A Fortunate Life

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A Fortunate Life

By A.B. Facey

I got the recommendation to read this book from this blog, and, as I was looking for a new book to read, decided to give this one a go. It was published in Australia in 1981, so I had to purchase a used copy on Amazon. Lucky for me, the book I picked must have sat on a shelf for the past 30 years because it looks nearly brand new! Although it kind of makes me sad that it sat on the shelf without being read, because it is a great book.

This is the autobiography of A.B. Facey, a man born in the late 1800's in Western Australia. This is his life story, and my goodness he had an interesting life! He grew up in poverty and worked extremely hard just to be able to survive. He didn't really have a "normal" childhood as you and I would define it, but was forced to grow up extremely quickly, going out to work at the age of nine. I am amazed that after all of the hardships he faced throughout his life, in the end, he could still say "I have lived a very good life, it has been very rich and full. I have been very fortunate and I am thrilled by it when I look back."

I love books that make you think - but not too hard - I don't like to think too hard :) As I've been reading this over the last couple of weeks I've been reflecting on my own life.  Compared to Mr. Facey, my life has been a breeze! I am concluding that my life has also been pretty fortunate thus far. I had a great childhood and I feel that I am continually being blessed with goodness in my life. Good husband, good friends, good family, good job, good health, and the list goes on. Things aren't always easy, this life wasn't meant to be easy; we're supposed to experience challenges, and I think it's through experiencing hardship and trials that we learn to really be grateful for the good things that we do have. As I've been reading and reflecting I've felt so much gratitude towards my Heavenly Father for the many blessings He has given me throughout my life. I am so blessed.

Give this book a try. You won't be disappointed. It is so uplifting and inspiring, I know you'll love it!

Summer Potpourri

Labor Day has come and gone and with it comes the end of summer. I thought I'd post about all the random things we've been up to. I did this last summer and it seems like the easiest way to recap everything that's been going on. This summer has been AMAZING. No joke, one of the best summers I can remember. It's the first time that I haven't felt stressed in a long time: no stress of starting school in the fall, no stress of looking for work, etc. Just happy and free to do whatever. My goal was to do something every weekend of the summer. It didn't have to be anything huge, just something to get us out of the house. And, though it was EXHAUSTING, I'm happy to report that we accomplished that goal. Here's a look at what we've done (not necessarily in chronological order, because that hurts my head too much):

We started off the summer in VEGAS! (read about that here, here, and here).

Next came four weekends of hanging out with my family in both Burley and Utah. (Read all about it here, here, here, and finally here). 

I got BRACES. Yep, that's right. As if I don't look enough like a 14-year-old right? Because of circumstances at the time, I didn't get the opportunity to have braces when I should have, and because of my profession, it was important to me to get my teeth fixed. Though I must say, that was a difficult check to write! It's kind of funny how some of my patients at work will look at me funny, and I know they're trying to figure out if I'm old enough to be doing what I'm doing. And Dr. J called me "kiddo" for the first couple of months that I had them on. Oh well. So far they haven't been too bad. Eighteen months (give or take) of torture are going to fly by...

Brandt's sister Karman and her family came for a visit the last weekend in July. We enjoyed hanging out with them for a couple of days. We met up with them on Friday after work and went to Indian Hot Springs for a dip in the pool. Saturday we just hung out, Brandt and Sheena put together a treasure hunt for all the kids, built a fire, etc. Sunday was church, Sunday dinner, and more hanging out before we had to head home. It was lots of fun. We wish we got to see the Petersen's more often...Missouri is too far away!

Two of our best friends from high school got married this summer, so we had the privilege of attending both of their weddings. Aaron married his sweetheart, Ali, in the Bountiful temple and Kimmy married her prince charming, Clayton, in the Salt Lake City temple. It was great to be there on their special days.

We had so much fun seeing some of our high school friends at the weddings and receptions that we thought it would be great to get everyone together just to hang out and get to know their spouses a bit better. So in August we got together for a BBQ at Tiff's parent's house. Everyone was there except Carla, Abram, and Aaron & Ali (we missed you guys!) It was great to see everyone. That night we also got to see our good friends, the Moulton's, for a bit and they showed us around their new house - can't wait to see the finished product!

We ended up with two Saturdays for the whole summer where we didn't have anything specific to attend (Crazy, I know). We used those days to go hiking. Now don't read this and think that we are amazingly active people, because that is a bold-faced lie. (Remember this post?) However, we do like to get outside and in the fresh air. We're all about the easy hikes. I wish I had a knack for photography because these pics just don't seem to capture how pretty it is in this area. On one of the hikes, Brandt lost his fishing rod as we were hiking through the rough terrain trying to find the fishing "hot spot". Very convenient, if you ask me, since that meant he got to buy the bigger and better (aka more expensive) rod he's been wanting for the last few years. Yes, very convenient babe.

Brandt and I LOVE movies, but we don't go OUT to a lot of movies. A movie has to have rave reviews for us to shell out twenty bucks; we'd much rather spend that money on eating out and watching a Redbox at home. Someday we'll upgrade to Netflix.  Here's a quick review of the movies we went to this summer:

"Killers" - went to see this one as something to do for our anniversary. Terrible. Absolutely terrible. One perk: Ashton Kutcher is HOT!

"Eclipse!" - (I always post Eclipse! with an exclamation point even though it's not supposed to have one... oh well...!!!!) LOVE IT!! And I love Jacob! I was sad they left out the part where Edward rips Jacob out of the sleeping bag once Bella says she's too warm (I laughed so hard). These movies are just so much fun. Even though there is absolutely NO comparison to the books, it's fun to get excited about a movie.

"Toy Story 3" - we were supposed to see this with Katelyn when she came to visit in June, but the boogers wouldn't wait ONE DAY for us to get there and go with them. Grrrrrrrr...Anywho, the movie was really good! There was so much hype about it that I think we both expected more, but it was still good. Definitely not the best of the Toy Story's like some people were saying, but still good.

"Inception" - we heard about this one on the news - they were saying how popular it was and how people were seeing it again and again to try and figure it out. So Brandt and I decided to see what all the hype was about. GOOD movie! Such a crazy idea, the writer was a genius. I love Leonardo Dicaprio - he's so good and I wish more of his movies weren't rated-R.

Movies to look forward to: Breaking Dawn! (I can't help it with the exclamation :), Harry Potter 7!!, and Pirates! (exclamation included for Brandt's sake).
 

We had some visitors come and stay with us here and there throughout the summer which was fun. Linds and Craig came for one night so the boys could go fishing, Brandt's parents came for one night so we could go to his cousin Carson's mission farewell up in Rigby, and my mom and Syd came for a couple of days to go school shopping (which I must say was not pretty on my pocketbook - I had to go buy more hangers to take care of all my loot - thanks girls!) I didn't take any pics while anyone was here, but thanks for coming! It was fun having people come and visit.

Oh, and we can't forget the good ol' Cassia County Fair and Rodeo. Brandt and I weren't going to drive to Burley AGAIN just for the fair, but his sister Allison and her family came for a visit, plus my mom wanted us to go to the rodeo with her, so we decided to drive down for Friday and Saturday. We went to the rodeo with my family Friday night which was fun and hung out with Brandt's family at the fair on Saturday.

And FINALLY, we finished off the summer with a fun trip over Labor Day weekend to Utah to see Brandt's nephew Kimball get baptized (Congrats Kimball!) We figured since we drove all that way we might as well make a weekend trip out of it, so we stayed in a condo in Park City with Brandt's parents and Sheena & Kyle. We went to the Hogle Zoo on Saturday afternoon and the Soldier Hollow Classic Sheepdog International Championship  on Sunday after church. That was so much fun! Definitely not something we would normally do on our own, but I'm glad we went. On Monday we stopped at the outlet stores for a few hours before heading home.

And that's it! Pat yourself on the back if you made it through this entire post. It was definitely a fun and BUSY summer. I totaled it up and out of 15 weekends we made one trip to Vegas, seven trips to Burley, and four trips to Utah. As fun as it was though, I think we're both ready for things to settle down. Here's to a  great summer and a slightly less hectic fall!

I am a HUGE fan...

...of The Hunger Games Trilogy! I bought the first two books back in February and just got around to reading them, partly because I was reading other things and partly because I wanted to wait until the third book came out so I wouldn't have to wait for it if I ended up liking them. Good move on my part, because I had a hard time putting these books down! Seriously, I haven't had this much fun reading since probably Twilight.

The story is based at some point in the future after our country has been destroyed by war. Out of the ashes, a new country erupts: Panem. As a reminder to the citizens of Panem not to rebel, each year they hold The Hunger Games, where one boy and one girl from each district must compete to the death. This is the story of Katniss Everdeen's journey through The Hunger Games. I know, it sounds really weird. And violent. And barbaric. That's another reason I held off reading them for so long. But Collins is a master story-teller. She presents the story in such a way that you see very little of the gore and violence of the plot; you see compassion, love, sacrifice, courage, honor, etc.

These novels are as close to perfect as you can get. Not once did I get bored; the plot moves along smoothly. I hope they do a good job with the movie, because it could be great. One suggestion I do have is that you try to slow down when you read. This trilogy will make you think, so rather than rushing through them, take time to process everything. You get more out of it when you slow down. Love, LOVE, LOVE Hunger Games!!! Go read them - you will not be disappointed!

Next: A Fortunate Life by A.B. Facey