It's My Party and I'll Cry If I Want To

 Started the week off with a whirlwind 48 hour trip to Seattle to call on Amazon with one of my clients: Huk Performance Fishing Apparel. It was my first time actually exiting out of the Seattle airport and it was as pretty as I had imagined. We've surpassed our peak fall but it felt like Seattle was just starting theirs. 

It's always good to actually see my boss Major in person and we were able to coordinate some of our slide deck before heading off to grab drinks with our Amazon Vendor Manager Wynne. We had the yummiest beet hummus that was the prettiest most vibrant purple color and was seriously so yummy going to be searching for a recreate recipe. After our casual meet up with Wynne we went for a second round of drinks with the Huk guys after the flew in and since my drink = water on the rocks by 8:00 when we left for dinner I was starving. We went to a cute little English inspired pub and I swear they kept the doors propped open because it was freezing in there. It was fun to hear Bill talk about more of his adventures with Luke Combs. He knows him well from his prior days working at Columbia. After a couple of hours we went to turn in for the night before our morning meetings. 

I don't think I even moved after I fell into bed I was so tired. After a quick peloton workout in my hotel room the morning I packed up my backpack and left ready to head directly to the airport after our meetings at Amazon. Amazon's campus extends over several blocks and the Sports and Outdoors category that we mainly associate with had moved buildings so Major wasn't sure where we were going and we got turned around a few times. After making it there we had to sign in, hand over our drivers licenses and get our pictures taken. They actually print out a visitors pass with your picture on it and put it in a clear sleeve with a clip on it that you have to pin on your clothes. They definitely mean business over there. Our meetings went well. Wynne is transitioning out into a new role so we were able to meet our new vendor manager and Bill and Ned brought a lot of the F24 apparel line for them to see and feel which was really cool. I've said it before but in person meetings really are so nice and it's always good to watch facial expressions and reactions while presenting. I do need to work on my introductions because I find it so awkward talking about and introducing myself so that's a goal me. I've got a pretty good elevator pitch for the random person that asks me what I do for work but when it comes to introducing myself to people within the industry I clam up. 

Major is definitely not a show up two hours before your flight kind of guy and I was having second hand anxiety for him after we wrapped up the meeting and said our goodbyes and he turned to me and said ok we need to get an Uber my flight leaves in 40 minutes... LEAVES NOT BOARDS! I would have been a train wreck. Somehow we got an Uber driver that we are convinced is ex-NASCAR because he cut a 25 minute airport commute down to 15 minutes. I joked with Major that I need to come back to Seattle because I didn't even get to see much of it even from the car because we were going so fast. 

Somehow we made it and security was not crowded at all so Major walked right onto the plane and left without any issues. I had a little more time to kill so I grabbed lunch at a Lucky Louie's Fish Shack, figured I should probably get some fresh fish while I was there and sat and worked for another hour before my own flight left. It was a crazy couple of days but honestly way fun. I was glad I finally got to go to Amazon's headquarters and hope to be back again soon.

Best/worst part of the week was my birthday on the 10th. I'll explain.

As a kid I would cry on my birthday because I didn't like to get older, I liked where I was at. I know it's weird but I think what it really translated to was my dislike and fear of the unknown and all that turning a year older would/could bring. 

As I got older I got better with it but this year I slipped back into my 9 year old self and may or may not have cried. Mainly because looking ahead at this next year I just don't know how and when we'll be able to get into a house the market is crazy and it hit me that I'm turning 26 and we need to start having kids and how many are we going to have and how old will I be when I'm done?! Is your head spinning? Welcome to the club. Jaden comforted me and told me it was all going to be ok and I was much too young to be crying on my birthday. That worked for the rest of the night but by the next afternoon when I went to lunch with my mom I expressed some of my same fears and ended up crying in front of everyone at Vessel Kitchen where she took me for lunch. She offered me the same comfort and validated that it was ok to not have all the answers and not feel settled. Then she took me for some retail therapy and we found me some cute black boots and a black purse that I think I'll wear every day for the rest of Fall/Winter. I seriously love them both. She's slowly turning me into a purse girl but they have to be super small and compact. 

I don't want it to sound ungrateful I truly am so incredibly thankful for the life I have, the things I've accomplished the people I am surrounded by. I do think that trusting in the future is something no one is ever really good at. At least not me. I later found these verses in Mosiah that was a good reminder for me: 

I would that ye should remember and always retain in remembrance, the greatness of God, and your own nothingness, and his goodness and long-suffering towards you, unworthy creatures and humble yourselves even int he depths of humility, calling on the name of the Lord daily, and standing steadfastly in the faith of that which is to come....

"And behold, I say unto you that if you do this ye shall always rejoice, and be filled with the love of God, and always retain a remission of your sins; and ye shall grow in knowledge of the glory of him that created you, or in the knowledge of that which is just and true."

That phrase "standing steadfastly in the faith of that which is to come," is what stood out to me the most. THAT is what I need to work on this year. As I've read the Book of Mormon I keep thinking about how often the word "remember" is used and how the promises are the always the same: if you keep the commandments you will prosper in the land. There's a reason it's repeated is because we forget! We forget to remember and we forget to trust God and His promises. Time and time again I have seen Him work miracles and bestow beautiful blessings  in my life and I need to stand steadfastly in the faith I have in Him and all that lies in the future. Because when you do the promises are so sweet: you will always rejoice, you'll feel His love, you'll be forgiven, you'll know Him and His glory. I want those promises. My parents have a home video of me as a toddler flipping through flash cards and not knowing how to read but repeating the phrase "I know the things I know the things I need to do." Here I am 26 years old needing to dig out those flashcards and repeat that same phrase: "I know the things I know, the things I need to do."

It is always better when your birthday falls on a weekend so after work on Friday Jaden and I went to the spa. He had never had a massage before and Landon and Mady had given him a giftcard as a thank you for performing their wedding and I said for my birthday I wanted to tag along with him when he used it. As we headed for our car after he said to me, "I'm kind of sad it's over... do you think we can go again when we're in Hawaii?" I think it's safe to say we've converted him!

He took me to one of my fav SugarHouse eats: Saffron Valley. I found it while I was living in SLC and going to the U. Jaden hadn't really had much Indian food before he met me but Saffron Valley quickly became one of our favorite places to pickup dinner and take it back to the Beach House. I hadn't had it in years and it was just as good as I remembered it. And to top it off we stopped by Cheesecake Factory and picked up my fav S'mores cheesecake as my birthday treat. Even though it was emotional it was in fact a good birthday and I am always taken aback by the amount of people that reach out via, text, call, email and Facebook expressing their birthday wishes. I have the best support network a girl could ask for. Just need to remember and trust that no matter what happens I am loved, I am thought of and all will be better than I could imagine. 

Peaches

• Amazon meetings in Seattle
• Fresh salmon from Lucky Louies

• Actually making our flights
• My Grandma visited me on my birthday and brought me a giant cupcake she made

.

• Lunch with my mom
• Finding new fav black boots and bag

• Cutest birthday wishes from so many

• Finding a song called 26 that is actually really good

• Listening to my birthday playlist I add to every year
• Sometimes you need a good cry and reset
• Finding a scripture verse that spoke peace to my mind and heart and prompted me to do and be better
• CMU Crew girls can't trash each others' porches but we are keeping up the tradition of leaving a gift on them and the girls sent me a chocolate bar and the new Magnolia cook book with the sweetest note I taped in the front of the book to always remember. Since I'm not living by Waco they sent me a piece of it instead!

• Seeing pictures of my cousin's wedding in Spokane

• Planning my upcoming lesson for Young Womens

• Dinner and some new sunglasses from Bridge
• Lunch and shopping with mom
• Birthday spa date night and dinner
• Pretty lights in City Creek

• Forgetting to take a picture so stopping by my parents and having them take one of us

Pits 

• Logan's mom Camille passed away after a 7 month battle with cancer. We are gutted for the Barber family 
• Losing sight of faith and focusing on fear 
• Crying about getting older