, so I popped a tylenol and went back to sleep. I then proceeded to dream about Justin Bieber.  My new best friend.  We had randomly met and had been hanging out quite a bit lately. We had been inviting eachother to random events like family BBQs. concerts, soccer games... you know.. typical places best friends would go together. Then one night we were hanging out, he tried to kiss me, and I shut him down hardcore. "Justin... I'm not easy like that. You know better than to randomly try to kiss me when we aren't at that place in a relationship yet. You're going to have to try alot harder than that if you want to be my boyfriend!" We kept hangin out though because we were tight, and he liked me ;-) haha it was kindof annoying though because everywhere we went, there was a stream of girls chasing him... but I felt so privilaged because out of all the girls, he wanted to be with me and WE were hangin out! hahahah

To make things even better... in my dream, we started having a church discussion and J was thinkin of goin on a mission (hahahah) David Archuleta style!
I woke up and then fell back asleep and had this completely different, but reccuring, dream about a war-type thing that I was in.  It was like a Lord of the Rings type war. Where there were people, and weird type of animal people (like orcs... but not exactly) and other human-like creatures. It was this massive war where everyone was fighting everywhere! We didn't have guns either. Just swords, spears, knives, and stuff.. It was terrifying and I was surprised I stayed alive for as long as I did! So at one point in my dream, we had this plan where a bunch of our guys were going to be hiding in a pitch black stairwell/hallway and some of out other guys were going to round them into this dark corridor and we were going to slaughter them! We all gathered together and painted ourselves black (we looked so gung ho!) as we waited in the hall for the fight. Just then, my roommate, Alicia ran around the corner wearing a weird little outfit and she had smothered mud all over her body and said "I'm ready to fight!" We all just looked at her funny and the captain told her that we already had enough people and that we didn't need her. It was really random and funny and it threw me off which woke me up.... so I didn't get to finish my dream. But it's okay because I already knew what happened since I've already had this recurring dream a couple times.  I just wasn't expecting Alicia to show up. It was alot cooler had you actually seen it. Wouldn't it be so cool if there was a machine that could record your dreams, that way you could watch them again?

In other news... look at my pretty nails =)

Near To You

My roommate showed me this song the other day because she said it reminded her of me.

He and I had something beautiful
But so dysfunctional, it couldn't last
I loved him so but I let him go
'Cause I knew he'd never love me back


Such pain as this
Shouldn't have to be experienced
I'm still reeling from the loss,
Still a little bit delirious


Near to you, I am healing
But it's taking so long
'Cause though he's gone
And you are wonderful
It's hard to move on
Yet, I'm better near to you.


You and I have something different
And I'm enjoying it cautiously
I'm battle scarred, I am working oh so hard
To get back to who I used to be


He's disappearing
Fading suddelly
I'm so close to being yours
Won't you stay with me
Please


Near to you, I am healing
But it's taking so long
'Cause though he's gone
And you are wonderful
It's hard to move on
Yet, I'm better near to you.


I only know that I am
Better where you are
I only know that I am
Better where you are
I only know that I belong
Where you are


Near to you, I am healing
But it's taking so long
Though he's gone
And you are wonderful
It's hard to move on


Near to you, I am healing
But it's taking so long
'Cause though he's gone
And you are wonderful
It's hard to move on
Yet, I'm better near to you.


Yet, I'm better near to you.


I found this song rang more truth to my situation than I had thought it would.  Part of me wants to write about it and pour out all my feelings from my heart... but at the same time, my experiences from the past 2 years are still somewhat tender subjects and my heart is still a little raw from it all.
Side note: Don't you all think having a public blog is so bitter sweet?? It's fun to post cute or funny little posts and see the responses people have to them! You're so proud that people are reading/commenting and you all check your stats like twice a day! (don't deny it... I'm sure you have all done it!) But sometimes you just want to pound out exactly how you are feeling without having to leave stuff out, or avoid using people's names because you don't know who might stumble across your blog, or you don't want people to know so much about your personal life. It makes a person vulnerable. So the more vague you are when writing, the less vulnerable you become. Right? K, cool... I'm glad we all agree. But isn't this a pretty sweet song? =)

Oh... are you feeling a little let down because I didn't expound upon my original point of this post?? .... Oops...

My New Friend

So while I was sitting in the airport, waiting to board my flight, a guy around my age asked me to watch his stuff for him for a couple minutes.  We started chatting when he got back and he told me that he knew he could trust me to watch over his stuff because my book that I was reading had a big picture of President Monson on the cover. I learned that my new friend, Tim Sharp, had just gotten his mission call from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints to serve in Minneapolis, Minnesota! (also, he just turned 19 on April 23! I made sure to be the last one to sing him a wonderful rendition of happy birthday!)

The more we got to talking, the more special I came to understanding he is. We got talking about the church and I mentioned to him about how my friend Stephanie Penny just got baptized just recently (refer here) and Tim got all excited and whipped out his laptop and showed me this amazing video! (That's right, my friend Timothy Sharp is starring in a Mormon Message!)

Isn't that such a cool experience? I am so proud of both Tim and Danail =)

About a month ago, Tim asked me to join in on fasting for Danail because she wasn't doing too good... feel free to pray for this sweet, sweet girl.

K seriously... the world is so small! Especially the Mormon community... There is crazy connections everywhere! I got on the subject of what I was doing in AZ for my visit. I mentioned how I missed the Merchant sister's concert and that I was going to be staying at their house for the next couple days. That I was going to be hanging out with my ginger friend, Preston.

 Speaking of gingers, Tim told me about the last time he was flying from Great Falls to Arizona, he was sitting beside a ginger and a girl about his age. She wasn't a member, but the red haired guy was. So him and this guy ended up teaching the girl the first lesson on the flight. The other guy had a Book of Mormon on him, so he gave her the book, and then neither of them heard from her again.  Still... it was a pretty cool story.  My friend, Preston, picked me up from the airport and when I saw him, I gave him a big hug. Tim was behing me when Preston saw him.  "I KNOW THAT GUY!!" Preston yelled. Tim looked at him, and then looked at me, "This is the ginger you were talking about?!?! This is the guy I was telling you about!!" Turns out, we were both talking about the same ginger!... Soooo we had to get a picture together when we all met up at the Easter Pageant later that week. Small world eh??

I am SO happy I was lucky enough to meet Timothy Sharp. I think Tim and I must have been best friends in the pre-existence or something because we because insta-friends and I love him like a brother! He's my big little bro, and I love him =) Is that weird to say? haha

And out of all my friends, him and I skype the most. He's the best though =)

One of my really good friends was getting married on Friday, March 23, 2012. I looked into getting a flight to Arizona to go to her wedding, but noticed that my passport had expired like a month earlier.  I just assumed that I couldn't go because I figured it would take weeks to get my passport renewed. I found out like a week later that there is such thing as an Urgent Passport Renewal. Obviously it came with a cost, but that meant that I could get my passport renewed, and get to Arizona for my friend's wedding! Here's the sketchy part about it though... in order to prove that the situation was "urgent", I had to buy my ticket, drive to calgary to show them, and hope that I was approved and that I could get my new passport the next day.

I bought my tickets on March 17th, drove to Calgary on Tuesday, March 20th (keep in mind, my flight was for Friday morning!). I went to the passport office and talked to these 2 ladies.  Long story short, they liked me and thought I was funny so they pulled some strings for me so that I could pick up my passport the next morning (I was so blessed!) Then I went to my really good friend, Camilla and Ryan's house and got to play with them and their sweet little girl, Everee.

I am so smitten with this little girl!

So I have a little experience that I don't think I will ever forget or take for granted. It is so insignificant but such a powerful testimony builder to me of the power of a positive attitude and a smile.  I was in a really good mood that morning.  I went to the passport office to get my passport, and as I walked into the big hall, I gave a big toothy grin to the 2 security guards, which in turn caused them to smile a big grin.  I kept walking and I saw a group of LDS Missionaries. So I smiled big at them and said hello. They were caught of guard, but super happy that I knew who they were and they all gave me a big smiley hello and a wave.  I walked into the room where I needed to pick up my passport, and grinned at 3 more security guards. Guess what? They grinned back at me. The same ladies that had helped me the day before were working again that day and as soon as the first lady saw me, she burst out laughing (because I was such a gong show the day before) as she said hello to me and asked me how my day was going. I was chatting with her for a minute, when the second lady who was helping me was walking past, and as she looked over and saw me, she also burst out laughing (I wasn't joking when I said I was a gong show the day before...) and she stayed and chatted with me for a bit as well. Both ladies had a big grin on their face. I said goodbye and on my way out, I noticed the 3 security guards that I had smiled at 10 minutes still carried that same big grin on their face.  The elders that I had said hello to, were much more allert and happy. The other 2 security gaurds I smiled a big toothy grin at were still smiling from ear to ear.
So this is what I took from the situation... Before I had smiled or said hello to any of the 10+ people around me, I noticed their countenence and their body language as well as their facial expressions. None of which were showing a particular enthusiasm about their being there. But the second after I smiled and said hello, there was a distinct difference in their countenence, body language and facial expressions! By one little smile and inquirey about how their day was going, I noticably changed their outlook on their attitude.  Not only in that moment, but from what i witnessed, in that 10 minutes I was in the passport office.  As I was leaving, every. single. one. of them was still grinning from ear to ear.  I may or may not have had an impact on their mood for the rest of the day. I don't know that. But I DO know that I had an impact in that 10 minutes for sure.  Now just imagine for those 10 minutes that these 10+ people were smiling to the people they were interacting with.  They may have passed that smile on, which may have been passed on.  And so on and so forth.  How many people could have been impacted for the better because of a simple smile?? I don't know why I found that situation to be so profound, but it sunk deep into my heart as I felt the Spirit witness this little tender mercy to me. 

Anyways... On Thursday, March 22, Ricky Duane and I went to watch my momma perform in the play The Sound of Music (along with Payton Dudley who played Rolfe-- he did great! So did Momma G!) After the play, Payt and I gave Ricky a tour of the theatre (our second home... ooh the memories!). Me, Ricky, my mom, and Desmond ended up being the last people in the theatre and we randomly ended up having a dance party out in the middle of the street in front of the theatre at like midnight (Isn't my mom the coolest?!)

I was supposed to be leaving to Bozeman at 3:30 am that morning for a 6 1/2 hour drive. But we didn't end up leaving Raymond until after 1 am. Ricky helped me pack and kept me company until 3:30 and then I was on my way! I did really good about staying awake all night! I had about 2 more hours to go when I stopped to ask for directions. The guy gave me directions, but threw in ONE wrong turn in there... that's all it took for me to get lost and end up in a farmers field! There was one single little farm house that I pulled over to so I could ask for directions. They weren't home. (of course) Long story short. I got lost long enough that I missed my flight be 15 minutes.  Yup. 15 Minutes... I drove 7 1/2 hours just to get lost and miss a flight. I bawled in the airport for... 2... hours. (I was tired and emotional. Give me a break!) Multiple cry baby phone calls later, I finally got up the ambition to drive 2 hours to Helena, MT to stay at my relatives house for the night.

This is what a tired, grumpy, cry baby Amy looks like

 I'm actually quite surprised I stayed up for as long as I did... I expected to go straight to bed as soon as I got there, but I ended up chatting with everyone, playing some weird sandwhich game, going out for dinner, and then dessert, and then hangin out with my cousin and his friends past midnight. I was awake for over 36 hours... don't think I've ever done that before.

The next morning, I woke up at 7:30 and left for Great Falls to catch my flight. Except my flight was delayed because of the weather. I ended up missing my friend's wedding, another friend's birthday, and the Firefly concert (which was all on Friday) That was pretty much the only reasons I was going to AZ but I was set on going to AZ! There was no way I was going to drive 14 hours and buy a flight for nothing!

Aren't they so perfect for eachother?! Presenting Mr. and Mrs. Hon!
(In case you didn't catch the memo... this is my friend Chelsey.
And I missed her wedding.

To be continued. (mostly because I have been writing this post over the span of a week or so and it is all over the place. I'll finish the story when I have the ambition to sit down for more than 5 minutes)