It's funny how life's timing works...

Even just in small, simple things. I've noticed throughout my life that a lot of times I learn something from my dad or in life, and then we discuss the very thing I learned in Seminary, Sunday school, or Institute. Or vise versa. Today I went to the doctor (P.S keep in mind this is definitely in the category of small simple and quite possibly silly. But I thought it was fairly ironic so read on. :p) and while I was in the waiting room I was reading a book by Michael Wilcox. It's called When Your Prayers Seem Unanswered. 

        I would like to suggest some things that go through my mind in those difficult moments of life. Hopefully they'll be of value to you as they have been to me. They are the letters I peruse from a kind of Father in Heaven, who knew beforehand we would face such dilemmas and questions. One of the first of those scriptural letters contains a principle I call "The Fourth Watch".

        A new Testament day was divided into twelve hours, beginning at six in the morning. The third hour would be nine o'clock, the sixth hour would be noon, and the eleventh hour, though we visualize it as being just before midnight, actually was five o'clock in the evening. The night was divided into four watches: The first watch was from six in the evening until nine at night. The second watch was nine until midnight, the third watch from midnight until three in the morning, and the fourth watch from three in the morning until six, about sunrise.

The Savior had just fed the five thousand. He instructed his disciples to get into a boat and pick him up later, after he had dismissed the multitude and later spent some solitude in prayer. The disciples obeyed. It was late afternoon or early evening when they got into the ship and pushed out into the Sea of Galilee. Jesus sent the multitude home and then turned to communion with his Father. He prayed into the evening and long into the night.

       In the meantime, a storm had swept down on the disciples in their voyage: "And when even was come, the ship was in the midst of the sea, and he alone on the land. And he saw them toiling in rowing; for the wind was contrary unto them" (Mark 6:47-48). In Matthew's version it says, "The ship was. . . tossed with waves" (Matthew 14:24), and in John's account we read: "And the sea arose by reason of a great wind that blew. So when they had rowed about five and twenty or thirty furlongs..." (John 6:18-19). "

(Ok, there was some preface to what I was really getting at. :p)

      "And then we read: "About the fourth watch of the night he cometh unto them, walking upon the sea,. . . [and] they. . . saw him, and were troubled. And immediately he talked with them, and saith unto them, Be of good cheer: it is I; be not afraid. And he went up unto them into the ship; and the wind ceased" (Mark 6: 48-51; emphasis added).

       I have a feeling that the Apostles, if they could have chosen, would have had the Lord come in an earlier watch. I put it to you, as I frequently put it to myself-- when I toil in rowing against the wind, when the sea arises and I'm frightened and it's dark and the storm keeps blowing, and I want help-- I want him to come in the first watch. I'm a first-watch type of person. Aren't we all? 

       But there is also something inside of me that channels my thinking to the realization that it is good to toil in rowing against the wind-- that there's something to be gained by exercising spiritual muscles that are stretched in facing trials and opposition. All right, we can accept that. But if he doesn't come in the first watch he certainly ought to come in the second watch. However, it appears that we worship a "fourth-watch" God. And it is important for us to realize that we worship a fourth-watch God.

       Sometimes I pray; "Lord, I know you're a fourth-watch God and that I'm a first-watch person. Couldn't we compromise and have you come at the end of the second watch or at the beginning of the third watch? Wouldn't that be fair?" But the compromise rarely comes, and in my better moments I know it's good that it doesn't. He's a fourth-watch God. (S. Michael Wilcox, When Your Prayers Seem Unanswered 2006)

Brother Wilcox lists three different stories that prove Heavenly Father is a "fourth-watch" God: JSH 1:16, when Joseph Smith is praying in the grove and the adversary comes upon him until "...the very moment when [he] was ready to sink into despair and abandon [himself] to destruction" and at that point, in his fourth watch, Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ appear to him, dispelling the darkness.
Then there's the story of Hagar in Genesis 21, when she was wandering in the wilderness of Beer-sheba, and "the water was spent in the bottle". An angel of God shows her a well of water, and she gave her son, Ishmael a drink so he wouldn't die.
In 1 Kings 17:11-12 is the story of a woman and her son who are starving to death and the woman is gathering two little sticks to prepare their last meal "...that [she] may go in and dress it for [her] and [her] son, that [they] may eat it and die", but Elijah appears and asks her to share her meal with him. When she does she's blessed and the Lord spares her and her son from death.

So many times in my life I've noticed that I suffer from the "I'm-incredibly-impatient" disease. :p I'm with Brother Wilcox on understanding that ok, sometimes the Lord teaches us through waiting, but surely he ought to come by the second-watch. I've been frustrated with some things that aren't life-threatening by any means, but are really annoying and inconvenient to deal with, so when I went to the doctor today I was hoping there'd be something obviously wrong so we could fix it. However, here comes my next lesson on patience. :) There's a blessing and a teaching moment hidden in here, I'm sure. "When you feel somewhat desperate, when it seems like your prayers aren't answered and the winds still blow, take comfort in the knowledge that he is on the hillside watching. Remember, you might not know that he's watching as you struggle in the boat, but he is on the hillside watching, and he will come. But he generally comes in the fourth-watch-- after we have done all we can do." (S. Michael Wilcox, When Your Prayers Seem Unanswered 2006)
The next chapter in the book is about Moriancumer, and the boats he was instructed to build. It's really repetitive on the description of the boats, which were "tight like unto a dish". Brother Wilcox points out that even when we've reached the fourth-watch (or maybe even when we haven't but we've convinced ourselves that we have :p) and we still feel afraid and alone, we should remember we're tight like unto a dish. :) God created us with the knowledge beforehand that we needed to be vessels that could face storms from small rain showers, to hurricanes. He knew what he was doing. We're tight like a dish, and even though sometimes the waves are going to push us under, we won't sink. He knew, He knows, and we'll be prepared if we trust him. :)

Basically, my tangent was just because I really like this book! But also, because I felt the need to blog and this seemed like a marvelous topic. :) Eventually when I upload pictures of our Salt Lake trip to look at the lights on Temple square, I'll blog about that wild escapade. ;)

Ok Ok, now I'm catching up on the Christmas festivities.

DISCLOSURE:The pictures and substance of this blog may cause some people to want to inflict bodily harm upon me. Please refrain, as this is sort of contradicting of the "Golden Rule". Thank you, that is all. (Erin. :p That was for you mostly. And other seesters, and familial members.)

Also I'm too lazy to put captions. :p Maybe I will later. When I'm through being lazy. :)
Also again, we're going up North to see the lights on Temple square, slash hopefully seeing Angie, Klane, Kyle, Michelle and baby Kaylie :D (I'm crossing all my fingers.)

(In case you didn't notice, this post has changed drastically. And by that I mean about a gajillion pictures have suddenly disappeared. That's because it was basically driving me nuts when I'd scroll down and my whole entire blog would shift. That's a wee bit annoying. Just sayin. So eventually I'm sure I'll post the pictures again. Once I figure out how to do that without costing me my sanity. :) Haha)

P.S I guess I'll stop being lazy and tell you about the Salt Lake trip. We drove up and met Tyler at the Lehi exit by the festiveish gas station that has a creepy smiling clown logo. So then I went and hung out at Tyler's house (complete with tours, and FREEZING scooter rides around town.) We met my family at Wingers for dinner, at which my little sisters pulled lots of faces, and my parents "interrogated" us. :p Except for not really. It was a joke, but they did say they were going to and they did visit with us. :) After dinner we all squished into the suburban and drove to Temple Square, pausing to let Tyler call his mom to figure out which exit to take off of the freeway, and walked around for not as long as I thought we would looking at the pretty Christmas lights. I want to know who in the world has that much patience to put the lights on all those trees they way they do! Tyler said that they just cut the lights off after, instead of trying to unwind all of them. Sounds like a good plan to me. Maybe that's what I'll do someday. :p Anywho. The lights were pretty, and even if we did get lost in the stairwells, and get stuck listening to Conference Building trivia (Thanks, Tyler, for asking the question. :p Goodness those guides love talking about that building! It is pretty incredible though.) it was a fun trip I think! Oh! Also, my dad hates HATES elevators. Which all of my sisters love. What can we say. We grew up in a village of Circleville. Elevators are fun stuff! Yay for novelty! ;) Anyway, we're in one to get back down to parking, and the doors close... and open. And we're still on the floor we started on. So then these other people squish in with us, and the doors close, and open. ....Aaaand we're still on the same floor. So then we try one more time, and the doors close... and (yup,  you guessed it) open. My dad, at this point, is trying to contain all sorts of panic ;) just kidding, maybe not. But it seemed pretty convincingly panicked to me. He dashes out the closing doors, calling over his shoulder something about finding some stairs. The doors close, we giggle, the doors open. We give up, and follow my dad down the stairs. :p Oh, I love my family. Also, you should know that Tyler bribed Bri to like him with some chocolate kisses (he must have something with those candies. Haha) and a 'whatchamacallit' candybar. Um, hey! Where's my bribery? :p It was funny.
After the temple trip, Tyler and I went to his house, grabbed a key ("Don't worry about it," when I ask what the key is to. What a sneak. :p) and drove to his dad's animal hospital. For a second I was a little concerned, wondering what exactly, or where actually, our date was going to be. But then after weaving around through dark rooms of vet type stuff, we got to the foyer which has a big, beautiful fire place. So after that was lit, as well as the Christmas tree and lights, we roasted some marshmallows in the fireplace. There were two red champagne type glasses next to a bottle of sparkling cider, so we drank some of that too. :p Kind of cutesy huh? Then I opened a gift of some scarves and a hat that he had crocheted. I can't even crochet. I think he's showing me up a little bit in creativity. And then we watched Kate and Leopold on a sheet/projector set up. Oh, we watched the movie while sitting in a giant cardboard box full of pillows and such. I guess I should put that on my bucket list, just so I can cross it off:
* Watch a movie from inside a pillow filled cardboard box
There. That's better. :)

So I should probably be blogging about the wonders of Christmas, but you have GOT to see this follow up of the sad little Bieber lover.
Click here to get some more giggles.

I promise I'll tell you about Christmas. Eventually, when I finish editing the pictures I took. :)

Yup, Merry Christmas.

Yes fellow blog readers (and or stalkers) I am perfectly aware that it's one thirty and Santa's gonna give me a lump of coal. That's ok because I'm still buzzed from the sparkling cider that was more mountain dew than sparkling cider. So amid my bored trying to waste time tactics, I stumbled across this. The first part is mostly ridiculous. But then at the very end.... it's grand. Just watch. It's sad on so many levels.

I also think you should know the only reason I cry over Justin Bieber is because I feel bad that everyone thinks she's a boy. Poor child.

Star's Delight...

It's Christmas Eve Night! (erm...) Day! :p

Cute, Sweet Grammie Marilyn always says that, and therefore I've been counting down until I could call her and make that exclamation!

It doesn't seem like it could possibly be Christmas Eve yet! I'm feeling a bit in limbo I think, but that's ok, tonight is the traditional Christmas Eve celebrations at the LeFevre's so maybe it'll set in then. :p

Yesterday my family went to see Narnia: Voyage of the Dawn Treader which was AMAZING! I definitely recommend it. C.S. Lewis was an incredible author, and although he wasn't LDS he was right on with so many of his religious principles and parallels. Keeping that in mind through the movies makes them have much deeper meaning, I think. This one was especially touching to me. It was beautiful! I think you should all go see it. :D

Two days until Christmas!

So... I realize I've already posted today. But technically I think the first one this morning shouldn't have counted because it was total nonsense. Not that the majority of my posts aren't complete and utter balderdash, if you will.
But I must post again today because I've got some awesome pictures to show you folks. But as a preface, have you seen This movie , or This movie? Because I sort of love both of them... Saints and Soldiers is one of my favorites, I cry like a baby every time. And Take a Chance is a funny movie, of which we quote in awful Russian accents. (We are... heeeeeeeerrree!) 
So as I was eating my fries with Kaitlyn we saw Corbin Allred walk in with a couple of other paramedics. For a minute, I thought about settling with these stalker-ish pictures....

Sorry they're so blurry. :( Someday I would love a new camera.

I'm fully aware of how ridiculous we looked taking super obvious 'sneaky' pictures. :p

But then we decided to suck it up and just ask him for a picture. :) When we asked if he was Corbin though, he made this face and was like... "I... don't know..." So I"m thinking "Shoot!! It's not even him!" :p 

He stood on his toes for us to take the picture. 

Me, Corbin Allred, Kaitlyn Friese

Pretty nifty, eh? :) Also I took about a million other pictures, and a video. Here's what I've been up to today! :D

I sort of adore this old red truck. 

We found these little beauties in the Dollar store. I thought they looked rather alien-ish.

We coulda been super stars!

Birthday glasses for the Birthday girl!

Cutest beanie I've ever beheld!

I so love the rain!

:)

This picture begins the saga of silly string warfare. 

Ok so this has nothing to do with the silly string, I just liked it. :p

This is where the epic battle took place. At the park. Not the garbage can.

We tried to have a face off... as you can see that didn't really work as well as planned right off. Also, the stinkin camera angle is offish, but that's ok because you get the gist of it. You should also know that Kaitlyn got silly string all over my face and therefore I know first hand when I tell you, don't eat that stuff. It's awful.

Anywho, I'm off for a birthday dinner at Apple Bee's. I'm sure you'll see more pictures from that little party. :p Merry almost Christmas!! :D

Oh mylanta! People! I've reconfigured my blog (or some other grand word) and now my postage is as cool as Erin's! Do you know what this means? I now have the ability to make spastic posts to my little heart's content. :)

Cool!

I can make things easy for geriatrics to see!!!

Or hide secrets in here sorta. :p 
Mostly I'm just REALLY enjoying messing around with this. Bear with me. (Is that the correct spellage of that use of the word bear? (Because if I put "Bare with me"... well that could be disastrous. This is a G rated blog you know.)  
Also if I decide to make this a journal looking entry, such as 
Dear Diary
Dear Wanda,
Dear Iris,
 (See? Then I can make it look like I crossed out things, hehe. How quaint.)


I can highlight things in periwinkle type colors just because that'd be unique I believe.

And if I really wanted to get your attention..... :p I rather like this stuff. I'm as giddy as... Marissa on a morning when bacon is being served. (That's pretty giddy!)




So anyway...

Just in case you didn't know...

There are only four days until Christmas day! Um, also in case you didn't know, that's sort of really soon! The sad part is it still feels... not as Christmassy as it should.
However. On the bright side, today I got to shadow Becky Henry at Bulloch Drug. She's a compound pharmacy technician, so she mixes the creams and capsules. It really was so much fun! Next semester (cross your fingers) I'm going to take a math class, Medical Terminology, and Chem 1010 as pre-requisites for the Pharmacy Tech program that I want to take next fall. Neat eh?

I finally downloaded all the pictures from my camera so we should probably stick some of those on here, right?


Riley's being stalked/mauled by my sisters... :)



Kaitlyn sent me to time out once. We re-enacted it in Mickey D's on our fry run! :p



Kait giggled. Quite a bit.



"Chub", "Chunky", and "Fat name yet to be determined". We've got awesome name skills eh? Plus poor Kassie has an abscess that she almost had to get surgery for so she could still breathe and was on lots of drugs at the time of this picture. Haha which is rather obvious. ;)



Frank Sinatra (yeah, she's a girl. We just didn't know that when we named her. :p) makes a really grand scarf type accessory. Don't you agree?



Marissa. With "her boy". As usual. :p



I love this cute sister of mine!



A super coolio van that we saw when we went on our roommate trip to Salt Lake. (To be explained later.)



Best bumper sticker I've ever seen! I want one. :p




For the record, I love this bed...



and the mint that my cute Aunt Sharla left on the pillow! :)



This is the first of many random pictures from the drive to SLC...










Sami's tiki man! Handsome devil, he is.





"RED ONE!!!!" (Sam and I then had a cat/girl slappy fight over who saw the bug first. We're really mature.)




Random side of the road picture. :)




Sami driving... enthusiastically! :D




Sometimes Steven our neighbor boy gets abused by Tori my roommate. But honest to goodness, folks, he asked her to. Boys. I'll never understand them.



I HAVE THE TANGLED SONGS!!!!! (Thanks Caitlan!)





My friend from CHS, Emily Nakken, came to visit me last Monday!




Torrence (AKA Tori) hid in my closet, "Shannon! I have a surprise for you!" I go back there, "HIHIHIIIIIIIAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!" (Torrence's war cry) Sami's giggling uncontrollably on her bed, Tor comes after me with Sam's rope, wraps it around me and then shoves me over so I fall on the ground. There is love in our apartment. :p



Woo Woo! Hooray for Snow College Basketball games to get us out of the apartment! :)




Tor and Me before the game. :) We had to be pretty. Her man was there. ;)




Remember when I said you'd never see our garbage cans clean and empty again in your life?? This picture was taken (literally) eight hours after cleaning checks. Oi.




Sometimes we have adventures for our shoes. This is the water park edition.




You can always tell when it's cleaning checks at Snow Gardens because this happens. A bajillion people finally take out their trash haha.




Duct Tape. Saving the world, one job at a time.





On occasion Jayson comes over to visit, flops on the bed for five seconds and is out. Then he mumbles something about Shannon should go eat fruit flies. Yeah. Working graveyards at Wal-Mart isn't so great for him. :p





So. Where to begin. I haven't blogged for a while huh. That's probably because on Thursday all of my roommates and I packed up and drove to Salt Lake. Our objective? Christmas shopping, Roommate Christmas dinner, and most importantly walking around Temple Square to look at the lights. Sami and I decided we wanted to stay overnight and so my Aunt Sharla was awesome and let us stay at her house in Lindon. (She's a cute hostess. We loved it! :D) We ended up taking three separate cars, which seems pretty silly but it worked. Jill drove her car because she wanted to leave for home right after. Alisha drove because she and Tori and Karlee had to be in Ephraim Friday morning. So we parked Sam's car in Riverton and all got in Lish's. There was an accident on the freeway by Draper, so we were in stand still traffic for an hour at least. This old grandma woman swerved off the road at one point and tried to cut us off after going off the white line. Lisha wouldn't let her though, and the cute sweet grandma figure of a woman mouthed all sorts of angry obscenities at us. Quite frankly, my dears, it was hilarious. Sooo not what we expected from a little old woman. But let me tell you, age does not destroy spunk!
We went to Olive Garden first for the dinner, where Karlee and Jill informed us that it's tradition to flirt with the waitor. Poor Houstin. We had lots of problems. Jill stared at him like a creeper, I asked for numbers when he asked if he could get us anything else, Lisha asked for a picture, Tori and Sami giggled, and Karlee was flirtatious to a fault. ;) It was kinda funny. This was the first time I've been to Olive Garden though, and I give it two thumbs up. If you've got some extra money to spend. Which none of us did. Happy holidays.
The Gateway= stop numero deux. For the love of garbage and all other things that are holy... I hate shopping I think. The first ten minutes were fun. Then I just wanted to get the stuff and get out of there! Lisha is rather indecisive I think because we sat in Buckle for a looooong time. And this rather... happy seeming man was asking all sorts of questions and trying to find outfits for her. So. Long story short, we missed the lights.
Then we went home. The end. :p
I packed as soon as we got back and hit the road to get to Cedar home! (I missed my house and my family lots more than I thought I did. I wasn't planning on coming home until Sunday evening.)
Brianne didn't know I was coming home, and so I rang the doorbell. Mom answered, "Bri, it's for you!" She comes up the stairs and around the corner, which was my cue. "Surprise!" :) She gave me a much needed big hug! I love those a little bit of a lot.

Which brings me to my "I'm thankful for..." moment.

I feel like I'm always super redundant. But... Ok so I have no justifications for my redundancy. I went to the American school of redundancy school I guess. ;)

This Christmas season has been different in so many ways. I wasn't at home with my family for most of it, the tree in my apartment was tiny and had funny lights on it, I didn't have a fire place to drink hot chocolate by (and I didn't even drink that much hot chocolate this year), and all sorts of other physical/superficial ways. This year I've spent a lot of time around the sweet spirits (not referring to that one song. :p) in the Nursing home and it's been mostly after Thanksgiving and before Christmas. Therefore this Christmas season. :p
I've learned so much from each of them, and I've come to love them all so much! I'm not sure how I feel about that, because a couple of them are in their 90's. I'm kind of scared to get too attached. But I decided it's like that song from Wicked "For Good". There's something that's touched my life in different ways from each individual. The opportunity for service has made me so much happier and made me think a lot more about Christ's service to us, and the service Joseph and Mary did for Jesus. It still doesn't feel like the typical "I'm so excited for Christmas that I can't sleep for the week before" kind of Christmas spirit. But I've felt so much love and warmth this year. This year might be my favorite Christmas yet! I'm so thankful for family. (Again. :) ) I'm thankful for soft comfortable beds that I get to sleep in at my Cedar home. :p I'm thankful for small blessings like having snow fall right off of the road, but having the road stay dry while I have a white knuckle drive back to Cedar City, or like smiles from friends and random strangers. I'm thankful for perspective. I'm thankful for everything! :) Haha that's a shortcut so I don't bore you all to death. :p


Merry Christmas in four days!!! :D