Wow!! Two Updates in One Month!!!!!

Well, not a whole lot has happened since the General Conference Weekend of Rest & Relaxation! We managed to survive another very busy week. This past Friday night we went to a Corn Maze in Gardner, KS. That is about 35 minutes or so away from our house. This is what the maze map looked like.



Our friend Tiffanie is moving back to Utah, so for a fun hoorah before she left we went out to dinner and to this corn maze. This is the group that we went with.


Back Row left to right: Jonathan Player, Erin Barker, Tom Barker, Steve Tingey, Matt Baker
Front Row left to right: Cassie Player, Tiffanie Player, Ali Baker

After we did the corn maze we parted ways and went to Jen and Jason's house. They live in Gardner. We hardly ever go see them because it seems that whenever we do, something happens to our car. =) Well, we are proud to report that we have been there two weekends in a row with no car incidents!

On Sunday, we went to some friends house for Spain Night Dinner. I made Gazpacho. It was really good if I do say so myself. Tiffanie made tortilla, chicken paella, and this tomato and onion salad. It was a really good dinner. Thanks again for a fun evening.



It is nice to have friends to go and do stuff with. In the mean time, Tom remains busy with school/work. He is in the process of putting together a course proposal for a summer class, writing articles, grading papers and TA-ing.

I on the other hand have been working at my job as a secretary, helping out in the capacity of Assistant Cheer Coach at the Junior High I work at and most recently finished my last week cleaning the church.

We are getting ready to leave for Nauvoo, Illinois on Thursday and are excited to kind of just get away from it all for a while. There will definately be an update after Nauvoo!

When We Do The Things We Should...

So all week long I have been thinking about how much I have been neglecting things that needed to be done around the house. Mounds of laundry, dirty kitchen, piles of stuff all around the living room. I don't like things to add up like that but Tom and I are both so busy that we tend to put that kind of stuff off. I was thinking I will just do it this weekend. Then I remembered that it was conference weekend and was trying to decide which sessions of conference I should watch. I watched Saturday mornings session and was absolutely thrilled when a temple for the greater Kansas City area was announced. =) There were lots of great talks during that session that I felt were directly written for me and for the things that I am going through and facing at this point. After the first session I began attacking the kitchen. Once that was done, Tom yelled from the other room that the 2nd Saturday session was starting. I was on a roll with cleaning and didn't want to stop. I finally decided watching conference was more important and that I needed to hear what was being said. Sure enough many more talks that I felt were written just for me.

During the Sunday sessions, I kind of felt the same way. I have a lot of things to do blah...blah...blah. Needless to say I set aside time for myself to watch all four sessions of conference AND in between times have gotten everything accomplished that I wanted to get accomplished. It is amazing to me to that by doing the things that I should have done (ie...watching conference) I was able to get everything done that I needed to. I was supplied with "extra" time.

I enjoyed L. Tom Perry's talk about not letting the stresses and strains of life get to us. Remain positive. I also enjoyed his quote, "The best is yet to be." This is definitely something I need to work on. I need to remember that I need to take things one step at a time and as long as I am going in the right direction I will be o.k.

I also loved Elder Wirthlin's talk. "Come what may and love it." I loved his saying, "Learn to laugh." He explained that adversity can be a blessing in our lives depending upon how we deal with it. All stuff I really need to work on.

I enjoyed conference a lot. I am excited for April when we get to do it all again.