So my daughter, Ashli, works at a residential treatment center for young men ages 12-18. It has profoundly changed her life, and consequently, mine. She has learned communication and coping skills that have made the past year not only bearable, but ultimately beautiful for me. Tonight she asked me to go with her to see the display of "The Clothesline Project" at UVU in Orem. I would be missing a math quiz at college, but hearing her describe the display, I knew it would be well worth it.
And it was.
Victims of violence, emotional and sexual abuse write or paint on t-shirts, saying whatever it is they want to say. Some of the shirts are pretty raw and painful to read. Some of them I actually couldn't read. The organizers don't censor the shirts at all, and you don't exactly leave the event with a warm, fuzzy feeling.
Someone had made a shirt for Lori Hacking, with a tiny little onesie attached to the larger t-shirt. That one was pretty powerful.
I didn't start to cry until "Rockit", the secretary of the Central Utah chapter of BACA, started speaking at the podium. She described a time when her BACA chapter was in court with a 5 year old girl. She was afraid to walk down the hall to the bathroom because her father was seated in the hallway. So the bikers formed a circle around her and escorted her down the hall. I cried when I heard that. Every child needs a circle around them. Every child needs to feel safe. Far, far too many are not safe, not loved, not protected. It is impossible for me to articulate everything I felt as I looked at the hundreds of t-shirts on display. I only know that I was there for a reason. The things that have occurred in my life have occurred for a reason and I can't stop thinking about this tonight. Everyone we meet is fighting some kind of battle.
I must find a way to make a difference for someone in some small way every day.
SO many people have made a difference for me this past year.
Ashli and Mack insisted that I move in with them exactly a year ago this week.
Instead of me sitting alone in my apartment crying every single night.
They brought me back to life.
It wasn't easy for them. To have mom living there. Crying every single night. But they did it anyway.
Tami listened to me cry any time I needed to. No matter what time of the day or night. Jeanie sent me flowers on a particularly rough day.
Steve and Bob flirted with me and made me feel like a girl again.
Lisa checked up on me via text, facebook message or blog comment to make sure I was doing ok.
Grandma sent me money.
The list goes on and on.
I thought my life was over.
And I had a circle around me making damn sure that it wasn't.
I didn't really have that when I was younger.
I'm glad I have it now.
And I hope I can be in someone's circle when they really need it.
I love going over to Mt Pleasant and watching Miss Ashli play volleyball, now that I live close enough to go over there when I can. 
At her most recent game, she played against her preschool teacher, who hasn't changed a bit. 
I took this picture of Ash without even realizing that our friends, who aren't on Ashli's team, were in the background. Ashli's dad knew ShaRane years ago, but she is also a good friend of Ken's kids, so I know ShaRane better now than I did when I was married to Ashli's dad. And Julie is one of the people I love most here in Ephraim. I met her at Maverik, but she's also in my ward and I think THE WORLD of Julie. I love her:) 
So my daughter, Ashli, works at a residential treatment center for young men ages 12-18. It has profoundly changed her life, and consequently, mine. She has learned communication and coping skills that have made the past year not only bearable, but ultimately beautiful for me. Tonight she asked me to go with her to see the display of "The Clothesline Project" at UVU in Orem. I would be missing a math quiz at college, but hearing her describe the display, I knew it would be well worth it. 
I didn't start to cry until "Rockit", the secretary of the Central Utah chapter of BACA, started speaking at the podium. She described a time when her BACA chapter was in court with a 5 year old girl. She was afraid to walk down the hall to the bathroom because her father was seated in the hallway. So the bikers formed a circle around her and escorted her down the hall. I cried when I heard that. Every child needs a circle around them. Every child needs to feel safe. Far, far too many are not safe, not loved, not protected. It is impossible for me to articulate everything I felt as I looked at the hundreds of t-shirts on display. I only know that I was there for a reason. The things that have occurred in my life have occurred for a reason and I can't stop thinking about this tonight. Everyone we meet is fighting some kind of battle. 
Ken bought us a couple of dutch ovens Saturday (Finally! Every season when we dig through our respective boxes of stuff, we find that there's something else we don't have.) Anyway... back to the point. So we planned to make dutch oven chicken on Sunday and invite the kids over. This stuff is super scary for me. I'm afraid someone won't get along and it will be awkward. But I should not worry!! Ken and I both have amazing kids and Sunday with the blended families was awesome:) I finally got to hold Rylee for the first time. Yay:)
Prior to our 1:00 scheduled dutch oven, Ken got called out to Eureka to fix a cable problem. Boo!! It was General Conference, so people really wanted their TVs working. But we had to move the dutch oven to 4:00.
This is how thrilled I am when he gets called out on the weekends. He's only on call every 5th week, but I still hate it:(
Haiden will be having a little sister this summer, so he holds his new little cousin to practice:)
The bright side of Ken getting called to Eureka was that Zack was being the Easter Bunny on his last day at the Payson Wal-Mart. So I went up and got my picture taken with the cute little stinker. He's working for his dad this summer and living in Tooele with Tami. Then here to Ephraim for school in the fall. Yay!
Yup. This is my favorite picture. Rylee reminds me so much of Ashli when she was a baby. Dang, I love Ashli. She's an amazing person. I know it isn't easy for my kids that Ken has grandkids, but they are very gracious and good about it, and everybody is just really making this work for everybody else. We have an amazing family:)