Thankful Challenge Day 1

I've decided for the month of November, until Thanksgiving to challenge myself to each day make a list of things that I am Thankful for. I didn't come up with it until today so we're starting on Nov. 2! But, today's is a list of people that I'm thankful for because they have influenced my life for the better, one way or another.

1. My Mom - How can she NOT influence anyone's life for the better?

2. My Dad - He's always been there and willing to help. And he gave me my love for computers :)

3. A Primary teacher in WA. Laura and I were somewhere between 6-8. I don't remember her name or any real specifics of why but I believe she was one of our primary teachers when we lived in WA and she was one of the kindest most loving people I've ever known and she was a great example

4. An Achievement or Activity Days leader, (whatever the equivalent was 15 or so years ago)

5. Several of my Young Women's leaders. Or most of them! But to name a few, Sister Boyack, Sister Sharp, and Sister Castleton. They were great inspirations and you knew they truly cared for you. They taught me a lot and I appreciated all their hard work, love and support!

6. A neighbor (Bro. Webb) who helped out my family several times when we needed it. I'm not sure I could ever show my appreciation for the things he's done.

7. My friend Sam, she's always been there for me and even though we live way too far apart she's always some one I can talk to and I know we're friends forever!

8. My friend Tiffany, when Dennis and I moved into our house, the one thing I had really been praying for was one of those types of friends who lived right next door that you talked to everyday, shared things with, could count on, you know the kind I'm talking about? Well, I figured it was a bit too much to ask for but Heavenly Father really does answer our prayers and he gave me Tiffany, right next door :)

9. Should I make my last person for this post Dennis? Maybe tomorrow I'll do a post on all the things I'm thankful for about my dear sweet husband, but I could never have enough time or space to finish it! He is such a wonderful person and I am so thankful to have him in my life.

Most of these are from when I was younger and not a grown-up but there have been many people in my adult life who have also had a huge impact on me!

The Holiday Season

Ok, so this holiday season starts at the beginning of October when everyone is getting ready for Halloween, but I've got admit, that while I love Halloween. I love it when Halloween is over because it means one more holiday and less than two months until Christmas. And I absolutely LOVE the Christmas season!

This year for the holidays Thanksgiving will be spent with D's family. We considered having them come here since half the kids live up with way now but it looks like they want to have Thanksgiving down there so I don't have to worry about cooking a turkey :) I think it would have been a lot of fun to host, but it also would have been a lot of work! Here's to an upcoming great Turkey Day!

Christmas this year is with my family, and as to how that is going to happen no one yet knows! Laura wants everyone to come visit them in Arizona (I doubt this is going to happen, but it would be a lot of fun, though no snow for sure) , depending on who is planning on going to my parents we just might invite them down here instead. Of course if we do go up there, Christmas Eve will be spent here and then we'll drive up there Christmas morning after gifts and breakfast. That's what we did last year as well (it's our new tradition we started) I just hope this year, the weather is better!!!

We're just about down getting the girls' their gifts (Yay!) and have almost decided on our gift. Now is time to figure out our gifts for other family members. And to start listening to Christmas music, and to decorate for Christmas. I can't wait until the Monday after Thanksgiving, that's when we'll put up our Tree!!!

Oh, and a funny story. Yesterday Charity was all sad when we told her it wouldn't be Halloween for another year so we decided to cheer her up by telling her but Christmas is coming. So, she started insisting that we needed to do Christmas right now and that she wanted to give Grandpa Y his gift. We wanted to know what the gift was and she told us the train table! lol. We bought a train table for a gift to the girls and it's stored in Grandpa's room right now and the girls found it a while back, so apparently Charity thinks it's for him. LOL! She's going to be so surprised on Christmas to find out it's for Danielle and her!!! Although, with her lack of ability to share with Danielle lately it might just end up being for Danielle.... hmmm... Yeah, they've been fighting over toys lately! Drives me nuts, especially when there is enough to go around!!!

Anyway :) Onto the holidays!!!

Happy Halloween

I just had to tell everyone, Happy Halloween! Hope it's been a good one! Pictures are soon to come! Charity ended up being a flying Unicorn tonight for Halloween and a witch last night for Trunk-or-Treat and Danielle was a ladybug both nights. Such cute girls!

Last night at Trunk-or-Treating, Charity was going from car to car saying, "Trick or Treat, Happy Halloween, Thank You!" LOL, at one point she got her order messed up and started telling everyone, "Happy Halloween, Thank You, Trick or Treat!" But I'm not sure if it was her or Danielle who loved it more. They're so cute!

And they both loved Trick or Treating tonight as well. It was so cute seeing them just lighting up to go to every house. And Charity had so much fun saying Trick-or-Treat, though at the end when she was getting tired, she started asking people if she could stay at their house, lol, how embarrassing! lol.

It really was a lot of fun though!

Droid - Officially Announced

Ok, so I should have put this together yesterday, but I didn't think of that until Dad asked me today about the phone I've been watching. So, Droid by Motorola was officially announced yesterday and will be available for purchase on November 6h. Here are some exciting specs of the phone:

3.7-inch display with a 854-by-480 pixel display (total of XX pixels)

DVD Quality Video

Built in HTML5 support

Google Maps Navigation, a turn by turn directions GPS system (brand new! only on Droid currently!)

Voice Recognition, Voice Search

Search program also searches for information on your own phone!

Multitasking - run multiple programs at once

5MP Camera with a dual LED flash - though people have varying opinions on just how good it is :(

Physical Qwerty Keyboard

Only Android phone currently Running Eclair (Android 2.0)

10,000 + App Market (still unsure of how many will be compatible with 2.0 though)

Multimedia Dock

Car Dock

Flash 10 Support as soon as it becomes available

Sync with Gmail, Facebook, and Exchange

Battery Life: Standby 270 hrs, Continuous Usage 385 mins (almost 6 1/2 hours)

Micro USB

3.5mm Jack

eCompass

Google Talk

Source Information: Motorola Droid Site

Anyway, just thought I'd share. If you wanna know more just google Droid! There's lots of reviews and information out there now!

Google Voice

So, a few weeks ago I decided to investigate to see what this Google Voice was that I was hearing so much about. So, after reading about I decided I wanted it! (Note to those who live nearby, we now have a local number!)

What is google voice you might ask? Well, it's a number assigned to you by Google Voice that when called rings to whichever numbers you have set up under it. Make sense? So, you can call our Google Voice number and it can then ring to both D's and my cell phones. How cool is that? Part of their advertising and explanation of it is saying so that if your work number changes, or your cell phone, or home number you won't have to update people onto the changes. (I know some people I know who would love that!) Well, I like simply because it means we could get a local number without having to change our cell phone numbers! No more will people be telling us they tried calling and our number was disconnected! We live in an area that has the same area code as D's cell phone, but it's not a local number but people don't realize that and try calling it without the area code). So, I'm excited and then in the future if we ever move, we can easily change our google voice number to a local number for where ever that is if we feel like it and we'll never have to change our cell phone numbers. I really like that because I've had my cellphone number for almost 10 years now and D has had his for a little over 7 so we don't want to change them. Anyway, have I gone on long enough now about Google Voice now? Onto some Droid talk...

So, after all the anticipation, excitement, and obsession over the new Android powered phone coming to Verizon Wireless, I don't think I'm going to be getting it :( D may have the opportunity to do a project at work that can be used for his school project and wouldn't need it anymore. It requires an extra data plan each month in order to even have the phone on the account and where it's not something that I NEED we're finding it hard to justify the extra expense, not to mention D thinks I spend too much time online lately as it is! (And he might be right!). So, sorry for putting all of you through my Droid Obsession ;) But hey, maybe sometime in the future, right? In the meantime, I do need a new cellphone soon, so what cellphone do you have and why do you like it? Help me come up with some new options!

Halloween

Now, onto something NOT Droid related. I know, I know. I've been a little obsessed lately. My poor husband :)

So, I figured I'd write about Halloween and the upcoming Holidays! I love this time of year, when all the festivities are beginning to start and there is so much to look forward to during the Holidays! This will be my first Holiday season in a while that hasn't included me being pregnant, or a baby so it'll be interesting to see how this plays out!

So, for Halloween, we are all set to go! The girls have their costumes, D and I each have ours and Halloween is only a little over a week away!!! There's going to be a ward trunk-or-treat next Friday and then trick-or-treating on Saturday!!! YAY!!! I'm so excited for Charity, last year she was starting to get it, but this year, she's got it down. And since she understands, she is SO excited for Halloween. Everyday she asks me if it's time for trick-or-treating! lol, we all know she just wants the candy!

Then next month is Thanksgiving and who doesn't enjoy eating all of that food? :) Not only that, but getting ready for the Christmas season to start! I love the anticipation at the beginning of the holidays!

And then, (you know where this is going, right?) Christmas!!! I think Christmas is my absolutely FAVORITE holiday. And I'm really looking forward to it this year. I used to really like Christmas, but it just changes things when you've got kids to anticipate it with and to buy presents for and that's really what makes it so much better.

Oh yeah, and did I mention we made scarecrows this year? Their sitting on our front porch. :) We used the zebra grass we have and they turned out great! I'll try to get some pics to post! I told Charity they were a Mommy and Daddy scarecrows (since they're wearing our clothes) so she wanted to make a Charity scarecrow, I didn't want to go to that much work and told her we were only going to make the 2. So, she named them Charity and Alex. That works! lol.

My Droid and Verizon Predictions

Ok, so I've been watching all the rumor mills (pretty much any I can find) for new information, reading long threads on forums about what people know (and don't know!). Well, I have a few thoughts that I don't feel like adding anywhere else, but still want to have them written down. So, here are my suspicions for what Verizon MIGHT be up to in the next week and half or so.

#1, in the code for the droiddoes.com website, it shows the flash file as being phase1. I think this upcoming weekend will start phase2 and we'll see a new commercial come out, or else phase 2 is

#2 there is going to be a press conference next Wednesday (been confirmed from mulitple sources). So, this might be phase 2, introducing people to the phone. People are hoping it's going to go on sale and while I've read that Verizon has a habit of announcing a new phone at the same time it becomes available, I don't think it's going to be available this date. But then again, maybe the R2D2s sent out was phase two and the conference will be phase 3. Me, I'm still hoping for a new commercial :) But probably not.

#3 I'm really not sure if the phone will be available for telesales on the 30th like everyone is speculating, but I want to try the phone out in person before I buy it anyway, so that point is mute. I'm going to have to wait until November to get a new phone, possibly until Christmas as well, depending on what we decide to do.

#4 I think it's possible Verizon will be pulling out a new pricing scheme. Why do you ask? And why has no one else heard or said anything about it? Maybe verizon has been really good at not leaking anything. But everyone's #1 complaint about verizon it seems is their prices, and t-mobile as well as sprint have both recently done new pricing plans. So, it's possible verizon will follow suit.

#5 I'm hoping they will introduce a data family plan that has the plan for the smartphones included in it because if we really like this phone, then D may want one too, but an extra $60 a month to have 2 smartphones on the account? We're having hard time right now deciding if an extra $30 is worth it!

#6 Which adds to my next worry, what if all they do is change their pricing plan so that an android smart phone requires an add-on data plan that is more than the $30 smartphone add-on they have right now? I hope not, it would be a deal breaker for me. But I don't think this is as big a worry to me simply because I think they might be trying to draw more of a crowd to smartphones and upping the price will turn people off instead of drawing them in.