My Dear Friends

      Coming up on Saturday, one of my very dearest friends, Kim Mortensen, is coming to visit me all the way from Taylorsville and she's bringing my adopted daughters (her own daughters, of course) with her.  It is a surprise for the younger kids (Alexia and Audrey already know and being that they, too, are best friends, have been texting each other excitedly about it for weeks).  I really need her visit right now, but more on that later.  It is not often that you find people who make you feel like you can say or do just about anything and they will still love you.  Not only will they love you, but they will do those things right along with you.   Kim is one of few people who will go for an early morning run with me and stick by me even if my flatulence may be acting up that morning, or if my complaining level is especially high.  She acts like a dork just like me, running, jumping, and screaming through IHOP parking lots when we see each other for the first time in a year.  She will sit and cry with me when I am feeling down and she forgives me when I make mistakes.  I have many plans for when she comes, but my most important plan will be just to be together, not really caring what we do. 

     I have another dear friend, Carina Bennett, who has also made plans to come and visit me in February.  I don't know yet if they will come to fruition, but I sure do hope they will!!  This woman is amazing.  She has five beautiful kids who are smart  and well-behaved.  She is humble and kind and one of the most giving people I have ever met.  She makes you feel happy just by being around her.  She has the same paranoias as I do, so I don't feel silly sharing them with her--whether they are about myself, my kids, my calling, school, whatever.  I can tell her anything and usually she has felt the same way.  She too, is a total goofball when she wants to be and it makes my life so much fun.  She participated in the Dirty Dash with me, Kim, my baby sister Sam, and another dear friend, Cheryl, back in 2011 before I had to go and move to dumb old Texas.  I am convinced to this day that she had more fun playing in the mud than all of us!  She was the first friend I made when we moved to Taylorsville back in 2007, and she has stuck by me through thick and thin.  That is a true friend indeed.

I have many other friends that I would love to write a paragraph each about: Becky Weller, the one who always has wise advice for me, yet also has no problem when my questions have no filters whatsoever--she knows what I mean! =)  Or, Sarah Morgan Ashliman, the friend I have had the longest who gets me T-shirts saying that Safety is Sexy and both of us can laugh hysterically at it while everyone else sits around wondering what the heck we are laughing at!   There is Heidi Lambright, a friend who even after not seeing each other for ten years, can still pick up with me right where we left off, reminiscing and talking for hours on end.  Or Melissa Ivie, a friend that I can tell just about anything to as well, and I know I won't be judged.  She is a friend who will give you whatever she can to make your life that much more bearable and never asks for anything in return.  Then there is little Misterissa Parkinson who was recently married and even in her youth is able to provide endless amounts of wise words for me. I love her and miss her daily. And, don't even get me started on my sisters or my brother, or my parents or my aunt.  I could seriously write a million pages about each of them it seems, so that will have to be saved for another journal entry entirely.  My list of people who love me is endless, it seems.

     Needless to say, I am blessed with amazing people in my life.  I am so lucky to have each and every one of them.  Recently I went through a very trying situation and although it only lasted a few hours, it seemed like an eternity (thus the reason for really needing this visit).  After much soul-searching and prayer following this event, I realized that  I have all of these amazing people in my life who love me unconditionally.  I love those kinds of people!

     So, hurry up, Saturday!!!  I need my Kim and my Alexia and my little Lacey!!  It just can't get here fast enough!!