Good Friends/Grandma's Wisdom

The first Saturday this month was one of the best I've spent in a while.  One of my best friends came up to visit me!  Mary was one of my roommates my first semester of college.  Wow, that was five years ago!  Crazy.  After that first semester, our lives kept going in separate directions.  She went to China, then I went to China, then she moved to Orem to attend UVU, I moved to Logan to attend USU, she got married, I got married....you get the idea.  Currently she lives in Provo with her husband and adorable daughter.  It's been hard to spend time with her very often, since we live far apart and are both married to college students (and thus don't have a lot of money for cross-state trips!) 

The amazing thing about our friendship, though, is that we've never grown apart despite the fact that we don't talk or visit much.  Every time we get together, it's just like old times.  We talk and laugh and have the best time!  I have always admired Mary so much, she is such a strong and smart and funny girl.  She is one of those friends who has changed me for the better.  It makes me so happy that we have managed to stay close despite the distance. 

The reason she was able to visit this month is because a couple of her friends were getting sealed in the Logan Temple.  She and her husband dropped off their darling 15 month old girl, Lily, with Dustin and I at 8 am.  The last time Lily and I met, she was about 3 weeks old, so naturally she was a little nervous about being left with Dustin and I!  She didn't cry though, the whole time we were babysitting.  She just sort of stared at us when we tried to interact with her (like when I tried to give her some pancakes for breakfast), and a couple of times she got off the couch and went to the door, clearly telling us she was done and ready to go!  Finally Dustin found the magic word to get Lily to open up and have fun: "Elmo!"  While I was getting ready, he pulled up some Elmo's World videos on Youtube and Lily just had a blast laughing and chattering and banging on the computer keyboard!  Mary and her husband Aaron took Lily to the luncheon after the sealing, and then came back to hang out with us.  Also, Robert and Kim and Edgar came over, and Michelle, another former roommate of me and Mary.  We had such a great afternoon talking and laughing and getting to know each other all over again.  Isn't it so great to spend time with good old friends?  After everyone left that evening, I just felt so good, sort of filled up with happiness.  That's what good friends can do for a person. I love friends!!

The other thing I wanted to post for today is a conversation I had with my grandma yesterday.  I admit, I'm not really the best granddaughter.  I hardly ever call and talk to my grandparents, and I really should more often.  Well, my grandma is having a surgery tomorrow, and my aunt told me via facebook that she is pretty nervous and would love a phone call from anyone.  So, I called her yesterday, and I am so glad I did.  I talked to her about upcoming surgery for a bit, but mostly we talked about pregnancy and parenthood.  I wanted to record a little of her thoughts, mostly for myself, since this is a journal for me. 

The main thing my grandma said to me, is that you never really grow up until you become a parent.  You may think you're a grown up, but a marriage and a career don't really teach you those crucial life lessons about sacrifice and selflessness and love that only having a child can teach you.  She talked about how amazing it is to have someone so helpless depend on you for literally everything.  Our Father in Heaven is so smart and really knew what he was doing, creating families for us.  There are so many things you learn from being a parent that you just can't learn by doing any other thing. 

Why don't I talk to my grandparents more often?  When I do, I am always amazed by their wisdom.  I have also been learning a lot from a lady I visit teach now, a wonderful 95-year-old woman named Zilla.  I felt awkward the first few times we visited her, since my companion and I are both in our early twenties, expecting our first children, still in the "college student" phase, and Zilla is a great-great-grandmother several times over, who has lived through every major event in American history this century!  However, as we've visited her, I've really come to appreciate her stories and gospel insights.  I find myself thinking, I hope Zilla's grandkids and great-grandkids visit her and learn from her stories while she's still around.  Then I realize, I don't even do this with my own grandparents!  Anyway.  I'm really glad I was able to talk to my grandma.  I  hope her surgery goes well tomorrow, so I can visit her over Thanksgiving break.  I'm sure I have a lot more to learn from her. 

Here is a picture of me and my grandma at my wedding!

(I wanted to put a picture of me and Mary on this post too, but, can you believe it, I don't have a single picture of us on my computer!)