No More Frowny Face :)

Guess what I got today!?!?!

A LETTER!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! YAY!!!!

I’ve seriously been waiting for this letter from Mike since Saturday. And yes, 5 days of waiting is torture! But this letter was great because Mike being his sweet self wrote The Snider Clan! :) What a sweet boy!

Here’s letter to the Snider’s…

Is it weird that just his handwriting puts the BIGGEST smile on my face? :D Cause it does! I love it. Especially his cursive. That’s probably really weird huh? Haha. It must just be an MG thing. I love that he love my family. I love that my family love him (or at least I think they do… ;) ). He’s seriously such a great kid and I’m so lucky to have found him. I’m sure a lot of you guys can relate, but I found this quote that basically sums up how I feel about being with Michael. “One Universe, Nine Planets, Two Hundred and Four Countries, Eight Hundred and Nine Islands, Seven Seas, and I had the Privilege to meet you.” Like seriously, what are the odds? It just blows my mind how perfectly things work out.

And yes, I did get my own personal letter from his as well but I don’t really like to post those on here. They’re special. He’s such a good writer. One sentence will be so spiritual and then the next one he’ll be telling a goofy joke and the next he’ll be telling me how much I mean to him. One thing that I will share is this, “Just know you’re a blessing to me out here. I love you!” :) That sentence just helps me to keep going. 5 months and 1 week down! WOO! Funny thing is, I actually thought to myself the other day… “Wow…This is going faster than I thought it would.” Haha.

This is basically my favorite song right now :)

 

I LOVE MY ELDER RAINES!!!

2+14=16

Forever and Always

"Zostanę z tobą Na Zawsze”

I Love Mondays…?

YES! I absolutely love Mondays! Weird right? But it’s true. Mondays are great for me for many many reasons.

1. NO WORK
2. NO SCHOOL
3. EMAIL FROM ELDER RAINES
4. LETTER FROM ELDER RAINES

I basically spend the whole day relaxing, reply to Michael’s email/letter and just enjoy the beautiful day.

But today, this Monday, SUCKS BEANS! (as Mike would say) Today I woke up and started off my Monday like any other Monday. I grabbed my phone and checked my email. ONE UNREAD EMAIL FROM MICHAEL RAINES it says. I opened it up and the email says “I sent a ton of emails but they are not making it to everyone so talk amongst yourselves to see which you did not get. Sorry.” That is the only email from Mike in my inbox. I then get an email from Mike’s mom saying that she did not receive any emails from Mike and if anyone did to please forward them. Well still no word from anyone so…I am just assuming that absolutely no one got his emails. This is the first Monday in five months that I have not received an email from him. It really sucks and was a crappy way to start off my Monday. Well I brushed that off because there was nothing I could do about it and decided to get ready and then go eat some lunch. Lunch would definitely put me in a better mood because we have leftover of my moms delicious homemade chicken pot pie……Mmmmm. If you have not tried this stuff then dang, you have not lived my friend. Anyways, so I open the fridge and start searching. I looked everywhere and could not find it. So I did the only thing a good child would do, ask mom duh! Well she knew exactly where it was. With my father…yes my father took my chicken pot pie…It may not seem like a big deal for my dad to have taken the last of MY chicken pot pie, but really it is. It was just another thing that I was very much looking forward to and that stuff is the most delicious stuff ever. I brushed that off as well. 1 o’clock finally came around and that is about the time that the mail comes. So I grabbed the key and headed on down to the mailbox. I opened up our box and….nothing. “Hmm…” I thought. “Maybe the mailman is just a little late today”. So I went home and waited a half hour. I headed back to the mailbox at 1:30. STILL nothing. That put me in a bad mood. So I did some homework to pass the time. I waited a whole hour just to give the mailman plenty of time. I headed back to the mailbox at 2:30 very optimistic that the letter in there from Mike would completely make my day. I opened the box and….there was mail, but nothing from Elder Raines. Wow…another disappointment today. I grabbed the mail and seriously looked at every pieces 5 times just to be sure that I wasn’t missing it. Nope, I wasn’t missing it because it wasn’t there. I walked home crying the whole way. My expectations for the day were completely destroyed.

Luckily my sister just barely called and helps me to see the humor in all of this. Thanks Jay :) Love you!

So yeah, Mondays are usually really good to me except for this one. Hopefully this is the last of my bad Mondays. HERE’S TO BETTER DAYS!

There’s nothing I want more than to give him a hug

Loving a Missionary

So I found this awesome poem that I fell in love with. Basically my life right here :)

Loving a missionary isn't all sappy,
the life it demands of you isn't so happy.
It's mostly the having, but not getting to hold,
it's being so young and feeling so old.
Its life of skimmed milk without the cream,
and being in love with a wonderful dream.
Yes, loving your missionary means "Good-bye" at the plane,
and two years must pass before you see him again.
You reluctantly and painfully let him go,
while you are aching inside for wanting him so.
Then you wait for his word that everything is well,
and bide through a miserable letter less spell.
Then comes the mail, and you're giddy with joy,
and you pounce like a child with a shiny new toy.
You realize that he is so far away,
and your love for him grows greater each day.
You are proud of the job he is helping to do,
and you know he is doing it thinking of you.
Loving a missionary and its undefined fears,
and crying at night till there aren't anymore tears.
Then seeking comfort, you kneel down to pray,
and put your whole heart in the words that you say.
And you find that your feet are on the sand and not sod,
and your source of strength comes only from God.

You’re the best thing that’s ever been…

MINE!

YEP! He’s all mine and I just love him :D

How cute is he? :) EXTREMELY! especially in those glasses

Do you know what TODAY is!? TODAY IS MONTH 5!! WOOHOO! I’m soooo happy about that! That’s 20% of his mission done, gone, over with! and I will NEVER have to deal with them again! 154 days without the love of my life. How many people could say they’ve done that? Did I ever think that this day would come? No. No I did not. It honestly feels like sometimes that I’m never going to get to the finish line but on the inside I do know that it’s not true. Everyday comes and goes and one day will come when I will be filling in that last bubble on my countdown calendar and someday everything will make perfect sense. Until that day, I’ll laugh at the confusion, smile through the tears and remind myself that everything happens for a reason.  

He’s the most fantastic missionary boyfriend EVER! He just makes me so happy! It’s crazy how someone 5,000 miles away can make me feel like the most important person in the world.

Four things that Mike wants me to get ready for is…

1. A RIDICULOUSLY good looking man (Oh am I ready for that!)
2. Someone who has really grown up
3. Someone who loves the Gospel
4. Someone who loves me :)

So here’s an update on what’s going on in the mission field. Elder Raines got transferred from Warsaw to Bydgoszcz on August 20th. His companion is Elder Gladun who is the only native missionary in Poland. They both have their ups and downs and don’t always get along but Michael is making the best of it. It seems like they are having a lot of luck with passing out books and finding people who actually are interested! So that’s good! Sadly he still hasn’t received my package that I sent to him a while ago! (Dunno what’s up with that :/ ) He’s still the same old goofy Michael who always knows what to say to make me laugh, cry, and yell from excitement!

Because our FOUR YEAR dating anniversary is coming up in November, I’ve been looking and thinking back about our relationship. And I’ve come up with the conclusion that honestly, I am sooo lucky that he has stayed with me this long. I’d like those of you who can remember back to when we started dating to think about how mine and Michael’s relationship went. For those of you who can’t remember, I basically I denied that we were officially dating for at least 1 year, even though EVERYONE knew that we were boyfriend and girlfriend. I’d always tell people that we were “really good friends”. I’d never let him kiss or hold hands with me in public. Basically PDA was not my thing. I think about it now and I really don’t know why I did any of that… I wasn’t ashamed of him…I didn’t not love him….I think relationships were just so foreign to me that I thought people would not be okay with us dating (Keep in mind, Mike has been my only boyfriend, ever.) but COME ON! How dumb of me is that? I’m sure that if I did that to any other guy that they would have been long gone within the first couple weeks. But not Michael…Nope. He stuck through it with me until I got comfortable enough to think…” WHY IN THE HECK SHOULD I CARE WHAT OTHER PEOPLE THINK OF ME!?” After that it was PDA all the time! haha. Just kidding. Ever since then we’ve still been pretty conservative around people. I decided that I like how our relationship went. Sure, it was different than how a normal relationship goes but HEY! Who’s likes to be normal these days? I realized that I fell in love with my best friend BEFORE I fell in love with my boyfriend. Being physical was never a real factor. His humor is what got me hooked on the MCR train in the first place and that’s what’s still keeping me on today!

At church this week my mother was telling a lady how I was definitely waiting for my missionary. I corrected her in saying that we are just seeing what happens. I don’t really like the term “waiting”. I looked up the definition of waiting, just to see what it said, Waiting=The act of remaining inactive or stationary. Well I am definitely not waiting.

I still have a life.

I do stuff.

I have fun.

I enjoy and make the most of my time away from him.

That doesn’t mean that I don’t love him, because I do, very much! That also doesn’t mean that I’m not counting days or months, because as you can tell I am counting. What it does mean is that I am open to new possibilities and adventures. I know that the Lord has a plan for me. If Michael is his plan for me then great. If someone else is supposed to be my plan then apparently it’s what’s best for me. Mike already told me in the beginning that he is okay with whatever happens as long as I’m happy, hence the reason he did not ask me to wait for him. So basically….yes he’s my boyfriend, no I’m not waiting, but yes I’d love to be here unmarried when he gets home. I really don’t know if this makes any sense at all to anyone but I guess it does to me and to Mike, so that’s all that matters right? Right. Okay sorry! I didn’t mean to get all serious and stuff I just wanted to get that out in the open.

Okay! So thank you to anyone who read this really long, random, and confusing post about…I don’t even know…haha. Anyways….

cieszyć małe rzeczy!

New Shirts!

For the longest time I’ve been looking for a place to make your own t-shirts. But paying $35 bucks plus shipping is a bit ridiculous. I mentioned to Jamie to keep her eye out for any cheap place and she told me that her neighbor can make them! Whaaat?? How perfect is that? So I figured out what I wanted on my shirts and sent my designs off to her. I finally got my shirts back today and they turned out JUST like I was picturing! I couldn’t be happier with them!! And on top of that I’m sending Mike matching shirts! Not until Christmas though :) Happy day!

P.S. I LOVE MY MISH!!!!!!

Everybody’s Got Somebody But Me…

So this is basically how I’ve been feeling lately. I know I’ve still got somebody but not with me and that’s what I really wish I had. One day right? Right. On the bright side though 84 weeks left!! YAY!

Don’t Feed the Bears!

I am warning all of you in advance that this post is going to have a LOT of pictures. So yeah.. :) ENJOY!

This post is about my trip to Yellowstone August 22-26. The last time that I’ve been to Yellowstone with my family was 19 years ago while I was still in my mommas tummy. (Although I did come last year with Michael’s family but we basically just drove through with a couple stops here and there). But you can imagine how excited I was for this trip! The only sad part about it was that it was the first family vacation that we would be taking without Bradley. You honestly have no idea how weird it was to not have him in the back seat with me fighting over who gets to lay on the middle section of the seat. I really did miss him and Kami also but they were enjoying their honeymoon.

This is what I left on the fridge at our house for when B&K got home :) Now that I knew that our food would be safe it was off to the car for the long ride. I drove with my parents while Jamie, Tommy, Sean and Carson drove in their car. I spent the whole ride listening to my I-Pod and taking naps.

*Wednesday-Our first stop on our way to Yellowstone was Mesa Falls. It had such a beautiful waterfall!

Me and my parentals

Mom and Pop

The whole gang at Lower Mesa Falls

The awesome waterfall

I’m a moose!

Seaners the moose

Da bear

AHHHHH!!!

Love my girls

*Thursday was our first day in Yellowstone and within 5 minutes of being in the park we saw our first bison! This is the day that we basically went to all of the main geysers and hikes. For lunch we had sandwiches and picnicked outside of Old Faithful.  We visited the HUGE lake and also a little river where I had fun playing in the sand :)

Carson pointing at the Bison

Me and my Carsey

Our first bison!

 

At the hot pots, man were they stinky! Or was it Tommy….

Me and my mommy

So funny story behind this picture. Last year I took a picture with Michael at this exact spot! So I wanted to take a picture where we could *insert Mike here* haha.

Our picture from last year :)

Jump!

My big sissy :)

So tender!

DON’T FEED THE BEARS! RAWR!

Lunch outside of Old Faithful

Say cheese!

Me at Old Faithful

~No caption needed~

Daddio looking at the mud pots

Grandpa and Sean

Grandma and Seaners

I love this kid

Rock on! With a red tongue from a fruit punch and a pretzel ring nose!

I love Mike :)

Missin’ my Mish

This bison would follow behind all of the others and say “BLEHHUHHAH” haha.

Bison were EVERYWHERE!

Dad and I at another waterfall

My cute parents

This is the reason Yellowstone got it name, because of the “yellow stone” behind us. Also this picture is awesome because in the background there is a black dot which is actually a bird that happened to be flying by

Tom and Jay

The best picture I could get of the 4 because Carsey was starting to get grumpy. Sean was all smiles!

*Friday we decided to rent a pontoon boat and spend the whole day just relaxing and tubing.

Killing time at Quake Lake

This place was SOOOO windy!!!

ON THE PONTOON!!! (I recommend listening to the song by Little Big Town)     We boated on Hebgon Lake

Tommy’s the Captain, my dads Skipper and me, well I got voted to be Gilligan…

J and the boys

Who’s the Captain now!? WOOT WOOT!

Everyone took turns on the tube and I mean EVERYONE!

My MOM went with Sean

J and I

“Jumpin' out the back, don't act like you don't want to!”

I drove my dad around on the tube

Carson and Pop

Tommy and I went…

…and he was a mad man!

Carson’s in charge of the flag

Then crashes with Jamie

*Saturday we spent the day in Yellowstone. For those of you who don’t know I have TMJ, so every time I open my mouth my jaw pops. I’ve been going to a jaw specialist and they gave me a mouth piece to wear that helps align my jaw in the right place. I’ve been using it for about 2 months and it seems to be helping. Well Saturday morning I woke up, opened my mouth and my jaw locked on me. It is not a nice feeling. I couldn’t open my mouth so it made for a miserable day.

Beautiful View

We found this awesome tee-pee!

Finally around lunch time my jaw started feeling better and I could actually open it (thank goodness!) To celebrate, I decided to be daring and get a Bison chili cheese dog! It’s so not like me to be brave like that but I figured why not!? I must say it was not half bad!

But what really made my day was the fact that we found a place that actually had cookies n’ cream ice cream! Yay!

Being dorks

And of course Sean has to join in :)

My two favorite little men :)

Kings of the world!

Hiding in the bushes to scare everyone

Cheeeeeeeese!

Yet another waterfall. Man I didn’t realize how many we saw!

 

Daddy’s little girl

My Bonners

Cause we are sisters!

“I wonder if this water is hot…OUCH! Yep…”

Looking at the hot pots that look like chocolate milk!

The bison had a tree branch stuck to the side of its horn HA!

Antelope crossing the river

*Sunday was sadly our last day :( but we made it a fun one! We made a stop at The Bear and Wolf rescue Center then headed home through Yellowstone Park, the Grand Tetons and Jackson Hole. We got home at probably 11:00 at night. This trip was SO much fun!

Brothers make the best friends!

I won!

Goodbye Cabin!

One cute family!

 

 

A BEAR!!

He looks so relaxed

Cooling off from the heat

Carson was doing this for some reason but I don’t remember why…but I know it was funny

I wanted to steal this!

More waterfalls

Love these people

*Insert Mike* again

The Snider Girls

Goodbye Yellowstone! We’ll miss you!

An arch made out of antlers in Jackson Hole

High Fived a bear. Oh yEah!

So there you go! My fun and exciting trip to Yellowstone with my family. If you got through this whole post then wow, you must either really like me and be interested in my life or you are super bored. Either way Thanks! haha.