Easter

The annual Clark Family Easter egg hunt was extra special thanks to one extroadinary 11 year old. His name is Taylor Clark and he is my nephew. He spent several hours on his own putting together an "Easter Program" for all of his cousins. Here are pictures of his work: Along with creating this beautiful display, he also wrote a beautiful little program for all of them to hear. Take a look at this video: Hope you can hear it!
Isn't he amazing? I hope this is just the begining of many wonderful things from this young man. I love you Tay!

Done....... Finished........Sayonare.....Adios!

Here is my declaration to the world; I am not taking anymore drastic measures to try and get pregnant. That's right I'm done, finished! And boy does it feel good to come to that conclusion.

It took us just shy of 5 years into our marriage to get Jake and now we have been trying another 4 years since we had Jake (since he was about 2) cumulative that is ...count em, 9 years!

9 years and 65 pounds later and I am soooooo done! I've been depressed, I've had heartbreaking miscarriages, I have tried everything I can that medicine can offer with the exception of in-vitro, which I don't have a spare $25,000 to do it and my chances are cut in half because of my weight, so we are done.

Goodbye nasty shots and horrific hormones, goodbye basal body temperature charts and ovulation predictor kits, goodbye hot flashes, severe mood swings, bouts of crying and anger, and goodbye severe headaches and nasty time-of-the-month yuck, I won't miss you.

Judge me if you want, you won't change my mind. I have learned through this process that unless you are me and Jeff you can't know how we feel so don't compare. My heart breaks for my sister who is childless and my sister and brother-in-law who are in a similar situation. I went through 4+ years of that so I remember, but I don't know really how either of them feel or how difficult it has been for them personally so all I can do is pray for the baby from China to come for Brad and Julie and that someday Kath and Derrick are able to have their own or adopt. Secondary fertility has it's own nastiness. Your body has done it once right, why not again??? Not in the cards..........

Our society is so focused on how many kids you have or why you don't have any. Let me give you all a heads up: If you see a couple childless or with 1 or 2 children instead of saying "you only have one, or two?," look at the couple and see how they are living their lives. If they are trying their best to live the gospel and/or keep high standards, they probably have trouble trying to conceive more. So instead of being nosy and asking too many questions, it is OK to "assume" that there is a reason why they are childless or have a small family and it's really none of your business, even though I know the vast majority of you all mean well and have the best intentions, but enough already! Leave us be about it, and love us anyway. The less you pay attention to all this, the better. You will find you still have a lot more in common with us than you think even though we don't have as many children as you do, or have any at all.

Que Sera, Sera. If we get pregnant and I actually don't miscarriage, we'd be thrilled. If don't, we have a wonderful son that brings us as much joy as any 10 kids could and I am OK with that. I've quite asking why and I am going to just live.

My next quest is to lose about 70 pounds, I hope to lose it by the end of this year. Bring it on! Without the fertility drugs messing me up I should be able to achieve my goal.

So don't be sad for me because I am not. And don't say your sorry, because it is OK. I have a great life, a fantastic husband who works so hard for us and is a wonderful man. And I have Jake, my little buddy and the reason I get up in the morning. I have a job where I make people's lives better and truly make a difference! I have the gospel of JESUS CHRIST to guide me through troubled waters and a family that is forever.

I've now jumped off my soapbox to level ground. Boy, that was good to get off my chest!

Below is my latest cancer healing photo. It was taken last week. Remember no tears or feeling sorry for me. There is no need......

4 weeks after surgery.

Toothless Grin

Today my little boy has one less tooth and is $5.00 richer (I had nothing smaller in my wallet so we said that the first tooth you lose, you get the most money). Although he is 6, this is his very FIRST tooth to come out! My little boy is growing up way too fast!

Yesterday morning Jacob started to eat breakfast and cried in pain, "It hurts to eat!" After careful evaluation of his tooth, (and the permanent one growing behind it) I tried to tell him his tooth was ready to be pulled out.

So all day he suffered, eating soup for lunch and nibbling at dinner. Both Jeff and I tried to pull it out but he shrieked in terror with his big alligator tears "I'm too scared." So we left it alone and put him in the bath.

While Jake was in the tub, Jeff got a brilliant idea. He decided he would brush Jake's teeth for him while he was in the tub. He gently took the brush and massage it around the loose tooth (not telling Jake what he was doing) and then poof! Out popped the tooth! No one was more surprised than Jake. Daddy saved the day! We love our Dad!

Jake and the tooth

Last week Jake was in a short program at school entitled "Leo the Longhorn," where he was a cowboy. He had a terrible sinus infection but insisted on being in the play. He did not have much of a part in the show but was by far the cutest stink' in cowboy in the whole show!



And finally, my face as we head into the 3^rd week after my surgery. Thank heavens for silicone scar strips; I've seen a dramatic improvement since I have been using them! And kudos to Dr. Martineau for his masterful stitchery!

Progress and Vacuum Love

Just thought you all might like to see the healing process on my face. This picture was taken 1 week and 2 days after the surgery. Things are healing nicely so far although my nose is still a little bumpy and I literally feel like I have something hanging on my face, it is a weird sensation. People are also calming down and I am getting less comments and shocking stares.

On a much lighter note can I just say I LOVE my Oreck? Our 4th Vacuum bit the dust in the end of January. After using my parent's Oreck and a few clients, I was totally hooked. We bit bullet and bought an 8lb Oreck! Our carpet is twice as clean and my back is saved! A little pricey but worth every penny!


The Upright is so Easy to Use.

The Handheld Vac is 6lbs and is a PERFECT size for Jake to
Vacuum the Stairs!

Stare Hard: But be careful not to trip.

So here I go again, but this was too funny and enlightening not to share!

The interesting thing about this whole Skin Cancer experience is what I have learned about myself. If you regularly read this blog, you are aware of my weight woes (which I am working on), I have those days where I think "I am so huge, I bet people are looking at me thinking what a big girl I am." I seriously have thought this from time to time when I am having a particular tough day.

My obvious over-inflated opinion of myself was knocked of it's rocker this past week or so with my temporary "scar face." Man, can people stare! They can't help themselves but gawk at me!

I am getting some of the most jaw dropping stares at my face that you can imagine, and everyone is so nice to me, perfect strangers open doors and give me serious "pity" looks. I must look worse than I thought.

My nephew was baptised last Saturday and during the confirmation I opened my eyes to "shush," my son and startled several people who's jaws were dropped staring at me during the prayer. It was actually hilarious!

My latest favorite was yesterday when I went to pick up my son after work from a neighbors and while I was waiting for him to gather his things, a neighbor I am not very acquainted with walked by, looked at me, pulled his sunglasses off and looked again, and then tripped over the sidewalk! I chuckled under my breath as he caught himself and then tried to act cool, calm and collected. What a way to stop him in his tracks!

My lessons learned; No most people are really not staring at me, ever and now I know the difference, and yes, I plan on trying even harder not to stare at people who are different whether they have a permanent ailment or temporary.

I thank the Lord, for this experience, I am sufficiently humbled.

The Aftermath: Battle Scars

For those of you who are on FB, I am so sorry to be redundant but I cannot express enough the importance of limiting your sun exposure. I had skin cancer surgery on Wednesday of this week.

Morphoeic Basal Cell Carcinoma is what it is called. The technique for dealing this kind of cancer around the face and eyes involves examining the carefully marked excised tissue under the microscope while I waited in the waiting room, they examined the tissue layer by layer.

They are not sure until they examine the tissue whether they have to take several slices until the tumour has been completely removed. The defect is often much bigger than the BCC appeared to be before surgery because of hidden extensions of tumour cells under the skin.

Luckily they only had to go digging one time. However, it left enough of a gaping hole on my nose that I did not have enough excess skin to pull over the hole and stitch up. So the Doctor elected to pull down some loose skin from my forehead to cover the hole. (I suppose I had a mini forhead lift by default!) 35 stitches later and below are the aftermath pictures. Here's hoping their is no scar!

This is what tanning in my teens gave back to me! The thing that kills me is I was not even close to as obsessed as some of my friends. I tanned a couple times a month at the most, ever! I knew people who went once or twice a week and layed out every day in the summer. So if I am getting it, I can only imagine they will get it too, it will happen and it stinks!

Thank heavens it is not permanent. I saw a poor guy with a birthmark on the majority of his face the other day and I said a very grateful prayer for my temporary ailment.

Show this to any obsessed teen or person you know who is addicted to tanning. It's NOT worth it!!!! White is the new brown!





This picture was taken a day after the surgery. Nice left black eye, real sexy!




This was after I was finally able to take a bath. My two swollen eyes look like I am wearing raunchy eyeshadow.

People! Stop the maddness!

The next blog will not be this serious!!!!!

CANCER that ugly word!

Sorry for the title shocker but I wanted to get all you sun-worshipers attention. I spent the majority of my teen years in a tanning bed or outside tanning. Thanks to my Dad's skin, I always tanned quite easily and my skin would turn a nice golden.

Fast forward 14 years later and I have Basal Cell Carcinoma right between my eyes. That's right skin cancer. I am the 3rd of my siblings to have a spot and my Dad has had many spots frozen off or cut out. Jeff's Dad has also had some taken off too. So here's my deal....................

Quit with the sun obsession! Spray tan for Pete's sake! This picture is just of the chunk they took off for the biopsy, they will take much more when they dig it out. I am hoping the scar will not be to bad, it is in fact one of the only redeeming things about my body right now. My face!

This is not intended to gross anyone out, this is intended to wake those of you who worship the sun see what sun exposure gives back to you.

I have not tanned in years in fear that I would have to deal with this someday. Now it has happened and you can bet, I will continue to slather on the sunscreen on Jake.
This is not fun or cool, it stinks. Stop the obsession!


On a lighter note, here are some pictures of our little jaunts in January and February, my least favorite months of the year..........I am so ready for spring!

Jake at the Salt Lake Temple


Jeff showing Jake the door handles on the temple.


Jeff and Jake at the LDS Church History Museum.

A year in Review

As I contemplate the events of this last year, I am extremely grateful for the blessings we have received. Here is our year 2008 in review……

A week into January I got a very unfortunate call from Jeff in the late morning on a Monday. He called to tell me that he had just been laid off. He had 2 more weeks of work and then would get 2 weeks of severance plus a payout of his accrued vacation. We were not shocked by this and knew it was a possibility, it happened a little quicker than we had anticipated.

Immediately Jeff began sending out resumes’ and contacting the friends he had made in the aerospace industry to see if they knew of any jobs that they might have open.

In the meantime, Jake had surgery on his feet that very next week after he was told he was going to be laid off. We felt fortunate that we had health benefits to the end of February so this critical surgery could move forward.

Jake had surgery on his feet because of severely flat feet. He had been wearing orthotics since he was two and in three years they had done nothing to help correct his flat feet. So because of the pain he experienced and the fact that he tripped and fell when he ran even after extensive physical therapy, after careful research, we decided to go ahead with a procedure called Subtalar Spacer System (STS). They made a linear incision of 2 to 3 cm in the relaxed skin on the side of his foot just below the ball of his ankle. Then a titanium screw was inserted in his ankle and then they used a guide wire to set the bolt at the approximate angle that would position his feet so that he would have a normal arch like the rest of us. He was a trooper during and after the surgery. A few days after the surgery when we changed the dressing on his feet, he already had this beautiful arch on his sweet little foot. It was amazing for Jeff and me to see.

The doctor said it would be two weeks before he could walk and he would either crawl or need to be carried around until he could support his weight on his feet.

Against the odds, he was walking on his heels a week later and adapting as he could to his situation. Now our boy runs with the rest of the kids and does not get tired after a few steps, he is just like everyone else and we are so grateful!

We are grateful for the family we had who made an effort to help and support Jacob during this time as well as our wonderful friends, Thank you!

In the meantime we took an inventory of our food storage and finances. We lived primarily off our food storage for about a month. We are grateful that we had this to sustain us through that difficult time.

We are grateful for the friends who came forward and offered up their food storage if we needed it during this time, we have amazing friends!

Within 6 weeks of being laid off, Jeff had 3 solid job offers and was trying to decide which one to take. He ended up back at L-3 Communications in Salt Lake. He was happy to return be back to a company with more solid footing and was glad to be with all friends he had made when he worked there previously.

While all of this was going on, I finally obtained a business license for my professional organizing business, received a little more training, and started Clearing Space by Design. It has been a little over 3 year process of getting training shadowing experienced organizers, and picking a time that was best for our family to start the business and move forward. Now nearly a year later, it has been an exciting, rewarding and an amazing educational experience owning my own business. I’ve never worked harder at any job (other than being a wife and mother) in my life! I LOVE my job!

In April Jake had another surgery, this time on his eyes. He has a muscle imbalance known as “intermittent exotropia,” in both eyes that was beginning to affect his balance and tunneling his vision. Exotropia -- a common type of strabismus – is an outward deviation of an eye (away from the nose). The deviation or eye turn may occur while fixating (looking at) distance objects, near objects or both. And he had both. Our optometrist noticed it a year or so back (thanks Dr. Lincoln!) and at the time it was not bad enough to do surgery. He recommended we go to a specialist at Primary Children’s. We went in and visited Dr. Hoffman and they said to come back in six months to evaluate his condition further (that was in 2007). Right after he had his foot surgery, I noticed his eyes appeared to be getting worse and so we went back in to Dr. Hoffman at PCMC and my suspicions were correct, it indeed had gotten a lot worse.

After talking with another Mother who had just gone through it with her daughter (Thanks Ally!), we decided to go ahead with surgery to correct his vision by having them balance the muscles so that one is not more relaxed than the other, thus helping his vision so that it would significantly reduce the side effects of his condition.

Once again, he was a very brave boy! The only thing that was so difficult was they had to numb his eyelids after the surgery to protect his eyes that first day and as he was coming out of anesthetic, he started yelling “They took my eyes, they lied to me Mom!” It was a good thing he could not see me because I held him and cried, seeing my child in pain and not being able to soothe him was about more than I could take!

A day later he still refused to open his eyes even though the numbing had completely worn off, so we decided to motivate him by buying him a “Woody” doll from “Toy Story”. Our plan worked and he couldn't’t take it and had to open his sore blood shot eyes to see Woody. The healing progressed quickly from there.

Again, we were amazed at the love and support we had for Jake. We have such great people apart of our lives! We thank you!

Now a year later, we have a new child! Our boy can run and run and not get tired and for the first time he can look us in the eye with both eyes at the same time. Jeff and I are amazed at his transformation. He has also had quite an academic jump since he had his feet and eyes fixed. We are so grateful for modern medicine so we have these options available to us!

In Late July I went in for the 4th time for surgery on my ovaries. Because of my Poly cystic Ovaries they did what they call “ovarian drilling.” They poke holes in the ovaries to drain the cysts which gives an extra 40% chance of getting pregnant (rather than the 15 to 20% otherwise) obviously it did not help as I am not pregnant. But I have a new resolve about all of it and am so grateful for the amazing son, and fantastic husband, I have and the wonderful life I have. Whatever will be, will be.

We were just "skinny" spring chickens in this picture!

On December 27th Jeff and I celebrated our 11th wedding anniversary, time flies when you’re having fun! 11 years have flown by faster than I ever would have imagined. I love you baby!

Overall our year was a good one another year of learning, growing and hopefully progressing.

For those who are interested, I have some exciting events coming up for my business this year and I am excited for all the events these next couple months. I’ve also established an organizing tips and products on my site as well as a calendar of events of classes (Click on the link on this page for more info.).

Happy New Year Everyone!

Some thoughts as I live more life and grow older. To all the women I love.

So this post may be a little different but here goes.

I have been thinking a lot about how we as women look at ourselves, how critical we are of each other and mostly ourselves. I've made a few changes. And I have already seen the fruits of my labors.

So most the pictures in the blog below, I really hate of myself. BUT! Guess what??? I am going to keep them. They have precious memories, that I would rather not delete.

My Jake is not going to look back years from now and say, "Wow, my Mom was one fat lady," he's going to look back and say, "Wow, look at me and my Mom at the Festival of Trees!" That's why I get in the pool and all the other stuff so he will not remember me sitting on the sidelines feeling sorry for myself, he will remember me actively engaged in his life. Not an easy thing to do for me, but for him, my precious and only child, I do it.

Do I like the way I look?? No and I am working on it. Do I have confidence in who I am and what my abilities are? Absolutely. I know what I can an cannot do and being heavy does not stop me from living my life. I would not be a successful small business owner if I wallowed in self-pity.

I've starved myself to be thin in my life and still felt fat and now I am on the other end of the spectrum wishing I could knock some sense into that stupid girl who was so caught up in her looks, she was miserable. Sure, she was thin, but VERY unhappy!

So, I've said goodbye to all those wasted times I spent sitting on the sidelines worrying about how I would look and saying hello to participating in life today, not waiting for tomorrow when I like how I look in pictures better. It's really liberating !

I have a fantastic life, a great husband and son and work I LOVE because I know I am making a difference! I want to enjoy it as much as I can!

I hope all you gorgeous women out there live life too and not let it pass you by. Today only happens once........Live for today.


P.S. PLEASE! Browse through and enjoy all the pictures below!

Tons of Pictures and updates!

The 1st Annual Clark Family Game Night Christmas Party! The game of "Sneaks" (kind of like spoons with a twist). Thanks Heather for all your "Simply Fun" games. Let me know if any of you want to book a party with her, the games are awesome!


Uncle Rich (Brother No. 2) doing what he does best, making people laugh! (We love ya Rich!)


The second generation off-spring of Brent and Karen Clark (our feeble attempt at getting a picture of all of them together)


The half eaten table of goodies for the party.


Angel girl Lily (our niece) at The First Annual Clark Family Game Night.


Jeff, this one is for you, GO UTES BABY!


The finished product!


The Annual Making of the Gingerbread House!


Our Jacob, singing in his Chior group from school.


My brother Jon, his son Hunter, and my awesome Mom and Dad at Hunter's Baptism.


Jake and his favorite cousin Hunter at Hunter's Baptism. So cute!


Jake's bear he made for a sick child at Primary Children's Hospital.


Jake and myself at the Festival of Trees. ( I hate this picture but I am going to keep it and not erase it. See more of the blog for the reasons why)

Here are Jake and his cousin Michael in the Kid's Korner at the Festival of Trees


Cutie Pie's Jon (Brother No. 3) and Hunter (his son and our nephew) at Hunter's 8th Birthday celebration.

Jeff and Jake at the Kaysville City Light Parade, so fun!



The finished project! What a Beauty!


Artistry at it's finest (J/K).



Me and my Thanksgiving Pie Extravaganza. (Yes I made every bit of those pies from SCRATCH!)

Fun on a Crisp Fall Day!

I jumped in here too mind you, but someone had to take the video and pictures.


So cute these two! The one great thing about only having one child is you re-live your childhood literally with them! You're it, there is no one else for Jake to share it with!


Our little Buddy!


I think I love this one the most. Jeff and Jake looking at the sky, talking about life!



Happy Thanksgiving everyone! As always, I have much to be grateful for. The Lord has blessed me and my family abundantly with a full life full of purpose and JOY! Who says money buys happiness?? Love and the joy of being together outranks anything else in my opinion. May you all express gratitude to our Creator for the goodness that is so readily ours! Enjoy your Thanksgiving!

Our Little Indiana Jones

Better late than never, here are our Halloween Pictures. I think this was Jake's best costume yet!


Harrison Ford, Watch Out! I think We've Found Someone Cuter!
We had YODA! And Batman Too!
Jeff and Jake (Jeff makes one "Hot" Blond! Actually this picture of Jeff frightens me)

Happy Birthday Jeff!

It was Jeff's Birthday on Sunday. This is the 11th Birthday I have spent with him.

I can honestly say he's the best thing that ever happened to me, the love of my life, and my very best friend! Happy Birthday baby, you're the best. (Pictured here are my two favorite people)!