My family is so great!

Today I had a day off of work, so I decided to sleep in. I had be awake for about two minutes when I heard my Skype making noises that someone was messaging me. I got out of bed and saw that Sarah had sent me a message. She was just trying to see if we could chat. I quickly grabbed a shirt to put on over my tank top, and switched my camera on. What ensued was an hour of hilarity, as I met some of Sarah's students, saw how she interacted with them, judged two girls' shorts and let them know they were too short, and just was able to chat with Sarah. She is so great! It was SO nice to catch up and plan some stuff for the summer. It just made me all the more excited to visit the Coleman fam this summer.

Also today, I saw some pictures of Curt and Cole on a canoeing trip. Curt aptly entitled this picture: "Lewis and Clark-Dawg". I LOVE IT! Notice that Curt didn't have a paddle, so he had to use a branch. We Isenbargers sure are resourceful! Guys, I love you, and you make me wish I were living in Indiana so I could have this much fun with you!

Creative Visiting Teaching

Tonight was American Idol & Glee, so we had a bunch of people over to watch the shows. Both were really disappointing episodes, but we had a great group of people over. Our visiting teachers, Collette & Marietta, were both in attendance as well. They are so wonderful, I can't even tell you. They come every month and leave us with some great words of wisdom. This month, they mostly hung out with us, but when it came time for the "What can we do for you?" moment, Jessie brought up the fact that she wanted to go over oral injections again. She wanted to brush up on her skills, and Collette just finished school a little while ago. So they grabbed a couple of Q-tips, had Marietta lay down, and they went to work. I decided I had to document the moment.

So, there you go!

Goodbye to Banessa!

Today I had to drop Vanessa off at the airport because she is going home for the summer. I am truly going to miss having that girl live so close to me. She has become a really important addition to our family out here. She loves Braden and Addie, and they definitely love playing with her! I tell you, I'm really going to miss having a tanning buddy, too!(Don't judge me or my hair- it was WINDY that day!)

But she is moving on to bigger and better things- namely, MARRIAGE! She and Curt will be able to spend the summer together before getting married in August. Although we will miss her over here, I'm sure she will have the best time back in Indiana with her family. Girl, you had better keep in touch!

Y'say Somethin?

This has become Braden's favorite phrase in the last few weeks. If you ask him a question, whether he heard you or not, he likes to look at you with wide eyes and ask, "Y'say somethin'?". It is pretty darn cute and hilarious. Ashley and Kyle have been trying to figure out where he picked it up, but I just can't stop laughing about it.

Tonight was Ashley's birthday party, and I was able to get off of work early to head over to their home. We had a birthday cake with pink frosting and a sunflower made out of marshmallow fondant, courtesy of Kyle. It looked great!

After dessert we had a few games of Wii. Grandma Lu STILL kicks my trash at Cow Racing! I don't know when I will be able to beat her. Braden has also gotten pretty great at sword fighting. We actually tried to beat him, and he would fight back and win. The kid is crazy!

**On a work-related note, today was check-ins, and I have to say it was the EASIEST one I have ever done! I didn't have to deal with any upset people at ALL on Monday- that has NEVER happened. I was actually able to get off of work on time, there were no tears, and I wasn't ripping my hair out! What a relief!

ASHLEY'S BIRTHDAY!

Today my sister Ashley is celebrating her birthday! Girl, I can tell you that there has been several times in the last few years that I don't know how our family ever got along without you, or even how I got along without you! :) I hope you have a great day filled with fun and laughter. Jess and I want to come visit soon so we can party!

Anyways, to demonstrate how amazing Ashley is, here is a little list of fun facts that you may not know about this awesome woman:
1. She can pretty much whip up any kind of dinner you'd like, improvising with the ingredients she has. Plus she can make it milk-safe for Braden. It's true. I have seen her do this. She has magical powers.
2. Ashley loves her family more than anything in the world (except maybe motorcycles). She has come to the rescue of several family members many a time, and will drop anything she is doing to help. I have seen this first-hand a few times in the last two years!
3. She is an incredible example and mom to her kids. When I babysit Braden and Addie, I am in a constant state of wonderment at how a two-year old and a nine-month old can behave they way these kids do. They are angels, and it's because Kyle and Ashley made them that way.
3. Ashley can sport the short OR long hair-do! Not many women can pull both off, but this lady looks amazing with either style.
4. Ashley can name ANY kind of motorcycle out there. And she is teaching Braden to identify them as well. What a rockstar.
5. She is a very "crafty" woman. In both senses of the word! She can plan some great surprises and keep the secret so you don't suspect a thing, AND she can make some amazing things! Check out her latest craft, Trin was lucky enough to get one for her birthday.It's a cute little bow holder. It is so adorable!
6. Ashley is getting to be quite the accomplished photographer! She took some cute pictures over Easter while we were at her parent's house. This is my faveCHECK OUT THEM SKILLS!

I love you, Ash. I am so grateful for the addition you are to our family. And I will be eternally grateful for the pep talk you gave me two years ago when I was taking out my endowments. I don't think you will ever understand how much that meant to me, but I couldn't love you more.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY!

updates coming soon . . .

I just need to finish checkouts and checkins and then my life will be gravy. Life has been very busy with work, but hopefully I will get you some cool musings soon.

The return of GLEE!!

Tonight was a GREAT night TV-wise! I got home from work JUST in time to get set for American Idol to come on. I was curious to see Adam Lambert as a mentor and see how the week would go. All I can say, is: not bad, guys! I was really only bored by Andrew and Siobhan's performances. Leave it to Siobhan to ruin my favorite Elvis song, "Suspicious Minds". I had to listen to the song five times to restore my faith in how good the song is. Really.

We kept having teaser moments during the show for the upcoming episode of Glee, and we kept getting more and more excited! It didn't disappoint. We had drama, humor, and TONS of great singing! This show rocks my socks.

And the Sue Silvester version of Vogue? I'm a FAN! Check out Nathan from So You Think You Can Dance- he's the white dancer with black hair slicked down. Awesome!



I. Love. This. Show.
A lot. :)

Lazy Day and Stake Conference

Today was kind of weird for me. Jess and I woke up around 9 a.m. . . . and didn't have to do anything. I went in her room and we talked for a bit, and both of us had no idea what to do with ourselves since church didn't start until 3. So we decided to laze around. We had a birthday lunch to go to at 1, but until then, we were free. So we dinked around on the computer, looked up stuff on the internet, and I rediscovered my love for the Hallelujah Chorus from Handel's "Messiah". Jessie showed me the version that she wanted to download on iTunes, and I decided to just see if there was a version on YouTube that I liked. I prefer it sung quickly and loudly. This is a little fast, but close to what I like:


This song rattles your bones and sings to your soul! While Jessie was in the shower, I turned this up full blast on my computer and just sat back with my eyes closed. I had my heart in my throat, goosebumps on my arms, chills going up and down my back, and the music just rolled over me and filled my ears. I got a little emotional, I'm not going to lie! This is a piece to inspire.
Anyways,
We went to a lunch for our visiting teacher on her birthday and had a blast just hanging out with some ward members. It was a gorgeous day, so the windows were open and a breeze was coming in. Smiling, laughing, eating, talking, gorgeous day, can it get better?
Oh, yes.
Stake Conference was a great meeting today. Even though they split our ward and took some of my favorite people for the new ward, I think this will be good. A smaller ward = getting to know people better. At least, I hope.
After Stake Conference we had some people over for a rousing game of Fireball Island. This game's notoriety is quickly growing in our ward. We sent out a text to about 14 people, expecting to have maybe 8 or so, but EVERYONE showed up! Our kitchen table was crowded! It was a great time, and a great way to end the night. We even had people come up to us at ward prayer and ask if they could come to play a game next Sunday. Ha! The fever is spreading . . .

Choose the Sprite when a Coke is placed before you . . .

. . . just one of the cool attention-grabbers that were used in tonight's adult session of Stake Conference. I almost burst out laughing when I heard that. Cheesy? Yes. That is why I love it.

But I'm getting ahead of myself.

Today was a GREAT day! I lazed around this morning, since I had gotten some cleaning done on Thursday, and while I was on the internet, who should Skype, but Lindz?! She and I chatted for over two hours. This is how much I love my bestie, people! Lindz and I can be half a world away and we still crack each other up. She even told me more about her plans to move back to the states this summer. I can't wait!

After that I got ready for the day, had some lunch, and ran a few errands. Before we headed to Stake Conference at 7, we got a bunch of people together to grab a bite to eat. I was excited that we got to try something new that most of us had never had before: Smokehouse BBQ. Jess and I split a sampler basket, and HOLY COW! Their BBQ sauce was magic. I almost wanted to pour it on my bread! The place had a very casual and family-friendly atmosphere, we ate off of paper plates, had plastic silverware, and plastic cups. Nice. Definitely not somewhere you'd want to take a first date, but very fun.

Stake Conference came next, and I got to hear one of the ladies from my Relief Society talk on preparedness. She shared a personal experience that really had me thinking about what I need to do to start preparing myself for any kind of emergency that might arise. Then I thought of the food storage Jess and I have in our pantry. And felt better. :) THANKS, MOM!

The after party was at our new Bishops house, where he and his sweet wife got around 20 half-gallons of ice cream out for us to have banana splits! They are so cool, I am SUPER pumped for our new bishopric. They are all so wonderful. They get so excited to be around us and be able to plan cool activities. Maybe one day I will post one of their emails to my blog. Stinkin' hilarious!

Well, gotta head to bed tonight. No church until 3 pm, so I wonder what I will do tomorrow? Hmmm.

The FIRST Bonfire Of The Season!

For you Isenbargers reading this, say the title of the post like Mom does at Christmas when she reads "the first gift of Christmas!" line in The Polar Express. Tee hee!

anywho . . .

When I got a text from Bryan saying, "Bonfire?" I went from bored to ecstatic in .02 seconds! Jess and I love bonfires, hence the reason we have roasting sticks, extra firewood, camp chairs, a camp light, tons of blankets, an extra sweatshirt, and a supply of s'mores stuff on hand at ALL times! Usually, Jess carries this stuff around in her trunk so we are able to bonfire-it-up at any time.

Just a few highlights of the evening:
1. Introducing people to s'mores with Reeses Peanut Butter cups instead of Hersheys chocolate. *SO GOOD*
2. All of us going through the checkout at Allen's together, just to have the checker inform us that we WEREN'T the first bonfire group he's seen this season. But he couldn't put a damper on our spirits!
3. Kalli getting the idea to melt a marshmallow on a Samoa Girl Scout Cookie. I'm not a fan of those cookies, but others raved about it.
4. Chowing on Twizzler's Pull-N-Peel. I love that stuff.
5. Jessica and I telling a joke that we thought was funny, but others didn't. Whoops.
6. Changing bonfire sites, and instead of putting the small fire out at our old site, David and Jessica decided to carry the half-lit logs around, not wasting any of our wood. Yeah. Jessica carrying fire around = hilarious!
7. Getting to snuggle into a camp chair, wrapped in a blanket, while burning my front side since I was so close to the fire.
8. Making some new friends in the ward. I always love that!

A five hour bonfire. What a GREAT start to the weekend. :)

Now THIS is how American Idol should be!

Jess and I weren't too interested in watching the results of the Idol show this week, we figured it was going to be obvious who went home- Tim or Aaron.
WRONG!
We got a Facebook message saying that we should watch the final moments, so we tuned in. Only to see Big Mike, one of my favorites, possibly going home! WHAT?! I couldn't believe it. So we watched the last ten minutes, and all Jessie could say, "Now THAT is good TV! This is how it should be!" I agree. Well, here are the results:

Thank heavens the judges were all on the same page for this one. But what is going to happen next week?!

And . . . my Monday ends now

Look at the time of this post. That is really when I got home from work tonight. No joke. I started at 10 a.m., and am getting ready to fall into bed.

I already told them I would be out of the office until noon. I'm off to sleep! Heaven help anyone who calls me or waked me up before 10 a.m. . . .

Happy Easter, Birthday, Sunday, ALL THE ABOVE!

Today was such a great day! After watching the morning session of General Conference (which was amazing by the way), Jess, Vanessa, and I all headed up to Ashley's parents house in Heber. Her parents invited us all to Easter dinner, and I don't usually miss a chance to have some of Lance's brisket! It is making my mouth water just thinking about it. We were able to watch the second session of Conference up there, and then it was FEASTING time! I did a lot of that this weekend. :)

Jess and I brought broccoli salad, seven-layer salad, and two Hershey pies, and the rest of the family brought potato rolls, homemade honey butter, mashed potatoes, brisket, green bean casserole, and veggies! I was good and only ate one plate, but that plate had a little of everything on there. LuAnn even took the time to make these cute little rice krispie treats shaped into a nest, and they had jellybeans in them. It was milk-free for Braden, so that was a cool treat. I also think I ate an entire pound of bacon by myself! Everything we had at the table had bacon on it! Dishes that included bacon: mashed potatoes, broccoli salad, and the seven-layer salad. I tell you what, those Weavers know how to EAT! It made me think of this:

Seriously. Love it. Every word is true!

Today is also a very special day for one Mr. T-Diddy. It's his BERFDAY! I have been very blessed to have this guy be a part of my family. Todd, you have been with us for so long, I can hardly remember when you WEREN'T one of us! Well, all I can say is I will be eternally grateful to you for a multitude of things, but most importantly, for being the one to SHOW me how to pluck my eyebrows! No joke! That skill has helped me so much in the last ten years, and it is one of my favorite memories of you. That, and remembering how Jessie met you for the first time. . . :) Oh, I love it!
I hope you have a FANTASTIC birthday, you are such an asset to our family, and I'm very grateful you decided to put up with us enough to become one of us! Love you!

Girl's Night Out!

Jessica and I have decided that we want to have a tradition for the ladies in our ward. During the Priesthood session of General Conference, we have the ladies bring a dessert and come veg out at our place. We watch a chick flick, and then gorge ourselves on confectionery delights! Oh, and did the girls in our ward DELIVER?! We had an eclair cake, Hershey pie, chocolate dipped strawberries with whipped cream, 3 kinds of chips with 2 kinds of salsa, raspberry almond torte, strawberry shortcake, organic chips (thanks, Meesh! :)), swiss roll cake, and a custard. I'm not kidding you. Each girl brought enough to share, and we only made a dent in what was brought! I couldn't believe how yummy everything was.

After a long deliberation between American Outlaws (major 'hottie actors' factor), and The Importance of Being Earnest (major funny AND major chickie), we settled on a little Oscar Wilde. The next two hours was just filled with laughing and carrying on. IOBE is one of my favorite flicks, and what made it better was watching it with all the ladies!

After the movie got over, a few people had to leave and go to other things, but a large chunk of us decided the night was young and we still wanted to have a little fun. Someone brought a few Doris Day movies with them, and when the girls found out that I had never seen Pillow Talk, but loved Doris Day and old movies, there was no further debate.

I fell in love.

Pillow Talk is now on my top 10 list. I was laughing, I was smiling, I was falling in love with the couple, and I was cheering the characters on. I would give it a definite 5 out of 5 stars. If you haven't seen it, grab a bunch of your girlfriends, a bag of popcorn, and a snuggie. Settle down on the couch, and enjoy the AWESOMENESS of Pillow Talk! Just the theme song will get in your head an leave you smiling. For you doubters, here's a little sample:


Rock Hudson is hilarious! He is trying to get Doris Day to fall in love with the real him- just read the description to try and get another idea of what the movie is about. And fall in love with this movie. :)

Easter Eggs and Sesame Street!

Tonight was so much fun! Vanessa, Jessie, Ashley, Kyle, Braden, and I all dyed eggs tonight for the Easter Bunny to come. The Easter Bunny has always come on Saturdays for the Isenbarger family, and this year was no exception. Braden has been so excited this past week, asking for jelly beans, asking when we would get to dye eggs, helping Mommy get the eggs ready, etc. He almost didn't come to dinner with us because he didn't want to leave the eggs at the house!

We spent some time laying down newspaper, getting the dyes ready (Ashley got some GREAT ones- the eggs turned out so bright and colorful, and we didn't have to wait half an hour for the color to stay on the egg), and keeping Braden occupied until everything was ready. But we had 5 dozen eggs to get to! We started in on the eggs and got down to business.

Braden picked up the dyeing techniques pretty quickly, and it didn't take long before he had around six cups of dye with an egg in each. He even went around identifying each color and which eggs were his. It was too cute! he got the hang of that metal dipper pretty quickly. I remember that as a kid, it took me years to finally get comfortable with that thing and not spill the dye every time I tried to get my egg out!

Vanessa was the queen of the "double dip" egg, she loved putting several different colors on her eggs. They turned out great! Jessica got into the swing of things when she started making "engagement eggs" for the couples in the family. Basically, she wrote around the outside of the egg, "Cole & Emily" and "Curt & Vanessa". We also made a few "Aunt Jessie" and "Aunt Lisa" eggs. What happened to them is reminiscent of Christmas, and the now infamous smashing of Curt's favorite cookie. The short version: Jessie ruined one of my eggs, so I smashed hers. Juvenile . . . yes.

The evening ended with Jessie reading Braden his new favorite bedtime book, "Pajama Time", the kids getting tucked into bed, and the adults watching old-school episodes of Sesame Street from our childhood. Kyle, being fortunate as he is, has a toddler child that he can blame for buying all the Sesame Street dvd's known to man, but I KNOW that he is just buying them for his own amusement! Braden doesn't get nearly the amount of fun out of them that Kyle does. Cole, we decided that you need to remix some of the old-school Sesame Street songs. Crayon making, the line that made a ton of different colored circles to a tune of "oh's" from a ton of different people, and the alligator sketch- get started. :) *Sigh* What a great night. Oh, check out how little Miss Addie amused herself while we were dyeing eggs:

WHAT A CUTIE!!!!!

April Fools Day!

You know, even as a kid April first was just a day when I could be a little more mischievous than normal. In fourth grade I pretended to have a twisted ankle and was on crutches, the other years consisted of a few little pranks here and there. Putting a rubberband on the sink sprayer seemed to be our favorite prank as kids.

Today I witnessed an office-full of twenty-somethings turn into elementary school kids. It all started out this morning when my boss, Loren, came in and asked me to go over the reports I had printed off earlier. He told me he had found a mistake in them and I needed to audit them. So I started going over them. On the third, fifth, and ninth pages, there was a picture of a man on a beach, giving a thumbs up, and wearing nothing more than a skimpy mankini and a smile. It also said "April Fools" across the top. I had to laugh, it completely caught me off guard!

But that was just the beginning . . .

Loren had put a whole bunch of the pics in the copier, so all day we were double checking whatever we printed off and trying to make sure none of the residents got pictures in their print jobs. Pretty hilarious. But Loren and Ceec also decided they needed to fool Blake, so while he was gone at a meeting, they left him a message saying he needed to call a Mr. "Harry Lyon", and the phone number they left was to the zoo. They also stapled fifteen plastic cups together, put them on Blake's chair, and then filled them with water. Thankfully, Blake saw the cups before he pulled out his chair, and he was able to dump the cups in the pool. It didn't create too much of a mess.

Blake, Robert, and Brandon decided to get Loren back a little by stealing his keys to his Tahoe and sabotaging the car a little. They almost broke the key fob, and that would have been so terrible!

Since they were hitting Loren's car, I should have figured that I needed to keep my keys with me, but I though I was safe. I walked out of work and saw that my car was missing! I looked around just a little bit, but couldn't see my car, so I went into the office and asked around. Blake and Loren 'fessed up, and I found out where my car was. Thankfully, nothing else was done to it, but I had to give a smile as I was driving off the property. It was a pretty interesting day, and an April Fools I won't forget any time soon!