Lions & Tigers & Bears. Oh my.

Today I went on an African Safari and then an Everest Expedition. I saw a musical of the Lion King and then inadvertently ate an entire package of graham crackers. Busy day.

kids

The kids that hung out at the job site were our favorite part of the trip.

Backing up

On our first day in the Dominican Republic we took a tour of the capital. Here is the Reader's Digest version....





More to come.

Year of a million dreams....

When I was a little girl I spent a lot of time at Disneyland. And for some reason I was fascinated by the people who cleaned up trash. They had those really cool, long dustpan things and I wanted their job when I grew up. I know, dream big, right? A few summers ago, my dream came true when some Disneyland Cast Members let me use their dustpans to clean up the park. Well, it could have come true on a more permanent basis when we decided to move to Orlando for the summer. Only I decided to pass on the custodial opportunity and accepted a position at the Blizzard Beach Water Park instead. That's right, I am the new slide operator. You might ask what that means. I'm not really sure. But so far what it means is that I have an ID card that gets me in the parks for free and I don't actually start working for a few more days!!! Happy birthday to me!!

Okay so what it really means is that I was the lame 25 year old single rider grinning from ear to ear in the Magic Kingdom today. Some guy in the Dumbo line asked me if I was with a kid. Like everyone doesn't secretly want to ride Dumbo by their self.

Here is me in front of the Castle.

Here is my self portrait on the Carousel.

And I wasn't kidding about the whole lame 25 year old thing either. I really don't think that is the right age though. I'm pretty sure my birth certificate is wrong, or someone messed up somewhere because 25 just doesn't sound right! Li took good care of me on my birthday; check out the stack of presents he wrapped up for me!

And here I am modeling a few of my treasures.

Called to Serve

Brett is going to Japan!!!!

I didn't guess that.

shout hooray

Happy Birthday to Brett. He is smart, witty, stylish, talented and willing to drive across the country with me....who could ask for a better brother.

His mission call is in the mail. Where do you think he is going?

Sorry for the delay.

I know I promised pictures from the DR. They are coming. But last week I decided very last minute to hop on a flight to Utah to be with my sister Tina when she went through the temple. Then my brother Brett was kind enough to drive for 3 days across the nation with me so that I can have a car for the summer here in Florida. Needless to say it's been more than a little crazy around here. Here are a couple pictures from my time in Utah and a teaser from the DR.
isn't my grandpa the cutest man?!

the happy couple.

I tried to bring a souvenir home but didn't know if I could make it through customs.

Estoy Cansada

Wow. I am tired. Last night I almost fell asleep in my dinner. Today we have been done with work for almost 2 hours but in my head I am still pulling nails out of wood so that both can be reused. In fact this internet cafe is under construction and there is a pile of wood with nails sticking out and I have been searching for a hammer so that I can "help them out."

I LOVE this place.

The cars and scooters on the road are nuts, the kids and workers on the job site are amazing and the landscape is beautiful. Uploading pictures would be a nightmare but Li just bought a new memory card so we´ll have more to share than you care to see when we get back.

Update

The only thing I can complain about right now is that my new house doesn't have internet. But it may actually cure my blogger addiction!

I LOVE our house in Florida. I'll post loads of pictures when we get back. But right now I have to pack; we leave in 3 hours for the Dominican Republic!!

Life is sweet.

P.S. Sales is hard! But Li is giving it a good fight everyday. I love him so much for being willing to do this for us!!!!

The promise

That night that we spent sleeping on wooden benches I opened my scriptures and found this verse: and so, after he had patiently endured, he obtained the promise.

Well, after another night sleeping in the airport, a red-eye flight the next night, about a dozen missed flights, basically living in airports with no showers, toothbrushes, or clothes to change into --we obtained!!

The plan was to fly into SLC and then drive to Orlando. I found a flight to Tampa and my aunt Patti and uncle Mike saved the day. They came and got us at the airport and fed us and washed our clothes and let us shower and bought us presents and let us sit in their hot tub and gave us a warm soft bed to sleep in with clean sheets and pillows. I literally felt my muscles melt when I crawled into that bed!

Here is a picture from our excursion to the pier for dinner.Our stay at the Hanks Resort has been WONDERFUL. And we can always take that cross country road trip another day.

Terminal

I thought we were in for a long trip. I had no idea.

We flew standby last night and listened as one by one the people in our group were called to get on the plane. Then Li's name was called and they told him it was the last seat. He, of course, told them he wanted to stay with me and the seat went to someone else.

So we found ourselves stranded at the airport at 2 in the morning with our new best friend Vaughn. We discovered a beautiful garden and then the very nice security man came and told us we needed to leave. He directed us to some rock hard benches and showed us where we could buy some $8 sandwiches and $6 hot dogs. I opted for the $3 muffin instead.

We tossed and turned on the benches for a few hours and then decided it was morning. The highlight of the adventure, for me, was that we found free internet. Somehow that made it all better. We left the airport to get some cheaper food, catch a dollar movie, and then came back to get in line. Hopefully we make the flight tonight. Ironically I always wanted to fly standby.

When I was writing this post in my head it was so much wittier. For some reason my brain just isn't processing information as well as it normally does.


Does anyone know why my picture uploaded sideways? Maybe I have become one with my blog and it automatically orients my pictures to match my upside down life?

Summer Lovin'

I guess I never told the blogging world about our summer plans. Li and I will be summering in Orlando, Florida. Li will be selling security systems and I will be doing something cool that is yet to be determined. (Maybe Disneyworld?) We are pretty excited about our move. We are a little less excited about what it is going to take to get there....
All this stuff and a whole bunch more needs to be packed to move or put in storage somewhere. Everyone who knows me knows I LOVE to pack. (That explains why I am blogging right now and Li is asleep.) And then comes the red-eye flight to Arizona, the layover in Phoenix, the training in SLC and the DRIVE to Orlando.

It's just an all-expense paid road trip, right?!

peace like a river.

I know it is easy to make things look and sound good on the internet. Everyone's life can seem blissful and perfect on their blog. That is why I need to clarify: the happiness that I feel today is the real kind, not the kind where is just looks like I'm happy because I said so on my blog. Here's why.....

1. I walked barefoot to yoga with my ipod and my "the power of peace" shirt and felt like a true yogi.
2. Everyone around me is stressing about finals and I don't have to take anymore. Ever.
3. I get to see some of my family this weekend.
4. I have an amazingly patient and supportive husband. When my load gets too heavy and I'm about to drop it, he just picks it up and starts carrying it, without being asked and without asking for recognition.
   
5. I have been trying to learn to cook for about 4 months now. Yesterday I invented a soup that, while it is most likely nothing special to you, it is special to me, because I like it and I made it up myself.
6. When I first started my job I basically HATED it. Nobody at work liked me and I didn't have a clue what I was supposed to be doing. Today they had a pizza party for me and bought me a cake that said Thank You Jen.
   

I'm so content today that even though I just spilled the aforementioned soup all over myself, and all over the floor I didn't feel the slightest urge to throw a hissy-fit. That's happy.

What are you happy about today? Leave a comment and share the love.

Murmur Not

This morning I stumbled upon a treasure left behind by the late and great Elder Neal A. Maxwell. I love to get wrapped up in the intricate ways he weaves his words.

Here are a couple of gems from this talk.....

• How can it rain on the just and the unjust alike without occasionally raining on our personal parade?
• Letting off steam always produces more heat than light.
• Murmuring can also be noisy enough that it drowns out the various spiritual signals to us, signals which tell us in some cases to quit soaking ourselves indulgently in the hot tubs of self-pity! Murmuring over the weight of our crosses not only takes energy otherwise needed to carry them but might cause another to put down his cross altogether.

I love digging around in old conference talks. Have you discovered any buried treasure lately? Leave me a comment if you've found one that is fun or cutting or inspiring or otherwise worth repeating.

A letter

Dear Bicycle,
We miss you very much. We don't know why you left us. We don't know who has you now and we are afraid that they aren't taking good care of you. Are they? Are you okay? Please come back to us. We promise we will ride you every day and put air in your tires and grease your gears. We love you. Please come home. Please.

Love,
Jen & Li

All growd up

You probably don't know it but I didn't post that last video. And no I am not being cyber-bullied. It was Li!! I'm so proud of him for his first post on our blog. Seriously, I am.

Logan, the Sky Angel Cowboy

I don't know if you've seen this yet but you have to check it out. Its a recording of a boy who called from Nevada to a Christian radio station in Houston sharing with the host a lesson he learned from God. I love it, I absolutely love it.

Move Over Rachel Ray

Li slept in this morning and I thought I'd surprise him with some pancakes. We are too cheap for Bisquick and we are out of eggs so I spent almost an hour on the internet looking for a recipe that didn't require egg. I finally found one and I was so proud of myself as I mixed it all up and quickly poured it into a pan. I even remembered to turn the burner on early so that it would be ready to go. As soon as it was starting to sizzle I remembered that, in all my excitement, I did not remember to grease the pan. What follows is the sad result of my mistake.


Yeah, looks like scrambled eggs huh? Funny because there are no eggs in our house and that is what got us into this mess in the first place.

Free Rice - Fight Against World Hunger

I am in love with Free Rice. I love learning new words. I love feeling like I am helping. I love feeling like my wasted time on the internet might not be such a waste after all.

P.S. Li and I finally figured out how to make a button on our blog, so you can just click the cute little free rice image and start feeding the hungry. You're welcome.

It really happened now.

Our wedding pictures are here!!

we are the champions

Last week Li's basketball team won the championship. One of the teams wanted a chance to beat the champions so they had an "exhibition game" tonight. And they won that one too. They are pretty much unstoppable. I absolutely love watching their games and am pretty sad that they aren't going to be playing anymore. Maybe someone else wants to challenge them to a grudge match?It is so fun to watch Li on the court, he is totally in his element out there. He gets the MVP award for sure. (Never mind the guy who tore his ACL last game.)

Scripture Power

I just finished reading El Libro de Mormon in March. Now I am wondering what to do next? Does anyone have a interesting way to study the Book of Mormon? Leave me a comment and let me know what you have done to get the most out of Mormon's book.

I'm a dork!

I didn't post the link.

hungry?

I love this site. You get to learn new cool words and help feed the hungry all at the same time. Yup, that's pretty much all there is to say about that one. Check it out, you'll love it.

P.S. I wanted to post this forever ago, but I wanted to make it into one of those cool links that is a picture. Can someone teach me how to do that? Does anyone know what I'm talking about?

every girl's fantasy

I came home from work the other day and this is what I saw....

In case you didn't catch it....that's a clean house and a husband making me dinner.