The Cat Came Back!

Well, with a little help from an awesome friend and some awesome family our cat Polly is back home where she belongs! We are so excited to have her back! I thought she wouldn't remember us but last night after hiding from us for a little while she came out and slept next to me on my bed. She is even getting along great with our other kitten Chloe. They growl at each other but then the next minute they are batting at each other and pouncing all over the place. She is just so beautiful (and I never thought I would say that about a cat) and we are so glad to have her back in our family!

It's Official

It's finally official, I have nothing to live for...:) Grey's Anatomy will be re-runs from now until January 8th. For those of you that would like to mourn with me, we will begin a moment of silence now...

oh and PS. I am so not a Christina!

Mystery Smell...

I have been trying for over a week to find out what the heck stinks in my house. It's not the garbage, it's not the dishes, it's not the cat box and everything is freshly vacuumed and cleaned...Any Ideas??? I don't know where else to look.

Worn Out

It is official. I am completely worn out. I think that the happenings of the last 6months have finally caught up with me. I don't think this has been the flu, I think this has been life kicking my butt. I should never have slowed down. This whole move just seems so surreal. While we were in the hotel, it seemed impossible but we made it. When we moved in, it started to feel like just an extended vacation but now the reality of it all is setting in. I know this sounds morbid and a little suicidal (don't worry, no immediate attempts) but I am starting to wonder what the point of all of this is. Not just us and this move but everything. I watch everyone around us struggle, I feel the struggle on our end both emotionally and financially and I just wonder how much longer it's all going to last. It seems so obvious that the Second Coming is getting closer and closer and I am starting to yearn for it. You are probably thinking "she's lost it!" and frankly I am starting to think that too. It's not that I'm unhappy here, I'm just here. I've never lived away from Utah and now I am somewhere completely foreign. Matt and I had this plan for ourselves or so we thought. I guess we never really talked about where we wanted to end up because we just always figured we would be where we were. We never imagined we would have to move away from everyone that we love. We thought we had a choice and in all actuality we did. We could have stayed but we were struggling on what Matt was making and all the jobs he interviewed for started lower and didn't have the insurance benefits that we have with this job. So we felt like we didn't have much choice. We really feel like we are supposed to be here but now that we are here we have no idea what it's all supposed to be about. We may never know. It is a comfort to know that we have done what the Lord has asked of us but man it's hard to feel like the trials are starting all over again. We thought getting here would be the bulk of the burden but now that we are here we just don't know how to start a new life. It helps to have the Church to lean on but our ward is just so huge that I am overwhelmed. I have been called to the Activities Committee and I am hoping that it will be the push that I need to start meeting people. Well it's not meeting people that I need help with, I can meet people really easily. It's just that I need to find some really good friends here. I had so many awesome friends in Tooele, it just doesn't seem possible that I can do that again but I know I felt overwhelmed when we moved there too. The difference between here and there is that in Tooele when I was overwhelmed and lonely I had a familiar place to go. I could go "home" to SLC where everything was as it had always been. I could go to my mom's house or have my sister come out to watch a movie. Here, if we leave home we are lost in a very unfamiliar and overwhelming new world. I know it will get better, it just doesn't seem that way right now. I just long for something familiar. We had Mandy and Mark out for Thanksgiving and it was so awesome, I want them back. Well, I guess that is enough complaining on my part.

Thank Goodness For FHE!!!

Tonight we had a very good experience with our little family. We had a very long and trying day. I have been sick, Matt wasn't feeling well and the kids were just out of sorts. Claire was having an especially hard day emotionally. Claire has always struggled a little more than kids her age. She is very sensitive to her emotions, fears, challenges, etc. Today she was crying over things that had happened last summer and it amazed me that at 5 years old she could remember what we would think to be trivial things and worry about them. Tonight we came home from grocery shopping and hurried our way through dinner and sat down to have family home evening. Claire wanted to learn about money. She is always asking for treats and toys at the store and I am always telling her we don't have enough money. Well, that answer is just not good enough for a kid as smart as she is so she wanted to know where the money was! As we started our family home evening, everyone was crying and screaming. I almost didn't continue because it seemed like a lost cause. I started by just singing some Christmas songs. Ivan caught on but Claire just kept screaming. Finally I just started to pray. The kids quieted down as I plead for the spirit to fill our home. I prayed for each child individually and althought the Lord is aware, I voiced the troubles that each one was having. I finally admit out loud to Heavenly Father that we are struggling. I prayed that things would get better for Matt at work. I prayed that the kids could feel more love from Matt and I and that we could all show more love to one another as a family. I prayed that we would feel the spirit more strongly in our home so that we would not feel so alone. It felt so amazing to finally admit that this move has not killed us but that we are struggling a lot. I started to feel calm and loved. We ended our prayer and the spirit was there. The contention was gone. What could have been a very tension filled evening was suddenly a calm and collected teaching atmosphere where we talked with one another, said sorry for the things we had done to hurt one another this evening and learned just where in the heck our money goes each month. We ended our family home evening singing more Christmas songs and by the time it was over, everyone including Matt was asleep. We have needed that peace so much. We have needed to turn to the Lord and plead for his help. I know we have been relying on him but we haven't actually voiced our concerns and fears directly to him, only to each other. What a difference it makes to turn your problems over to someone who can actually fix them. I am so thankful for Family Home Evening and the difference that it makes in our home. I am especially thankful for the Spirit that it brought into our home tonight at this trying time in our lives.

Two Milestones!

Wow, what a day, week, month, year...I could go on and on. Today we celebrated what we here in the Garff home consider major milestones! Today was our wedding anniversary, 7 years!!!! Matt stayed home from work but mostly because we are all sick. It was nice to spend the day together however, sick or not. It is so hard to have him gone everyday. I must be a very needy person because I would be perfectly content to have him home all of the time. The thought of him going to work tomorrow is very sad for me. We did not get to go out on a date but tonight as we were fighting children into pajamas and bandaging bite wounds that they had given one another I told him that next year we are definitely going on another cruise. We are going to enter every contest we can to win a cruise so if you know of any, send them our way! The other milestone that we celebrated is that Ivan is FINALLY potty trained! No accidents in almost 2 weeks now! He still wears "Big Boy Pull-Ups" at night but during the day he is in real underwear! This is a huge deal for us. I thought it would never happen. Claire was an extremely hard child to potty train and so I was dreading the deed with Ivan. Truth be told, after we moved into the house he just sort of did it on his own. He wanted to go to Chuck-E-Cheese to celebrate a completed potty chart but changed his mind and went for a toy instead. We took him to the store and he picked out a Triceratops Diego Tree House. He is a huge Dora and Diego fan. It made for a hard night because the other kids wanted to take over his toy, especially Claire but he is so proud of himself and I am so grateful for a lower diaper bill each month! So it was a good day in the Garff house and after a week of being completely sick, I am starting to feel like joining the land of the living again.

Drunken Co-Workers!

We went to Matt's work party last night and by the end I was floored by his drunken co-workers and reminded again why it is I don't drink. It makes me laugh to think what they will have to face on Monday when they remember what they did. It was nice to go though. I have been so sick and so I didn't know if I should try and go or not but I knew I needed some time out of the house. I had a really good time meeting some of Matt's new co-workers and spending time with my hubby. The best part of the whole evening was the fact that I got to slow dance with my husband. We haven't done that since our wedding day and it was such a great moment for me. We also won a 50$ gift card to Starbucks so we are going to be able to go out for Hot Chocolate for our anniversary on Monday! We will be married 7 years! I am just so grateful that with everything that we are going through, we are going through it together.