Seizing a Lifetime, One Day at a Time

I'm a Sabbath breaker. I just couldn't help it. The six year old girl made me do it. Before I explain, I have to announce that I'm a dad! Nathan James Tolley was born on November 8th at 5:03 am. He weighed 7lbs 1oz (up to 9 lbs 12oz now!) and 19.5 inches long. It was an amazing experience to go through. I was in shock when he arrived and there's still times when I look down and realize he's my son, not just some baby we're taking care of. I'd definitely recommend it to anyone wondering if they should have kids. Now, back to the six year old girl. Melissa and I were sitting on the couch enjoying our Sunday afternoon when a knock came at the door. We weren't expecting anyone so you can imagine our surprise when I opened the door and saw a little girl standing there with a basket in her hands. "Hello, my name is Callie," she said in the cutest voice you've ever heard. "I'm selling oatmeal cookie mix to make money for my piano le...

Hey everyone! After a year, I'm back! Okay, it hasn't been a year and let's be honest, it's likely the person reading this is someone in Latvia who randomly stumbled upon my blog while searching for an article about American toothpaste, or something random like that. If that's you, thanks for stopping by, but I don't have any information about toothpaste. For anyone else, how's it going? I know it's been a while since I last posted. Life has been busy and yet pretty uneventful. I'm married now and just starting to settle into it. I'm living in Boise with my beautiful wife and my new puppy, Topper. He's a handful, but great for our little family right now. My job is going great and I'm learning a lot. I feel like I'm really accomplishing something everyday. Life is just pretty darn good. So that brings us to today. Why do I suddenly decide to blog after a peaceful leave of absence from the digital world? There's two reasons. Fi...

Holy Cow! Things have changed so much since the last time I posted. I promise to keep things up to date (okay, that's probably not true, but I'll try) with my new life. I met someone! I love her! I'm going to marry her! We met on a blind date that we both felt was meh. However, the next day I asked her to go to lunch and she asked if I wanted to play some games with her friends. From then on our relationship just naturally grew. It's been crazy as things have progressed, but I've loved it! Since then I've proposed and I wanted to type that up so everyone could hear the great story of what happened. So here it is. The story starts on Thursday, May 6, 2010. Thursday, Decisions and Graduation (May 6,2010) Thursday, I got an email from Eileen (the lady at SE Needhams) saying that the wax for the ring I had ordered was done. I went in and looked at the wax. It looked good, but not as great as I thought it would be. I wasn't sure if it was exactly what I w...

I have a future! I just accepted a job offer today from Clearwater Analytics, the company in Boise that I worked for last summer. It’s great to have that job security and not have to worry about finding a job over the next few months. The only thing I’m really nervous about is moving back up to Boise. I liked it up there, but it’s no Logan. I’m just starting to feel really comfortable back here in Cache Valley and now I already have to consider leaving again! I guess the constant in life is change and I just have to get used to it. So life has been pretty interesting lately. And by interesting, I mean mostly boring. I’m starting to hang out with some old friends again which has been fun, but I have a feeling that the new semester will change that. There’s a lot of thought going through my head that I would love to post about all my social life experiences, but I think for once I’m going to plead the fifth. I’ve decided that my life really isn’t interesting as an open book and I need ...

You know, it’s so much easier to vent than it is to be grateful. Last night I wrote a post that was all a vent and of course the answer to my venting came this morning. I was (of all places) in the shower and D&C 121 came to my mind. It wasn’t any sudden big revelation or any new knowledge that came to me. The only thought that really came to me was “If you’re going through trials, you’re among good company.” Also, I’ve been reminded of some interesting things that happened a year ago that just helped me know that God loves me. Trials happen, and they’ll pass. If I can’t bear my own trials, how will I be able to bear them and help when it’s my children going through them. I guess what I’m saying is that life can be tough. It sucks sometime. But who cares about the crappy times? Sure I can hold them in and let them make me shallow and angry at life. Or I can get over them and help other people going through them. I’m choosing to smile. After all, it’s better than the alternative. ...

Warning: This blog is a vent. I need to get some thoughts out but don't really have anywhere else to put them. I can already tell it's going to be negative but hopefully I'll be able to see the positive once I'm done venting. Here goes... Life is so frustrating!! I'm just really sick of so many things going wrong. I'm trying so hard to be patient and charitable but sometimes I wonder if life just keeps throwing me challenges just to make me break. It's like me and life are playing bloody knuckles and I keep getting hit because I'm afraid to hit life back. I don't want to be negative or rude or anything like that, but sometimes it seems like the trials are going to keep piling up until I finally break and be the negative person I don't want to be! I'm trying so hard to keep a positive attitude, but I can't just keep smiling when everything keeps falling apart. It's unbearable. You might be wondering what could be so bad and I'll ad...

It's been a little while since I last had anything fun to say. Sad to say, it will still be a while until I come up with something "fun" but I figured I should write something on here before I start losing all my dedicated readers. :) Actually, I'm sick (possibly Swine Flu) and have nothing better to do on this beautiful Sunday afternoon where I'm stuck inside and self-quarantined in my own room. I need to apply for EFY... nevermind, the application doesn't open until November 6. I'll have to add that to my calendar. Done. Moving on... Not a lot has happened over the past few months. School has started and is moving along, with or without me. My classes are relatively boring. Either I have a really cool teacher and a boring class or I have a really boring teacher and a boring class. The material just isn't reaching out and grabbing my attention. We'll see if my grades show it at the end of the semester, btu I think they'll turn out okay. I'...