Jessica Got Married!!

Jessica and Steve

February 7, 2009

I can't believe Jessica is married!!

So here's the story Jessica and Steve got engaged right near Christmas. The plan was they were going to get married at the end of May or first of June because Steve has an internship with the Clinton foundation in Boston till the end of May and Jessica was going to be doing her student teaching in Arizona till the end of May. But unfortunately ASU messed up and Jessica wasn't allowed to do her student teaching this semester so she decided she wanted to go to Boston with Steve. That required moving up the wedding date.....a lot! Instead of 5 months to plan we had 3 weeks. We got to work and were able to pull it off, it helped that Jessica fell in love with the second dress she tried on (I think we set a record of quickest bride at Davids bridal...ever) and she was amazingly easy to please and decidedly not bridezillaish. I tried out my floral arranging skills and did all the flowers for the wedding, I think I found a new talent, they all turned out really good. (Am I allowed to say that?) We had the wedding and luncheon at a restaurant in Tempe and it was really pretty. The wedding was really, really small, basically just our immediately family, Steve's parents, my mom and a couple of Jessica's girl friends. She and Steve plan to have a reception in June after Steve's internship is over so hopefully we will be able to share that with a lot more family and friends.

I really can't believe she is married!!! I am sure all mothers feel this way and I am not alone, but I still can't believe my little girl is married, that she is old enough, grown up enough, to be married. I know, I know she is 23! But this girl has always been such an independent person, since she left me without even looking back on her first day of nursery to her and her best friend making plans to move out and get an apartment after HS graduation (they were making these plans when they were 16!) she has always been ahead of me. I have always been trailing behind saying "Are you sure you are ready?" "Do you really think you can do this" and she has always been saying "no problem Mom, relax!" So once again she is ready before I am, but as always I will give her a hug, smile, hold my breath, say a prayer and reluctantly let go, wishing her everything wonderful in her life, and wondering where all the years went.

All the Bradfields

Erin - the beautiful maid of honor

Three generations

Mom, Jessica, and Grandma Weingard

Miss Emily

the cutest Jr. Bridesmaid around

Jessica and Erin
Sisters and best friends


Jason and Kelsey

I'm Blogging!!

Ok I know it has been 2 and a half months since I posted on my blog so I am officially a super lame blogger. I know in my last post I said I was going to only post when I wanted to and not feel guilty about it, but I never intended to go this long. That being said a whole lot has happened in the last few months so much so I should have been blogging all that much extra but I do not seem to have the skill of chronicling my life and living it at the same time. Since the last time I blogged my daughter got married (and I planned and did much of the wedding), she moved all the way across the country to Boston, I started college and finished my first couple of classes, and changed my major! I just finished my class and I did really great! So now that I have a break in school I have a little time to catch up here. There is more of course but these are the highlights I imagine I should cover each one with a separate post, hey good idea see you there.

Double edged sword

I was blow drying my hair yesterday and got to thinking (I have to take whatever opportunity to think that comes along) about my giant list of to do's and everything that needs to be done for my kids, Young Womens, school, the house, Robert, Christmas, our finances, my blog, my to be read book list, my diet - or lack thereof, the environment, ......... AUGH! I feel a bit over loaded, I think that is the normal for moms, at least the normal for me but it has become much more intense lately. In that moment I realised that this blog has become a lot like my journal, this wonderful place to express myself (here publicly, my Journal, a little more privately) a place to connect and share. But it has also become just like my journal in the pressure I feel just by it's very existence. It is always on my to do list always nagging at me, sometimes silently and sometimes actually (through comment by readers, honest I am not that crazy yet hearing voices from my blog) . This blog has become a double edged sword for me something wonderful when its good but something dark and draining when its bad. So I have decided to shake free of all of it. No, I am not shutting down my blog I am just rejecting the pressure, I will post when it makes me happy, period. If that is once a month, great, if its once every 2 months, fine, if its 3 times in one week, great! I am taking it off my to do list and taking it off my guilt list!!! Honestly I need to do this with many, many more things in my life but here it is manageable, controllable, and absolutely no one will be harmed in anyway if I am an inconsistent, undependable, blogger. I think I need to save my dependability and consistency for other things I would hate to run out.

We Start Young Aound Here!

Emily went to her first rock concert tonight!! We had so much fun! A couple of weeks ago I bought tickets to see Goo Goo Dolls on the 16th and Sheryl Crow on the 21st of October. These concerts have seemed doomed for us, I was going to see Goo Goo Dolls with Erin but she and I both got sick and couldn't go. Then Jessica was going to go see Sheryl Crow with me but she got sick today and couldn't go. I really didn't want to go by myself and Erin and Joy both had things they had to do. I figured I was just out of luck, then I thought "hey maybe Emily might want to go!" She did and we had a blast. It was so cute to see her out of her seat dancing to the music clapping along and totally loving the experience. Hey she is my kid after all!! The Concert was at the State Fair so afterward Emily went on a few rides and we had a really great night together. I think I have found a new concert buddy!

Maroon 5 and Counting Crows

September 10, 2008

Maroon 5

Counting Crows

Emily Johnson and Erin

Us Girls having fun

About 2 months ago Emily Johnson, one of the laurels in my class, came into Young Women's a little sad and unhappy. She had found out that Counting Crows was coming to Phoenix in concert but none of her friends wanted to go and her parents understandably didn't want her to go by herself. Then she remembered that I like Counting Crows (we talked bands on the drive back from the Trek) so she said "we should go Sister Bradfield". I am not sure if she was serious but I thought that would be fun so I told her it sounded like a great idea. When I got home I checked on tickets and talked to Erin and texted Emily and just like that we got tickets. It has been fun talking about it and looking forward to it and then it finally came. It was so much fun Emily is a blast to be around so sweet and fun and she and Erin together are even crazier and funner than each of them alone. The music was great Maroon 5 was way better than I expected and Counting Crows was great of course. This is the third time I have seen them in concert and they never disappoint me. I love live music you feel it rather than just hear it. Hmmm who should we see next.

My Gift of Perspective

I have been wallowing a bit lately its not pretty and definitely not something I am proud of but still true. Our ward just got moved to another stake which in and of itself is a good thing. All my girls in YW are now in the stake that most of the kids they go to school with are in. They will be with their seminary friends etc. for stake events. But as I began to hear murmurings and they are just that, murmurings it looks like there is a good chance the ward boundaries in the stake will be changed. We live in a tiny little jut of our ward, right on the border which would easily be split off and put into another ward. If this happens I of course will be released and I will be in a different ward than 90% of the people I have grown to love and be friends with in our ward. I have built my life around the Young Women, and my work there, maybe too much but still true nevertheless. Thinking of my life without my girls AND my friends in Elliot ward was bleak. So I wallow. As I was wallowing I was doing some blog stalking, checking out the blogs of friends of friends etc. I happened onto a Blog by Bethany's brother, Trey and his wife. (Bethany is one of Jessica's really good friends.) As I read I began to cry and then before long I knew I was done wallowing. I had been given the gift of perspective. Sometimes we can get so focused on tiny little things that the big picture becomes unclear. On this blog I read about how Treys wife Amber lost her baby sister, her mom delivered early and the baby was just not strong enough to survive, she lived a very short time and passed away. This baby was only 2 weeks earlier than Emily was and as I read I could see myself in Amber's mothers place and I felt so grateful for our Emily and all she has brought to our lives and so grateful she has been so healthy considering she was more than 9 weeks early and so ashamed I forgot all I have and all the Lord has done for me. If the ward splits it does, I know the Lord will look after me and make it OK or make me strong enough to find a new way. He always does I don't know why I can't hold on to that. I hate how easy it is to forget the big picture and I am grateful for this blogging medium so I could read baby Jades story and be reminded of how much the Lord loves all of us. Reading Amber's testimony through this, the hard questions and the loving acceptance of Gods will. It is amazing and testimony building. I felt the spirit so strongly in her words. There is so much of true importance in this life and it is so easy to get caught up in the unimportant, I am grateful for the Lord and his way and for my gift of perspective.

Emily's Broken Arm

Emily BROKE her arm!!! It was the weirdest thing a totally regular childhood fall, she tripped while she was getting out of a chair. She only fell like 2 feet onto carpeted floor! But it was unfortunately enough. At first I didn't take it totally seriously it just looked like a regular everyday kids fall, brush her off, kiss the owie, and on with the day. She was crying pretty good but Emily can be a little....shall we say whinny at times and Jessica was here so I figured she was putting on a good show for Sister. But then she started to look not right and she got all clammy and cold and sweating profusely at the same time. Well my crack first aid training kicked in (that would be from like a jillion years of girls camp) and it looked to me like she was going into shock. Well in my experience kids don't go into shock for regular everyday falls so I made a call to the doctors office. They thought she should be seen and of course they had no openings so we were off to Urgent care. I was still thinking this was just precautionary she was looking better and I couldn't imagine that fall had actually broken anything. But when the xrays came back I was wrong, she had broken both the radius (the big bone in your forearm) and the ulna, (the little one next to the radius). They are both incomplete breaks which means they were only broken partway through the bone, (about 75% of the radius and about 25% of the ulna). I guess this is fairly common in kids they call it a green stick fracture because it breaks like a green stick off a tree, it just bends and splinters instead of a sharp break. Fortunately it is no where near her growth plate and it should heal really well. They had us go to a pediatric orthopedist to get her cast which she will have to wear for a month and then she will get a brace that she will wear for another 2 months. It sounds like a long time but they said the healing should go really well they just want to protect it so there is no re injury. We have changed things a bit around here because she can't play actively much so we got her some Webkins and have been reading a lot, she is hooked on the Magic Tree house books and I have become well acquainted with Jack and Annie (the main Characters). I guess that is the story of life, something bad happens and then when you look hard, sometimes you have to look really, really hard you can see the good. So far in my life that is always true. Emily and I are really enjoying our time together reading and playing on the computer and just being together. She is such a joy in my life. I will be forever grateful for the Lords intervention on this one. :)

Emliy and her broken arm, just the splint, before she got her cast on. Look at that smile! Thank goodness for pediatriac pain meds!!

Emily getting her cast. (Thats Brownie in the backgroung getting her cast too)

Emily and her doggie, Brownie, Emily adopted this sad pup the day she broke her arm. Brownie broke her arm the very same day, imagine that! So these two are going through all this broken arm business together.