We would love to have you Link to our Website

Our Vital Solutions MD website is up and running (can you tell what has been on my mind for this Christmas break?). I'm going to ask as many people as will feel comfortable to put our http://www.vitalsolutionsmd.com/ link on your sites. I've got the link button on my site, but don't know how to give instructions to have you put that on your site. If anyone has ideas - I'm all ears!

By having people do this, Google will rank our site higher so that when people do a Google search ours will come up without having to pay for it to come up all of the time. By the way, I don't know if you realize that every time you click on a link that is under the heading "Sponsored Links", that company pays for it. We have sponsored links, but don't want to pay for people to come up on our site if we can help it. So.... by adding our link to your site, we will automatically be ranked higher without the extra $$$$.

By the way, anyone who does this and wants to use any part of our services, let us know - we'll give you a great deal for helping us advertise!!!

Stay tuned ... I will post something about Christmas later. I've got to make dinner now.

MERRY CHRISTMAS!

Make a Smilebox scrapbook

A New Chapter in our Lives

We're going full bore trying to get ready to open up Vital Solutions MD, our new wellness clinic business. So far things are going quite well, but it just seems that everything takes a couple of days longer than we planned for. We had planned to be in the office this month to get things really moving for January, but it looks like we'll be starting up in January. We're getting our office furniture made right now and hopefully it will be in by the end of this week. Our iDXA machine will be here on December 22 and we'll do a training on the 23rd. Then Christmas and New Year's comes and we're opening up. We're finishing up our Website (you can check out what's done so far at http://www.vitalsolutionsmd.com/ ). I'm excited about that and really grateful to my brother-in-law Paul for helping out - okay he's really doing almost all of it - we just fill in the text. I'm going to be asking all of you to put a link to this site on your blogs. It seems that you get higher ratings with Google the more places you're linked, and then you don't have to pay as much for the advertising through them. I'll wait until we've got it all together though. That will help us out. My sister-in-law is doing our marketing and she's going to help set up a big hoopla Grand Opening - she's even looking to book some local celebrities. We'll see what we can come up with.

We've got our Doctor hired and we've interviewed a couple of people for our Physiologist/nutritionist position. I think we'll do another couple of interviews tomorrow and then hire someone. Luckliy we've already got a great prospect. She really knows her stuff and I think she'll fit really well. I just feel like we've got to at least check out a few of the other applicants - we'll probably pass on the body builder that told us he'd send his resume upon request, but he made sure to include his muscle - bound picture in his e-mail. I'd post it, but I think I could get in trouble for that one.

I guess I'll tell you what we'll be doing at our clinic. We're going to be doing the weight loss plan that has helped our family lose over 140 lbs (Jeff's down 80, Celeste 30 and Shelby 30). We'll also be doing a program of Bio-identical hormone replacement, and then we'll be doing body composition scans on our iDXA machine. This is a scary time to be starting a new business, but we're very excited about what we are going to be providing for people.

We would appreciate those links when I let you know we're ready and prayers on our behalf are always welcome :)

Is it Really Possible for me to have a 15 year old?

That means that in 6 months we'll be looking at a Learner's Permit and she could legally drive around this city! Aughhhh!

I've gotta say though, I am so lucky to have Shelby as my daughter. She is such a wonderful girl. She's got a lot of common sense (most of the time) and a really sweet disposition. She's also very motivated to succeed in school and on her viola. She's so responsible that I usually wonder where it all comes from. I am so glad she has great friends she hangs around with. I know that makes a huge difference in her attitude and behavior.

Saturday night Shelby and her friend Alex Adair (far right) had a combined birthday party with their friends. The played Dance Dance Revolution in the basement, ate Pizza and cake and icecream, sat around the fire pit on the back porch and played Capture the Flag on our street. They seemed to have a great time. Like I said we're so lucky she hangs out with such a great group of girls.

Shelby and Cooper sat nicely with Dicey. Notice Shelby holding her much anticipated gift for this birthday. She's had a countdown on her school binder for around 3 1/2 months now.

She didn't even have to look at the instruction manual on her cell phone. She knew right what to do. She felt like we were the last parents in the world to allow their teenager to have a phone. We're being a bit mean though and making her pay for her texting time. Jeff and I both thought (and still kind of do) that it was ridiculous for her to think she needs a phone. We still don't think she needs it, but I guess we gave in. Now at least we have a great external motivator for following all the rules.

Tonight after dinner our Dana cousins came over to help her celebrate. She got to blow out the candles again with the little ones looking on excitedly.

Happy Birthday Shelby. We love you!!!

Marathon Week

I'm sure that lots a people are busier than I am every week, but this week seemed especially busy for me. As I said before, Jeff and I are starting a new business and things are definitely busy there. We've been trying to nail down a location for our office in North Scottsdale. We've now narrowed it down to 2 and are waiting to see which one give us the best deal. We also started advertising for a NMD to work in our office and spent time looking at resumes and interviewing. We opened up a bank account for the business as well, so we've got the ball rolling on a lot of the stuff. We need to pick our Doctor and our location so we can get moving and be up and running (if a little slowly) in December.

On Monday night we went out with Jeff's siblings for Sandy's birthday dinner. We had a great time. I'm so lucky that I really enjoy being with my in-laws. It's great to have people I love on both sides of our family. We brought Jackson home afterwards to spend the night since there was no school for Veteran's Day on Tuesday. Tuesday morning I still had Notations as we are trying to get our Christmas show ready. I left the kids with house cleaning assignments and instructions to gather everything they wanted to sell at our Garage Sale (am I crazy? - I think so) on Saturday. Shelby had a Viola lesson (during which I wisely used the time in my car for a catnap), then Jeff and I ran around North Scottsdale. The day had been set aside for cleaning and getting ready for the garage sale, but that was put on hold.

Wednesday night I attended Harris Park's Young Women in Excellence Program, then on Thursday I spent the day preparing for our Stake YW Leadership meeting that night. I must give huge thanks to my Heavenly Father for the inspiration for that meeting. It's been so amazing for me to see how clearly I've been directed in this calling. I was talking about it with my mother this evening. I wish that in all aspects of my life I could sense the direction of the Lord as much as I've been able to in this calling. I'm writing this down because Jeff gave a Sunday School lesson that talked about the importance of recording our spiritual promptings and answers. I've found that my best inspiration for this calling comes as I'm on my treadmill with the mp3 of General Conference addresses playing in my headphones. I have ideas come to me that just seem to develop easily and I'm always amazed that I get to be the instrument for those ideas. One of the ideas that came for the leadership meeting was to ask a young woman from each ward to share an experience they've had in Young Womens that has strengthened their faith. I felt that this was the highlight of our leadership meeting. Those girls brought the Spirit with them as they let the young women leaders see that the little things they do can make such a big impact on the testimony of a young woman.

I got to speak at the end about making sure that all of the interactions with these young women are experiences that can be counted as building blocks of their faith. I fully believe that the youth today are going to have to be rock solid in their convictions and willing to stand strong for their beliefs in the gospel. I was able to talk about how surprising it is that in the state next to ours we have protestors marching against our temples and missionaries and members of church being threatened because we stood up for our beliefs regarding the marriage amendment. I don't think that youth who are waivering in faith will be able to make it. Anyway, the Spirit was great at the whole meeting. We finished in exactly an hour (which is always my goal because YW leaders are so busy). We had most members of the presidencies from every ward attending. What a great night!!!

Friday was our next big business day, but I spent the morning in the playroom going through all of the toys and deciding which ones were junk (a couple of big garbage bags proved that there were many), which ones were still playable, and which ones we should sell. What a great feeling to get that done!!! We were up late that night after all the business stuff was done finishing up with garage sale prep.

Early Saturday morning came fast, but we were ready for our first customers, unfortunately our profit wasn't as big as I would have liked it to be, but the kids made some Christmas spending money and now I've de-junked my house -so it was worth it in the end. Cooper had a football game that I had to miss because of the Garage sale. I had the truck loaded and dropped off at DI before Jeff and Cooper got home. I had a good nap that afternoon before heading off to another YW in Excellence program for Hillside ward. Jeff and Cooper watched the Sun Devils win their game and Shelby had a nap over at Leslie's house. I came home and wrote my talk for Harris Park Ward's sacrament meeting today. I spoke on the importances of being fully committed to the Standards found in the For the Strength of Youth Pamphlet.

Tonight we had our Stake Standards night. It was wonderful. We have a woman in our stake, April Price, who is an amazing speaker. She spoke on following the standards fully and being "tight like unto a dish" in our resolve ot follow them. The youth loved her and I wish I could speak like her. She followed three of our youth committee members who gave great personal examples of the importance of the standards, then President Ahlstrom spoke about the protection that comes with following the standards. It was a great evening!!

I got to come home and visit with my mom for awhile who came back from watching Doug's kids in Utah this past weekend. I don't think she's utilizing her nice Granny Flat near enough, she thinks she'll go home tomorrow to get her bills paid there.

Now I'm looking forward to a low key week, but I'm sure that won't happen. Next week is Shelby's 15th birthday, and we've still got a lot to do to get this business up and running. Wish me luck!

No Pics - Just Words

I thought I'd catch up a bit on what's been happening. The Dana household has been hopping lately, I guess so much so that I haven't had much time (or remembered well enough) to take pictures.

Halloween was pretty low key this year. Our week before Halloween was so busy we never even carved the pumpkins I bought. I promised Cooper we'd make a fun Thanksgiving display with them. Now I've got to get going on that. Cooper went as a Sun Devil's Football player (big surprise), Shelby was a witch. We went to our ward's Trunk or Treat and then Shelby and her friends took Cooper around the neighborhood (you have to do a lot of walking around here so you work off the candy quite well). Jeff and I held back some candy at the trunck or treat so that we'd have something for those who came to our house, but we didn't get one knock at our door until the kids came home.

Cooper counted his loot and fell asleep on our bed watching Ironman. Shelby and her friends watched a movie in the basement (I think they did more hanging out than watching the movie) and stayed up late. Friday night is a good night for Halloween I guess.

Cooper played some football the next day - I guess I did actually video some of his game, I'll have to post some of that later. Then he and Jeff went to the ASU game that night. They've been extrememely disappointed in their Sun Devils this year.

Sunday we had our Arizona wide Stake Conference broadcast from Salt Lake City. It was really nice, and we enjoyed hearing about Arizona's part in the early church history. My favorite talk was from Bruce C. Hafen about the need for us to be "Consecrated" to the church. Our stake president told us the night before that we can't be cafeteria Mormons anymore, we can't pick and choose which parts of the gospel to live, we need to dedicate ourselves to living it all. I really enjoyed the conference and all of the "warnings" to live faithfully through the perils that will come in the days and years ahead.

Speaking of perils, Jeff had his last day of work on Friday. He's quitting (maybe we could say that Real Estate quit him) and we're getting ready to start a new business partnering with some friends of ours, John and Jacqueline Olson, opening a Wellness clinic called "Vital Solutions MD". We'll focus on weight loss (our family is now 130lbs lighter) and Bio-identical hormone replacement. We're very excited. Jeff feels like what he's done has changed his whole outlook on weight and how he can feel. I think he'll be terrific at helping others. We've got a lot of things to do to open our doors (like finding an office with doors) in December so we'll be ready for a huge January push. It's a scary and exciting time in our family.

This was a busy week. Monday for FHE we hung some pictures in Grandma's Granny flat for her. Tuesday night Shelby and I had Mother Daughter enrichment night. Wednesday Shelby had dress rehearsal for her MYS concert and I had the Harvest Dance for our stake. Thursday night was Shelby's concert. She was the principal violist in the Division II. She'll get to move up to Division I for her next big concert. She's very excited about that because many of her friends are in that group. Friday we packed up our quads and our trailer and headed to the sand dunes for a much anticipated weekend at the dunes. We had a great time with the Hunsakers and the McClaws'. Cooper and Shelby rode so hard that they can barely move today. I only took one big ride and did the rest of my riding in the Rhino's with Katie and Stephanie, so I'm not too sore. A nice jacuzzi bath felt really good last night though.

We had our big election day for 2008 on Tuesday, November 4th. I was disappointed that John McCain didn't run a better campaign. I worry about many of the policies Barack Obama has in mind. I worry that he leans toward the socialist side in too many of his beliefs and I hate that the conservative party has leaned so far toward the center to placate people that they've lost site of their values.

I was so pleased that the marriage ammendments passed in Arizona, California and Florida. I think that speaks well for conservative values and the importance of family and the institution of marriage. I'm sad that so many people think the church should not have voiced it's opinion in this matter. The church always stands for moral issues and encourages it's members to do the same. I know that in Massachussettes the Catholic church stopped it's Catholic Social Services adoption program because they were being pushed to allow same sex couples to adopt through them because same sex marriage is legal in that state. I feel like that is a huge infringement on freedom of religion. It seems that the LDS people in California are really being persecuted for these beliefs even though they were only about 4% of those who voted in favor of this amendment. They had to close the LA temple for awhile because protestors were so disruptive and the members felt threatened as they tried to go to the temple. I sometimes feel that maybe the economy isn't the worst of what is going to happen to us as a people. I think we might have to have our mettle tested by those who disagree with our beliefs and want to make us reject them. I guess now is really the time to hold to the rod and stay on that path to eternal life.

Okay, enough of my soap box.

Today was our fast and testimony meeting. It was a nice meeting. We had our faithful home teachers come, Jeff and I took a much needed nap, then after dinner I went to a presidency meeting and then to our Youth Committee meeting. We've got another really busy week coming up.

Cooper's 10!!!

10 Year Old Cooper

I can't believe my youngest (I won't call him my baby because he would HATE that) is 10 years old. Cooper turned 10 on Thursday after what must have been the lonnngggeessstttt week of his life. We woke him singing happy birthday to his birthday breakfast of buttermilk pancakes (none of the homemade stuff for him - boxed is better) with buttermilk syrup. He opened up one of his presents before school, then at lunch time I picked him up and took him to In and Out Burger (that's just torture for someone who can't eat anything there - diet time again). He had to go back to school, much to his dismay.

He came home and Patiently waited for Jeff to come home so he could open some more presents. He got lots of football cards, a flag football set and some football action heroes (that broke as soon as we took them out of the box - can you say REFUND??) We went out to dinner at Outback Steakhouse - his favorite restaurant. He's definitely our kid - most of the birthday was about eating!!

His Mima and Papa came over after we got home and brought him some more great gifts. It was nice to visit with them.

On Friday after school we had a birthday party with his friends. This must have been the all time roughest birthday party ever!! Have we mentioned that Cooper likes football? He plays flag football because we don't want him playing tackle football this young, so for his birthday party he has several boys from school, from the neighborhood and cousins come over (along with the lone girl, Hallie - she was very brave) and they played TACKLE football, TACKLE town, and capture the flag - TACKLING. They had some burgers then played some more football, opened gifts and had cake and then finished off the party with some SMEAR the quear. I'm ALMOST wondering if tackle football would be safer - just because there are pads.

Cooper had a great time and had some fun friends who joined him. I'm so happy we have this great little boy as part of our family. He keeps things hopping around the house, and seeing his smile always makes me smile!! Here are some pictures for all to enjoy.

Cooper posing with his (now returned) Football Guys

They don't look near as rough eating burgers, chips and soda

Bring on the Gifts!

Dana Look-alike Meter

MyHeritage: Family trees - Genealogy - Celebrities - Collage - Morph

Dana Look-alike Meter

MyHeritage: Family trees - Genealogy - Celebrities - Collage - Morph

Celebrity Collage by MyHeritage

MyHeritage: Celebrity Collage - Roots

Celebrity Collage by MyHeritage

MyHeritage: Family trees - Genealogy - Celebrities

Celebrity Collage by MyHeritage

MyHeritage: Celebrity Collage - Blank family tree - Roots

Celebrity Collage by MyHeritage

MyHeritage: Family trees - Genealogy - Celebrities - Collage - Morph

How Fast Are You???

I read about this as I was blog jumping (you know going from blog to blog). I think I'd better not spend too much time competeing with myself though. I can get pretty competitive.

65 words

Typingtest

Fall Break in Greer

Beautiful View from the top of Green's Peak

Jeff and the kids stopped at Carneiro Lake
Celeste and Cooper at the lake
Really bad picture of Celeste with Shelby
Jeff and Celeste
Carneiro Lake

We had a great time last weekend at Jeff's Uncle Ralph and Aunt Martha Jo's cabin in Greer. We went up Thursday night and travelled with Mark and Katie Hunsaker. We were all pulling our quads (and their Rhino) up there.

We got up there late that night. Friday we went on a ride up to Green's Peak. We met the McLaws family. It got really cold that week and the wind was blowing like crazy. Hard enough that when I got off the quad at the top of Greens Peak, I was almost blown over. It was a fun ride though, and the kids had a blast.

We planned an all day ride on Saturday, but the weather changed our plans. It rained and hailed for much of the day and it was very cold. Luckily Mark and Katie brought their Wii game and Rock Band and the kids (and the adults for a bit) spent the day playing that and pool and having fun hanging out together. That night the dads and the kids went for a short - very cold - very muddy ride, and the moms got to be smart and stay home where it was warm.

It was a nice weekend of playing games, eating a ton and relaxing. I love it when we go to Greer.

Sunday morning we went to church in Eager and then went back to the cabin to eat and pack up and help clean up the cabin before heading for home.

Uncle Ralph and Aunt Jo are so generous with their cabin and we have a great time taking advantage of it. Here are some fun pictures of our time there. You can see a bit of how beautiful it was this time of year, but Sunday (after it had frozen that night) it was even more spectacular to look at the changing leaves on our way home. Sorry I didn't take pictures from the moving car.



Another view from the top of Greens Peak


Quad Riders on the peak

Shelby with Trevor McClaws and Conner Hunsaker being Rock Stars

The Fabulous Flying Danas

General Conference Week

We are watching General Conference as I type. I'm getting ready to leave for Snowflake with my Mom so we can attend Glen Flake's funeral tomorrow. Shelby has end of quarter tests tomorrow so she can't come with us as she really wanted to. Glen is my Dad's first cousin - his daughter Margo is in our ward and Shelby and Leslie (Margo's daughter) have been best friends since they were 3. I love Glen. What a fun person. When we first moved to Mesa we moved into Keith and Margo Clouses ward and Leslie was 2 and Tanner was about 5. Shelby was always called Shelby Lynn Dana by these two, so now still 12 years later - the last time I saw Glen (which I think was at my Dad's funeral) he asked me how Shelby Lynn Dana's mother was. To me - Glen will always be the Sheriff, always fun and interested in how I was doing. He's been suffering with congestive heart failure for the last couple of years, and commented that he'd rather be "sick in Snowflake that feel well in Mesa". He's a Flake from Snowflake through and through.

I'm honored to be able to play a violin duet with my cousin Tawna at his funeral tomorrow. We'll play La Golandrina, which I hadn't heard before, but my mom said it was one of her dad's favorites. Mom will be accompanying us. A few years ago when Aunt Nerita had asked me to play at a Heritage Foundation fundraiser in Snowflake called "Stars over Snowflake", I played "Meditation" from "Thais". After the program was over Glen came up to me and gave me probably one of my best compliments I've had for playing the violin. He told me that he'd heard "Uncle Melvin" (Mr. DeWitt as I know him - he was my orchestra teacher from the time I started through my freshman year when he retired) play that song many different times and that I played it just like he did. That was the ultimate compliment for me.

Now for the rest of the week. I had my first substitute teaching job on Thursday (also the first day I was able to sub). I subbed in Shelby's orchestra class and then the next class at Stapley. It turned out good. I've always known that orchestra kids are the best in the schools. That is propbably the only reason I would be willing to sub for Jr. Highs.

Jeff and I went out to dinner with John and Jacqueline Olson on Friday night to discuss a possible business partnership. I'll write more about that when we get things set.

Saturday morning we watched conference, but we had to miss the 2nd session that day to go to Cooper's football games. He played well and had a lot of fun annnddd they won both games.

Mom's been down here this weekend to pick up a new bed for her house in Snowflake, and she stayed to watch conference. I'll go up to Snowflake with her and then come home with the Clouses after the funeral.

Today conference has been really good. I especially loved Elaine Dalton's talk about Returning to Virtue. I think that could be a great theme for the Stake New Beginnings we are discussing for February.

Cooper made a fort to watch conference from (really it was more about the process of building than about the fort itself, but we figured this was his way of copying the people of King Benjamin when he addressed them in Book of Mormon times. I took a few pictures I'll post here.

Cooper watches conference from his tent

Snowflake Cousins and Horses

Here are some pictures of hangin' out in Snowflake. I love it when my kids get to go there and hang out with their cousins.

Mindy's son Briant rides Thunnnnnnnder Bolt with Uncle Travis helping

Doug helps Ryan ride Dana - it's only right, they have the same color hair

Cooper loves to ride Business - he was a bit sore after going riding for a couple of hours with his Uncles Doug, Wynn, And Travis and his cousins Jake and Tori. He got to ride Grandpa's horse Chester on the ride.

Trav and Teresa's son Trevan poses
Josh and Trevan 2 cute cousins

Shelby relaxes on the floor

Cooper's trying to strike a Heisman pose