Day 1: Friendship

WELCOME NOVEMBER!

In the spirit of the month of Thanksgiving, I decided to write a post every day this month on what I am most thankful for. It will be a great reminder of what is really important in life and I hope I can keep up with this promise I've made with myself.

I am thankful for great friends. I have some of the best friends I could ever ask for. I am at a completely different stage in life than a majority of them, as they are married with children, but I still keep in touch with many and I'm grateful for them.

More specifically, I'm grateful for Debra Jo and Jenny. We have been friends since 1994. WOW, 16 years of friendship and counting!!! Man, the stories I could tell! Hahaha :) I love Debra Jo and Jenny as if they were my own sisters. I would do ANYTHING for them and they would do ANYTHING for me. I love who they are, I love their kids, and I love who they married. They are such great examples to me and I will be forever grateful for their friendship.

Photo taken by Jenny

Debra Jo and Jenny and I were all in the same 5th grade class. Debra Jo and I became better friends after being assigned as partners for an Atlas assignment. We both knew we were LDS and while staring at a map of the United States, we both commented that our Dad's served their missions in Florida. What are the odds?! Come to find out, they served at the same time in the same mission, but were never companions. We both went home and told our Dad's the other Dad's name and the rest is history. Friends for life, as well as our parents. The funny part about it was my parents had 4 kids (3 girls and 1 boy) and Debra Jo's parents had 4 kids (3 girls and 1 boy) as well. And we were all about the same ages too. Debra Jo's parents ended up having one more child, a son, and we tried to convince my mom to have another but she wasn't havin' it!!
Jenny lived on the street behind me. We were over at each others houses ALL THE TIME. One time I went over to Jenny's to hang out and spend the night and the next morning I couldn't find my underwear that I had brought with me, but I found it walking back to my house later that same day! It had fallen out of my bag and onto the side walk at the end of the street! BAHAHAHA!! Jenny and I would literally stuff our faces with Goldfish, Pepsi, and Mountain Dew while playing Donkey Kong. That was our thing and those were great times. And after many years of inviting and introducing Jenny to the church, she was baptized and became a member of the church on April 3, 2003. It was a very special day that I will never forget.
We've been out of high school for over 8 years now. Debra Jo has been married for 6 years and has a 3 year old son, Tyson, and a 13 month old son, Emmett. Jenny has been married for 2 years and has an 8 month old son, Hudson. And I'm single and the best "Auntie" to these 3 sweet little boys. I love them so much and they are such a joy to be around. Tyson especially because of his age. He is too smart for his own good, I could just be around him all day if he'd let me. Anytime I say, "Tyson, who is your best friend??!" He says, "LINDSAY!" Even G'Ma Tenney, Debra Jo's Mom, tried to get him to change it to "G'Ma Tenney" and it didn't work! YESSSS!!!

My Little BFF!
I carried him on my back for a little while and he loved every second of it.

"Look at the lion Lindsay!!"

As you can probably tell, we all recently went to the Phoenix Zoo and had a blast! The weather was perfect and the zoo trip was so much more enjoyable with the little ones. Plus I hadn't been to the zoo since I was in grade school and it was really cool!! Tyson had to hold a map of the zoo and he could never fold it back together. He would ask me for help all the time, it was the cutest thing.

We all got to feed the giraffes and I have to admit it WAS worth the $3/person they charged. Did you know that a giraffe's tongue is between 18-20 inches long (long enough to reach its ears), and it's the color black?!?! CRAZY! They are by far the coolest looking creatures ever.

The giraffe wanted to see what Hudson tasted like! HA!!

Little Emmett feeding the giraffe lettuce; he wasn't scared one bit...BUT HIS MOMMA WAS!!:)

The look on Debra Jo's face is PERRRRFECT!!
Tyson's turn!

The zoo was clean, we got a lot of exercise, we fed giraffes, and most importantly we spent good quality time together and enjoyed the day with each other. After spending 3+ hours at the zoo we decided to call it a day.

Tyson took this photo and he was standing on a bench. I wish I had my camera so that I could have taken a picture of him taking a picture of us. He was so proud of himself he said, "LOOK MOM! I got the whole body!!" It was so stinkin' cute! THANKS DEEJ FOR THE FREE TICKETS!! Easily the best day I've had in awhile :)

I love you both! Thank you for everything!! xoxo