My Birthday

I thought I would write a short update this week.  We have had a nice week.  Last Friday evening was a ward dinner.  Andrew wanted me to make his favorite corn dip to bring.  It was a pot luck dinner with chiles.  There was a contest for the best recipes using green or red chiles.  The corn dip uses green chiles.  I did it a bit different by putting in fresh Anaheim peppers from the garden in it.  I actually didn’t eat any of it, because I don’t like the can corn in it.  I guess it was a hit because I won two awards for it.  I won both the adult and the children’s voting on “people’s choice” awards.  They had other judging going on but they let everyone vote on their favorite and I got the most votes in both age categories.  I was surprised.  I was given a New Mexico recipe book for each award.  Now I need to look at the new books and try some new recipes.  My family likes Mexican type foods.  I don’t like chiles very well because I am not that fond of spicy foods, but I do like the flavor if it is used sparingly. We had a fun evening visiting with others that came to the dinner.  There is a family from the school that came.  Caleb enjoyed having one of his friends there.  The older son in this family has been participating in Boy Scouts with his friends.  The family was invited to the dinner and came.  They seemed to enjoy it and seem to know a lot of people in the ward.

Saturday and Sunday we listened to General Conference.  I enjoyed all the talks and heard many wonderful thoughts about life.  I look forward to listening to them over and over and reading the talks too.  I learn so much from them and things I can do better.  I was listening to a talk this morning from October 2016 conference about prayer and I really thought about how grateful I am to know that I have a loving Heavenly Father who really does care about me and my struggles.  I am thankful for the church leaders and their wisdom.  It was sad to hear that Elder Hales passed away Sunday afternoon.  He was a valiant leader and I am thankful for his service.

We had a lot of rain last week.  Monday morning was sunny and I took the opportunity to work in the yard.  I got a lot done with keeping up with things.  I enjoy spending time in the yard and hope that I can keep the gardens looking nice.  We are still getting tomatoes and I enjoy eating them.  I learned things about gardening in New Mexico this year and look forward to doing it again next year. 

We had good weather again on Tuesday.  I am thankful for the sun shine.  Today is cloudy and chance of rain all day again.  I guess it got sunny for me for my birthday.  Tuesday was my birthday.  I went to the school library like I usually do on a Tuesday morning.  Caleb came into the library between his classes (he goes between two class rooms at the school) and gave me a big hug and sang Happy Birthday to me.  It was cute.  He came into the library about four times yesterday, every time he was going between class rooms!  I appreciated his loves.  In the afternoon I baked me a cake and I think I have finally learned how to make frosting the right consistency so that my two layer cake doesn’t slide apart.  Neal came home with a big bunch of flowers.  They smell so nice.  I have enjoyed looking at them. He also gave me some chocolates.   Last Friday Neal was off work and we went to the temple together and also went to the hard ware store and bought me a gift.  I got a new pair of hedge trimmers.  I know, it isn’t that romantic of a gift, but I am excited about them because our old ones were hard to use.  That goes back to my yard work ethic. The right tools make it easier to do the work.

One of the roses broke off and Neal pinned it on me for dinner time. 

My way of doing candles without making it a fire hazard

I hope everyone has a great week.  It is always nice to hear from others.  Yesterday I just wanted to be remembered.  I didn’t care about gifts that much.  I just wanted to feel appreciated and loved.  I did. It was a good day to start a new year in my life.