Hello Family!

Mom and I recently visited Todd and Ruby in Canada. While we were there Ruby introduced me to myfitnesspal. It is a free calorie counter that helps you reach your weight loss goals. You can access the website on your computer or as an app on your phone. When you sign in, you have to enter your current weight and your goal weight. It will also ask you questions about your activity level throughout the day and your exercise goals. You also choose how quickly you want to lose weight e.g. 1lb per week, 1.5lb per week. After you are finished with all of this it will let you know how many calories you can have every day to reach your goal. There will also be a diary for you to track your calories and exercise. I have only been doing this for a week, but I have really enjoyed it so far. It not only allows me to log what I eat, but it also shows me what is in the food I eat. It sets daily goals for how many carbs, calories, fats, sugars, etc that I should eat each day and keeps track of how I am doing. Anyways, I thought I would share this with all of you because Ruby shared it with me! If anyone else is interested, let me know.

Here is the website: http://www.myfitnesspal.com/ 

p.s. I have discovered that I rarely get enough potassium during the day. I realize that bananas are a good source of potassium but I rather die a potassium deficient death than accept bananas in my life. Just a thought :)

Love you all!

Jessica

from dad...

Where Columbus landed

A brief message from Dad...

We just left Dunn River Falls in Jamaica. Please foreward to everyone. 


Dad

Corn Husker Crew March 2013

Our update is mostly photos this month.  We enjoyed March.  We really grew close to our Elders this winter, Elder Hadfield and Elder Tatafu.  They have taught some of our friends and have been a great example to our boys.  They also helped out in the Primary and provided service to our family.  We like to think of them as "our" missionaries, sadly Elder Tatafu was recently transferred, but Elder Hadfield is training and we had him and his greeney over yesterday for Easter with our "North Platte family" (Ryan & Lauren).  It was a great day.  We were so excited to have Jessie come and Mom and Dad.  We were glad they all got to meet Ryan and Lauren at church Volleyball night (while a tornado was brewing outside) and we just loved spending time with them.  

We should probably announce that we are having another baby!

April Fools!

But seriously, we actually do need to announce that Evan has decided he does NOT want to do more schooling and we therefore are NOT going to be moving to Lincoln to pursue a PhD.  We are consequently JOB HUNTING right now...so the future is a big ????????? right now!  And that is exciting.  Evan feels very good about this change and has had a lot of direction and comfort from the Lord.   We are grateful for that.

Pray for us to find a good job, and hopefully closer to family :)

The boys, helping Elder Hadfield blow out his birthday candles

Cleaning pine needles off the yard...Caleb getting thrown away by Joshi

Elder Hadfield and Elder Tatafu "our missionaries"

Eating Elder Tatafu's fried oreos...dangerously yummy

Learning the Ukulele with the elders, singing "A Child's Prayer"

Work friends, Connor and Ryan

Elder Tatafu and Elder Hadfield, with our future missionaries

Chocolate bacon shakes...its a "Evan/Ryan thing", and the boys like it to, so maybe its a "guy thing"

Our friend Lauren and sleepy Hannah

Caleb and a bacon shake

flying kites?...piece of cake

Joshi loved flying kites with Aunt Jessie

the kites are carrying Evan away...:)

these boys sure love their Aunt Jessie (aka George)

super cute photo of grandma and grandpa with their adoring grandkids!

with Grandma!

with Grandpa!

Easter Sunday

Easter Egg Hunt

So excited for Nauvoo!!!!!

Family
Challenge!!!!!!!

Trent and I both spoke in church on Sunday.  I thought I would share a little of my testimony with you all.  I was thinking about the Nauvoo Temple the other day and the first thing that came to my mind was the sacrifice it took to build that temple.  We all live in a time of day where temples are covering the earth with really no "effort" to put it up like they did in the days of Joseph Smith.  Are we taking advantage of the Temples we have.  Are we making a sacrifice to go to the temple?  

Trent and I were asked to speak on the covenants that we make in the Temple and how it is important to teach our children about them.  Even though some of us don't have children it is our responsibility to teach those in our family about the importance of keeping our covenants.  I shared an example in my talk that I would like to share with you all.  

Before Trent and I got married I had a love of music.  I loved to sing all the time.  I sang at school, at church,  at home and preformed many times.  When I got married I got jealous of the musical talent in the Gunderson family....especially of two beautiful sister-in-laws who have angelic voices.  I made a foolish decision and stopped singing.  I was jealous and thought that my talent of music wouldn't meet up to their standards.  Of course I didn't know your family very well at the time, so it made it hard to sing in front of you.  Well, because I decided not to keep the covenants in the temple of sharing my talents, I feel as if the Lord took that talent away from me.  I slowly lost my love of music.  I stopped singing to Trent and to my family .  I stopped listening to music like I had in the past.  I even stopped singing to my children.  I felt as if these last couple of year I lost the love of music because of one stupid decision.  It took many times praying on my knees asking for Father in Heaven to give back that love in my life.  I honestly, lost my voice.  Every time I tried to sing my voice would crack and I couldn't sing like I did before.  

After repenting for the lack of keeping my covenant, I feel that the Lord has given back that love of music.  Both Trent and I sang in church and I felt like a different person when I had that music talent back in my life. I love my Father in Heaven and I know that he wants us to be happy but in order to receive his blessings we have to in return keep his covenants.  I urge you all to ponder on the covenants that we make in the temple and in the scriptures and think of an area that you can work on before we go to Nauvoo. 

I love this Gospel and I love you all. 

Clown Car

Well, Ruby and I have some very big news.  No not that big news.

We just wanted to let you all know that we recently purchased a 'new to us' car! Our Canadian Uncle Mark Jensen let us know that there was a 2002 Ford Focus at the dealership that was in good shape and was going cheap, so we decided to bite the bullet and get it.  It is a Sedan, and it's silver, and when I drive it I feel like I should be wearing an orange wig and a red nose, because it is so, so tiny.  But, it is supposed to get 40 miles to the gallon, so we're excited to say that we will now be driving to Nauvoo.  We're looking forward to seeing you all there!

5 POUNDS GONE (and "never" coming back) 

Yeah I have lost 5 pounds over the last 2 weeks.  It was nice to step on the scale and see that I am almost out of the 150's.  My hard work is paying off.  Ok, so some things that I am doing.  I am running/walking for 20 minutes and then I am doing some ab workouts.  I have chosen 5 different ab workouts and I am doing them 10 times each 3 times.  So a total of 90 ab crunches a day.  By the time I am done with the last one I am so sweaty and feel so good.  Good luck everyone and I would love to hear any other exercises you enjoy doing.  

I Over Did It!!!

I think that I ate way too many chocolate chip cookies.  Was 10 too many yesterday?????  AW HA!!!  I think I might need to do some extra workouts today.  Darn it. 

SLIM AND SASSY

Ok ladies, just for some kicks and giggles, I am using some essential oils for loosing weight.  The oil I have is called "Slim and Sassy".  You put 4 drops in a glass of water and drink it when you have a craving.  You can also put it on your wrist when you have that craving for sweets.  It works.  The smell is delicious and I am then thinking about my delicious scent instead of the treat I was craving.   

Dad

Hey, I've finally been accepted and am ready to start making plans.  I'm excited and can't wait for this Summer to get here.

Trader Joe's Hummus

Hummus is full of fiber and protein and no carbs...so its a great snack.  I enjoy eating it with whole grain crackers or veggies (sugar snap peas and carrots recently)

Here is the recipe!