Thoughts From The Old Testament.

Hey everyone!

It has been a long time since I have posted on my blog-but I decided that I enjoy writing my thoughts and feelings down so I decided to pick it up again! Today I want to share a cool insight I had while studying my scriptures this afternoon (How can you not enjoy studying the scriptures while looking outside at Heavenly Father's beautiful ocean and earth?!) Anyway, I have decided to study the Old Testament and surprisingly am loving it. I am finally starting to catch on to all the lineage and all the individuals who have paved the path for us in the Gospel and I am loving that. I currently reading about Jacob, Or Israel, and how He gave the main birthright and greater blessings to Ephraim-who became one of the Twelve Tribes of Israel. It was so interesting to me that this was bestowed upon Him, and not his brother Manasseh, who is the elder brother. That being said, I realized that many of us are from the tribe of Ephraim and that we have a great responsibility...except that I didn't quite know what that responsibility was! So, I did some digging. I learned that individuals who are of the tribe of Ephraim are to: bear the Priesthood, raise an ensign to the scattered nations to bring them together again, and to share the Gospel with all the world. Those seem like pretty big responsibilities to me-and I was perplexed at how I could do this better in my life! While thinking of this I also started thinking about my Patriarchial Blessing, and how I have always wondered why it seemed rather short compared to some of my family members. (For those who don't know what this is-it is a blessing given to an individual by an ordained Patriarch of our Church, who is the spokesperson for our Heavenly Father while giving the blessing. It gives us our lineage and advice and counsel)1221 I stumbled across an address given by President James E. Faust that talks about Patriarchial Blessings, and in it he said (and this is not an exact quote): Length does not matter-mine is only about three quarters of a page (that is the length of mine!!) and it is adequate for my needs. I loved that! For some reason I really needed to be humbled and comforted to know that my blessing IS adequate for my needs, and that I can be happy about that. I was so grateful for that guided tender mercy Heavenly Father gave to me. Now, after thinking about that, the words from this Primary Song came into my mind: "I know who I am, I know God's plan, I'll follow Him in faith. I believe in the Savior Jesus Christ, I'll honor His name. I'll do what is right, I'll follow His light, HIs truth I will proclaim"! There. That was it. That was how I could better live up to my responsibilities as a member of the Tribe of Ephraim, and how I can be more content with my Patriarchial Blessing. I DO know who I am-I am a Daughter of God who loves me, and I have divine worth and potential and a purpose here on earth! I DO know that I love the Gospel and my Savior and that I DO believe in Him and that He IS there for us. I DO know we ALL have a plan, and I want to follow Him. (Even though sometimes I am very bad at it). I can be a missionary by loving those around me and serving with a smile. That will be my goal for this week while we are in Hawaii! Anyway, I just wanted to share my testimony with all of you and hope that it touches someone's life-if not now then maybe in the future. I love this Gospel and I love my life. So thankful for my family and friends and the chance to be a member of the LDS Church. And to be here in beautiful Hawaii! God is good and He is real. Love you all. Happy Saturday!

Christmas Break

2015. The year I had my first Christmas away from home. I will admit, I was really nervous about how I was going to react not being with my parents. Surprinsgly though, I only cried twice-neither of which were on Christmas Eve or Christmas Day, so I would call that a success! 😂 Even though I missed my parents, I had an absolute BLAST with my Rowan Family. It was so fun! I was so thankful to spend a relaxing week with them and to create some new holiday traditions. One of my favorite things about the week was playing games galore! We played Banagrams, Spot It, Cap Game, Spoons, Heads Up, (I proudly beat Dad Rowan in that game) and more! It was so fun being able to play and laugh with each other every night. I also loved the trip we took to Mariposa and the lovely meal we had up there! And who could forget the Rowan Christmas cookie decorating party, or the Family Feud Holiday Style on Christmas Eve? It was GREAT. So many new fun memories. One of the things that touched me most though was what Mom Rowan did for me for our Christmas Sunday Supper. She contacted my parents before we came to California, and asked what my favorite holiday dish was. (Green Bean Casserole, obviously!) then she made it for part of our dinner to make me feel more at home. That meant the world to me, and I was so grateful for that and ALL the love I felt from my immediate Rowan family and from my extended Rowan family as well. 

After Christmas we flew to Arizona to spend a few days to be with my parents, which was also a blast! My grandma, Aunt, Uncle and three cousins were all in town so we got to spend time with them which was so nice. We celebrated my Aunt Christine's birthday by grilling pizzas and having cake and ice cream, we went to lunch with friends, played Top Golf (which was SO fun) and got to see the new house we will be coming home to this year! 

All in all it was quite the memorable winter break. I am so thankful for all the family Scott and I have who love us so much and who do so much for us. I am especially thankful that I have my best friend by my side to share and create all these fun memories with. Happy New Year! 

Coloring With Emily! 

Sunday Dinner

Love these two.

Christmas Cookie Party! 

Christmas Eve. 

Christmas Bingo! 

Family Selfie 

I love my Cat! 

Top Golf! 

New house! 

Thankful.

Things I am Thankful For:

• A job that I love
• Rainy Days
• The peaceful and still quiet moments of a morning during a snowfall or afterwards.
• Decorations. I love making our home feel more "homey", and I love all the things you can make or buy these days.
• The dollar section at Target. That's my go to holiday decoration stop. 
• BYU football games-they are so dang fun.
• Christmas Bingo 
• Friends to hangout with who uplift us and make us want to be better people.
• A home to live in-while it may not be perfect, it's ours, and we are very blessed. 
• A car to get to work in
• Scott's education at BYU, as well as mine.
• The ability to think, create, hear, listen, and communicate. Such a blessing.
• My agency and the ability to make choices for myself
• The scriptures-I have been learning so much from them lately.
• All the resources available to me to learn more about the Gospel-Lds.org, Mormon Messages, Gospel Library apps, BYU speeches, etc.
• Books
• Stationary-I love writing notes to people and cute and happy it makes me (and hopefully them) feel.
• Visiting teaching-I love my companion, the girls we visit, and those who visit me!
• Nursery-at times it is crazy, and sometimes I hate it-but it teaches me patience and love and those kids are so darn cute. I definitely need the humbling and lessons in how to be a mom!
• People in the ward who just show love and kindness towards us.
• Games. I am loving playing games as of lately and just challenging myself and those around me and learning to laugh and have fun!
• Tim Tam slams. Did those for my first time and it was so fun.
• Good doctors and nurses and all other healthcare professionals who help me to be healthy and feel better.
• Weight Watchers- (when I stick to it) it changes my life and helps me to be so much more confident and happy with myself.
• Kind strangers who just make my day. 
• A family who shows me everyday what true kindness and selflessness looks like-they are all such a great example to me.
• A husband who works so hard daily to learn, grow, and prepare to provide for our family. I love how responsible he is, but yet how loving and caring and selfless he is to me and all those around him-he always makes time for those in need.
• My Savior-who loves me even when I disobey and make mistakes-He loves me unconditionally.

Happy Belated Thanksgiving everybody. Enjoy the holiday season!

Six Months: What I have Learned So Far

Hey everyone!

It has been awhile since my last post, and as I have thought about what I wanted to write about, it seemed fitting to write about Scott and I since we hit our six month mark of being married this past week! Here are some things we have learned about each other:

What Scott Has Learned About Me (Yes, In His Own Words): 

I am completely OCD about cleanliness

I have an aversion to doing the dishes

I can go from completely lethargic to cheerleader mode in an extremely short amount of time

I can't go to bed without a sweet treat

I can pump myself up really well when I am working out

I love happy shows-happy anything, really

I would rather sleep with the window open and three blankets on, then the window being shut and only having one blanket

I am really cute in the morning when I am sleepy

I am not subtle. AT ALL. 

I have a good understanding of when it's time to be serious, and when it is time to party

I hate having nothing to do 

What I Have Learned About Scott: 

He is very OCD about the kitchen being clean 

He is NOT a morning person

He has a strange aversion to cold meats and leftover foods 

He forgets everything we have in the pantry and fridge. Literally everything. (So half the stuff goes bad because he doesn't eat it)

He loves working out and training for triathalons

He does not like taking naps very often

He has a secret obsession with some Eminem songs 

He is very witty and goofy all at the same time 

He LOVES reading new books

He hardly goes shopping for himself and doesn't understand my need to have things

He is extremely responsible and hard-working every.single.day

He is more selfless than anyone I know

Here Are Some Things That Have Happened To Us Since We Have Been Married: 

We said goodbye to Grandpa Rowan (Whom we love very much)

We said hello to our new nephew Jacob 

We attended 5 weddings together

We went to Lake Powell for the Fourth of July

We had our first Rowan Family Reunion as a couple

I started two new jobs

Scott has completed two semesters of school and is finishing his third in the past six months 

Scott started a Research Position at school 

We have been to countless doctors time and time again

We got our own insurance 

We paid to have our car fixed up 

We have made our house a home

So, I know that some of this is silly, but in all seriousness it has been amazing to learn more about each other and to grow closer to one another. I am so grateful to have Scott by my side and for ALL that he does for me. I mean it when I say he is the most selfless person I know-and I am so thankful for that. He shows his love to me every day by word and deed and I can only hope to become more like him. Thanks for all the adventures Scott-I love you! Happy Six Months!

A Little Bit About Life As An SLT

Hey everyone!

I have been getting asked a lot recently about my new job, so I decided I might as well make a post about it to explain what I do! First off-I know many of you are wondering, what is an SLT? An SLT is a Speech-Language Technician or, in other states a Speech-Language Aide. I graduated from BYU with my Bachelor's Degree in Communication Disorders (which is Speech Pathology and Audiology), but unfortunately did not get into Graduate School to get my masters-and I was devastated. I had no idea what to do with my degree, until I heard about this "SLT" thing from one of my friends at work. I ended up going to a week-long institute in Salt Lake City, where I was taught and trained how to give speech therapy to children. After a couple of months of searching and searching for a job as an SLT, I finally landed one with Alpine School District-and I LOVE IT.

So, what is it that I do everyday? Basically, I just get to work with the kids. As an SLT I work under the supervision of my Speech-Language Pathologist and help them with whatever they need. I am not assigned my own caseload, as I cannot handle all of the legal documents that are involved since I do not have a master's degree, but I can help to handle data and therapy sessions with their supervision. Supervision is KEY. I am in no way capable of assessing or diagnosing anyone with speech disorders-I am only allowed to help the remediation process.

I currently work in three different schools, with three different SLP's helping me, and it is GREAT. I work at Hillcrest Elementary in Orem on Mondays and Wednesdays, Forbes Elementary in American Fork on Tuesdays and Thursdays, and at the preschools at Northridge Elementary on Fridays. It is absolutely crazy running around everywhere-but I LOVE it. I get to work with so many different kids, and I love learning therapy techniques from all my SLP's. I work with kids from preschool to 6th grade-some who are regular-ed students, some who are part regular-ed and part resource kids, and some who are in life skills classes. I work with kids not just on their sounds (for example, their "r's" or "l's") but with social skills, basic concepts, WH-Questions, story telling, etc. It is an absolute BLAST. I love learning how to become a better teacher and therapist, and I love the experience I am gaining. Most of all though, I LOVE the kids. They all have such sweet spirits, and truly are special children of our Heavenly Father. All of them. I love seeing them learn, grow, and progress and to learn how to use the incredible gift of communication. It really is such a blessing! I love how they make me laugh, as hard as it is all day, and how they bring out the good in this world. I love getting to be creative with them and to do silly lessons, play games, paint and color, eat candy, and many other things to get the therapy rolling. Basically, I just love my job. I feel so incredibly blessed to have this job and can't wait to see what the rest of the year brings for me. So there you have it folks-my life as an SLT!

The Good, The Bad, and the Blessings.

So, I finally decided to create a blog. Can you believe it? I never thought that I would be the type of girl to start a blog...but here I am. And let me tell you, it feels great. I am so excited for this new hobby and adventure of mine-documenting my life! I have never been great at writing in my journal, but this is a fun way for me to update people on my life as well as to record memories of everything that has been going on. So...let me give you a re-cap on the past 5 months of married life!

For starters, when people ask me how "Married Life" is going, I always tell them two things. 1. The "Married" part is great. 2. The "Life" part is hard. Obviously, right? Well, I will admit that I had this idea in my head that everything was going to work out perfectly and that I would have the perfect apartment, the perfect job, and be the perfect housewife-but boy was I wrong. After an incredible wedding and honeymoon, we drove back up to Provo to our new apartment to find it completely in shambles. There were spiders, bees, and centipedes everywhere, and nothing had been properly cleaned. The door was slightly broken, which leads me to my next story-the next day when I started my new job working in an Autistic preschool. I woke up after spending the night on a deflated blow up mattress with bugs crawling everywhere to get ready for the day, and was for once going to be on time! I was so excited for my new job. Scott had already left for school, and I was just about to leave when I found a worm by our front door. I cleaned it up and went to take it outside, shutting the door behind me so nothing else would crawl in...and that's when the unthinkable happened. I had locked myself out of our new apartment-where my phone and keys were inside-and our landlords lived in SLC-but I had no way to contact anyone. I freaked out and well, broke through the door-breaking it completely. I called Scott bawling my eyes out about how I had broken our door and how now someone was going to break in and steal all of our wedding gifts, and basically just had a meltdown. So there's that. Anyway, after a few months of water leaking everywhere, doors breaking, both toilets shutting down, the dryer burning our clothes and sheets, and calling pest control we finally got settled into our apartment and are now loving it. 

In addition to my mental breakdown about our apartment, I had a breakdown about who I was as a person-which is hard for me to admit. There were a lot of complications with my job this summer, and I was left to spend a lot of days completely alone with nothing to do. I was devastated that I had not gotten into Graduate School for my Speech Therapy program, and was unsure of what Heavenly Father had in plan for me. I was MISERABLE, to say the least. I watched everyday as Scott got up to go to school and work, and felt that I was a complete failure. Sure, I could clean the house and run errands and cook a meal, but I felt that I had completely lost my passion for life-which was hard for me. Thankfully, I had wonderful family members and friends who encouraged me to pursue a new job as a Speech and Language Technician, which I was finally able to secure and am now loving it. (More details to come on that in a future post).

I know that to most of you this may not sound like a big trial, but to me, it was. I was truly just lost. I was away from home for the first time in the summer, was living with a man all of the sudden, and was no longer the school-girl that I had been for the majority of my life. As I look back on it all now though, I have started to realize what a blessing this all has turned out to be. I realized that I can work through hard things, and that I don't have to live in the most perfect apartment. I am also realizing that the way my apartment look does not define my "housewife" status, and that not everyone is perfect. I have realized that there is more to life than school, and that I have unknown talents that I am working to strengthen to use to help others. Most importantly though, I have learned two main things: what an INCREDIBLE husband I have, and how much love my Heavenly Father has for me. I don't know all the reasons as to why Heavenly Father let me go through these trials, but I do know that He is always there for me. He knows what I need, and I am learning to put my faith in Him and trust in his plans for me. I truly do believe that He knows all things, and that He loves me. I know that Scott is such a blessing in my life, and that he was meant for me. Heavenly Father knew I would need him. Not only does he bring sunshine and laughter into my life, he is so incredibly good and patient with me. He has never once doubted me or called me a failure, and has constantly built me up and carried the burdens for both of us when I shut down and couldn't take it anymore. He is such a blessing to me, and I am so thankful for his Christlike patience and love that he shows to me every day. 

So, there you have it. That's a short summary of what my summer has looked like-and although it has been hard, things have never been better. I love my Savior, my husband, and my life-and I can't wait to see what being a Rowan has in store for me in the future. Thanks for reading, everyone-and Happy Thursday! <3