The thirteenth seven days.

I'm almost at the end of my 100 happy days posts! This post brings us up to day 91.

August 10: I think today was a really good day. Our sermon at church was good (it was about forgiveness.) Then later in the afternoon, we went over to Brandon's parents' house. His mom really wanted to make us dinner, and I wanted to spend some time with her anyway. So we went over there and she taught me some crochet basics while Brandon played video games with one of his brothers. We had a good dinner and I got back to crocheting while Denise and I watched "19 Kids and Counting" on Netflix. I was very glad to get to spend time with her, and I'm glad Brandon got to spend some time playing with his brother, too. I'm excited about learning to crochet- I am going to try to make some things to sell to fund my next mission trip!

August 11: I didn't do much today, but what I did get done, I feel pretty good about. I got a little bit of housework done and spent much of the rest of the day working on the scarf I'm crocheting (it's totally for practice- it doesn't look very good!) I was also happy to have leftovers for lunch and dinner. I'm thankful that our families have shared food with us!

August 12: Do you ever get really excited about something you find for a really awesome price? Today I found some steeply discounted yarn in a clearance bin, and I bought two skeins to turn into scarves. I started on one today, and I think the practice I had on my "ugly scarf" really helped. I just started a new one with the pretty, soft, new yarn, and I'm already very pleased. The stitching is neat and the colors are so pretty! I'm looking forward to finishing it so I can see how it looks and start on the next one. It's also nice to work on something you can be proud of!

August 13: Hey hey hey! I don't remember what I was originally going to write for this day, but I have something super exciting for today- I get to go to  Disney World! My cousin will be in Orlando for work in November, around her birthday. My aunt was talking about driving down to do a few days at Disney, since they'll have some of the Christmas stuff going on. I guess they've nailed down the dates and are starting to make things official, and my aunt texted me and invited me to go along! I'M SO EXCITED!!! I adore Disney. I am one of those people who tears up when seeing a commercial for the parks. I love it, love it, love it. And my last visit there wasn't super awesome- we tried to do two parks in one day, and it was hot and we were tired, my dad was in pain and my brother was absolutely miserable (his medical issues limit his mobility, and he spent the entire trip in a wheelchair. Despite not having to walk- which he couldn't have done- he still had so much pain and the heat made him feel terrible.) We will be spending a long weekend there in November, so we don't have to rush through as much, and hopefully since it's the week before Thanksgiving, things won't be too busy! I'm super pumped. Ridiculously so. This has made me so happy!

August 14: Today is my best friend's birthday! Kelli and I have been friends since 8th grade. She is one of my oldest friends and I love spending time with her. Around senior year of high school we saw each other every day, and spent a lot of weekends together. She came over once or twice a week throughout most of college, too. But then we got older and I got married and our schedules are harder to coordinate, between when I'm at work and when I have things going on and when she's out of town or working nights. I actually haven't seen her since my birthday (mostly because we haven't had air conditioning most of this summer!) I'm so thankful for her. Spending time with her makes me happy. Actually, usually I get sick when we hang out together, because we eat and then laugh and talk and laugh even more, and my reflux starts acting up big time (she is the only person to whom I can say "being with you makes me feel like barfing" and it be a compliment.) But it's worth it! I hope she has a really fun birthday, and I'm looking forward to spending time with her this weekend! Besides being happy and thankful for my BFF, I'm also happy that I got a letter from Bonifas today!

August 15: I got to take a surprise field trip today. My boss needed to get some books on a specific subject for one of our volunteers, and the task kind of got away from him this week. Today, he asked me to try to track down the books, and said that he would even be willing to travel to a nearby branch to pick them up. I found that our branch didn't have the books, but another branch did- the one that my dear friend Jess went to work at! I selflessly (haha) volunteered to drive over and get the books for my boss. I kind of had to work hard to convince him that I definitely didn't mind going! So I got to leave work for a little bit, drive over to the other branch, and spend about five minutes speed-talking to my friend whom I miss terribly. It's still so weird that she's gone- as I said last week, we've worked together for the better part of a decade. She's like a sister to me, and I'm sad that I no longer get to see her every day. It still sort of feels like she's just helping out temporarily at this other branch! But getting to drive over to see her for a few minutes was an unexpected blessing. I don't think I could do it every week, because of using the extra gas, but it'd be nice if I could run errands to see her every once in a while!

August 16: Today I got to spend the day with my BFF Kelli. I did some cleaning this morning and baked up a batch of birthday brownies for her, then she came over around lunch. She picked up lunch on her way over (we had lunch from Mark's Feed Store, a really yummy local barbecue chain.) I'm happy she liked her birthday presents- there were some inside jokes, lots of candy, and a really sweet Harry Potter t-shirt (it was navy and had a doe patronus and the word "always" in floaty script. And if you like HP, you will know why this is awesome.) We watched "My Neighbor Totoro", read some funny articles I had been wanting to show her, and then decided to watch "Jumanji." I had been wanting to watch it all week, as the passing of Robin Williams has weighed heavily on my heart. And Kelli said she hadn't seen it since she was a little kid, so it was fun revisiting that part of our childhood together!