Trials

So today was the trial of a man who was arrested for DUI back in 2008. I was selected to sit on the 7 person jury. I often wonder why one person is chosen over another. Of course sometimes it's obvious like the women who kept shaking and stating that she was nervous and it caused her to have tremors didn't get chosen.

So today was his trial. We heard from 3 police officers all of whom pretty much collaborated each others testimony. It was interesting to see how the defense had nothing to state but to twist the words of those who were testifying. He kept asking the officers why their cars didn't have cameras in their cars. Why didn't they call and ask for someone who did. Anyhow, when we finally were released to go and deliberate we found him guilty quickly.

But all in all I learned today of a great eye Dr. who does Lasik Surgery. Not all men who have gray hair are older than 50. I saw pictures of Jurors children and grandchildren. I saw one of our jury members take another members plate after she was finished eating (she thought he was going to throw it away) and dump left over food on the floor. It was all in all an interesting day. Tomorrow I have plain old work!

What a day! Is it Monday?

So today was a downer of a day for me. We attended the funeral of a young man who was just barely 21. Funerals are always a bag of mixed emotions for me. I feel so sad for the family but yet so happy for the person being able to move onto a better place. It was hard to watch his parents and siblings today. His brother gave an amazing talk about him. He shared stories why Alex was such a great brother. I can't imagine how hard it is to lose a child. I hope I never have to go through that in this life.

Upon leaving the funeral we were told that another family we knew were going to take their son off life support. He was the ripe old age of 20. I received a call in the afternoon that Oren had passed away. Not only is this tragic but his mother lost her father 10 years ago to the same type of auto accident. I hope I never have to go through that in this life.

And I come home from work and discover that I have to attend Jury Duty. What else can go wrong?

Today the thought of "Life is Precious" keeps rolling in my head. Hold your children close and teach them to stay out of trouble so we can put the court system out of business!!!

Happy Birthday Mike-

Tomorrow is Mike's Birthday and I wanted to say, Happy Birthday to the love of my life. We celebrated his birthday yesterday since there was a ton of stuff going on today and tomorrow as well. I get to celebrate with him all by myself tomorrow night and I am looking forward to that!

Mike, when I think about how blessed I am to have you in my life I think about all the decisions that had to go right in order for us to meet. I'm glad everything did and the rest is history. I hope we get to spend a zillion more birthday's together. You are my best friend, the love of my life and the best father in the world.

Happy Birthday Darlin`

I'm proud to be an American!

On Thursday I had the honor of attending a friend's Naturalization Ceremony. It was wonderful experience. I met Sana when she came to interview for a job I was hiring for. She was hired and has worked for me this past year. The day finally arrived for Sana and we all left our work duties behind. We walked about 5 minutes away from work and watched as she embarked upon this new part of her life. We weren't a small group but we came armed with flags, pins and cheers! Sana was born in Tunisia (ya I had to look it up too).

After we all passed security we took the elevator to the 5th floor we walked into the courtroom. We were handed a program of the events I began to look it over. I hadn't ever seen or been apart of a naturalization ceremony before so I didn't know what to expect.

I turned to the center portion of the program and found the names of all the people taking the oath this day. I believe there were 75 people but what is even more remarkable to me is where they all came from. Of course Sana is from Tunisia but there were 3 people from China, 2 from the United Kingdom. 5 from Palestine, 2 from Iran, 3 from Turkey. Some from Jordan, Barbados, South Africa, France, Trinidad and Tobago, India, Korea, Nigeria, Romania, Philippines, Nigeria, Cuba, Belize, Haiti, Mexico, Egypt, Moldova, Uganda, Lebanon, Ethiopia, St. Kitts-Nevis, Vietnam, Croatia, Canada, Jamaica, Spain, Brazil, Nicaragua, Pakistan, Liberia, Dominican Republic, Italy, El Salvador, Ghana, Syria, Dominica. It was a mighty melting pot this day.

The colors were posted by a young Marine who did an outstanding job. A Rabbi gave both the invocation and benediction. That caused me to pause as I listened to his words and thought of those in the room that might have a disagreement with him because he was a Jew but today we all sat in the same room as Americans.

My favorite part of the ceremony was when they had each person stand, state their name and the country from which they came from. They all remained standing as the oath was read and they repeated it. You are not a citizen until you have stated this oath and this is the oath to which they swear by-

"I hereby declare, on oath, that I absolutely and entirely renounce and abjure all allegiance and fidelity to any foreign prince, potentate, state, or sovereignty, of whom or which I have heretofore been a subject or citizen; that I will support and defend the Constitution and laws of the United States of America against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; that I will bear arms on behalf of the Untied States when required by the law; that I will preform noncombatant service in the Armed forces of the United States when required by the law; and I that I take this obligation freely without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion; so help me God."

The judge welcomed them into the arms of the United States. They had another speaker who welcomed them as well and then we all stood to say the Pledge of Allegiance. The colors were retired with a Benediction to end the marvelous day.

I stood in the back and watched as the camera flashes went wild. The new citizens were eager to get their picture taken with the Seal of the USA hanging on the wall. They waited in line to get a picture with the Judge. It was touching as I watched all of the people I work with stand in a single line and hug Sana and congratulate her and welcome her to the USA. There were about 15 of us so this was no small reception. A few pictures later I was walking back to finish the days work.

As I replayed the days events in my mind I felt such great pride in what had just happened. I was thankful I was asked and allowed to share this important day with her. Her husband told me how excited he was for her because when he took the oath he had no one with him to celebrate with. I noticed that was the same for some of the other new American's. I wanted to say to them, welcome to the USA!!!

I ran across this short prose written by George Mardikian - an Armenian born, naturalized citizen who became a successful businessman and author, and who was awarded the US Medal of Freedom for his service to US servicemen during the Korean war.

You who have been born in America, I wish I could make you understand what it is like not to be an American -- not to have been an American all your life -- and then suddenly with the words of a judge in flowing robes to be one, for that moment and forever after. One moment, you belong with your fathers to a million dead yesterdays -- the next you belong with America to a million unborn tomorrows.

I am thankful I am an AMERICAN!

Giving Talks

Tomorrow is Sunday and I have to give a talk. I guess have to give isn't really right. I agreed to give a talk. I really hate giving talks. But I am always glad that I did when it is over with. I just gave a talk about a month half ago. I used that to justify why I shouldn't have to do it but that didn't work. When I heard the topic I said... I gave that talk about 4 years ago.

While complaining to my sis-in-law about it we came up with a great way to start... "I gave a talk on this subject 4 years ago and since most of you are new and haven't heard it I will just give that same talk again." (the problem with that talk is I was asked to speak for 3 years on this same topic at the local FH fair. After doing this 1 time I quickly added Mike and it became a team effort. Last year we told them... we are folding up our tent and going home.

When we lived in Ca I became the holiday speaker. I talked on every holiday there was possible. I have talked many times on Mother's Day. Each and every time I talk I tell them that one day the Prophet is going to make it illegal for moms to talk on Mother's Day or talk after the Primary children sing.

Ugh... the only good thing about giving the talk tomorrow (I was originally scheduled to give it on the 31st but was asked to speak early) is I'm hoping most people will be out of town. I wonder if we have to give talks after we die?

Wild Adventures with Mike

Last week Mike and I went to Columbus GA and along with going to Callaway Gardens which is a must see for anyone in that area or within driving distance, Mike came across a place that looked fun. It's called Wild Animal Safari. We had already walked a ton in Callaway Gardens and I was feeling a little pooped and offered to just head home. But Mike said lets go see what it is. I'm so glad we did. We paid for the tickets and bought some food for the animals. We were given the choice to rent one of the parks cars or drive our own. That seemed harmless enough until she said, many of the animals have sharp horns and we don't cover damage to your car. Mike quickly said, okay we will take one of yours.

After seeing our adventure car and laughing about it off we went. It was just okay at first.. we saw pigs, small cautious fallow deer. We had to throw the food to them. The giraffe was way off in the distance and that was a disappointment to say the least especially when we were able to look back and see other cars feeding it.

Anyhow the adventure was about to begin. We came across some buffalo. These were no ordinary buffalo these were huge DIRTY buffalo and they had no problem sticking their heads all the way into the car to get food. A lot of our photos have only mouths or a bulging eye because that is what we saw and we couldn't get back fast enough. The one buffalo whose tongue is to the side loved Mike. He was huge and a bit scary looking which left Mike's left arm and shirt slimmed. I thought I was going to die laughing and couldn't snap the pictures fast enough. Mike's words.. lets move on to see what big animals are on your side of the car! That he did. But I was wise... and as they came roaming to my side... I rolled the window up which left slobbers on the window.

We had so much fun and this is a great place to go if you find yourself near Pine Mountain Ga. We think we might take the kids with us when Brittany and Robby come in Dec. One lesson learned we need to buy one bag of food for each person. We had way to many fun animals we couldn't feed because we ran out of food.

If you ever want ideas about fun stuff to do Mike and I have plenty of them and we are finding even more places to go check out. Thanks for being such a great adventuresome husband Mike. I always have a great time when we travel together. It off to our next adventure!

Mom's

So last week was Mother's Day and I had planned on posting about my mom. But that never got done. But I would like to talk a bit about her.

So many times we get caught in the trap of saying... well my mom didn't... my mom wasn't.... or my mom treated me ... and I will say it is an easy thing to do. But over the years I have come to understand that my mom was the best mom for me. Of course she wasn't perfect. She made mistake and so do/did I. She use to tell me that her sister use to say, "I did the very best I knew how to do." I thank her for being the best mom she could. Of course we had some rough patches growing up but all in all I think I turned out pretty well. Thanks Mom!

Last weekend Mike and I went to Columbus GA. We started a few years ago picking places we could run off to and check out that didn't take a tremendous amount of time getting too. Columbus GA is one of those places. Our girls have been to parts of Callaway Gardens so we thought we would like to as well and see what there was to check out. We found a ton of stuff to do in Columbus but not enough time to do it all. We will have to go back again.

We drove the extra hour to Callaway Gardens and the fun began. We started off at the Discovery Center. It was amazing and gave us just a small glimps of what was ahead of us. We watched a predatory bird show which was interesting, Mike's comment was less talk more birds please! We saw a bridge with lots of people leaning over the side. That caused us to walk to the edge and lean too. We found turtles and fish. Lots of them. We fed them and watched this one little baby turtle ride around on the backs of the bigger turtles. So fun to watch.

We got into our car and we were off to the Horticultural Center. We found one of these in Ashville a few years back and loved it. But this place was not to be out done. It was amazing! We walked into our first room where there hung huge baskets of Petunias. My mother grew these flowers all the time. You have to pinch the heads off when they die so they will keep making flowers. I hated pinching the heads off these plants but seeing them made me think of Mom and pinching the heads off. I learned to love flowers because my mom loved flowers and I was surrounded by them all the time. We continued our walk through the center and as we ventured into the center the more my heart started to patter and the tears came. Oh how mom would have loved this place. I came across beautiful Orchids and stopped and enjoyed them for a while. Kathy and Doug Pulley use to give mom either whole plants or stems of orchid flowers. I love orchids because they remind me of my mother. They had a ton of orchids to view. While Mike and I walked throughout the center there was a sense of peace in my soul. I missed my mom but was so thankful she gave me a great love of nature. As I took pictures with my phone and sent them off to different people it gave me time to remember such a fine woman who I feel blessed to call Mom.

Mom taught me how to clean. She made sure our home was always clean and presentable. She taught me that it was important to make the other person in the conversation feel important. If you ever run out of things to talk about ask them about themselves. People will go on and on about themselves she would say. She taught me to keep my knees together when wearing a dress so I wouldn't show my panties. She shared her love of music with us. We would be asked to sit and listen to classical music. To this day I love Handel's Messiah. She would say sit down I have something to read to you and we would sit and listen to what she had found. She showed me the importance of attending the temple and being within those sacred walls. She loved working in the temple and some day I will do that and I can't wait. She loved the gospel and often I would see her reading scriptures and preparing lessons weeks in advance. She taught me that a job will done is best and to always give your best. These are just a few of the things she taught as she took her job of mother very seriously.

She taught me to be the woman I am today. Mom I love you and miss you. Perhaps Heavenly Father will let you peek into my blog so you can see how very much you mean to me. I miss you! Happy Mother's Day to all the fine and wonderful women I know and to especially my wonderful mother!