General Conference

Wow!  I tell you what, Wow!  Was General Conference powerful or what?  Jacob and I spent the entire weekend in Salt Lake watching General Conference this last weekend.  Conference is such a good experience.  I think that I definitely prefer to watch instead of just listen.  I find I can take in what the Apostles are saying when I watch. 

  It seems to me that recurring theme was that of spiritual nature and not temporal.  I mean, the first two talks were so powerful about always having the spirit with you and getting personal revelation. 

  Jacob’s favorite session was the Priesthood session and was particularly struck by President Uchtdorf’s talk.  I can’t wait to read it and see what he, and the other General Authorities said. 

  We are so grateful to be members of the true Church of Jesus Christ.

A Bored Teller

Hello out there.  How are you all doing?  We are good.  Every day at work I sit here at my teller station and not many people come in.  It can get pretty boring.  So I thought I would post something.  I am not sure what to write, but something.  Oh, here is something good.

I have recently re-kindled my love for yard sales!  Last weekend I took a little bit of cash and came home with some wonderful bargains.  Here is the list of what I got and how much I paid:

2 Kitchen chairs- $5.00 (If any of you have been to our house for dinner, you have seen Jacob and myself sitting on some pretty interesting concoctions.  Like, Jacob at the table in a wing-back chair, and me on a big black box.  Now our table has 4 real chairs instead of 2!)

1 Gun cabinet- $5.00 (I know, you are thinking gun cabinet?  Well, it doesn’t look like a gun cabinet and I am going to turn it into something very cool.  By the way, any ideas?)

3 baskets- $0.75                                               

3 picture frames- $1.25

1 white nightstand- $5.00

1 pie plate- $0.50

1 cool looking bowl- $0.50

1 angel ornament- $0.25 ( I collect angel ornaments, or other ornaments.  Did you know?)

1 Halloween cat in a pumpkin plate- $0.50 (It’s plastic but looks like glass.  Totally cute.  So excited to put it up.)

1 shelf to hang on a wall- $2.00

1 lamp- $1.00

1 fake plant- $1.00

There might be some other things but I can’t remember right now.  Isn’t that wonderful?  All that stuff for under $25.00.  I like to decorate and make my house look cute and cozy, but I don’t have a big budget for that kind of stuff.  Let me take that back, I have almost no money whatsoever to spend on decorations, but with a little bit of careful planning and some scouring and bargaining, I know my home is on its way to cozy.  I wish I had a camera to show you all the things.  Anyway, I was inspired by this blog: The Happy Homebody

  http://thehappyhomebody.blogspot.com/ Love her blog. 

I am excited to see all the amazing things I can do with my new finds!

Isn’t this the cutest thing?  I found it on a random blog.

The Morrises Updated

Friends, it’s been a while.  I recently read my friends LaChelle’s blog and was inspired by her update to do the same thing myself.  So here we go.  I would like to break down our information in segments for you starting with sweet Jacob.

Jacob- Many of you may not know that Jacob and I actually met each other first in seventh grade while doing the musical Oklahoma! together. This was such a terrible experience for Jacob he vowed never to be in another musical ever again.  However, Jacob recently discovered he actually likes being in musicals, as long as the other people are nice and Caroline is doing it with him.  Jacob discovered his dancing feet in the summer production of Annie Get Your Gun with Alpine Community Theater. 

  Jacob is still plugging away at US Bank.  He just can’t seem to tear himself away from that place.  (Caroline still tries to, but Jacob is ever so persistent).  He studied all summer to become A+ certified, but after much thought decided he would rather just try to get a programming job when the time came to change professions. 

  Jacob is ready to go back to school come August 26th and get his Associates Degree in Computer Programming in the next 3 semesters.   Even though working full time and full time school seems daunting, he will do great!  He is such a good studier. 

Caroline- After getting in touch with her mean, prejudiced, and ridiculous side, Caroline really enjoyed portraying Dolly Tate in Annie Get Your Gun this summer.  Who knew that performing would be such a thrilling experience for a performance major?  Thank you to all the friends, family, and co-workers that came and supported us during the performances.  We truly love you. 

  Caroline is still working at Alpine Credit Union as a full time See How Many Other Things You Can Do At Work That Are Not Really Work Representative.  That is the technical name for Teller.  Yes, her new branch remains slow as molasses in January. 

  The big news for Caroline is that she is going back to school in the Fall to Utah Valley University.  She will graduate with her Associates of Science is Music in the Spring if all goes according to plans.  Caroline hopes to make it back into the BYU Music program this winter. 

Well, that sums it up folks.  Summer has been great!  We are looking forward to a wonderful autumn.

Annie Get Your Gun!

It has been so long since our last post!  Jacob and I auditioned and were cast in the Alpine Community Theater production of Annie Get Your Gun! I decided we needed something to fill up the summer evening hours.  We are both characters in the play.  Jacob is playing the role of Mac the Prop Man, and I am playing Dolly Tate.  It has been a lot of fun so far, although, not quite what I had expected.  It is taking up a lot of time and trying to play my character so far has been really challenging.  I am playing a very antagonist character and it is really hard for me.  Jacob is required to dance in almost every dance number and he is struggling with that.  We are both being stretched.  It will all work out and all in all is a fun experience.  Come see us perform July 10-18th.

Every Rose has it’s Thorn.

Getting married was an opportunity for God to remind me how much I don’t know. I’ve mad some bad mistakes in a little over a year of marriage, and there was a recent one that was a doosey. I bought a car off of KSL without taking it to mechanic first! Not surprising there was a ton more wrong with it than the guy told me about. It’s been awful and even embarrassing. I’m overwhelmed by the kindness of my parents who have really helped us out, my Step Father has done a lot of the repairs himself, and they helped us pay for the repairs he couldn’t do. It’s definitely an answer to prayer, I’ve spent a long time praying and agonizing over that car since I bought it, and the only answer that would come is that somehow I needed to fix it up and not give up on it. If all goes as planned we should have it fully registered this week! It’s nothing short of a miracle.

By the way, we decided to name this car Pebbles because it’s been a pebble in my shoe.

Hello Boys and Girls, Welcome to Nursery today!

Jacob and I were just called to be Nursery workers in our new ward.  I know that for some people, you might as well be asking them to slit their wrists, but were are totally stoked!  We both love kids and are so happy that our calling is a Sunday only calling.  Not that we won’t put in extra time during the week for lesson prep and such, but with both of us working full-time, it’s hard to have callings that require presence during the week. 

Our first week was last Sunday and it was a good experience.  When we first came in I felt like one of the shy kids myself.  I might as well have been in a dark corner, my fingers in my mouth, looking around with doe eyes wondering why my Mom left me in this scary place.  I think Jacob felt the same way.  We just sat there for the first 45 minutes looking around, feeling dumb.  However, one of the little boy, Sam, came up to us and started throwing a Nerf football to us.  That did it.  That broke the ice and the stupefied look on our faces and all of a sudden we were the Super Heroes of the Nursery.  Okay, we just were able to start playing with the kids and helping out.  It was a good thing we were there too because this same Sam needed us.  It was his first week and he just turned 18 months.  Very much a baby still.  He was crying for his Mom a lot, but somehow decided that Jacob was a pretty ok guy and attached himself to him.  Jacob carried him around and Sam felt better. 

We are excited for this new calling and hope that we can love these little children.  We hope to make their first experiences with the gospel positive.  Most of all, we want them to begin to understand that their Heavenly Father and Savior, Jesus Christ, love them very much and want them to be happy.  Although, I have a feeling that they are probably more aware of that than I am. 

Another fun blog

Hi there.  For my own benefit I have created a personal blog.  I am using it for my journey of losing weight.  I am tracking what I eat and the exercise I do every day.  Check it out.  www.livingmypotential.wordpress.com

I would love to have as much support as I can get through this life changing challenge. 

Here’s a little something I wrote for communications:

Jacob Morris
COMM 2110
My Best Friend
My wife, Caroline, is by far my best friend. She’s great. She’s fulfills a lot of complimentary needs for me. I see her often, I am able to disclose my feelings to her, and she does the same to me. I have never been as close with anyone as I am with my wife.
One complimentary need that my wife meets is something I like to call spreading versus stacking. Caroline is spreader, I’m a stacker. I like to devote all my time and energy towards one thing at a time, Caroline likes to be doing many things at the same time, so she does more things, but she has less time and energy to dedicate them in.
My wife and I just moved into a new apartment, and I think that experience provides a good example of stacking versus spreading. As a stacker, I like to pick what I consider to be the most important thing and work on it until it’s done. So I started packing boxes like crazy. I wondered why my wife wasn’t doing the same thing. To my good fortune, my wife took care of many details I wasn’t even thinking about, so by the time I was done with the boxes, they were all taken care of. My wife had cleaned up the house, washed and folded clothes, and helped to organize our incoming labor force. My wife reminds me to do things I should be doing, even if I don’t think they are the most important. I try to help my wife remember not to try to do too many things at once.
My wife also meets a complimentary need by helping me to be more careful. My whole life I’ve been the kind of person that puts forth as little work as possible to get by. My handwriting is a good example. It has never been very good. One day in second grade, I decided to write neatly and I found out that I could, but decided it probably wasn’t worth the effort. Before I got married, my shoelaces were often untied, my shirts were often stained, and my grades were almost always B’s. All of this behavior stems from my laid back attitude. Handwriting, shoes, shirts, and A’s never seemed that important. One of the first things I’ve noticed about my wife is that she has gorgeous, almost artistic, handwriting and dresses herself in a very neat and cute way. My wife has the attitude that in life, if you get all details right everything else will fall in the place. I’ve really begun to see that she is right.
I think my laid back attitude is helpful to my wife. I remember one time she was setting a table for a family gathering. She was getting very upset, because there weren’t enough plates of the same set. She was going to have to use some plates that wouldn’t match. Worrying about details is beneficial, but when there’s nothing you can do about a situation there is no use stressing out over it. Luckily, I was there to remind her that nobody was going notice if two plates were slightly different than the others.
Although Caroline and I have our differences, we also share some important things in common. We both have the same religious beliefs and core values. That’s important in a marriage. For example we both feel really uncomfortable watching movies that have swear words. This is good because otherwise I might get pressured in to watching something I don’t want to watch. I am very happy that Caroline and I enjoy the same things.
A lot of guys go for girls who are younger than them. The idea is that they can get prettier girls that way. Girls seemed to be impressed with a guy who is a little more established. I’ve never bought into that theory. There’s a big difference between 19 and 22. Part of what attracted me to my wife is that she is smart. I was able to have some really nice conversations with her because she had a mature enough mind. So another thing we have in common is we have about the same level of maturity.
I t is very fortunate that Caroline and I enjoy doing many of the same things together. I love movies. Once I came back home from Puerto Rico, I watched movies all day. I started in the morning and didn’t finish late at night. If I had enough time and enough movies I could probably do that all day every day. I love the experience of being taken into someone else’s story. When I’m stressed out there’s nothing I love more than popping in a good movie. It is good that Caroline shares that value with me, or I would go crazy. I’m glad we can put in a good movie together and enjoy it.
Not only do our differences and our similarities make us close, but also the time that we are able to share and disclose information to each other. My wife and I have dinner together every night and talk about things we have done that day. We spend every night and every morning together. It’s really nice to have someone to come home to.
In conclusion, I am attracted to my wife for several reasons. She fills complimentary needs for me and makes me feel better than I would otherwise. We share in common the things that are most important to me which makes her my best friend.

More Pics

I’ve decided I like these two pictures alot. I like my Caroline with a little sass!