I'm being a very good girl today. I've read and prayed, done yoga and vocal exercises. I have been tending my friends kids. I owe them.  I've had 3 extra 3 year old's and 1 extra one year old plus my 2 four year old's. They have all played really well together. I even cleaned up the mud room AND cleaned out the mud room closet and swept out the garage while they played outside. My trunk is full of stuff for the D.I. (charity)  I should unpack my husbands 2 bags from his last 2 trips. Nate spoils me and makes dinner for the family and so many extra perks but I always unpack his bags when we get home from trips. I don't like unpacking for him but it's the least I can do. Now my house just became empty, my kids are now playing at my friends houses. Ahhhhhhhhh  I feel like laying on my bed and watching Oprah. Maybe I will.

But first I'll unpack for Nate.  That's my puppy dog Tabitha. Isn't she sweet.
  How about a few more pictures

How do you like Sarah's outfit? She is still wearing her inside out turtle neck with her lightning McQueen jammy bottoms. (who knows why she has them all hiked up)  Gwenyth has changed her outfit 2 or 3 times and is now wearing dance clothes.
I never would have thought I'd have children that ran around the neighborhood looking like little orphans but I do. I try to convince them to wear the cute little matching outfits I buy them but they have very strong will's with very opinionated opinion's.




Do you want to see my personal recording studio?

I never thought I 'd be dreaming of recording in a real recording studio. Seems like a pretty far fetched idea today. Seems like I might be  letting myself get my hopes up a bit too high.
Have you seen Amelia? You know that movie about Amelia Earhart. I think it's like the last line of the movie where she says "What do dreams know of boundaries?"  That's how I feel about dreams. It is so fun to daydream and imagine up great stories for my life. If you haven't tried it lately you should. It always puts me in a good mood and makes me smile. Even if they don't come true it is so fun to dream them up. I do hope I don't dream so big that I run out of fuel over the ocean and crash and die.
Well I better get back to work, I'll unpack for Nate while watching Oprah. Win, win.

One more thing about dreams.............................
Before I met my husband at age 23 I had never been in love. I had dated plenty of boys but I had never been in love. Flirty fun?..........Yes.  In the love?............... No.
I used to dream about this handsome man that was just right for me.  Not perfect, but perfect for me. I even wrote down a list of the characteristics and qualities I'd want in my "perfect for me" man.
Now I have Nate. He is all those qualities on my list and way more.    Ever since Nate fell in love with me I have been a strong believer in the possibility of dreams coming true...........thanks honey.
I'll have to thank him in person since he doesn't read my blog.

P.S.
Aunt LeeAnn and Uncle Dale, if you are reading this will you leave me a comment so my blog doesn't look so lonely?  Lee, get a gmail account, it's not hard. :)  You're my relatives so I feel like I can ask you for this favor. (Taylor Z, I'm still waiting for your promised comment)
Uncle Dale, do you remember buying me slurpies and hoppytahs (those round things you play hop scotch with) from 7/11 when I was little?  I do.  Thanks again for that  :)

    I haven't had the heart or the time to blog.   Some of my loved ones are facing extremely painful and awful situations.  I haven't had the heart or the time to sing or write or even do yoga.   Why does life have to be so hard?  Why is it so scary and unfair?  Why do we have to feel so much pain and grief?  I don't want to to do it!  I'm telling you count me out!  I just want to be happy and shut out anything that is sad and scary and just live in a bubble.  Seeing people I love go through real pain puts things into perspective for me though. My problems seem manageable.  I got home from a trip with my husband a couple of days ago. I was sick, like maybe I brought home a Mexican bug sick.  I'm still sick. My kids all have a coughs and fevers. I had bags to unpack and laundry to do.  Normally this would have put me into post vacation depression.  Not yesterday.  I'm just grateful I can be home with my kids, making us all soup, letting them watch American Idol and 19 Kids and Counting all day.  Seeing and feeling some of their pain has put into perspective my own fears and insecurities.  My fears I have about playing the guitar and singing my songs that feel like journal entries seem pretty trivial in comparison.  The portion of pain that I have felt for my loved one was crushing.  I can only imagine how it has felt to them.

So big whoopdydoo if I'm scared of being embarrassed to sing in public.   There is a whole lot worse than being embarrassed or scared of making mistakes.


My first open mike night was a couple of weeks ago on Feb 4.  Wouldn't it be so sad if I was like those people that try out for American Idol because their mom told them they sound just like Mariah Carey  but really they don't, they just have a super positive mom that loves them. That would be sad.  Actually, that might be the case for me.  Up until now I've only sung my songs for some of my family and a few close friends.  Of course they are going to be kind to me.  When I play my songs for my sister and best friend Natalie they make me feel like I'm a genius.  I could be as delusional as some of those poor kids auditioning for A.I.

I get their at 6:45, the thing starts at 7.  I want to make sure I get  there in time to sign up so I don' t have any excuse to back out.  I'm the first one there.  The couple that is running it tell me it doesn't start till 7:30.  I suggest I go get some treats for everyone but they ask me to do a sound check and sing for them.  Perfect!  I can handle singing for this nice couple, work out some of my adrenaline before  more people come.  So I sit up to the mic.  One at my mouth and one at my guitar.  I start singing them one of the simple songs I practiced before.  As I'm singing they are saying to each other "nice" "doesn't that sound nice" "so pretty".  I am loving singing into the microphone.  I'm loving how I don't have to strain my voice and how the microphone picks up  subtleties in the way I was trying to sing the song.  A year ago even the thought of singing into a microphone alone made me nauseated.  I didn't realize how much I'd like it.  After I finished the song the wife said all the things I would want to hear. It felt great.   She seemed sincere and not overly gushy to where you wonder if it's for real.  Just sincere.  She was surprised that it was my first time and asked how long I'd been singing.  I launch off into my big long story then stopped myself because my heck she is a stranger and I'm sure she's not that interested.  She said she was interested and told me to keep talking.  So I did.  I'm  pretty good at blabbing on and on. This dang blog is only making me more of a blabber.   It's opened the flood gates that are my mouth.  Both she and her husband made me feel so good and were so nice.  I was very grateful for their kindness.

 People started coming and just like I hoped it was a small group.14 or 15 total. 2 people went before me. They did a good job and were for sure way better on the guitar than me. Oh help me with playing the guitar. Singing and writing songs feels natural, playing the guitar feels.....I don't want to be negative, I want to have hope that I can improve.  I'll just say, I have lots of room for improvement.  I'll keep working.  It sure would be nice if God would send me a really awesome band instead though ;)

So it's my turn, I get up to play.  I'm only a little nervous.  These are nice people that have come and we are all amateurs.   I thought it was so fun to tell a little bit about what inspired each song.  The talking about the song puts me at ease.  I sang 3 songs.  It was really fun to sing into the microphone.  I didn't mess up at all. That was fun!  People are nice and clap and say some nice things.  Because it was a small group we all went around and sang a few more songs.  At this point a couple arrived late and sang some of their songs.  They were good.  Like, intimidatingly good.  Played their instruments beautifully, sang beautifully, harmonized beautifully.   Now its my turn again.  Oh my.  I'm feeling so less than.  Plus I only practiced 3 of my songs before so now I'm trying to decide what the next 3 songs I should do.  I've written about 30 so It's not like I have time to always be practicing them.  Yikes.  I decide to sing this song I wrote called Jupiter.  Its about my great great grandfather's guitar that my mom recently gave to me.   I start to cry telling the story because it's so special to me. Cry........... In front of people I just met.................. Are you kidding me Kristen?  Hold it together girl!  Then I can't remember how I play it on the guitar.  I'm like fumbling around not remembering the right chords.  Lovely, I get all emotional and now I don't know how to play the song.  These are the reasons I need to gain some experience and confidence.   So I end up playing a different song.  Next I play Jupiter and finally I remember how thank goodness.  Then I play my last song and I'm telling the experience that inspired the song.  If you've read my previous posts it's the one where I'm doing the dishes and have an out of body experience.  I sing the song, I crack on the high note.  Darn.  I sit down and realize what I just did.  I just spilled my guts in alphabetical order for people I just met....................what in the heck!  Did I tell them I had an out of body experience?!  Did  I actually say "out of body experience" to these people I don't know?!   What has come over me?!  Am I nuts?!   I'm sure they all think I'm nuts.

I've never had a very effective filter from my brain to my mouth.  I usually say things that are blunt and sometimes offensive.  This is just how I'm built.  My parents probably made it worse because growing up they thought it was delightful how I just said what I was thinking and was so transparent and unguarded.  Well now this whole blogging singing mess I'm in is making my already weak filter even weaker.

After we were all done we stayed and talked and exchanged info, planned our next get together and that was it.  As I was driving home I felt so weird.  I felt like something inside my head and body shifted or changed or clicked into position.   I just felt different and like things were changing in me, it felt weird.  I came home to an empty house, (remember Nate had taken the kids on an overnight trip and left me home to enjoy my very own fortress of solitude.)  I stayed up late watching Oprah and tried not to think about how I felt like I said too much at the open mike and people probably thought I was a weirdo.  I put it out of my mind and went to sleep.

So now I guess I have to do it again. I need to find out when the next open mike is and maybe in addition, go to a different one around town.  We'll see.  I'll let you know.  I'm sure all 4 of my "blog followers" are on the edge of their seat wondering what will happen next in my exciting life. :)

I'm on the edge of my seat.  I really do think my life is exciting.

Don't you think Nate has a sweet look on his face in that picture?  He is really sweet. 

Why am I doing this?

picture by LeeAnn Samsel Larsen

                                               Don't we look like such a cute perfect family? ;)
                                                                Ya, well, we're not



Aunt LeeAnn, if you're reading this, I need a new family picture taken.
 
 This was taken in Nov 2009. We all look the same except my girls and I all have longer hair.


    The insomnia is back. I laid awake for hours last night. My mind wouldn't shut off. Now instead of laying awake writing songs in my head I'm writing blog posts.  I had a great conversation with my sister the hour before I went to bed.  It got my head all in a whirl and I couldn't sleep. I think I might be dependent on my melatonin supplement I have been taking to help me sleep. My first bout with insomnia started when I started writing songs last Jan. I felt like I had found a secret passage way in my brain that led to a secret door I never knew was there. I could go to this part of my head and hear melodies and write lyrics. You'd think  I would have known before I was 36 that my favorite thing to do ever is write songs. But no. I just found out last year. So now I'm 37 and it's time to be a big girl, no more secret life (see the last 3 posts).  I need to merge my inner world with my real world. That's why on Friday night Feb 4, 2011  I went to an open mike night. Last week I kept getting that naggy feeling that I needed to find an open mike night, I need to gain some confidence and face my fears. Oh the pain! Just googling and searching for one in my town made me sweat. I found one that was close to my house. I called the guy who was in charge of it. He said it just started a couple weeks ago and they had only gotten together once. The first time there were only 10 people there. This sounded perfect for me. I've got to start small. I didn't tell anyone I was planning on going, not even Nate. The reason I didn't tell anyone is because I didn't want them to be nervous for me.  I didn't want anyone I knew to be there. If I go alone and sing for strangers, they don't know that I'm scared, I can just fake like I'm confident and it will be more believable  to people who don't know me. If I brought my best friend or my husband they'd see right through to all my insecurities. You know how when you were little kid on the playground and you get hit in the face with the basketball really hard and it hurts and you want to cry. You can hold in the tears till your friend says sweetly "are you OK?" then you just start blubbering.  That's how this open mike thing felt to me. I just needed to go and act like the person I wish I was and I could pull it off.  Nate suggests  we go on an over night with the kids on Friday. I say "no thanks, I don't want to pack and unpack and do laundry."  He says, "I'll just take the kids, then you can stay home and have a break."  What!!!!???? Dream come true!!!!   To be home alone without the kids is my daily fantasy. (I love you honey)  So now I know I'm going to this open mike night, it's meant to be! Right?!  I don't care if I'm scared and actually just  making the decision to go starts to shrink my fear.  My friends ask me if I want to go to dinner or something but I say no thanks, just going enjoy some alone time. So Nate and the kids leave around 5:30 pm and the open mike starts at 7.  Nate asks me what I'm going to do. I end up  telling  him about the open mike.  He was glad he was giving me a break and this made him even more glad. They finally leave, I practice 3 songs that I feel pretty comfortable sharing.  I get my guitar and go.

Are you wondering why I'm doing this? Why am I spilling all this on a blog for anyone to read?  I'll tell you.

1. All of us are facing something that we feel is impossible. I feel like my personal experiences can translate to you personal experiences. I feel like it would be wrong to not be open with what God has taught me over 2010. I need to share it. I feel like he wants me to share it with as many people as possible.

2. I learn best by hearing other's personal experiences and applying it to my own life. If even just one person can learn from my experiences then I have succeeded


3. I need to exercise faith in what he has taught me is. I need to show Him I believe Him. faith is an exercise. It is hard and it hurts at times but it is the only way to grow and get stronger.

Here are my baby girls twirling in the living room this morning. They are at preschool now. They adore each other and play sooooooooooooo cute together.  They also fight like feral cats in the night.

Gwenyth colors and draws like its a full time job / spilling my guts is exhausting

Gwenyth is one of my twins. She is 4, her favorite color is purple, she loves wearing ballet costumes, and she draws pictures of ballerina's and fairies all day. She draws at least 10 a day. Here's the one she drew at breakfast.  
    One morning about a month ago I came into her room after I had dropped her off at preschool. She had made her bed and carefully laid out a leotard and tights for when she got home. I thought it was so sweet I almost cried, or maybe I did cry, I cry often. Then I sat down and wrote a song about how sad it is that I have forgotten so much of what my older children were like as babies and toddlers. It just doesn't seem right that I could ever forget such precious things. 


Back to the story.  I wonder if anyone is reading these oversized posts?  Maybe they are too long. I don't think I can waste energy worrying about that.  I'll just tell the story and if it's helpful to one person then that it enough. 
    So back to Spring of 2010.   I am writing songs and losing sleep. I'm listening to music like crazy.  I'm singing all day.    I finally admit to my husband that I'm writing songs and play him some.   He is very polite.  He smiles and says things like. "nice" or "pretty".  And that's it. I don't really mind much, I'm just having fun anyway. I don't even know if writing songs is part of what I'm supposed to be doing to prepare for what's coming (see the last 2 posts).  I keep having that naggy feeling that I need to take guitar from Danny. I put it off as long as I can. I think it was last March that I start taking lessons. It is great, Danny is a great teacher and teaches me all kinds of new chords. While learning the chords I can't help but hear molodies and write songs. It is just too natural and fun. I eventually tell my sister what is happening in my life. I tell her almost everything.  More than I have even typed in these blog posts. If you can believe, I actually am leaving out some details that are too sacred and personal.  She is so happy and supportive.  I go see her, she lives about 4 hours away. I play my songs for her and she just cries and thinks my voice is lovely and thinks my songs are good.  She can hear the potential. She makes a few suggestions.  She is extremely loving and supportive and helpful.  She really understands me and is like my other half in a lot of ways.


  Then one night I am staying up too late trying to write a love song for my kids. The trouble is I am not feeling the love for my kids in that moment.  My husband was out of town so I was exhausted, the kids had been naughty and tiring all day.  I was doubting myself something fierce.  I was doubting every prompting from God that I had recieved. I was ornery. I didn't realize at that point that you can't write a love song for your kids when you are exhausted and dreaming of the day they all move out!  I started writing in my journal to cleanse myself of my negative thoughts. The journal enrty started to sound rythmic, then it started to rhyme. I picked up my guitar next to me and started to play these blue's chords that Danny had taught me.  I heard a ornery sounding melody in my head and a song was born. I went to bed thinking "what an ugly song I just wrote. Ugly melody"  
    I woke up the next morning in a good mood. (mood swings are my lot in life) I thought about my ugly song and realized. "I think I like that song. I think its funny" That was when I really learned you can't force a song, you have to let it come to you. You can't control the creative process.  I never wanted to write a song celebrating the fact that I'm the moodiest creature alive, but I did and it helped me move out of my bad mood. I feel happy and positive and I think its a good song. 
    That morning while doing the dishes I had an out of body experience.  I was washing the dishes.  3 of my kids were at school and I guess the twins were watching TV or playing or something. It was quiet and I was alone in the kitchen doing the dishes.  I was thinking about 3 situations that seemed impossible to me. Two of the situations were in 2 of my loved one's lives. They were very hard, confusing trials that they were in the middle of. I could not see how these problem could ever be resolved.  The third impossible situation was the one I was in.  As I was wondering, I had the same feelings of love and joy come over me. There is nothing better than this feeling.  I know there are many of you who know exactly what I'm talking about.  I'm wrapped in this feeling of love. I could see a night sky. I felt like I was in the night sky. It was beautiful.  I can't put into words just how and what God explained to me but I'll do my best.  He spoke to me without words, he spoke directly to my heart. I'll try to put it in words.  He said  "when you look up at the night sky you see some stars and the moon. When I look at the sky I can see all the galaxies, I can see all the endless time and space. When you look at these impossible situations you see unsolvable problems.  I can see just how simple these problems are to solve. I can see just what my children need and I can see just when they need it.  I can see just who my children need. You don't need to worry, you just need to love and have faith."  I feel so much love, I feel like I'm so precious and He is so proud of me.  He tells me without words  "there is no limit to you, there is no limit to any of my children, there are no boundaries to what you can be and do.  How can there be?  You are my child.  My children have eternal potential"  I feel so much joy, I feel like everything is going to be so good. I  feel absolute faith.  
    Then suddenly I am back at my kitchen sink. The dishes are all done. I wonder  "Who did the dishes?! I wasn't even here"  
    I float upstairs, sit down with my guitar and stare out the window.  It's sunny and beautiful.  I find some chords that I like the sound of and start singing.  I write a song that I love. I love it because it captures a tiny bit of what I felt that morning doing the dishes. I love it because it will always help me remember the way I felt that day as God taught and loved me.  I don't really know if it is a great song to anyone else.  I don't care.   I wrote it just for me, in gratitude for this experience. 

Spilling my guts is exhausting

the sky is so blue

                                
The inversion has been bad this year. Today thank goodness the sky is blue. I think a white hazy sky is very depressing. All my kids are at school today. AnnaKate tried for one more sick day but I got her to go to school, just an hour late.

    Let's go back in time to January of 2010 to continue with my story. Leilani, my friend who asked me to sing ends up asking me to sing 2 songs, one in the middle and one at the end of the meeting. I of course say yes because I have decided to be a grown up and not be held back by fear any longer. She also asks her daughter's guitar teacher Danny to accompany me for these 2 songs. He kindly agrees to do it. He came over to my house to practice. I put my twins down for their 3 hour nap thinking we can practice uninterrupted. Well, they had something else in mind. Sarah pooped in her diaper, took it off in her crib and made a mess.  I  rush around cleaning that up.  Danny is waiting.  Gwenyth poops in her diaper, comes into the kitchen where Danny is, takes her diaper off and ditches it on the floor in front of him then runs off. Danny politely lets me know that my daughter left her diaper on the floor.  I tried one more time to get them to nap. They want nothing to do with sleep. My friend Leilani is kind enough to let them come play. Danny and I practice. I'm nervous and self conscious. I've never sung with my new voice in front of anyone. He is relaxed and awesome on the guitar. I'm so glad he is so easy going and respectful. We practice for an hour and half or so. It was so fun. I loved it.  It was sometime after that first practice that I pulled my guitar out of the basement. I hadn't touched it in over 4 years.  I tried to play it. I could remember a thing. Not even one chord would come back to me. I had taught myself to play a little years earlier and even taken lessons for a few months but that's another story I'll tell later.  I took it in to get re-strung and hoped I'd remember the little I knew.  The week before the solo I'm so scared I get butterflies in my stomach every time I think about it, which ends up being all day. Butterflies all day leads to nausea. I didn't know that before this. I can't eat. I lose 5 pounds.

       Finally the day of the solo comes. I force food down all day. That night I go to the meeting. I get up to sing, I start singing, I don't know what to do with my hands, I feel completely awkward. I look up at the ladies in my ward but then I see some of them tearing up (the words of the song are touching) which makes me want to cry so I stare at the wall or my neighbor that looks bored. I fold my arms and feel so awkward. My heart is pounding so hard I can hardly breath. I'm hitting all the notes except for a few squeaky cracks. Over all I sound fine. I can't even look at my close friends who know how scared I am, if I do I might totally loose it. The song ends. I sit back down beside my mom who came to hear me. I feel sick and nervous the rest of the meeting.  The speakers were really good so I did my best to pay attention. Then I have to get up and sing again. I think I sing this song better than the first but my heart is still pounding so hard. Afterwards lots of ladies are so nice and tell me I sounded great and all that nice reassuring stuff. I'm completely grateful for every kind word. I was still feeling so uncomfortable and felt surprisingly hurt by the friends who didn't say anything to me afterward.  That of course makes me assume they thought it stunk. I just felt really insecure so I'm sure they didn't think it stunk I was just freaked out. The week following the solo every time I even think of it or drive past the church or somebody brings it up, waves of nausea roll over me. I lose 5 more pounds.  Remember, at this point God had already dropped the bomb on me. (see the last 2 posts. I'd put a link here if I knew how)  I knew this wasn't the end but the beginning and I was going to be singing for more than 30 sweet women in my ward.  Yes, singing a solo was scary but the real reason I was so scared is that I had an idea of what was coming and what I needed to prepare for.

    I really wanted to stop feeling sick and be able to eat. I'm not a psychologist but I took some classes in college. I think because I was so scared during both songs and never relaxed my brain and body were stuck in associating that experience with fear and panic. I wanted to reprogram my brain and get it out of panic mode. I knew I needed to sing again in  front someone and sing until I was out of panic mode . You know, just sing until I relaxed a bit and realized singing a solo is not going to result in my death. So my mom stopped by for something and I asked her to sit down with me and let me sing for her till I was no longer scared. She kindly did sit and listen. Thanks mom, it did the trick.

    So now the solo is over with and I'm thinking, what do I do now?  I pick up my guitar from the guitar shop and run into my old guitar teacher. I feel like I should take guitar lesson's but I don't feel like I should take from him. He's great and everything I just feel like I should take from Danny. I don't want to take guitar lessons so that's a minor problem. I've tried to learn the guitar before. It's hard. It hurts your fingers and gives me a backache, hand ache, arm ache, neck ache. Plus I'd just hide in my room and play it, it's not like I wanted to play it for anyone to hear. There is a repeating theme here isn't there. I feel like I should do something. I don't want to.  I do it anyway...................learning new things is hard and makes me feel stupid but its the only way to grow.

    I bring my guitar home and miraculously remember 3 whole chords. C, D, G.  At the time I was feeling really happy and relaxed. I sat down on my bed and strummed these 3 chords. I wondered. "could I write a song?" I had been wondering this for weeks now.  I just went between these 3 chords over and over and could hear in my head a melody that could go with it. Then I just started singing what I was thinking about at the time.

  "No one can tell you but I think I'm gonna try. You'll hear the words but you'll think they don't apply. I don't mean to scare you but you might think you're gonna die.
   There's things about your body that you might really love. There gonna get worn out and stretched, there goes your youth. You might not believe me but my friends know I tell the truth.
    I don't know why I'm trying to warn you, you won't believe me anyway but no one ever told me that for joy like this, you pay.
   It wouldn't have done any good if I would have really known. It would have just got in the way.
So never mind what I say.  You go on home, put the birth control away, it's been worth all the pain I've had to  pay."

After I wrote it I thought "Well that was fun. It's just a for fun silly song but the process was easy and fun and made me laugh.  Maybe I could actually write a good song?"  And that's when the inside of my brain started to change forever. I would talk to myself in rhyme all day. I would fall asleep rhyming. I would be singing my made up songs in my dreams.  I turned into an insomniac. I'd lie awake for hours thinking and be somewhere between sleep and awake. It was weird. I got a sinus infection that lasted 6 months. I'm sure it's because I never slept. 5 days a week I'd do vocal exercises. I started to learn to play simple songs on my guitar. I started to write songs. They weren't that great but the process was such a fun challenge. I loved making up melodies and fitting in the words. I didn't tell my husband I was writing songs. I just wanted to enjoy the process and not worry if the songs were good. I didn't want to worry if they sounded stupid to other people. If I thought about singing them for even my husband it would kill any creativity I had going. So for the time I was just in my own happy world.
  
   Back to the Present. I better go figure out what to make for dinner. Do I really have to cook again? 

are they faking it?

Emmaline and AnnaKate both claim to be sick. They don't have a fever and they are not throwing up so in my book they are faking. When I was little being sick  was the best. My mom and dad pampered us. My dad would make me the best peach shakes. My mom would bring the TV into my room. She would go to the store and ask before she left, "is there anything you want me to get you at the store?" I of course wanted  new pencils and fancy pens, little notepads and bubble gum. I loved being sick. In 4th grade I faked at least 3 times a month. My mom knew I was faking I'm sure, but she let me stay home. I've asked her why she let me stay home and she said it was for my mental health. What a sweet mom I have. Too bad for my girls, they aren't that lucky. I told them no TV, and you have to stay in bed and if you get out of bed, do your homework or practice  piano.

Last night I woke up at 2:30a.m. from a heavy sleep and right in the middle of some nice dreams too.  I was wide awake. Then my stomach woke up and started churning. Then I started thinking about all the reasons my last blog post makes me squirm and feel so uncomfortable. I thought of all the things people might misunderstand  or  just misunderstand my reasons for writing it in the first place. Fortunately just Jennie and Melissa have read it. Thanks for your nice comments girls. I thought of my mom saying to me recently "I don't understand young people thinking they need to blog and post their journal on line"  I really love to please my mother so that is reason enough not to blog.

I think I'll just get back to the story before I freak myself out. Just know I have my reasons for writing this and putting it out there into cyberspace. Just know it's not some silly ambition, it's part of my life's mission. You like how that rhymes? I rhyme all the time now. Holy cow. I fall asleep rhyming, with such perfect timing. Pardon my silly rhyme but I am being serious about the life's mission part, I know it might sound cheesy but oh well.
On with the Story
So I keep practicing my song. I don't sound great but I can't believe how it doesn't hurt my voice anymore and I can stay on pitch.   So now its been about 6 weeks that I've been working on my voice, I still have 4 more weeks till the solo. I'm feeling Ok, plus the words to the song are words I need to hear. "I know you wonder, if there will ever be a day when the kids stay calm, the laundry is done and the dishes are put away. And sometimes you feel like your days are spent and gone And the question running through your mind is what have I gotten done? And when you finally have a moment to slow down at the end of your day I know Father would say. Believe in what your doing. Believe in who you are. Hold tight to the truth that you're a daughter of God. Believe in who you're becoming. Believe in who your are"  So singing these words every day over and over and feeling my voice get a tiny bit better every week keeps me motivated to just keep practicing.

  Now it is around Dec 28th, 2010. Nate and I took a little over night trip up to Hyrum to our family cabin/house for our 12th anniversary. We stopped at Maddox for dinner. Yum. We were having a great conversation, no kids to interrupt. Then Nate asked me a question. "what do you think that one part in your Patriarchal Blessing means? Do you know what it's talking about?"  I told him what I thought it meant when I first got it at age 17, and then I told him a couple of my other theories but when it came down to it I really didn't know what  it was talking about. I had been wondering what it meant for the last 3 or 4 years and even prayed about. I really hadn't felt like God had given me a clear understanding of what it meant yet. I figured He would when it was time.
A day or two after we got home I was doing my makeup. It was quiet, I was wondering about my Patriarchal Blessing. I was wondering what those 2 paragraphs meant.
      Then I had this wonderful feeling of love and joy come over me. I "heard" the words in my mind.  "You are going to.........................." Then I said  "Oh? What?, Wow!, I would love that! Then I saw pictures in my mind. I was overwhelmed with feelings of joy and love and it all made perfect sense. I felt so happy to finally have a better idea of what God expected of me. I felt so in awe. I felt so loved. This feeling lasted all day.
     A day or two later I was slammed with feelings of doubt. I was overwhelmed with thoughts like "if God says your going to do that then that means you'd have to do this........................you could never do that" "you don't even know how to........................" 'the whole thing was just your big imagination" "you must just what attention" "you know your too scared to even sing this solo for 30 women in your ward, what makes you think you could ever do more?" I started praying hard to know if it was me or God. I went to the temple and prayed harder. Over the next few days the spirit reminded me of other times God had spoken to me in the same way. I felt gentle reminders of when I had been warned of future events. I felt it comfirmed to me that it was of God and not my imagination. I knew all those feelings of doubt and fear were not coming from God. Then I started to get a nagging feeling I needed to write down the experience in my journal. I didn't want to. I was still in shock and occasionally being tortured with feelings of doubt and fear. Plus someday when I'm dead my kids will probably read my journal's and if I write this down and it doesn't happen then they'll know I'm crazy. Then I realized, if I'm wrong or if I'm right my kids can learn from this. I tried one night to write it down and couldn't. I tried again the next day and just wrote it all down. I felt uncomfortable and squirmy. Once I had it all down I felt better. Then I felt like I should tell Nate. Oh ugh. What if he thinks I'm delusional? What if I am delusional?  No I'm not delusional! I know what God sounds like! These were my thoughts over the next weeks.
     I woke up one morning with  a Lori  Mckenna song in my head "why don't we open up? Knowing that we all falter, when will we learn to reach out for each other?"  I knew I needed to tell Nate. So on a drive home from a date I told him.  It was embarrassing but Nate believed me and I felt better. I asked him for his support in looking for a voice teacher or something to help me learn how to sing. He said he supported me and to do what I needed to do. I tried to find a vocal coach but kept coming up with nothing. I called around I emailed but nothing felt right. I went back to the Singing Success website and bought the $200 voice lessons on CD. I started doing the exercises. They work. That's all I have to say. I have bought the next set and it is still working. I'm wishing I could fly down to Nashville and take lesson's with Brett Manning in person but for now this will have to do. I wish I knew how to do a link to Singing Success' website and Lori Mckenna's website so you could hear her songs. I love her. There is a lot I need to learn about blogging. I'll continue the story the next chance I can. This has taken so long to write it down in between taking care of my twins and my supposedly sick girls. I hope its not too long and detailed and weirding you out. If it is, just don't read the next post.

P.S.
He (God) did not tell me I'm going to be the next Celine Dion. What He told me isn't a big deal to most people in this world but to little old scared me it was and is a big deal.

P.P.S.
I can't sing like Whitney Houston. I can sing like Kristen and that's good enough for me. 

I haven't posted in a year

It has been so long since I posted I couldn't even remember how to get to my blog. I do have very good reasons for slacking off. I don't regret it or feel bad that I haven't taken the time. Actually, I have still kept a journal of sorts for my life and our family, just in a different form. It is much more fun that scrap booking, or blogging or anything I've ever done. I have been writing songs. Last January I started writing songs. Before last January I'd never written a song, I've never even written a poem. I loved it so much and was so obsessed that I let a lot of things go un-done. In the spring instead of planting a vegetable garden I started taking guitar lessons. I did vocal exercises in the morning instead of taking a walk or working in the garden. I wrote songs instead of all the summer canning I usually do. The millions of apricots, peaches, pears, apples from our trees were given away or fell to the ground. I didn't care. (my husband was pretty bummed) All I wanted to do was write another song. I'd love to go into all the details of why I started writing songs or why I started working on improving my voice and learning the guitar but Sarah is throwing another massive fit and it is such a long detailed, personal, spiritual story I don't think I can go into all of that in this quick post. Plus I'm wondering if I should play catch up and post pictures from the past year instead of launching into this personal story. I didn't stop taking pictures this past year. I kind of wish I would have. They are all piling up and making me feel overwhelmed and like I'll never get them organized! It's all so overwhelming that I don't even want to begin to sort through all the pictures on my computer and in my kitchen drawer...........but.......I'll just start here and see what I can do.

Sarah just finished her fit and came and said "sorry mom" and now she's gone to play at her friends house. My house is silent and all my kids are at friends or quietly playing in the basement. Wo, wow, what the heck is going on? I'll take that as a sign to just keep typing.

Fall of 2009 I said a little prayer. It went something like this. "Dear Heavenly Father, I really miss singing. In my teens and twenties I had opportunities to sing in choirs, quartets, duets. I don't have any time or opportunity so sing and I miss it. I don't have the guts to volunteer or go seeking opportunities to sing so.......if anyone asks me to sing, even if its a solo, I'll say yes. Amen"

Let me back up. About 4 years earlier my friend had asked me to sing a solo for the children in our ward to teach them a new song. I said "no, I don't sing solo's" That was the last time anyone ever asked me to sing. That's why I said in my prayer "if anyone asks me to sing even if it's a solo, I'll say yes" even though I'm pretty much phobic of singing solo. On with the story. I knew God would answer my prayer, I knew I'd get asked to sing. I've said enough prayers in my life to know what happens when I ask for something. A few weeks later my friend sat in front of me at church and heard me singing and complimented me. A short time after that she asked me if I'd sing a solo for this Relief Society meeting she was in charge of planning. I of course said........"Yes" even though I was terrified. She gave me the song she wanted me to sing. I listened to it on a cd she let me borrow. It was a song by Hillary Weeks called Who You Are. It was completely not in my range. I physically could not sing it. I thought maybe who ever played the piano for me could play it in a higher key and I could sing it in my choral soprano voice but the song was like a contemporary Christian type song, not a choral soprano hymn. It wasn't meant to be sung all high. This was a problem for me since in high school I learned how to sing in my head voice as a soprano and that is the ONLY way I could sing. My type of voice sounds great singing in a choir or singing a hymn with an alto harmonizing but not so good for a song like the one I agreed to sing. Oh dear. What have I agreed to? I could always tell my friend to ask Heidi H. or Debbie R. they both have beautiful alto voices and could sing this song easy. But, I said that prayer...... and if I turn down this chance when will another one come? I can't just ask for a chance and turn it down when it comes. Trouble.

I started to have these nagging little thoughts "If I can sing high I should be able to sing low."

"It doesn't make sense that I can't sing on key in my chest voice but I can in my head voice"

"It's not logical, my dad can sing so well, I should have that genetic ability in me somewhere"

"I wish I could sing with my whole range and my whole voice"

These types of thoughts wouldn't stop circulating through my head.

These thoughts would keep me up at night.

I decided I would just start practicing the song. I put my twins down for their awesome 3 hour nap, put the cd on in my kitchen and sang along. I sounded bad. Off key. very little control. No vibrato. And worst of all it hurt to sing in my chest voice (chest voice is when you sing low in more of your talking voice). In the past that's why I never really tried so sing in an alto range, because it hurt. I had always believed I just couldn't sing that way. Well now I was just not accepting that thought as true anymore. It didn't seem logical. I didn't seem right. I practiced the next day and I still sounded bad but it hurt less. I practiced all week and at the end of the week I could get through the whole song without it hurting my voice. After the second week I could pretty much stay on pitch. Another week and I had some vibrato on most of the notes. What!!!??? All I had to do was practice and I could sing with this part of my range?! I know that sounds so simple but it was a major revelation to me. I was almost 36 at the time so it felt like a big deal to me that I had this part of my voice lying dormant my whole life.

I was pretty shocked and happy that I was sounding better and better. I got on the Internet and started googling trying to find anything I could on singing lessons, vocal exercises etc. Eventually I found a website called Singing Success. It was great and basically said anyone can improve their voice. Your vocal chords are just muscle, they can be strengthened and become more coordinated. They had a set of cd's with voice lessons you could buy for $200.00. No way was I going to spend that kind of money. But the website was full of encouraging information and I felt hopeful I could improve my voice to sound good enough to sing a solo. Luckily my friend asked me to sing in late Oct and the solo wasn't till mid January.

I better stop here. I need to go to bed.

I realized as I was contemplating NOT posting this (because it's so personal and it's scary to share personal stuff) that is has been a year to the day since I've posted. It gave me the chills and made me feel like today is the day to start blogging again.

I'm just going to have to click "publish post" Yikes I can't do it. Yes I can.