What would you do?

This week I was put in a very awkward position at work outside of my comfort zone. I know I'm not a mother, but I'd like to think I would have acted differently than this particular mother, and am not okay with what she did. In a way it's humorous now looking back on it...but really not.

About an hour before we closed we had a huge rush of people. We have one one-room bathroom for our customers that has to be unlocked by an employee every time it's needed...(kind of annoying but a necessity)... As our rush kicked in I was straightening some items in between helping people and looked up to see a little girl, around the age of 7, walking toward the bathroom. Doing my duty I headed straight over "Oh, you need the bathroom?" I asked her, she just kind of glanced at me, didn't say anything, but I heard her mom from a few feet away, "Yeah, she needs it." I grabbed the key then turned to smile at the young girl. As I did so she quickly brought both hands in cupping position to her mouth and her cheeks puffed up...I knew that look all too well...

Horrified at what would potentially be happening in few precious moments, and annoyed at the mom for not having any sense of urgency in her voice when stating her daughter needed the bathroom, I fumbled with the bathroom key. Right as the door began to swing open the poor girl lost it....as I tried to jump back in the small space provided, vomit splattered all over the partially opened bathroom door and onto me and the floor, creating a nice speckled pattern on my eye-glasses. Adrenaline kicked in as a heard the mother casually under her breath "Welp, there she goes." Uh yeah there she goes! Thanks for the warning!! The poor little girl looked terrified so I ushered her in the bathroom while asking if she was ok, in reply she ran to the toilet and continued her business. Thankfully her mother put down her merchandise and came over to help clean up the smelly mess while I searched for plastic gloves and disinfectant. The mother was apologetic and helped clean up the worst of it. After making sure the girl was okay I went to town disinfecting the entire bathroom and trying to get chunks out of our new carpet.

It took me a good 1/2 hour or longer before I was convinced the bathroom was vomit and germ free. I sighed, sweaty, stinky, and disgruntled I opted that the last step to finish the job would be to take out the overflowing garbage. After taking out the garbage I walked to the front of the store for some relief from it all.

Relief didn't last long. Someone pointed to the bathroom. The girl was standing at the door again. I was seriously speechless!! The mother had continued shopping?? Her daughter was obviously ill, had thrown up all over, and she decided shopping was the best medicine. Come to find out from others, the mom had just made her daughter lay on the floor of a busy store while she continued shopping!!!

Although another employee was already opening the bathroom door for the poor little victim, I knew my fate. I headed back to the bathroom, doing my best not to breathe through my nose so that I could make it through round 2. The mom was back there again trying to clean up the vomit that she had instructed her daughter to aim into the drinking fountain (GROSS!!!) if the bathroom didn't get opened quickly enough. I was mortified. A drinking fountain is quite a different matter than the toilet....The mother then said "Well, I guess we better go now, next time you really need to tell me if you're not feeling well before we go somewhere." I'll save you the graphics of the second clean up, you get the idea.

You may think that I'm not okay with what the mother did because of the situation it put me in...obviously that ADDS to it! But come on lady! Put your kid first! Her daughter may not have mentioned that she didn't feel good before they got to the store, but she mentioned it when they arrived, and then threw-up, shouldn't it have been a good sign to leave after the first episode?? I understand that kids are unpredictable and something like this could happen to anyone. But I don't think it's okay that the mother let it happen twice within her visit to the store! Am I wrong to have these feelings toward this lady? Should I have said something to her? What would you have done??

Utah State Alum 2010

May 8, 2010: Bachelors in Communicative Disorders and Deaf Education: SLP

Utah State University

Receiving my diploma. Our graduation ceremony was actually pretty cool considering all of the stories I've heard of the boredom. Our speakers were short, and they had a children's choir sing, the song was actually quite touching, I don't remember what it's called at the moment, but it was something about not ignoring your children's education and teaching them to read. It was cute, and different. The funniest part was we actually sang the Scotsman! The longest and yes boring part was waiting through lines of graduates having their names called...we all grew a bit restless. But they finally called my name!!

Makenzie Taylor, Me, and Allisa Blackburn

Me & Cara Alder

All of these girls were major life savors multiple times throughout the last two years!! From study sessions, group projects and presentations, to craft days, sharing recipes and being a friend when in need. Love you girls, thanks for all of your encouragement and support, you'll go far, and I appreciate all you've done for me! You've left your mark!

Thanks just doesn't quite say it mom and dad....but THANK YOU FOR EVERYTHING!!!

We had a relaxed and enjoyable graduation BBQ at Summer & Davey's. It was fun to celebrate this day with family and friends! I debated posting another plethora of pictures, but these were all just too cute, and these are the people that helped get me where I am today, so I thought it fitting to post pictures of all of these amazing people I'm lucky enough to call family. (I missed having you there Justin, Nan, Jude, Ben, Melissa, Tosh, Chesie, Kalia, Jake, and Jenni, and all other family who couldn't attend)

Amber, Me, Shantel

The nephews present kind of stole the show...but I was more than okay with that.

Mom and Jonas

Porter

Summer, Davey, Me, Porter

Porter, Brandon, Shantai

Levi, Jonte

Kionna

Denise, Meghann

Porter, Aaron

Couper, Maddi, Sky

Kim, Cody

Thank you everyone who helped me when emotionally, financially, educationally, or otherwise afflicted during my college years! I'm forever in your debt!

Grad Announcements

I feel a little weird making this post...because it's mostly a bunch of pictures of me...but Summer took so many good ones it was hard to decide which ones to put on here...and you only graduate college once right?...well, some people...anyway, I'm apologizing in advance and forewarning you that this post entirely consists pictures of me ( and some with my hubby) celebrating the fact that I graduated from Utah State this year!!!! YAY!!!

Sadly we're actually not True Aggies...we still have a couple of years in Logan though, don't lose faith in us yet!

Love my husband!! Thanks for all of your support Couper! You and I both know I couldn't have made it through the days, weeks, months, and years without your encouragement!

The Lillywhite, the small building I've lived in for the last two years that no one seems to know where it is...

Okay...so I posted a lot of jumping pictures, but it's funny to see the progression and the failed attempts.

Looking to the future...what will it hold for us???

Oh yeah baby! Class of 2010--my time has come!!

Striving hard to still gain an education even though not in school.

We just wouldn't have felt right about our on-campus photo shoot if we didn't get a picture on the French Fry statue, don't we just blend right in?

Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants

Have you ever had old jeans that were holy or didn't fit anymore? Did you not want to get rid of them because they were your absolute faves and you wanted to cherish the memories you'd made with them forever? Here's a solution:

***This story may include some fictional information due to the fact that I am not the main character, and just because, but you'll get the gist :)***

The story of this quilt starts some 7 years ago, if we had known what was really to come of all of these little denim squares we probably could have kept some kind of journal filled with experiences seen and made by these jeans. My sister Summer inspired the birth of this quilt. Long ago she determined that she would learn to be a better seamstress and make a quilt. Not wanting to spend money she excited herself about a recycled denim quilt! She began with a few pair of her own jeans she was ready to toss out, then asked my mom for any of the kids jeans she was getting rid of, at least one pair I'm sure coming from each of us kids, some coming from hand-me-downs, and some even from the DI. Before she knew it Summer had a box FULL of denim squares (and had even gone through the effort of cutting stuffing squares to layer each denim square with.) Summer's life got busy and the box of story filled demin squares nested in their box waiting to add to their next story...

Time went by, Summer traveled to other countries and in so doing met her fiance. Summer was married and moved to Logan, UT to start her family. Somehow, the hopeful denim squares continued to be a part of her belongings throughout all of her moves and life changes. Summer and her husband decided to start a family. They had a beautiful little girl and continued life in bliss. One day, when her daughter was about 3 years old, Summer came across a dusty box. Curiously she brushed away the dust bunnies and opened the lid. There, patiently waiting for her were her even, straight stacks of denim squares.

Summer smiled to herself, remembering the time and effort put into those squares and pondered the stories they had to tell. She immediately knew what to do. Summer called me and let me in on her plan. We were going to have to put the pedal to the metal (haha...) for the next four months in order to pull off the genious plan. We informed the rest of the sisters of our plan and got started right away. There was no time to waste! We got Ken out and made sure he was ready for the long haul. **Ken we couldn't have done this without you**

Fulfilling our plan involved many afternoons of togetherness as we pieced together this quilt of traveling pants, adding to their stories as we went.

We couldn't believe how many squares we had sewn together! And we often had to rearrange furniture...and not to mention vaccum after each gathering. (to this day we find denim string in couch cushions and other places!)

We couldn't have completed this project without the help of so many sisters and appreciate every moment that went into the process (Shantai was there too...but we don't have any pics of her)

Us sisters were so grateful for the frequent time we were able to spend with one another especially because we were doing it all for someone we love very much.

Me and Summer were so proud of Ken for only breaking a needle once in the excrutiating process. (excrutiating for him, not for us)

Of course Summer's daughter (Sky) was there for the making of this denim patchwork of stories. It can only continue to be a Sisterhood of Traveling Pants if future generations are included and get to enjoy it!

Obviously Sky enjoyed being a part of such a project and Summer was quite pleased that her box of squares had made it this far so that we could continue the traveling pants....

... by giving the quilt to our Mother for Mother's Day. This durable quilt of traveling pants I believe will live to see many generations and memories to come.

Love you mom and sisters!!

On a side note this is a cute baby quilt I made for a dear friend! I forgot to get a finished product picture, but it turned out super cute, and I think she liked it.

Taking a stab

So I'm back. I've decided to re-visit the blogger world after my 3-month recess. To be honest I haven't been completely absent, I still thoroughly enjoy reading all of your blogs, I've just been lazy in my creativity. Our lives have definitely NOT slowed down with the summer time as we thought it may! If anything it's much more busy! Luckily in a good way though. We've had a lot of fun thus far and plug our ears at the talk of school beginning in a months time! yikes! Because I'm playing catch up there are going to be some pretty random blog posts for a little bit, but it will let you know what we've been up to! To keep you interested if you haven't already lost hope in my blogging abilities, here are a couple of pictures from the July 5th Hyrum fireworks. Look forward to more great pics throughout the week!! (...I hope..keeping my fingers crossed for your sake :) )