You Choose

The Velveteen Rabbit

"Real isn't how you are made," said the Skin Horse. "It's a thing that happens to you. When a child loves you for a long, long time, not just to play with, but REALLY loves you, then you become Real."

"Does it hurt?" asked the Rabbit.

"Sometimes," said the Skin Horse, for he was always truthful. "When you are Real you don't mind being hurt."

"Does it happen all at once, like being wound up," he asked, "or bit by bit?"

"It doesn't happen all at once," said the Skin Horse. "You become. It takes a long time. That's why it doesn't happen to people who break easily, or have sharp edges, or who have to be carefully kept. Generally, by the time you are Real, most of your hair has been loved off, and your eyes drop out and you get loose in the joints and very shabby. But these things don't matter at all, because once you are Real you can't be ugly, except to people who don't understand."

It All Works Out

“It isn't as bad as you sometimes think it is. It all works out. Don't worry. I say that to myself every morning. It all works out in the end. Put your trust in God, and move forward with faith and confidence in the future. The Lord will not forsake us. He will not forsake us. If we will put our trust in Him, if we will pray to Him, if we will live worthy of His blessings, He will hear our prayers.”

-Gordon B. Hinckley

Thanksgiving Change of Plans

So for Thanksgiving this year I was going to go to Hawaii with Laura and Becca. We all bought our tickets and we were ready to go. But after much discussion and prayers and such....we changed our plans. And everyone went home.

My trip home was wonderful. I have a wonderful boss who let me take off a whole week to be there. There were so many happy things while I was there but I'll just give a few highlights.

1-Mario Kart wars. Cassie and I did the battles which resulted in me doing so much screaming that I got a headache. Shane getting last place five times in a row :) Mom TRYING her best to play and falling off all the bridges. And Dad standing by and laughing.
2-I was in the shower one morning when all of a sudden Sesame Street music starts blasting outside the bathroom door. Cassie had turned it on for my enjoyment in the shower.
3-Thanksgiving dinner at the G-Rents. Pompa telling his usual jokes and his smoked turkey. Going around the table and saying what we're thankful for. Grandma playing the piano and all of us singing. Football and nap times after.
4-My bestest friend Karrie and Austin calling me and catching up after not talking in a LONG time and making plans for me to be out there when my little niece is born!!
5-One night just going out with the parentals and walking around the mall together and then testing out all the couches in Macy's.
6-Going to my mom's school and meeting her friends and professor and seeing her work up on the wall.
7-Late night talks with Shane and sleeping in the same room as Cassie.
8-Menah eating half the bag of Hershey's kisses.
9-Watching How the Grinch Stole Christmas and making gingerbread houses.

I'm so glad I went home!

Uncharted

When my mom was here she showed me the song "Uncharted" by Sara Bareillas. I'd never heard it before and its become a favorite. But I've had a line from it on my mind all week.

"Compare where you are and where you want to be and you'll get nowhere."

Its given me a lot to think about. Love it.

When My Mom Comes...

Today I was talking to my wonderful mom about when she comes to visit. After talking about our mutual excitement I asked her what she'd like to do while she's here. Her answer made me smile....

pile into bed at night and watch movies that aren't even funny and laugh really hard like they are
and stay up late
and then wake up and take walks in the mountains
and take pictures
and take long drives and stop wherever we want to
and run into shops we have never seen before
and if we wander too far from home just check into a hotel
and order pancakes for breakfast
and listen to music that brings back memories of my little girls
and call each other names like stupid and dummy...but not mean it at all
unless we are being stupid or dumb

I have the best mom on the planet.

Company History

The month of September...I made company history. Our company is a business training and leadership company. We have a program called the Performance Index that gives employees "scorecards" that detail their responsibilities. At the end of each month, you sit down with your boss and you score your scorecard. The categories are: Does not meet expectations, partially meets expectations, meets expectations, exceeds expectations, and far exceeds expectations.

The month of September was a FULL one. Of all the months to set a goal to reach far exceeds expectations, this was definitely the most busy one. I worked over weekends and was very tired. But I DID IT! I made company history by being the first ever to reach Far Exceeds Expectations.

On Friday, Peter made me STAND at the company meeting while the office applauded. He knew how much I'd hate that. That's why he did it. But I sure have the best boss anyone could hope for.

And I got a nice little bonus this month :)

"Adventurous-ness-es"

I've needed to post on here for quite some time. About two weeks ago a new side of Carly that no one, not even myself, knew emerged. It started with a hike. A bunch of people in our ward wanted to hike Mount Timpanogos on Labor Day. They wanted to start at about midnight on Sunday so that we could hike it in time to see the sun rise from the top. I from the get go told them I would not be interested. I'm not a hiking mountains kinda girl.

Sunday afternoon rolled around and I REALLY wanted to do something fun for Labor Day since I had the day off. Becca SOMEHOW talked me into going on this hike. So we leave and head up. It was a good thing it was dark. If I had seen that mountain and how much I had to climb in the light of day there is no way I would have done it.

After about six hours we made it to the top! Wow! What a feeling. I took some beautiful pictures. We stayed up there for about a half hour and then headed down. Everyone said that the hike down would be SO much shorter so I was excited for it to be over with. The way down seemed to take SO much longer than the way up. But after four hours, Chase-one of the guys in our group, said that the sign was coming up. The sign that started our journey. Much to Becca's delight (she still tells the story) I shouted "The Sign?!?" and started RUNNING as fast as my exhausted legs would allow me. We got to the sign (which I kissed) and knew the end was coming. We kept making our way down when Chased said that he heard a car. I once again, shouted "Cars?!?" and started running. I would not be stopped until we had reached the parking lot. The cute park service old men at the end of the trail could not stop laughing when they saw me coming. I'm sure I was the sight to see after a ten hour hike.

So that was Monday. On Thursday I got a text from my friend Austin asking if I'd like to go skydiving on Saturday. He was doing it for his birthday. After several hours of tossing the idea around in my head I consented (WHAT IS UP WITH ME?!) and started planning on jumping out of an airplane on Saturday at eleven.

We drove out to Toole where the skydiving place was. There were so many people that our time kept getting pushed back. Finally at 2:30 it was our turn. We started getting our gear on and my jumping buddy, Blake, and I started talking and I found out that he is a part of the Meibos family! One of my favorite families. So we felt very bonded at this point. We went up in the plane and I was introduced to the Channel 4 weatherman who was sitting in front of me. He asked me what I was thinking and all I could say was "I can't believe I'm doing this!" Finally....we'd made it to 13,000 ft. I put my toes over the edge of the plane door and next thing I knew we were falling for TWO WHOLE MINUTES at 120 mph. Then Blake pulled the chord and the parachute (hallelujah) came out.

We started floating in the clouds. He even let me hold on to the handles of the parachute. Then, after about six minutes of that, we went in for the landing. I completed a PERFECT landing on my feet. So thrilling! I would do it again in a heart beat.

My mom wrote on my facebook wall: "Sky diving-check, Rocky mountain climbing-check check, Next...2.7 seconds on a bull named Fu Man Chu? I love your adventurous-ness-es."

Me too :)

Speak English?!

The company I work for deals with customers all over the world. On Monday we have a program in Shanghai with Microsoft. The materials we needed for the conference were shipped out WEEKS ahead of time. As of Friday Chinese customs STILL wouldn't let the materials through. Even though we'd provided them with all the necessary paperwork.

So...we came up with plan B. If by noon on Saturday (Shanghai time) the materials hadn't arrived we should just plan on them not being there. So we found the phone number for a FedEx Kinkos that was close to the hotel were our Client Partner is staying. Peter asked me if I would please be in charge of calling them, explaining how we wanted the materials printed, and making sure they would be done in time. When I expressed my concern about the language barrier he responded..."Don't worry. It's an international company. They'll have someone there that speaks English."

I dialed the number for the Kinkos in Shanghai. A woman answered saying SOMETHING. It just sounded like a bunch of sounds to me.

"Uh. Hi. Speak English?"

"A little."

Oh great...this will be fun trying to explain everything to her. I started speaking in the simplest, shortest sentences I could think of. I'd ask a question....

"Ok."

"You understand me?"

"Ok."

Ya....not working. I tried asking if there was ANYONE else I could speak to.

"Ya. Ok. Great. Bye."

I started yelling in the phone. "NO BYE!"

After wayyyyy too long. She communicated that a man who speaks better English would be there in twenty minutes. Great. I'll call back then.

He did speak much better English. MUCH better. Not great. But it worked. And everything was finally figured out. But here are the lessons I learned from this experience:

1. Chinese customs does not care if you need your package.
2. Just because FedEx Kinkos is an international business does not mean that they will have someone who speaks English.
3. Google is very useful when converting RMBs to USDs.
4. If communicating with people in China you MUST be up all hours of the night because thats when they're up and doing business. AKA-I'm EXHAUSTED.
5. My boss owes me BIG TIME!

And...last but not least....

6. Speaking louder does not make it ANY easier for them to understand you. But it sure does make you feel better.

Crush

My roommate Laura is a second grade teacher. School starts on Monday and she was making name tags for the kids in her class tonight.

It made me think....

Remember the first day of school when the teacher assigned seats and you ran into the classroom HOPING to be "forced" to sit next to the boy you liked? And you found out you HAD to sit next to him?

That was happiness.

Memorable Flight

Last weekend I went home to help my parents get the house ready to sell. We painted and cleaned and packed. We also participated in the annual 5k our ward puts on. The Taylor family made us hot pink shirts. We went to a Cardinals game. And we had late nights and talks and lots of laughs. I loved being home.

On my flight back home I was EXHAUSTED. I'd only gotten a few hours of sleep the night before because I'd stayed up all night with my mom. As I sat down on the plane for the flight to Dallas (where I'd connect for my flight to Salt Lake) I was thinking I'd get some sleep.

A lady (mid-thirties) gets on the plane last minute talking on her phone and comes and sits down next to me. I hear her say, "And hopefully this nice lady next to me won't mind if I grab on to her when I get scared." Haha. Ya....at this point I'm thinking NO WAY I'm going to get any sleep.

So I start talking to her. Trying to distract her. Talk about scared of flying! Its an 8 AM flight and she's already had two cocktails she informs me and is frustrated with the flight attendant when he asks her for her drink order and he tells her its too early to be serving alcohol. But she's doing pretty well. The flight is only supposed to be about an hour and ten minutes so I figure I can keep her distracted for that long.

About thirty minutes into the flight the flight attendant gets on the intercom and starts SCREAMING into it "CODE RED CODE RED CODE RED" and flight attendants start running up and down the aisles. I'm literally thinking "This is it. This is how I go. Wow." Meanwhile the POOR lady next to me has a DEATH grip on my arm. I cannot feel it at all. I took a picture of my hand and sent it to my mom afterward....HOURS later you could still see this lady's nail marks in my hand. After what seems an eternity she follows her screaming of code red with "MEDICAL EMERGENCY. WE HAVE A PASSENGER THAT HAS PASSED OUT AND NEEDS MEDICAL ATTENTION IN FIRST CLASS."

Ok. Well glad to know we're not all gonna die. But for the sake of everyone on board next time.....LEAD WITH MEDICAL EMERGENCY!

Cause who the heck knows what code red means?!

Lets just say at the end of the flight the woman and I embraced as we said goodbye, truly feeling like we were saying goodbye to a dear friend. We went through quite the experience together.

Childlike Honesty

The day before my birthday I got a facebook message from my cousin Adam. My cousin Adam is on my Dad's side of the family. I'm not quite sure what developmental problems he has but in my mind Adam is always ten years old.

The first message was one line. It said, "Hello Carly Frazier. Its me. Adam."

I chuckled to myself as I read it thinking how much of a little child he is. He commented on how my birthday was the next day and asked how old I would be turning. I told him 23 and he pointed out to me that I'm only three years older than him. Wow. Crazy since he is so much like a child to me. Then he told me that he has a girlfriend. Which made me smile. He deserves to be happy right? He found someone. Then he asked if I have a boyfriend. I told him I don't. He said "well then you need to get one." I laughed again thinking "holy cow! thats been my problem! I just need to GET ONE!!!" So I told him I would work on that. Then he said...

"your twenty three and i started dating when i was eighteen and now i have a girlfriend now"

OKAY! The brutal childlike honesty JUST stopped being cute! I called my mom and we laughed and laughed. Finally I wrote him back and told him that for people as amazing as him it doesn't take very long. That if I were as cool as him I'd have a boyfriend by now. He wrote me back and said, "well i don't know about that but i will tell you this your cute so any guy can ask you out if they ask you or you ask them"

Okay. The childlike honesty is cute again.

What made me happy

Tonight I got to see my dear friend Kay.

Kay and I met our very first semester out at college. We were the first ones to arrive into our dorm. We became instant friends and had dinner together our first night and went to all the freshman activities together.

Now...five years later...she is married and eight months pregnant. Her husband is far away serving in the army. She is still attending school up in Idaho and I have graduated and am working in Utah. She came down for a visit.

We had dinner with her dad and her brother. Then we went to the mall. I bought my future little niece, Brooklyn Kay, an adorable outfit, complete with matching shoes. Kay then got her first tube of eye liner, which made her beautiful brown eyes stand out even more. Then, FINALLY, with an excuse to go into the Motherhood Maternity store....I forced her inside and made her try on outfits, her favorite of which I bought her. And getting $0.50 ice cream cones at Macey's and walking around the store and talking.

We discussed our lives. How they've turned out.

She asked what she can do for me. She wants me to be happy. And she knows that I've always wanted to be married and be a mom.

I told her that I am happy. That I still want those things. More than anything. But that they'll come in time.

You know what made me happy?

Serving her. I know it sounds cheesy. But spending time with her. Listening to her talk about her life and her concerns and joys. Buying her things for her and her baby. Thats what she did for me. Thats how she made me happy.

I think in blog....

Its true. I constantly go throughout my day thinking about what would make a good blog story. Writing on here is addictive. And therapeutic. Sometimes I wish no one else read it so I could pour out my deepest thoughts on here.

But long story short. I have become one of "those" people.

I think in blog.

Desires

Today I'm at home from church. Sick. I know...one thing after another for me.

But I've been thinking about all the things I want to do.

1. I want to have time to design things that I want to design.
2. I want to go back to school and learn web design.
3. I want my own apartment to buy my own furniture for and decorate.
4. I want to run a half marathon.
5. I want to study Spanish. And become fluent.
6. I want to be the person that sends people nice notes in the mail or care packages.
7. I want to travel. OH so bad.
8. I want to learn to play the violin.
9. I want to write.

And this stuff isn't about not being satisfied with the life I have. I just want to find a little time each day to do something that I want to do. These are my desires.

"Desires dictate our priorities, priorities shape our choices, and choices determine our actions. The desires we act on determine our changing, our achieving, and our becoming."

That's the kind of person I want to become.

Injured

Some people run, some people play sports, some people are running around and do something stupid, or step on something....

I, on the other hand, sleep.

I went to the doctor on Tuesday. My foot was REALLY bothering me. Just really uncomfortable to walk on, nothing too serious though. So he said he'd take a look at it.

"You have all the signs of a sprained ankle."

"Uh....ya....thats not possible."

We started going through what I could've done. We finally discovered that with my new way of sleeping on my back with a pillow under my knees, which is supposed to help my back and thus help with my headaches, that my heavy down comforter is the reason my ankle now has a minor sprain.

My family's response to the news that I sprained my ankle while sleeping.....LOTS of laughing, very little sympathy and then from my dear sweet mother....

"Good night sweetheart. Make sure you wrap your ankle before you fall asleep tonight!"

Funny.

Say What?!?!

I was so nervous. I had a whole speech. I knew that the perfect time was during my Monday morning meeting. We finished discussing my responsibilities for the week.

"Anything else?" I asked.

"Nope. That's everything."

"Alright.......Um......"

I was losing my nerve! I'd been thinking about doing this for WEEKS! I had to do it. I heard my mother (lecture #429) in my head "You can do hard things."

"Hey....there's actually something I need to talk to you about."

I closed the office door. Now or never!

"I need a raise."

I gave my whole speech. I was nervous. And shaking. And spoke fast. Tried to act put together and calm and responsible. I told my boss that I would basically need a FIFTY percent raise to stay where I am. Side note: I've been told over and over and over again by multiple people that they've asked for a SMALL raise and been told no. And consequently had to quit and move on. And I was asking for FIFTY percent.

And then I waited...

"Alright. You're worth a LOT more than we're paying you. We don't want to lose you. So I'll talk to Curtis and we'll get something worked out. We'll make this work."

Oh man. Awesome. But now getting Curtis on board....

I got a phone call later that afternoon.

"Hey I just talked to Curtis. We're going to take care of it."

SAY WHAT?!?!?!?!

And it continues....

Six weeks ladies and gentleman.

For six straight weeks I have had headaches. And they are getting worse.

At first they thought they were stress headaches. And given all the stuff I was going through when they first started it could have been it. But they haven't gone away. And they've gotten worse.

I'm out of my drugs that worked. I've resorted to taking my hardcore drugs. Ugh. No fun! How anyone can become a drug addict is beyond me.

But I got a blessing last night. I was blessed with hope.

So tomorrow I will go to another doctor. And Tuesday I will go the neurologist. And I will remain hopeful. Hopeful that one day (soon) the pain will be completely gone.

Thank you for all of you who have prayed for me and taken care of me through all of this madness.

High on Life

I remember back in high school a friend of mine would always jokingly say she didn't need to do drugs. She was high on life.

I have had horrible horrible headaches for a month now. EVERY day for a month to be exact. And I don't get headaches! This week they got so bad that I was forced to go see a doctor. The doctor gave me LOTS of pills. Six prescriptions to be exact...until they figure out what is wrong.

I'm only taking one of the prescriptions. It ended up being a blessing in disguise that I couldn't remember which ones I couldn't take together. I called two pharmacies that gave me different answers. So after a minor freak out I called one of my best friend's dad. Who is a doctor. He told me that the drugs I was prescribed, if I had taken them as instructed, would have had me taken to the hospital in an ambulance. Thank heavens for him.

So I'm only on one of the drugs. But holy goodness its enough. I am SO high on more than life.

Apparently it makes me really funny too.

"In the gospel of Jesus Christ you have help from both sides of the veil and you must never forget that. When disappointment and discouragement strike--and they will--you remember and never forget that if our eyes could be opened we would see horses and chariots of fire as far as the eye can see riding at reckless speed to come to our protection (2Kings 6:16-17). They will always be there, these armies of heaven, in defense of Abraham's seed."

The things I repeat to myself

I've been thinking about writing on her for a few days now. But I've been staring at the screen having NO idea what to write about or more importantly what to title this entry.

Its 2011! Amazing. Time has gone by so fast! I was talking about my freshman year of college the other day. And realized that was five years ago...

I'd have to say I thought my life would be different at this point. All signs led to it being different. I had a plan. I had backups to the plan. I had backups to the backups. But here I am. Completely and utterly in awe at how things have turned out.

You know how in school they had you write those things that said "in the year 2011 I will be...."? Ya. This is not what I planned. Not even close.

I am not myself at the moment. A lot of people that I would have told you were staples in my life are gone. I'm not quite sure why. I promise you I was nothing but there for them. But they're gone just the same. I'm not gonna act all Mary Sunshine about it either. It hurts. A lot. Still. Some are very fresh and some are old. And I've decided that its okay for that to hurt.

I am a good friend. Its one of the things I've actually taken pride in. If I am your friend you have not a single doubt that I love you. Or that I would do ANYTHING for you. Looking back I'm amazed at some of the stuff I have done for those people.

But you know what? Today was a good day. You know why? Cause I only cried ONCE today. And I found a song to sing to at the top of my lungs in the car on my way to pick Jenna up from school.

So...I'll wake up tomorrow...and hope for no crying. Or maybe just half a cry.

Things will get better. Its taken me a few days to realize that. But things will get better. My life isn't what I planned it. So what? Sometimes life just sucks. So what?

Things will get better. Its not you. Everything happens for a reason. The night is darkest before the dawn. Even roses have thorns. Every cloud has a silver lining. I can do it. When one door closes, another opens. After every storm comes a rainbow. One day at a time.

These are the things I repeat to myself.