Pioneer Village

For a work retreat, I got the chance to take a walk back in time to the "Wild West" at a place called Pioneer Village.  It is in North Phoenix hidden away off the I-17.  It was actually a pretty neat place.  It definitely makes me feel spoiled to have things like central heating, and um, i dunno, a TOILET! we joked when we saw the outhouse, can you imagine potty training especially in the winter...ha ha.  "Hurry up honey, and just go, its freezing outside!"  ha ha.  We got to see some very old historic buildings and homes and we got to watch an old west gun fight.  We even got to dress up and take some cute photos, and some of my co-workers played "hold up" in the bank. It was a good time and nice to take a day out of the office and go play.

He did it!

My amazing husband passed his real estate exams (on the first try no less) and is now licensed to be Realtor!  He is working for Smith Preferred Properties.  It is a great company that works hard to give everyone a quality and preferred type property for their money.  I am very proud of him and his efforts and we are very hopeful that this new career venture will provide us with some answers for our hopes and prayers.  If anyone is in need of real estate help in buying or selling a home, please think of Eldon and pass on his name to your family and friends in Arizona.  Thanks!

MIA

Sorry that we have been missing from the blogging world for a few weeks. There really hasnt been a whole lot to blog about and i have been super tired lately, so sorry! I have gotten a few phone calls asking about how my new job is going. I made it through the first week of being an HR supervisor for the police department. It was definitely different from running a sports complex that is for sure, but it was good. The first week was full of pretty standard stuff....a lot of policy reading (especially since i am in HR now) and following people around trying to figure out what they all do. Everyone was very nice and very welcoming though. I walked in on my first day to flowers and a candy dish with M&Ms from my 2 supervisors to welcome me. I thought it was very sweet. My new staff are very nice as well. All 3 that i direct supervise and the additional 4 underneath one of them that fall in my chain of command are all older than me, which is no surprise....just makes it interesting! My old staff from the sports complex have called me several times telling me that i need to come back! I definitely enjoyed what i was doing, and i really appreciate being missed (its means i must have done a good job) but one of the things i am loving about this new job is the hours! I get to come home while it is still daylight outside. We had dinner with one of our friends this week during the week! Amazing! That hasnt happened in so long! and Eldon and I got to enjoy a weekend together! That part was really nice! All in all i think it will be a good change....so we will see.

As for Eldon, my dad pointed out that i never acknowledged that during all our stress and chaos of worrying about me losing my job, Eldon got a new job. He is an engineer for a custom furniture store, so he spends all day designing furniture in a CAD program of sorts (he can explain it better) but he is loving it. It is full time so the extra money is very handy and he really enjoys what is doing, he also had a great boss (my cousin) and gets to work with my brother, my mom, my dad, and my cousin (poor guy ;P) since they all work for the same company. He also has recently begun a new hobby of working on the backyard now that it is warming up. we finally went out and bought a lawn mower and he has been very diligent about watering, picking up weeds, picking out rocks, etc trying to get his lawn to not look so dead. It is still in the beginning stages since he just started this past week, but he already looks a million times better. Its not so scary to walk outside (you can actually see the ground). And since Eldon has been working on the lawn, he laid down some seed which means we have birds trying to eat the seed, so Eldon taught Zeus a new trick (sick em'). He is doing awesome with chasing the birds and as soon as he sees them, he bolts to get them off the lawn. Its pretty funny. Today he spent about hour outside just keeping them off. We are hoping maybe it will give him an outlet to not be so destructive while we are away at work.

Well that is our life in nutshell at the moment. Sorry we were MIA, we will try to stay more current.

Lots of prayers and lie detectors

Crazy title, but it fits for the past couple of crazy weeks. I will start from the beginning but its a pretty simple story. Back in November, I was told that the state of the City of Phoenix (where i work) budget was not good and to be prepared since i had very low seniority for pending cuts. Well I figured I would be proactive and started looking for a new job. I really liked my job but I have had terrible hours and it is over 40 miles from my house and there is alot of stress and alot of after work phone calls, etc. So I have been applying for jobs since them knowing that the potential Dooms day would be March 2! Well a couple of weeks ago, I still had not found a new job (even though I have applied for pretty much everything but Walmart (last resort)) and March 2nd was coming closer and closer. To top it off, I got the dreaded "phone call" from personnel for a meeting down town. Well the meeting was to tell me that yes, I was going to loose my job because of the budget cuts that would be happening. I was devastated!!!! We just bought a beautiful house and things were going so well and then...........disaster! So I came home and emailed all our family and said that we really needed some prayers because I was freaking out! Everyone was amazing. Even friends that knew of my situation said they were praying (even outside my faith, were just praying that something would work out). Well let me just testify that prayers work! The next day however, there was a bit of brighter news, the City told me that there was an opportunity for a job in personnel for the Police Department but I would have to interview and then i would have to pass the background check process which includes a polygraph test (lie detector), well the interview couldnt have gone better, I walked out with the job if I could pass the test. Well I have been a fairly good girl so I really wasnt too worried, until I got to the test. Can I just say that it is scary!!!! Every little thing that you have ever done like going potty on the side of the road (public exposure), fibbing to your boss about being late or being sick (dishonesty), taking a pen from work (theft), using illegal fireworks at the family 4th of July party (illegal use of fireworks), i mean everything....they even check your credit. So i was freaking out! Well, today, Heavenly Father answered our prayers soooooo much because I got the job officially!!!! We get to keep our house and continue to move forward with all our goals, and even better, this job is a Monday thru Friday, 8-5 kinda job so no nights, no weekends, no holidays and it is only downtown Phoenix so I dont have to drive near as far, and the job ends when it ends (no phone calls at all hours of the morning and night!) And it is a lateral move within the City, so my pay and my benefits stay the same! Can I just say that I am so very very very grateful for answers to prayers because I just dont know what we would have done. And thank you to everyone who offered prayers and good wishes on my behalf. It means so much! Thank you!!!!!

Congratulations Divers

For the past couple of months, I have been coaching 2 different High School Diving Teams- Red Mountain and Skyline. It has been a blast to be back in the diving world (blast from the past :P) But it was alot of fun and I had some really great kids. Last week was the state finals and I had 3 divers make it to the state competition. Ryan placed 7th, which is awesome for a sophomore, and two of my senior girls from Skyline, Lauren and Khazia placed 3rd and 15th. They did awesome and I am very proud of them, and proud to have played a small part in them getting to this point.

MIA

Normally, I have been pretty good at posting, but September was an absolutely crazy month. So normally, I would give each of these activities its own post, but for sake of being behind....I will condense a bit but still try to show you what we have been up to and why we have been missing in action for the month of September.

First
CONGRATULATIONS TO MR. & MRS. MACK LARSON!

They were married in the Snowflake temple on Saturday, September 6th. It was a beautifully ceremony and both Mack and Valerie looked incredibly happy! Their reception was beautiful as well.

One of the few things Mack insisted upon was hot wings as part of the refreshments.....so I caught Derrick enjoying a little too much.

During the reception we got to hang with the Martin family for a bit. Their newest little one Mason was so cute. He and Eldon got along great!

Also during the reception the little ones-Jade, Issac, and Sadie had their own little soap opera on the dance floor :) It was beyond cute!


next
CONGRATULATIONS TO BOTH OLIVIA AND SHELBY ON THEIR BAPTISM

both girls were baptized during the month of September. Both looked absolutely beautiful and sweet in their white baptism suit that was made by their Grandma Larson. They both sincerely felt the gift of the Holy Ghost and felt different and special after their baptism which I love!

while we were up in Snowflake for Shelby's baptism, we attended a few football games. The first was the High school game. During the game, whenever the team scored (which was a bunch that game), the recording of a wolf howl was played. Our nephew Gannon showed us how to howl!

The next day we went to Chandler's Football Game. His team is doing amazing and I believe is undefeated so far in their season.

Jessica is on the cheer squad for Chandler's team and rocks all of the cheers!

She is absolutely the best one out there, and is definitely a good little cheerleader! Seeing how good Jessica was....Jade was on the edge of her seat wanting to be up there cheering with her older cousin. Jessica was so sweet and let Jade come out and stand with the squad. Jade is so stinkin smart-she was able to pick up on the cheer in like 2 seconds!

Back at home- I had a very entertaining day at work. I was sitting at my desk and saw something moving on the floor- If you have read posts about my work location in the past, you know we have lots of crazy creatures, including ones that i am absolutely disgusted with such as black widows, tarantulas, rattlesnakes, scorpions, etc. So i was a little cautious when i approached the moving object....it turned out to an adorable teeny tiny baby frog. i was a bit shocked

but was even more shocked when i saw another and another and another....Before i knew it, i had caught over 25 baby frogs in my office. I have no idea how they got in there, but it was kinda cute.



Well...it was a crazy month, but hopefully we wont be MIA anymore. I think now that I am caught up a bit, it should make it easier to stay on top of things. Thanks for being patient!