Yankees @ Rockies 2013

Unless you are a baseball fan, you have NO idea how amazing this is. Mariano Rivera is unarguably the BEST closer in the history of baseball and he's retiring at the end of the season, so for us to have this view of him warming up in the bullpen and then taking the field to get the save is like almost an impossible life event. 

But to make it even MORE amazing, just as I was finishing taping the video, Yankees pitching coach Mike Harkey looked up at Tyler and tossed him the ball that Mo had been using to warm up in the bullpen. WOW!!! We've obtained a few balls from games over the years, but THIS one. Wow. Touched by only 4 people at this point. Mariano Rivera, Austin Romine, Mike Harkey and Tyler Allred. This is unbelievable. 

 The whole trip was amazing!!! I just threw these photos on blogger in random order, but it was awesome. 

 This was Ken's first MLB game EVER and Brett Gardner tossed him a ball during batting practice. AWESOME! 

 We were thisclose to Mo a few times this week. Awe. Life is good:) 

 Pro Rodeo Hall of Fame was great. 

 One of the highlights of our trip was meeting Tom Cortez. We stopped for lunch at a Jack-in-the-Box and this amazing guy was working. We were all in Yankees jerseys, so he came over to our table and introduced himself as a lifelong Yankees fan who didn't have tickets to any of the three games in the series. Well, we had two extra because Ashli and Mack couldn't make the trip, and we gave them to Tom. He met us at the game, and we had a blast getting to know him a little bit. Great guy. 

 Joba's still rehabbing from an injury and did some jogging in the outfield before Game 3.

 CC!!!

 Before game 3, we finally found the fun stuff out in the community surrounding Coors Field in Denver. Like the $1 hot dog stand! 

 On the last day of our trip, we went out to Golden to see the brewery 

 and the Buffalo Bill museum. 

 We got a big kick out of this. 

 Great trip, great memories made in the summer before Ty leaves for his mission. 

Am I a lucky girl or what? 

Tyler's Mission call

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1zLqkji99_Q

I seriously hope you can open the link to Ty's mission call video, 'cuz it's really awesome!!!
I don't even know where to start to describe the amazing things I've felt and seen over the past few weeks as we prepared to receive Ty's mission call. Even going back YEARS, so much has led to this moment, it's hard to describe it all.

Let's start here. Every one of these guys has received his mission call. These are the kind of people my son chose to have in his life for the past 19 years. Amazing young men, on and off the football field, in and out of the classroom. Just a really great influence on each other. Most of them drove home from SUU the weekend before finals just to be there for Ty when he opened his call. They all love and support each other so much, it's a blessing to know that Ty has them in his life. 

So to the weeks before his call finally came. Ty has been terrified that he'd go to Asia or a country where he'd have to deal with snakes (his biggest fear in THE world) or spiders or rotten meat hanging in the streets or any number of other challenges he could have faced. He would have served the Lord wherever,of course, but he really wanted to stay in the United States. Well, he got his papers in, and the wait began. 

Every Wednesday we walked out to the mailbox to see if that big white envelope was here. And week after week, it wasn't here. Just in case it was a day or two late, we did the same thing on Thursdays and Fridays, then by Saturday we had given up all hope of it arriving at all. Kurt was getting irritated, because we were planning to open it at Tracy's house, and she had a nice dinner, cute decorations and fun stuff planned, so they really needed to know WHEN to plan the event. We checked with the Bishop every Sunday, and for like three weeks, his status said "Call has been assigned", so we knew it was coming. On Wednesday April 24th, I went over to the Manti temple to do an endowment session. I wanted to pray in the celestial room about Ty and also about Ashli and Mack as they are in the process of moving to St George and I needed to accept the fact that I won't see them every day:( 

So, anyway.... as I left the dressing room at the temple, I saw sweet little Norma Bramall, from the old Nephi 3rd Ward. I love when I see 3rd warders in the temple. It is the ward where I raised my kids, and there are so many wonderful people there.  As I turned the corner, Sister Ora Mae Mellor was sitting at the desk. She is the wife of our former 3rd ward bishop, Chuck Mellor. So that was another amazing moment. Then I went to get the name of the person for whom I would be serving that day, and Sister Dixie Boswell, also from the Nephi 3rd ward,  was the one who escorted me through the new name curtain to begin my session. The new name that day was SO special to me. I cried before I even left the cubicle. Dixie hugged me and told me how much she loves our family, asked if Ty had his call yet and told me to be patient. Her husband, Lynn, was Tyler's cub scout leader when he was 8 years old. Ty was the ONLY boy in the den, and week after week, Lynn planned amazing projects for Ty, while Dixie made treats and handled it as if there were a den full of boys. They had a tremendous influence on Tyler's life. 

About two years ago, their son, Brent, published a book "Brother's Bones"and asked Ty to be the cover model for his book, so the family means a lot to us, and it was so great to share that moment with Dixie on Wednesday. As I entered the chapel, I saw Adria Packard, Tyler's first stunt partner from the Snow College cheer squad. I was struck by the fact that on the day I was there to pray about Ty, I was surrounded by people who have had a profound influence on his life in the past, present and future. It was an amazing, humbling feeling. In the world room, I looked up to see the painting of Christoper Columbus, which always reminds me of Ty because he played Columbus in the Nephi Elementary School 1st grade play (of which Dixie Boswell was the director). So it was an amazing temple session, and I was just sure that I would find a mission call waiting at home when I returned from Manti that Wednesday. 

But alas.... 

So by Thursday, Kurt was getting really upset. I quit texting him back, because I really didn't know what to say. The Bishop could only check the status and there was not much we could do beyond that except wait. So, what did I do? Took a nap, of course. And dreamed that the mission call was in the box for apartment B because we had put the wrong box number on his mission papers. I jumped up from my nap, called Ty and asked  him to come over to my place so we could just look online and make sure we had given them the right address. I called Ken and asked him to go over to the post office and see if Kevin Bright could get us into the box for B in case the call was there. Ty got online,and sure enough, we had NO box number on his mission papers. He emailed the church to explain what had happened and asked if they could send the call to our PO box.  He no sooner hit "Send" than his cell phone rang. It was the institute secretary, who told him that his call was over at the post office and if he didn't pick it up that day, they would have to send it back to Salt Lake. Kevin had been calling bishops from the YSA wards for the previous week to try and locate Ty, as his call had arrived with no box number. It just didn't click to him that Ty was mine, as Kevin has now been delivering my mail for over a year with my new last name, and just didn't register that it was Allred before. He didn't think to call home wards, because most kids in Ephraim go to singles wards, so our bishop didn't get a call from Kevin that week. Kevin finally thought to call the institute and see if they could locate Ty. So when they called, we jumped in the jeep and headed to the post office. As we turned the corner from  Main Street, Ken called my cell and said that he was holding Ty's call in his hands. He had gone into the post office just as all of this was unfolding and it all finally came together. We met Ken in the parking lot, and Ty finally had his call! Kurt was working in Cedar City, so we waited until Saturday the 27th to open it in Nephi. 

 We all showed up in Yankees gear, because that's what we do. When Riken arrived in his "New York fan" onesie, noone even imagined that Tyler would be called to the ONE mission out of 405 missions in the church where Yankee stadium is located. Sure, he had hoped that he'd go there, but never once did anyone think it would actually happen.

This kid LOVES New York. This FAMILY loves New York. Tracy's family loves New York. We love the city, the state, the Yankees, the whole works. When people talk about their dream vacations, this is ours. Not Hawaii or the Caribbean. New York. And Ty gets to serve there for two years. This is no accident. Our Heavenly Father knows my son personally. There is absolutely no place Tyler would rather go to serve his mission, and I am so grateful that this is the place where he gets to be. It's a blessing that Tyler deserves 100%. He is a good man and he will be an amazing missionary. 

 Lots of people were there to support Ty, but I was especially grateful for my beautiful sister and nieces for being there as I went to Tracy's house for the first time. Tami had run a half-marathon that morning, and the girls had a track meet, but they came to support Ty even after a long and crazy day for their family.

Ah, my amazing kids. I love them all so much. They all bring something different and beautiful to my life, and I look forward to the amazing things we will see from all of them in the years to come. Check out the baseball caps. Not planned. It's just what we wear every day. We are psychotic Yankees fans. In fact, we leave in two days for a vacation to Denver which has been planned for six months. To see the Yankees play the Rockies. We heart New York. His call is no coincidence. My heart is full.

Oh, yeah... and THIS guy. I am so blessed. 

MS Walk 2013

So my husband has 9 kids now. Three biological, three stepkids from his former marriage, and my three kids.  Last Saturday, we had the awesome opportunity to do the MS Walk with his two biological daughters. Jenny, on the left, is his daughter with his former wife to whom he was married for 24 years. And Mallory, on the right, he didn't meet until 2011.   

Mal asked us to join her team Rammer Jammer for the MS Walk this year, and we were thrilled to help her raise money for a cause she believes in, but I had no idea how moved I would be by the whole experience. 

  Mallory was raised by an amazing Mom named Becky and a wonderful man named Nick Michoff. Becky married Nick around the same time I married Ken, but they had been together for many, many years before that. Mallory was so happy when her Mom got married, and we were so happy for all of them. 

Nick passed away about a year ago, and it meant a lot to me to see Ken wear Nick's name on the back of his shirt for the walk.  

I was nervous about meeting Becky. Ken hadn't seen her for over 25 years and I just didn't know how it would go, but she was so gracious and sweet, and it was just a wonderful day where we all came together out of love for Mallory and to honor Nick. 

Empty Nest... Again

This is Rike today. Uncle Zack was watching him while I went to what I HOPE was my last college math class EVER.  I just have to pass the final and I'm home free. 

Rike's Mom was in St George on a job interview for a company she really wants to work for.

And I'm kind of freaking out tonight. I see Ashli and Riken EVERY.SINGLE.DAY!!! How will I EVER handle them living in St George? Riken changes every day. Like all of a sudden today he is holding his own bottle. I held it yesterday and today he doesn't want to be held while he eats. He just wants to hold his own bottle and be a big boy. He laughs now. He even tried to do pat-a-cake today. How can I stand it when I miss him growing up on a day-to-day basis? This is SO much harder than I ever imagined it could be. 

I've done this already. Cried buckets of tears when Ashli went to college. Freaked out and went crazy on the way home from dropping Zack off at college. I prepared myself for the empty nest. So when life turned out so unexpectedly the way it did this past year, and I ended up living here in Ephraim with ALL THREE of my adult kids, it seemed too good to be true. And, it was:( Tyler's mission call will probably be here tomorrow. Ashli will probably get the call tomorrow that she got the job. And I have to do the empty nesting grief all over again. Thank goodness I have Zack right next door. I hope he and I both live here for a long, long time to come!!! 

Highlights this week

 Highlights of the week... grandbabies:) We had both Rylee and Riken here for a little bit on Monday night. I LOVE being a grandma:) 

 Ty spent most of the week here with us, as he was recuperating from having all four of his wisdom teeth plus a funky little front tooth removed on Monday in preparation for his mission. It was SO great to have him here. But this.... .he's going to miss Riken SO much while he's on his mission. And I'm going to miss Ty so much. I'm super proud of him and I know he'll be an even better man for the experiences he will have in the mission field, but man, I'm going to miss him. 

I sure love these guys. 

Ty's Patriarchal Blessing

Tyler got his Patriarchal Blessing tonight, as we prepare for him to receive his mission call, hopefully in the next week or two. Our Patriarch here in the Ephraim stake is Brother LeMar Hansen, and he is just an amazing man. 

I love that Ty got his blessing on Easter Sunday, and that all of us (me, Ken, Kurt, and Tracy) were here to participate in this experience with him. Kurt and I were the only ones back in the room with Ty and the Patriarch, but Ken and Tracy were in the front room with Sister Hansen, and it was just a beautiful experience for all of us. I can't remember every amazing thing Brother Hansen said, but here are some of the highlights. 

He told him more than once that Heavenly Father wanted him to know that He loves him. He said those were the most important words he would say throughout the blessing. 

He told Ty that he was placed in a situation in which he would be surrounded by good people to help him. He told him that people would hold his name in high esteem, that he would be confident and do great things to make the world a better place. 

He told him that history would not repeat itself. 

He said Ty would be a great husband and father. 

It was a really powerful blessing. Of course I cried through the whole thing. 

Like I'll cry when his mission call comes, and when he gets married, and blesses his first child, and all of the other times I'm going to weep with sheer love for this boy. 

BUSY-NESS

SUPER DUPER busy around here, which is GGGGRRREEAATTT!!! I used to brag to my kids that "I am the BUSIEST person ALIVE!" but then I heard President Uchtdorf's talk in general conference about not wearing our busy-ness as a badge of honor, so I had to lay off on saying that. lol. 

http://www.lds.org/general-conference/2012/10/of-regrets-and-resolutions

It is nice to be busy, though. I love it. 

Let's see. where to start? 

 Riken's Blessing was AMAZING! Tyler blessed him in the Moroni 3rd Ward on April 10, 2013, and he did a beautiful job:) I'm so proud of him. 

 We finally got to meet Zack's girlfried McKenna the weekend of the blessing. She's adorable. Super quiet, which is hard to get used to, but we adore her:) 

 Of course there's THIS guy:) LOVE HIM!!!!! 

I had NO idea my Grandma was coming to Riken's blessing, and I was SO excited to see her walk into the chapel. We couldn't do a 5 generation picture, per se, because my Mom passed away in 1987,but my Dad stepped up to stand in her spot for our photo. 

GREAT-GREAT GRANDMA Wilma Rebecca Abrams Freston Swenson Hunsaker 

GREAT-GRANDPA Thomas Jefferies Callister (wife was Rebecca Freston Swenson Callister) 

GRANDMA Tina Rebecca Callister Allred Carlson

MOM Ashli Rebecca Allred Brown

BABY Riken J. Brown  

Super awesome, yeah? 

Last Saturday we had a great Relief Society women's conference here in the Ephraim stake, and I was surprised to see Corinne Jenkins, who had been my visiting teacher for 10 years or so when I lived in Nephi. I went over to say hi to her after the meeting, and she, being 88 years old, had no idea who I was. Kind of broke my heart a little tiny bit. Getting old isn't fun. I'm ALREADY forgetting things and I'm only.... well, you know, only 29 and 15 or so. 

One of Ken's friends passed away this past week, and the funeral was yesterday. His daughter is one of the girls in our Sunday School class, and she gave a beautiful tribute to her Dad at the funeral. Things like this really make me appreciate the ones I love and how fragile life is. Kevin was one of the people who was immediately warm and loving to me when I moved to Ephraim, just because I was Ken's. They love Ken, so they love me. It's a wonderful feeling and part of the reason Ephraim feels like home to me. Kevin will be missed. There wasn't room to hold all of the people who attended his funeral. Chairs were set up clear to the back wall of the cultural hall, then they started lining up chairs in the hallways outside the chapels, the relief society room filled up, and people were standing anywhere in the building where they could hear the speakers from the chapel. It was a beautiful tribute to a great man. 

Then my final thought for this week. Kurt and I have been sending emails back and forth lately. It's easier than texting when we have more than a couple sentences to say,  and a phone call doesn't always come at exactly the right time. Emails can be opened, pondered and answered at the reader's convenience. It works for us. Well, in this one email, I was thinking a lot about how I used to treat people when I was married to Kurt. He is a huge flirt, he knows it, and I don't think it would bother him to know that I said it here. But I didn't know how to handle it, so I ended up just giving people (particularly beautiful young women) the cold shoulder when I knew he was friends with them. We'd be out in public and I'd completely ignore these people. I didn't realize at the time just how poorly I was handling the situation. Recently I've been going through something where someone is doing the same thing to Ashli and I can see how hurtful it is. I hate that I used to act like that, and I'm really embarrassed now that I did it. So if any of you beautiful women from Nephi read this, and I was rude to you because my ex-husband was your friend, I'm sorry!!!! Well, I wanted to tell Kurt I was sorry, too. So I told him in an email, and he responded saying that it was time for us to quit apologizing for the past. He said if he had to apologize for every time he'd hurt me, he'd be very unproductive because he wouldn't have time for anything else. lol. He said he was sorry for all of the hurt he caused me and he hoped we could just move on now and be friends, not just the kids' parents.  I wanted to hear that for a long time. He did hurt me. But I hurt him too. And it truly doesn't even matter anymore. I absolutely ADORE Ken, and he is the perfect man for me. I'm also really grateful that Kurt and I had our kids together, because I think we had the same ideas about parenting, and we did a pretty good job at raising kids. So all of the other stuff needs to finally just be put away. The hurt is gone. I don't like hug him when I see him or anything, but yeah, I think we can be friends. It feels a whole lot better than carrying around all the hatred and bitterness that I had for so long. 

The Men in My New Family

I found this old post in my drafts. I'm not sure what I wanted to say when I put the pictures up, but I'll go ahead and publish it now. 

Ken's Dad, Ralph Lee Carlson, is the same age as my Grandma. He just turned 87 and she'll be 87 in September. We won't have either of them for much longer in the big scheme of things. even if we get another decade, which would be AWESOME!!!! Ken's Dad had a stroke before Christmas, but didn't really know what was going on and didn't tell anyone. Ken's brother Gary noticed that his handwriting was a little shakier than usual on his Christmas card, and that's when it was figured out. Ralph is very independent. He has a car and does his own thing.  Ken's brother Steven does live with him, so that's good. Well, anyway, he was out shoveling snow one day after the holidays, and had another stroke. He fell and had to crawl up to the back porch to get Steven. He ended up in the VA hospital for a couple weeks, where some of his paralysis did resolve and he was able to go home with a walker and the promise of help from Steven. These are photos from the time we spent in the hospital visiting Ralph. 

My baby. I love him:) 

I had met all of the brothers at our wedding, but it was a crazy day and I didn't really get to know any of them. I hadn't seen any of them since, until we met up with Gary and Donald at the hospital, now 16 months after our wedding. They're intimidating. They have very strong opinions and we don't see eye to eye on everything, but I love them, and I feel safe when I'm in a room with the Carlson men. It's amazing to me how much alike they all are, even though they live scattered across the state and don't see each other that often. If  I closed my eyes, I wouldn't really know who was speaking at any one time, they sound so much alike and use the same phrases. 

It had been a really busy  weekend. I hadn't even had time to do my nails. lol. So Ken took care of my pedicure for me. I'm spoiled. I know. :) 

We got a late start Friday because every time Ken wants to leave town, some cable TV problem comes up and he gets stuck at work. Yup, that's the life of being married to the cable guy. So we finally got to Salt Lake to see Ralph for a little while, then headed to Bountiful where we got a room for the night because we were going to the temple the following morning with Dave and Tami. My Uncle Buzz and Aunt Dorothy work in the Bountiful temple on Saturdays, and we go to have the AMAZING experience of having Buzz being a veil worker on our session. This has only happened once before for me, when my Uncle Matt was working at the veil in Salt Lake, and this time was just as awesome as that one. LOVED IT:) 

After the temple, it was back to Salt Lake to visit some more with Ralph, Donald and Gary at the hospital, then back to Bountiful to have lunch with Ken's daughter, Mallory. It was crazy, but super great. I love having a great big family!!!! 

Going Public

I just came across this amazing blog

http://stodandlittlev.blogspot.com/

 

and decided that if she can be brave enough to make her blog public,

I can too.

So we're public again.

I've been working on family history lately, so I was already thinking about

making the blog public. I would LOVE to read things about our ancestors, so hopefully

my grandkids and great grandkids will want access to this someday, too.

 



Tyler's Ordination

Tyler was ordained an Elder on February 17, 2013 in the Ephraim 1st Ward by Ken Carlson. It was a beautiful day where lots of people came together to support an amazing young man.

 Kelton and Tyler have been best friends forever. They are both amazing young men and I can't wait to see what the future holds for both of them.

 My beautiful kids make my life complete.

 The men in Tyler's life are so supportive and great to him. This was a good day!

 Yay!! I love having Tyler in our ward and loved hearing my husband ordain my son today. It was beautiful:)

 This picture makes me smile. It reminds me of us straightening Ashli's veil for her bridal photos. We didn't do everything right, but Kurt and I had some great kids!!!!

 I feel so safe and secure having these two in my life. They are two of the best men I've ever known and I am so blessed.

The women:) I'm so glad we're all at a place where we can do this for him and I hope we can start building many more wonderful memories as one big happy family:) 

I'm at the VA hospital visiting my father-in-law who had a stroke on Monday. And I needed to stretch for a minute. This place is SO depressing:( These men and women were willing to give their lives for our country and this is the best care we can give them? Ugh. Send me to bldg 3