Good intentions...

I always start journals with the best of intentions..to write frequently and intently so that I can someday pass my history and life on to my future generations. However, as I have briefed over them throughout the years, I am always amazed at how LITTLE I actually write. I am so infrequent and sporadic in my ramblings, that it is truly quite pathetic. It always makes me think of the phrase... "the best intentions" and how the beginning part of that phrase is preceded with the words, "The road to Hell is paved with...".


Anyhow - here I find myself once again in a similar situation, only having substituted my previous days of writing in a journal with "blogging" online. So - since I seem to be getting only one post a month done - I am setting a goal to post at LEAST 2 times a month. Please - gently remind me if I am getting behind, or if there is anything you think I should post about. THANKS, oh faithful readers and friends!!


July is here - and almost 1/4 gone already. I am pretty excited about a bunch of things for this month... let me tell you the top 8 things that I am excited about for July.


#1.... Bailey Reunion (OK - this technically already happened... but it was marvelous, nonetheless. Everyone deserves a vacay like we just enjoyed in Utah. See pics below!)




#2.... Our HOME building process which has officially begun. It will be exciting to watch the progress of our future home and to try to document it all and to choose out the tile, etc. So fun!


#3.... GIRL'S CAMP!!! This is going to be a sentimental year for me. It is my 5th consecutive year going to Camp in this stake. (And my last one, as we will be in another Stake next summer...see #2). We have fantastic things planned - I just hope that I can figure out how to make a power point CD in the next few days.


#4.... MY BIRTHDAY! Yup - I am actually excited for it. When I turned 30 - I dreaded it. I had a hard time. I probably would still be pouting about it somewhere if it weren't for my cousin Carol who turned it into a fun and memorable day!

Now that I am turning 34 - I feel like it sort of justifies the gray tint of my hair and my extreme plagues of constant fatigue and associated laziness!


#5..... My sister Jennie is coming to visit us at the end of the month. She lives all the way in Arizona, and our kids don't get to play together that often, so they are WAY excited for the chance to hang out with them. I know from personal experience how totally awesome cousin time is!





#6..... I will be that much closer to my due date! Hooray. I am not sure what I am more excited about this time... having a sweet baby to hold...FINALLY, or spending 2-3 days inside of an air-conditioned hospital room! =) Haha.



#7.... We read our 50th book for Book Club! Hooray. Here is the list of the 50 books we've read so far...

1. Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte
2. To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee
3. Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen
4. Magnificent Obsession by Lloyd C. Douglas
5. The Chosen by Chaim Potok
6. Alas Babylon by Harry Hart Frank
7. My Antonia by Willa Cather
8. The Good Earth by Pearl S. Buck
9. Cry, The Beloved Country by Alan Paton
10. Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain
11. Great Expectations by Charles Dickens
12. So Big by Edna Ferber
13. Anne of Green Gables by L.M. Montgomery
14. The Scarlet Pimpernel by Baroness Orczy
15. Mere Christianity by C.S. Lewis
16. Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens
17. The Great Divorce by C.S. Lewis
18. Rebecca by Daphne Du Maurier
19. A Tree Grows in Brooklyn by Betty Smith
20. Man’s Search for Meaning by Viktor E. Frankl
21. All Creatures Great and Small by James Herriot
22. The Moonstone by Wilkie Collins
23. Gulliver’s Travels by Jonathan Swift
24. The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne
25. Far From the Madding Crowd by Thomas Hardy
26. Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe
27. Silas Marner by George Eliot
28. The Awakening by Kate Chopin
29. Little Women by Louisa May Alcott
30. A Room with a View by E.M. Forster
31. Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck
32. A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens
33. The Little Prince by Antoine de Saint-Exupery
34. The Phantom of the Opera by Gaston Leroux
35. Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte
36. The Screwtape Letters by C.S. Lewis
37. That Printer of Udells by Harold Bell Wright
38. Emma by Jane Austen
39. Little Britches by Ralph Moody
40. Death Be Not Proud by John Gunther
41. Frankenstein by Mary Shelley
42. Les Miserables (abridged) by Victor Hugo
43. The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald
44. Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stevenson
45. The Invisible Man by H.G. Wells
46. The Power of Positive Thinking by Norman Vincent Peale
47. The Age of Innocence by Edith Wharton
48. As I Lay Dying by William Faulkner
49. Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury
50. Exodus by Leon Uris

I love thinking about how enriched my life has been by absorbing all of that great classical literature. We decided that we are going to have a major party when we reach 100books! I LOVE my Book Club.



#8..... I am going to be doing a Round Robin Quilt. This is like a "make-a-row-and-pass-it-on-to-someone-else-to-finish-it" type of quilt. I am way excited to get started! I am thinking of doing blues and greens for baby Mile's room! Woot Woot!



Well - there are my top 8 thing to be excited about for July. Hope yours is wonderful as well!