They say it's your birthday...

This post is a little late, but I figure better late then never! :) Last weekend I went up to Provo for my best friend Kami's 21st birthday! It was so good to see her for her birthday! We were able to spend the day doing things that Kami loves. First we went to BMW and test drove an X5 because we had heard you have to be 21 to do that. Kami in the car!

Then we went shopping at the Gateway (her favorite mall) and spent lots of money we shouldn't have! ha ha! Then after that we went to dinner at P.F. Changs (I had never been there but I WILL go back, it was AMAZING!) The girls at Dinner, Shanna Kami Kassidy Me and Sista!

After that we met up with some of her friends from SLC and they took us up to Ensign peak. Yes I know the pictures are a little blurry, but it is the plaque on the monument at the top, all of us who were up there, and a view of the city. All in all a great day.

Shabby Apple

So as some of you may know, I LOVE LOVE LOVE wearing dresses!!! I found a new site (Thanks to the blog No Sex and the City!) called Shabby Apple that sells the most adorable, modest dresses! There is probably a good twenty dresses that I want! ha ha! Anyway I follow them on twitter and they said they were in search of a "prego" woman for some of there dresses. I nominated my sister-in-law Shalane! Here are some pic's we took of her today with Braxton and Brooklyn in the back-ground on some! Hope you love them! I think she would look great in your clothes!

The nicest thing I've seen

I found some new videos on YouTube that I am in LOVE with! If you know me at all then you know I have this thing for slow, slightly sad, love songs ( I swear I am not depressed, I just like depressing music, ha ha)! These new videos take some of my favorite songs and do an animation of them. This particular video is Kate Nash's song called Nicest Thing. It is so cute! Check it out! When you are done I also highly recommend checking out Snow Patrols You Could Be Happy that has also been done this same way!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wYWv_NSBZQI


P.S- If someone knows how to make the actual video show up on the blog would you please let me know! Thanks!

These are a few of my favorite things...

So I was looking on the blog Rockstar Diaries and Naomi has put up tons of lists people have made of things that make them terribly happy. I thought it looked so fun so I decided to make my own list!

1. Sitting at the edge of a lake listening to the sound of the waves on the shore.


2. The smell of rain in the mountains, or on the pavement, really just the smell of rain.


3. The first flowers that pop up in spring to show you that winter won’t last forever.


4. That moment right before you kiss where the world goes a little hazy and nothing else matters except for the person who is leaning into you...


5. When a niece or nephew tells me they love me and give me a huge hug.


6. Finding a song that describes how my life is at that moment.


7. Watching a musical...because who doesn’t want everyone to break out into a perfect song and dance at the same time?


8. Sunday afternoon naps


9. Reading a book so good you don’t even realize you are turning the pages.


10. Looking at the stars with someone who you can just sit and appreciate the beauty with!

Smile here we go...

I have been wanting new pictures of me taken for quite some time now so on Friday Shalane took some of me! It was really fun because we could just be kinda chill and do whatever we wanted without other people around. I also wanted to take some that showed a little bit of my personality so we took some with a cowboy hat on and some in my homecoming dress! It was so much fun! Thanks for taking the picture Shalane I really appreciated it!

Rain...

So I was browsing on YouTube and found this amazing video!!! If you are a Pride and Prejudice fan (like me!) and also like slightly sad love songs (also like me!) you will love this!!! The maker of this video has a user-name on YouTube of wikidwitch, and I love her work! She is amazing at showing a story with a new updated song that together just make magic! Check out her work!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pB23y8E1ZdE

Six years ago today our family had an angel sent to us for a very short time. Madison Angie Stubbs was born May 8, 2003 at 22 1/2 weeks. I remember this day like it was yesterday and will share what I remember of that day. You don't need to read it unless you want to, but this was how I felt.

The night before Shalane went to the hospital with contractions and they gave her medicine to stop the labor. When we went to school the next day we hadn't heard anything about how she was doing so my mom said she would call us if anything happened. After 1st period I was walking to my next class and a kid splashed mud on my pants so I went to the office to ask my mom to bring me some new ones so they wouldn't get ruined. I walked into the office right as Margaret Khyl, the secretary, was getting off the phone. As soon as she looked at me I just knew. She walked over towards me and asked if I knew what class Amanda was in and started to walk with me down the hall. My mom had called and we were supposed to go to the hospital. I went to Brother Poulsens class and got Amanda and we went to the hospital. When we got there my parents told us that the contractions wouldn't stop and that there was nothing else the hospital could do to stop the baby from coming. At this point I went kinda numb. We sat and waited in a room next door while Shalane's sisters showed up, and other family members kept coming. While we were waiting we started to talk about if the baby would be a boy or a girl. Shalane is the oldest of six girls and so all of her sisters wanted it to be a boy. My family had already had two little girls born two months before and one other one due a few months later so I thought it would be a girl. Finally just after three the nurse came and got the parents and they went in the room so that the dad's could help Keldon give her a name and a blessing. After that was done we were allowed to come in the room a few at a time to hold her and see her. She weighed 14 oz. and was 11 inches long. She lived for 1 hour and 47 minutes. That night Mariann and Sam showed up. They had already been planning a surprise visit and they just drove through the night so that they could be there for the funeral and all the planning of that. It was a very touching experience to have this sweet spirit brought to our family, for even a short time. I am so grateful for my family. Keldon and Shalane are amazing parents and have since had two adorable children, and have one more on the way. I am so thankful for them and they are amazing! I love them and hope they know that!

For some reason I can't explain...

So I was blog surffing today and Larissa had put up a link for a Jon Schmidt song. He combined the piano from Taylor Swifts Love Story with the cello of Coldplays Viva La Vida. The result is AMAZING!!!! Check it out!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0v3d6SFcDys

School's Out

I finished my semester back at college! I am so happy that I went back to school. It has been worth the move to finally figure out what I want to do with my life, and work towards getting there. Finally I fill like my life is moving towards something, and not just standing still. I finished up the classes for the semester on Monday and then had finals the following three days. I must say I am really happy to be done with most of these classes, but will miss some of the other classes. I met some really great people in class and hope that I will still get to see some of them.

I have decided that since I took so much time off in between high school and college (except for one semester at Dixie) that I really needed to buckle down and get to work. So to help this I have am going to attend summer classes as well. I am taking three online classes and two right here in Richfield. It will be good to get them done and out of the way so that I am closer to my goal.

Some of the best news from all of this though is the fact that I no longer have to commute!!!! I drove from Cedar to St. George for a year while I worked at Verizon, and when I moved home for school I would drive three days a week to Ephraim for classes. Now that these classes are over I am finally done commuting! I don't regret the decisions of living where I have, but it will be so nice to not spend two hours in the car so many days a week.

Well that's all for now! I will try to update again soon!

Yo Ho, Yo Ho, A Pirates Life For Me!

Lately my nephews have all loved playing with swords. Then my teacher told us how he has a ship in his back yard and lets kids come and play on it. So this week we decided it was time to take them and let them play. They loved it!!! There was a fun box full of costumes for them to wear and then we had brought lots of swords too. It was great to let them just have fun and to join in with them.

I Think I'm Ready For It...

Wow I really should work on updating this thing more often! ha ha Life has been good for me since my last post. I got a job at Maurices in Richfield (finally a job!!!) and it has been great! Now if I could just work on bringing home more money then clothes...lol! I love the girls I work with there though so that has really helped. This is a great environment for me and I finally love my job! The nice part too is that since I have a retail back ground it was really easy to adjust to this job, and since I love clothes it has been a fun and exciting adjustment!

School is coming to a close and I am so ready for it to be done! I have really enjoyed being back in school, even though sometimes it gets in the way of other things ha ha! This semester has gone by so quick it feels at the same time though! It is crazy to think I am already done with it (well in 2 weeks but still). I have signed up for summer classes though so no break for me! Then I have also decided to attend Snow this coming fall as well. The best part about this is the fact that I am going to move there so no more commuting for me!!!! WOO HOO!!!! I am so excited for that to be done. A year and a half of driving is far to long! Also by staying there I can work on getting my prerec's for my major done quicker and for less money! I have decided I am going to go into Elementary Education (which is funny because that is what I always wanted to do but then never got around to doing it ha ha!) It is a good fit for me I think and it should be really fun!

One thing that has been driving me crazy lately though is this stupid weather!!! It is April, snow should not be allowed! I hate driving to Ephraim when it is crappy weather, it is no fun. My one teacher always try's to tell me that Sevier and Sanpete have the same weather but he is so wrong! The other morning I left Richfield and the sun was shinning, then on my drive I was probably 10 feet from the Sanpete county sign and it started to rain and just got worse as I continued on my drive!!! I think that is proof enough that Sevier has better weather but either way it is time for it to warm up. I haven't even been burned yet this year, something is odd with that! ha ha

Other fun things that have happened since the last update are my cousin Sarah got married (crazy! she is younger then me by almost 2 years!) I also have enjoyed being able to chill with my family more and get closer with some of them. Tonight for example I went to a flag football game that was Keldon and Jim's team verses Kaden's team. It was freezing though so my parents, Amanda and I all left at half time. Also Jim and Angie are going to have their baby any day now so that will be fun! I love being the fun Aunt to all these kids and can't wait to spoil one more!

Speaking of being the fun Aunt one of my favorite things lately has been with Aubrey. If she comes over to our house in the morning (well really anytime of day that I am there lol) she comes up to me and say's, "I want make-up!" So we go down stairs and put make-up on and do our hair. She is so cute! I let her play with one brush and my one powder while I do everything else. We always listen to music while doing this as well and I have gotten her to start saying things like, "We need a good song" or "Dance to the fun song." It is so cute! I love it! And then after we are done she always has to "Go show mommy." When she does this though she always says "Come on Laurie" and take's my hand to go find Amanda. It is so fun! I love my Aub's!

Well hopefully I can work on keeping this updated more! Wish me luck! lol

Dancing Through Life

Well it has been a long time since I posted anything, I guess it is about time! I have been keeping really busy with school. It is so crazy being back in school and having to deal with homework and classes and teachers, just everything that way! I am living in Richfield and attend Snow College. I have classes there on Monday, Wednesday and Friday, and I have class her on Tuesday and Thursday! So in general I am kept busy! But it is good. This semester is now half way over so I am very excited! After this semester I only have the summer then I will have my associate degree, so I am very excited!

I also recently finally got a job! I now work for Maurices in Richfield, and I love it! It has only been a few weeks so far, but I have so much fun there! I hope I can just discipline myself enough to actually bring home a pay check! ha ha! It has been pretty easy since I already had retail experience, but working in clothes is a much better fit for me! The girls I work with are awesome as well, so it will be good times!

Not much else has been going on though. I got another nephew on January 9th, his name is Ethan O'Nil Izatt. I can't wait until I get to see him! They will be coming out her in July so I am very excited. Also we are just getting ready to welcome a few more kids into the family. Angie is due in about two months, and Shalane is due in August! So our family is just growing like crazy!

I recently went to Cedar and was able to see my friends. I miss them so much! It was so great to see them again, I wish I lived with them still! Tiffany and I got to chill the most, and I miss her so much! I hadn't seen her in two months, and it had been way to long! While in Cedar my cousin Mckay was playing in the state basketball tournament for South Sevier. They made it to the state game, but sadly couldn't pull it out! I felt so bad for them! But he is only a junior, so hopefully they will do well next year! Also it is so crazy my cousin Sarah is getting married in the morning. She is a year and a half younger then me! Holy Cow do I feel old! But she has a great guy so I am very happy for her, it is just kinda odd to me is all!

Goodbye To You!!!

Yes this blog is a little late in coming but as of January 1st at about 6:05 pm I no longer work for Verizon Wireless!!!! I may seem a bit excited, but that is because I am! I no longer have to drive 40 minutes everyday to a job that I HATED!!! Yes there were good things about Verizon, such as some of the people I met there and the great pay! But those things were not enough to keep me there after everything else that happened! It was a great 2 and a half years, I learned a lot. I wish I could thank everyone there that helped me grow as a person and an employee. Stephanie: I miss you so much! You made so many of those days when I just wanted to scream at certain people bearable! I never could have lasted as long ass I did without you there. Bri: Thanks so much for teaching me how fun life can be. I always loved all your treats, thanks for being the work mommy! Scott, Jay, Daniel and everyone else: Thanks for making me step outside of my bubble! I learned so much more about life from you. Verizon was great, but I am glad I am done for now!

Walking in a winter wonderland...

Well it is officially winter and Cedar City has had a ton of snow! Tiffany was amazing and purchased a snow shovel for our house (Thanks Tiff!) and we have had to use it a ton it seems like! But of course when it snows you have to play in it! She and I went to our friend Steve's house to chill one night and had so much fun! We made a snow-man, he was kinda small! We also made probably 30 or more snow-angels! That was way fun! After all that fun we went inside and drank hot chocolate! That is one of my favorite things in the winter!

A few nights later we ended up going to our friend Kami's house for a little bit. When we were going to leave my car got stuck in her drive way not once, not twice, not even three times, it got stuck four times!!! Talk about a joke! We had to have her neighbors come over and help push it out finally! So when we got home that night we decided that maybe we should shovel our driveway as well so that none of us got stuck the next morning trying to leave! So even though it was midnight the three of us took turns shoveling, and then enjoyed some more hot chocolate! UMMMM!

Long time gone...

So quite a bit has happened since I last updated this. The first thing was of course Halloween! I love Halloween so much! Dressing up, puting up decorations, watching scary movies, carving pumpkins, handing out/recieving candy... What could be better? This year I decided to go as Betty Boop! The costume was a little hard to find and I ended up ordering one on the internet. Once it got here I was kinda nervous about how much skin it showed so I added on straps, and put a 2 inch ruffle along the bottom... All by hand sewing it on!!! Yeah I know, I am kinda a joke but it was so worth it!!! I loved my costume and even though a lot of people didn't get to see me in it, it was worth it!

Second thing that happened was the election. I think that this was of the most contrversial elections ever! So many people were judging the candidates off of race, religion, gender, and age. I couldn't believe how many ignorant people voted this year for a candidate not because of what he or she wanted to do while in office, but because of one of the above listed reasons. Or vice versa, so many people would vote for the opposition because of the were not black, or female, or a mormon. I tried very hard to study up on all of the candidates and figure out which ones I agreed with the most as far as what they said they wanted to change. As for the final two Mccain and Obama, I voted for Obama. Yes there are things that are not my favorite with him, but at the same time there is a lot more that I like with him then I did with Mccain. For being the first election I have been old to vote in, I think it was a good one!

The third thing that happened was I had the opportunity to go to Vegas for a retail ralley for my work. The theme was hotels in Vegas and our store was the Hard Rock Hotel. Each of us got to dress up as different singers that we liked. My choice of singer was Madonna, from her "Like a Virgin" era. It was so fun dress up, go to Vegas, and get to see people you work with in a different environment. Our store won the 2 best awards for the night being the Most Gross Gains for the year (aka. new lines of service) and the Swagger award (aka. the spirit award.) We worked so hard for this and have been robbed of it the last two years! Thanks so much to Bri and all of her hard work she put in to help us come home with this award!

Last, but definitely not least is the fact that 2 days ago I had a brand new nephew born. His name is Andrew S. Madsen. He is 8 lbs. 5 oz. 21 1/2 inches long. He is so cute! That brings the grand total up to 9 nieces and 6 nephews so far! I love my family so much and feel so blessed to be a part of these amazing peoples lives! They help me more then they will ever know! My biggest wish and prayer is that one day I can find the love with someone that each of my siblings have found with their spouses and that we too can be blessed by the Lord with beautiful children!