Things I Love Right Now

My friend did this a while back and I thought I would too:

My Job - after not having one for four months I find myself a little too happy to go to work sometimes. My job has been such a blessing. My boss from two years ago randomly called me to see if I wanted my old job back. It was so unexpected and we were really getting desperate. I know that the Lord heard my prayers to help me find a job. Besides that, my job is awesome. I am in charge of a show called Classic Conference Talks on The Mormon Channel and basically I find and read cool old conference talks and select the ones that should be on the show. So basically I am being paid for reading conference talks.

My toaster oven - want something warm, yet crisp? this is the greatest invention ever.

My electric heated mattress pad - I love to be really warm when I sleep and Matt hates to be warm, so this mattress pad is perfect cause I can just heat up my side, not his.

Jesus the Christ - if you haven't read it you should, so much insight

Snow - its beautiful and I love skiing in powder

Our Couch - cuddling has never been so enjoyable

My Digital Photo Frame - it on my desk at work and it seriously keeps me entertained sometimes

My cute niece Zia - she is so funny and brings so much joy to our family

Newest Member of Our Family

I would like to introduce my birthday present, a new Mac. I love it so much. My previous computer was purchased in the year 2002! Can you believe that! People drive cars for 8 years, not have the same computer. It has so many cool gadgets and features I have been totally obsessed. My birthday was awesome - my family cooked me the most amazing Sunday Dinner with my favorite dessert, Creme Brulee. Then, Marin surprised me with a creme brulee blowtorch and little dishes! We all know I can't cook very well and don't like too, but I think for creme brulee I would. Besides, the recipe is pretty easy. I also got a new tennis raquet, ski passes and some money for clothes. The Robinson's took me out to dinner at the Silver Fork Lodge up Big Cottonwood and it was so yummy. It is a quaint rustic lodge with a view of the valley and they have great food. Matt and I had planned a fun day visitng the Zoo, but we got sick and it was snowing. I love elephants and I wanted to see the new baby one. Click here to see the video. They also have a baby snow leopard, a baby giraffe, and tigers. Now its way cold, but we may just wait until the Christmas lights are up to go. Thanks to everyone for making my birthday great!

The Abs Diet?

I am not the type of person that tries fad diets, but I just finished reading this book called The Abs Diet by the editor of Men's Health magazine and I think it makes some very good points. Basically, it tells you to focus on muscle building rather than endurance or running and tells you to increase your protein, fiber, and whole grains and limit carbs that are high on the Glycemic index. He says Carbs like white rice and white bread are high on the glycemic index, which means they create spikes in blood sugar levels. This gives us quick energy, but then leaves us hungry and in need of energy sooner. Proteins and fibers help us feel fuller longer because they are harder to break down and give us longer lasting energy. He says our body also burns more calories to digest these foods and they also help our metabolism. High glycemic foods are also more likely to turn into fat. He recommends concentrating on lifting weights because he says after the first 20 minutes of aerobic exercise our bodies start using our muscle mass for energy. That is why runners are so skinny. He says weight lifting also burns more calories in the long run because your body uses a lot of calories repairing muscles broken down by lifting. I have only been trying this for a little while, but I can really tell that I do feel fuller longer by eating more protein and whole grains and fiber. If you know me my favorite things are cereal, rolls, and high glycemic foods, but I have tried to eliminate those foods, and changed them to whole grain, not just wheat. Anyway, well see if it works, let me know what you think. Now if I can just keep away from the leftover Halloween candy.

Too Many Jobs?

I never thought I would say it but I now have jobs coming out of the air. I have been working part-time for the Deseret News, then this guy in our ward hired me to do some part-time marketing consulting, then my friend who works for Utah travel wants me to do some video editing for his company, then my previous boss from the Church Audiovisual Department called me and asked for me to come back part-time, then I got hired as a ski instructor at Solitude part-time. Then the Church called back and said they had another part-time position working for the Church Radio Station. I think I hadn't had offers to do anything for so long I just said yes to anything! So basically I decided to do editing, marketing consulting, and then both Church jobs. I start full-time on Monday and I am a little scared. After not working full-time for 4 months that will be an adjustment. So I celebrated my last week by playing tennis three times, and playing golf and volleyball. Not too bad for my last week of freedom. Goodbye PJ's, Hello Pantyhose.

Pandas are Amazing

Why are babies dancing so funny?

See more funny videos and TBT Videos at Today's Big Thing.

I Got a Job! (kinda)

So I applied at the Deseret News as a reporter, and they had 250 people apply from all over the nation, some with 8 or 9 years experience, so I didn't get that job, but I met with the Editor and he said that he liked my samples and since I haven't done newspaper before he wanted to train me and see if something could work out. So I am working part-time for them until December. Well see how it goes, I am hoping it gets me a foot in the door, but now I have to try and find another part-time job, which could be even harder. Anyhoo, here is a link to my first story.

Health Care

Overall, I thought Obama wasn't as one-sided as I thought he would be. He didn't say a government health care system was mandatory, he didn't say illegal aliens should have coverage, and I like how he called out both parties to stop bickering. One of the main problems was his idea that insurance companies are "profit mongers" and have all this room for savings and improving efficiency. He also thinks Medicare has room for cost savings measures that could save hundreds of billions of dollars? Are there huge travel budgets and bonuses we are not aware of, because I don't think there are. I sat in on the Utah State Legislature when they had to cut their Medicaid and Medicare budgets, and let me tell you, there is not much fat to cut.

The other main problem is that Obama will not get behind limiting medical malpractice. Obama thinks Heath Care is expensive and continues to be more expensive because of increasing administration costs, inefficiencies, etc, but the main problem is that medical technology is improving and Doctors are ordering more tests to cover themselves from junk lawsuits and malpractice. If malpractice lawsuits were capped, Doctors probably wouldn't order quite as many tests. Malpractice Insurance is a huge cost to Doctors that could be minimized.

Polymorphous Light Eruption!

Over the last few years I have been getting what I thought was a heat rash after spending a lot of time in the sun at Lake Powell, or Hawaii, or wherever. Turns out, I went California and visited my Aunt Jeane Anne and she said she has the same thing. So I went to the Doctor and he said basically that I am allergic to the SUN! Basically my skin thinks that UV rays are the same as something like poison ivy, and it creates a rash to get rid of it. It is a genetic chemical reaction! Crazy huh? The Doctor says it can appear when people are in their twenties, and it NEVER goes away. His solution: wear 75 spf, stay out of the sun or wear long sleeves ... awesome. I have been prescribed to the life of a hermit. The rash doesn't really ever get that bad, unless I am on a beach vacation, so maybe I can find a happy compromise. I guess I will never really be that tan again, not that I ever was but don't laugh if I am pasty white in July next year.

Summer Project Done!

Our summer project was to refinish our deck, which I don't think had been touched for 15 years since the house was built. At first I wanted to sand the entire thing so that we could stain it because I love the look of natural wood, but we couldn't get the paint off. We first rented an industrial sander from Home Depot, and then we did the rest by hand. The problem was that the wood was so worn that it had grooves in it that you couldn't sand very well. It was kind of sad, but I think the brown paint ended up looking really good. The only bad thing was our renters having to put up with all the sawdust and tarps for painting, thanks Dan and Cassie! And thanks to my wonderful parents who came and helped paint.

Grand Canyon & Saint George

The Decker clan finally went on a vacation together! We went down to St. George and then to the Grand Canyon. It was so fun! We played a ton of tennis, did some serious lounging by the pool, and biked and hiked in Snow Canyon. Then we rented a sick boat and went boating two of the days. The wake was huge and we did a bunch of wakesurfing. Then we went down to the Grand Canyon. I called the Lodge that is right on the North Rim of the Canyon and they magically had a cancellation when you normally have to make a reservation two years in advance, so we got to stay right on the rim. I can't believe I have lived 6 hours away from the Grand Canyon and had never been there. Oh, and don't worry that on our way my Dad drove us through Colorado City. It was really sad, all the polygamist women were stnading in line with boxes for food. I'm not sure how that worked, but it was sad. When we first arrived at the Canyon it was a major downpour and we were afraid we weren't going to be able to see anything, but that evening it cleared up so we got some great pics of the sunset with the clouds. It was pretty cold though, most people don't know that the rim is at about 9000 ft, which is the base of Snowbird. There are tall pines and it looks just like Yellowstone. Anyway, If you haven't gone, go, it is breath taking.

Fat Kid Diet!

Everybody knows that I would never blog on U football unless it was to dog them, but this article touched another one of my passions besides BYU football, eating. The U has just named true Freshman Jordan Wynn as their number one QB and I just thought I would share the 10,000 calorie diet he went on to gain 43 pounds since April. He was 6'1" 152 and is now 195. Amazing. Here is his diet:

2 a.m. » 2 protein shakes

Breakfast » 2 eggs, 3-4 slices of bacon, 3-4 sausages, 2 biscuits and gravy

Mid-morning snack » 2 peanut butter and jelly sandwiches

Lunch » Whatever the cafeteria serves, such as a two chicken sandwiches or cheeseburgers, and lots of milk

Mid-afternoon snack » 2 peanut butter and jelly sandwiches

Dinner » Cafeteria food again, lots of cheeseburgers or pasta

Bedtime snack » Peanut butter and jelly sandwich and a protein shake

Imagine if you could eat that much food, it sounds amazing, but it actually makes me a little sick thinking about it. Fat Kids do love Peanut Butter so 4 PB & J's a day would be awesome.

Michael Jackson

I wrote this post a while ago, but Matt, being the Micheal Jackson fan that he is said it was too harsh, so I took it down, but after the topic being brought up with a few friends of ours the other night, I re-wrote it and I want to hear what people think.

We all can admit that Michael Jackson is probably the most innovative, amazing dancer in the world, and he has a great voice, but I guess I am struggling with everyone celebrating his life like he was the most amazing person ever. Granted he was never convicted of anything, but have you seen that clip of him saying that there is nothing wrong with him sharing a bed at age forty with an unrelated 12-year-old boy? Matt is a hard core Micheal Jackson fan and we were debating whether his contribution of great music overshadows the shady things he may have done. He may have made people happy with his songs, but I don't think that makes up for the weird things he may have done with boys. Although I like his music, he just creeps me out. He did give a lot of money to different charities, and I know he has a lot that he has had to deal with being a child star and the abuse of his dad, but does that justify his crazy behavior? What do you think?

Stories From Our Callings

Our ward had youth conference at Camp Williams, which is a Army training base. It was really cool, we went rappelling and did an obstacle course and one of the nights we had a dance with another stake and some of the priests were hanging out outside the dance being too cool and one of the leaders from the other stake who was a big burly guy with a go-tee comes out of the dance and yells to the priests, " either you guys get in here and ask girls to dance or your dancing with me." And all the priests ran inside, it was hilarious!

Then Matt was giving his Sunday School Lesson to the 14-15 yr olds and he was talking about how he and I had just watched special on WWII on a Saturday night (it related somehow I promise). Then at the end of the lesson he asked one of the kids to pray and he prayed that Matt would take his wife out on a Saturday night!

Also, my young women are seriously awesome. They know so much about the gospel and they are such good examples to me and I actually sometimes say things that get me in trouble. For example, one of the girls was talking about a guy at EFY who was hitting on her and he was almost nineteen and I said, "Isn't he a little old to be going to EFY?" and one of the other girls said something like they wanted to go to EFY as long as they possible because it is so amazing. Oops, put in my place again. Anyway, I thought those were funny.

McCall

The Robinson's good family friends the Hyde's live in Boise and their son Landon was leaving for his mission to Brazil so we went up to McCall and Boise for the farewell. McCall was beautiful, we stayed in this amazing cabin and we rented waverunners and went boating, with some amazing tubbing thanks to Brents driving skills. We also went golfing at the Jug Mountain golf course, it was so nice, but a realy hard course. Basically the rough is 3 feet of bushes so if you hit it even a foot off the fairway you lose your ball. Matt, Cole and I lost so many balls. I also made Matt go on a hike with me up to Louie Lake. It was 4 miles round trip and so pretty. We were sitting by the lake and we kept wondering why their were so many flies until we stood up to leave and I saw a nasty dead squirrel right behind us. Gross. Then we had an epic River Rafting trip. All of the kids got thrown in at least once if not twice adn everybody got soaked, it was so fun. Here are some pics and a video.

Cali!

Marin, my mom and I headed out to Cali to visit my mom's best friend Carol and to hang out with my friend from college Aubrey who is going to Brazil on a mission. It was so fun, Marin and my mom ate amazing seafood, we hung out on the beach and I went surfing. We also hung out with my aunt Jean Anne and uncle Walt and their family. We tried to make it to the Getty museum but it didn't work out, maybe next time. Thanks Carol for letting us stay!

Bear Lake

We have been going a little crazy on the little weekend getaways, I am actually really excited to be home for a while. The first trip was Bear Lake with a bunch of Matt's group of friends from high school. Taylor, Jessica and Azariah were in Utah from China so we all got together. It was a blast, I think I got a shake every day. The water was fairly choppy, but we still got in a few good runs, we played tennis and basketball and then played on the sandbar beach. Here are some pics.

Bahamas!

So the next day after the race Matt and I headed off to the Bahamas! Matt has been in a insurance sales training program for a year and the top salesmen get to go on a Bahamas cruise for free. It was great we went from Miami to Nassau, where we walked around the town then snuck into the Atlantis Resort, which is really cool. They have an aquarium, great beaches, and amazing water slides.

The next day we went to Coco Cay which is the Royal Caribbean's private island thing which is kind of cheesy and touristy, but the beach was beautiful. I took my goggles and would dive down and look at the fish, then come back up for air. It was quite exhausting, but made me feel like I was a dolphin, and since I wanted to be a marine biologist growing up the trip was amazing.

The next day was Key West and it was raining pretty hard so Matt and I walked around town, got some amazing key lime pie, and went to the Aquarium where they had huge sea turtles which are Matt's favorite so we spent a while just watching them. We heard this story about how Key West became a rich city in the days of treasure hunting because the people would direct ships into the reef to crash so they could steal their treasure. The ship got into Miami at 9 in the morning and our flight didn't leave until three so Matt and I decided to go hang out at South Beach. But we didn't have anywhere to put our luggage so we drag it to the beach, only to find out that it was the gay section! So then we had to lug our luggage through the sand to the non-gay section. We were only there for about an hour and a half when this huge storm came up and we had to leave, but it was fun while it lasted. Here are some pics.

Wasatch Back

So these ladies in my ward called me last Thursday and said that one of their team members for the Wasatch Back Relay dropped out and asked if I could run in her place. We all know how much I obviously don't run, but I decided to do it anyway, but I really had no idea what I was getting into. It was a 12 person 188 mile relay race from Logan to Park City. I was crazy! But so much fun. I of course got to run the easiest legs, my first one was 5.1 miles and I was really proud of myself that I just ran the entire way. Then my next leg my IT band (the ligament on the outside of the leg from hip to knee) got really tight and by the end of the next 4.2 mile stretch at eight pm the same night it was really hurting. We slept from about midnight to four in the morning then got up and by then my knee was really tight and hurting so by the time I ran the next leg. I was seriously gimpy and one of the other runners ran the last 1.6 miles of that stretch. Anyway, it was really fun and a good experience. Here are some pictures of the team, called Tortuga after the place where pirates hang out.

We Were Trying to Lay Low ...

We have been in our new ward since December and we were kind of liking the fact that we hadn't received a calling yet, then the storm hit. I got called as a Laurel Adviser, Matt was called to teach Sunday School for the 15-16 year-olds, we both were called to the Youth Conference Committee, and then we were asked to speak in sacrament. I guess you could say they found us. It has been awesome so far though, its amazing how many more people you meet once you have a calling and how much more you feel included in the ward. My Laurels are awesome! So Sunday was our talk and the Bishopric asked us to speak for 8-10 minutes each. So we get there and the third speaker must have canceled or something cause there was one youth speaker, then us. It was so funny, Matt and I were sitting on the stand scribbling on our papers, trying to think of more things to say. Don't worry that I wipped out an 18 minute talk and Matt spoke for 15 minutes. Amazing. Anyway, I also read this article in Time the other day that talks about The Church and Gay Marriage. It was actually pretty fair. The Church and Gay Marriage: Are Mormons Misunderstood?