Amber Blair

In Which I Dabble in Domesticity

Hello there! Writing on the couch in my living room on a Friday afternoon. Yep, it’s Fall Break.

I didn’t have to go to work yesterday or today, and I get Monday off as well. Unfortunately, Spencer doesn’t have the luxury of a teacher schedule, so he still had to go to work, leaving me on break by myself.

Luckily I’m quite practiced at being alone, so I’m faring pretty well. Yesterday I did a lot of laundry, started watching “Queer Eye” on Netflix (LOVE LOVE LOVE), read a lot of the Book of Mormon, ran to Office Depot to get some stuff for my classroom, walked back carrying all my stuff, and then found myself with a few more hours before Spencer would be getting home.

So I decided to [drumroll please] try my hand at being domestic.

^what I thought I should look like

Not gonna do a “what I actually looked like” but maybe you can imagine. We keep our house clean, so there wasn’t much house stuff to do. So I decided to delve into my Food board, which has hundreds of delicious-looking recipes that I’ve never even thought about since pinning them. I know Spencer loves Buffalo Wild Wings, and we’re trying to eat healthier foods, so I decided to make Buffalo cauliflower. It turned out fine. The pumpkin cookies I made were mediocre at best. Needless to say, I was nearly in tears when Spencer got home.

Should have taken a picture.

Anyway, here’s the thing– doing the stereotypical wife things (thank you Mrs. Brady) is not easy for me. I guess I’m good at “keeping house” because I’ve been a fully independent adult for almost a decade and I can’t stand any kind of mess. But cooking is not my thing. I can kind of do it, and I plan on getting better, but it just doesn’t come naturally to me, and it is NOT fun for me.

Doing stuff for Spencer is fun for me though.

So of course I will continue to strive to do wifey things when I can. But we both work full time, and we’re both really busy. And who says good wives have to be good cooks?

I have this image in my mind of all the things you have to do to be a good wife (hi again Mrs. Brady. Hi Mom. Hi Grandma Hall. Hi Cathy.) and I feel terribly guilty if I’m not “measuring up” to that image.

But here’s the thing: Spencer didn’t marry me for my cooking skills or my sewing skills or my 1950s housewife persona. Nor did he fall in love with my mom or my grandma or Mrs. Brady. He married ME because he loves ME. So I think rather than getting down on myself for not being as domestic as I feel I should be, it would be better for both me and Spencer if I could just lean into my own strengths and focus on authentically being the woman Spencer fell in love with.

Society has a lot of expectations for women, but society can go jump in a lake. Society has no part in my marriage or in anyone else’s marriage. I think everyone should do what works for them and makes them happiest. If that means being a housewife, amazing. More power to you. If it means something else, you do you honey.

October Book: The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy

Just finished this book that I’ve been hearing about for as long as I can remember. That elusive 42 that held so much meaning to all who had read “Hitchhiker.” I guess I’m glad I finally understand.

This book felt reminiscent to me of Ender’s Game. Maybe that’s because that’s pretty much the only other Science Fiction book I’ve read.

Here’s a brief synopsis: The world ends, Arthur goes with an alien into outer space, chaos ensues.

Solid 6/10. Like it became enjoyable to read, but it was so weirddddd. Which is okay. Maybe just not really my jam. But I’m glad I read it.

Terrifying Love

*****Warning: this is the most vulnerable blog post I have ever written. I’m running on the assumption that my following has significantly dwindled, because I’m getting HARDCORE REAL today.******

I am completely and totally, head-over-heels in love with my husband. I love him with all my heart, which is why I agreed to marry him. Incidentally that’s also why I agreed to be his girlfriend. In fact that’s why I said yes to a second date.

Yeah, I’ve been crazy about Spencer ever since I met him.

I also had this dating policy where I’d only go on second dates with boys I really really liked. i.e. If I couldn’t see myself marrying a boy, there wouldn’t be a second date.

As you can imagine, I went on very few second dates. (Enough to count on one hand.)

So I meet Spencer, he has all of my “necessary qualities” (speaks Spanish, loves the Lord, worthy priesthood holder, ambitious, this is too embarrassing to continue writing) so I say yes to a first date. The first date goes really well, he continues to be everything I expect in my man, so I agree to a second date. In fact I’m so bold as to tell him at the end of our fist date that I had a really great time and I’d love to go out again. (Granted, he said it first. But I would’ve said it if he hadn’t!)

Second date goes really really well, and I decide that he’s the man of my dreams and I’ll agree to marry him if he asks me. So of course I agree to a third date. Everything continues like a fairy tale, and before you can say “basic Provo girl” we’re engaged. [In all fairness, I’m 26. That’s not basic.]

Believe you me– never in a million years would I ever have imagined I’d be one of those girls that got engaged fast. I always said I’d never even have a conversation about marriage until I’d been in a solid relationship for at least 6 months. And I also always planned on having a long engagement. (tbh I have no idea what the long engagement logic was haha.) Turns out all my judginess of fast engagements came back to bite me. When you know, you know. You know?

So I’m in love with Spencer, I know he’s the one, and I feel absolutely confident this is the right thing to do. However, along with my confidence, there’s this deep and abiding fear that Spencer would just wake up one day and realize that he wasn’t feeling it anymore, or I wasn’t who he thought I was, or he just couldn’t handle me anymore. And that would be that.

Story time: I did let down my [super duper] high walls once before, a few months previous to meeting Spencer. For literally the first time in my life, I allowed myself to be vulnerable and I opened myself up to another person. I got into like a real relationship, the kind where I let him hold my hand and kiss me and introduce me to his family as his girlfriend. It was one of the most courageous, scary things I’d ever done. And then it ended very abruptly, very quickly, with no warning at all. He just drove to my house and told me he’d received revelation there was someone better for me, and we had to cut it off immediately. (Important interjection: I am eternally grateful this happened. Spencer is my soulmate, the only one for me, and I am so thankful this other boy had the courage to act on the prompting he received. I’m just sharing this to give context to my hardcore trust issues.)

So yeah. Daily, constant, deep fear that Spencer would break up with me with no warning at all. But he didn’t.

We got married, and he’s the best thing that’s ever happened to me. I love him so much it hurts.

And that’s sort of my whole purpose here– love hurts. Sometimes it hurts like hell. When you love someone with your whole heart, you run the risk of having your whole heart shattered. It is SO SCARY to give yourself completely to someone else, always running the risk that that other person could at any point just decide to leave. There are very few guarantees in life, and another person’s continued happiness and loyalty are not one of them. I have no control over how Spencer feels, and that sometimes terrifies me.

Even though we tied the knot (and in our case were sealed for eternity, including real covenants with each other and God) I still can’t help from worrying that one day he’ll realize I’m not as good as he thinks I am, or I’m not the same as the woman he fell in love with, or he can’t deal with how much I cry (which is regularly, even though I’m happier than I’ve ever been #gofigure), or he meets someone that’s better than me.

I know I just have to trust him, and every time he does something to deepen my trust, like still loving me when I got food poisoning on our honeymoon, or showing me that I’m the most important person in his life by saying no to other people so he can spend time with me, it gets a little easier. It also helps that he’s NEVER done anything to break my trust. Sometimes when he tells me he loves me (which is often) I say, “I believe you.” That used to take a lot of work to say. Now it doesn’t. It’s still a little bit scary sometimes, but it’s getting less scary.

Love is scary, especially when you have 26 years of practice not allowing that kind of love. Protecting myself all those years kept me safe, but it also kept me from feeling.

I choose to trust that the high risk yields high returns. It already has. I never thought being married to the love of my life would require so much bravery, but it takes real courage to choose to trust Spencer every day. The good news is I’m a brave girl. I’ve been brave my whole life, and now I’m married to the most patient and supportive man I could imagine, and the terror of love is beautiful.

The Power of the Book of Mormon

I really really love the Book of Mormon. I’ve read it every day since I was 13 (Okay, not exactly… The day of my brain surgery I couldn’t read, so my mom read out loud to me while I lay in my hospital bed) and I know it’s True.

But beyond my love for it and my testimony of it, I’ve discovered a special power it has in my life. I’m sure my habit of reading it every day has protected and strengthened me, and I’m deeply grateful for that. When I started teaching 6th grade, I sometimes experienced anxiety. It started happening again this week as I started my first year at a new school.

So when I felt the anxiety coming earlier this week, I remembered what I used to do when I taught 6th grade– I pulled out my phone, and started reading the Book of Mormon. Almost instantaneously the panic and anxiety went away, and I felt great peace. I don’t understand how that works, and I know I don’t have like an official anxiety disorder, so I don’t know that I’m necessarily qualified to make this claim. But for me, the Book of Mormon takes away my anxiety. It calms me down and gives me the strength to do my job even when it feels too hard. I know that power comes from the Holy Ghost, and I’m so grateful for it.

Five Easy Steps to Find Your Soulmate

Hello! I’ve been off the grid (as far as social media and this blog go) for the last few months, but I’ve decided to return to the blog because I miss writing. So I hope at least a few of you will still be around!

I need to establish a core belief I hold before continuing on my chosen topic for this post: there is no “one and only” out there. There are no such things as soulmates. There is not just ONE person that you were predestined to find and be with for eternity.

Having said that, I do believe Spencer is my soulmate. But we COULD HAVE found other people and lived reasonably happy lives if our paths had never crossed. Thank goodness they did.

Anyway, the purpose of this post isn’t to discuss the intricacies of how our lives play out and how much control we actually have in the day-to-day events/ overall projection of our lives. Maybe I’ll blog about that another day. Today my purpose is to talk about how to meet, fall in love with, and marry the love of your life.

Step one: DON’T STRESS
As many of my loved ones can attest, I spent a good portion of my twenties (yes I know I’m only 26 don’t @ me) believing I wouldn’t get married in this life. I’d be in countless (literally countless omg #ysawards #byu) lessons/ firesides/ devotionals/ lectures about dating and marriage, and just feel incredibly guilty. Like, what was I doing wrong? I’d been a consecrated missionary, and I did my best to be faithful and strong after the mission. According to everyone (and by everyone I mean the adults giving these talks/ lessons) the most important thing we needed to be doing after the mission was focusing on finding an eternal companion. So in the same way that I invested myself on the mission, I did my best to invest myself in my new “mission.” But the irony here is that higher stress and anxiety about getting married did not correlate with getting closer to finding the love of my life. It may have resulted in dating more, but dating had nothing to do with finding Spencer. (this topic to be revisited here in a bit.) Stressing does not help. In fact I would say stressing does the opposite. So let’s all (hello adults talking to YSAs) just calm down about dating and marriage. It’ll happen when it happens.

Step two: DO YOU
Rather than worrying about being in the right place at the right time (e.g. a stake dance, other singles events, etc.) just do stuff that makes you happy. That’s not to say you should be selfish and only focus on yourself. What it IS to say is you should be spending time doing things that you enjoy, thereby leading you to people that enjoy similar things, thereby helping you be more content, thereby preparing you for marriage/ the rest of a happier life. Men aren’t that they might get married. They are that they might have joy. I trust that marriage brings joy, but so do other things, and if you already have joy, then I think marriage will be a lot more joyful.

Step three: STRIVE TO MAKE THE SAVIOR BAE
Does that sound sacrilegious? I think it probably does. But what I’m trying to convey here is that as long as He’s before anyone else, you’re good. Like obviously it’s different than having an actual significant other, but He should be your #1 forever, so this is really good practice time. Being single affords all kinds of time (lol not really it can if you prioritize) to really delve into the scriptures and go to the temple regularly and minister and do all sorts of other things that bring you closer to the Savior. Working at the temple is an awesome thing to do while you’re single. This is also a great time to form habits that will bless you for eternity.

Step four: ONLY DATE IF YOU WANT TO
I say dating schmating. If dating is fun for you, knock yourself out. If dating isn’t fun for you, see step two. I recognize that there is value in “practicing” and developing social skills and learning about yourself and what you’re looking for/ what you are NOT looking for. Dating is also an opportunity to share time with fellow children of God and offer kindness, etc. etc. Dating can be good. But dating in a culture full of marriage pressure/ other expectations isn’t necessarily fun. Maybe it is. Maybe free food, you know? But still. What I say now is definitely controversial, and nobody has to agree with me. But here’s my opinion: no one is obligated to go on any dates he or she doesn’t want to go on. You are at absolute liberty to say no for no reason. You’re not into it? Say no. You’d rather hang out with your roommates? Say no. Your show is on? Say no. That does not make you a jerk. I know some people aren’t initially interested, and then they go on a date and hit it off and it’s amazing and now they’ve been married for 40 years and good thing they went on that first date or else who knows where they’d be. Sure whatever. But I say only go on dates you want to go on, and never feel bad for just doing what you want.

Step five: BE OPEN TO CONNECTION
Set boundaries and do you and focus on your own happiness and your relationship with the Savior and serving others. But when you find yourself wanting to spend more time with someone (which may be more likely to happen if you’re spending time doing things you love) then go for it!!! Be vulnerable if you feel like you should be. Have enough self compassion to continue with your happy life if things progress, or if things don’t. Depending on the circumstance, this could mean saying yes to dates you aren’t like completely crazy about going on. The important thing here is to not close yourself off completely. Be ready if the opportunity arises.

There are my five easy steps to finding your eternal companion. Take them with a grain of salt since I’m not even married yet. But I’ll close with a quote by President Uchtdorf, who should not be taken with a grain of salt.

So once you’ve found your person, which is NOT the only goal of this life and you’re still a good person if you haven’t found someone to be with for eternity, then you have a soulmate! Yay!

What do you think of my five easy steps?

btw I am extremely aware that they are not easy. I would never dream of writing a blog like this if I actually thought finding your soulmate could happen easily. Nothing good in life comes easily. Being a single member of the Church is really really really hard. I just wanted to share my experiences and thoughts, and I hope they can be helpful to some people. At the end of the day, the only really important part of our identity is that we’re children of God and disciples of Christ.

The Good Kind of Pride

That’s a thing, right? The good kind of pride? Like I’m proud to be a member of Christ’s restored Church. I’m proud to be Jim and Traci Blair’s daughter. (Can’t currently say I’m proud to be an American, but I trust I will soon be able to. And I’m GRATEFUL to my ancestors who sacrificed so much to come here!) I’m proud to have served in the California Los Angeles Mission under the leadership of President and Sister Weidman. I’m proud to be an ordinance worker at the Salt Lake temple.

So I’m thinking hubris pride, which Ezra Taft Benson said is the root of all sin, is definitely not good. But the kind of pride where we recognize we’ve got a good thing going and we’re fully invested– not hubris– seems to be productive and good.

I was thinking about this on my morning run yesterday. I had been planning to do a 20-miler, because my next marathon is in a few weeks. I was feeling fantastic the whole run, and then my back started killing me, so I ended up only running 10 miles. Rather than being proud of myself for getting up at 5:30 to run, or being proud of the really solid 10 miles I did, I felt ashamed that I hadn’t been able to do what I’d been planning on. I was embarrassed that I didn’t run 20 miles.

What the heck. 10 miles is awesome! It’s 10 miles more than most people ran yesterday! I’d like to work on being proud of myself for my effort, rather than beating myself up for not being as good or as fast or as perfect as I’d like to be. As my dad says, the victory is that I made it out the door.

We’ll All See Eye to Eye

Today is the last day of my amazing Institute class Jesus Christ and His Everlasting Gospel. The class is (obviously) entirely focused on the Savior, and I’ve loved every week of it. My teacher is phenomenal, which is a big part of why I love the class so much.

Last week’s class was focused on the 2nd Coming and the Millennium, and we did a really cool activity for the opening hymn. Bro. Halvorsen had all the hymns about the Millennium written on the board, some indicating specific verses and some the entire hymn. Instead of singing, we had 5 minutes to read the words of as many of those hymns as we could. [Activity to be filed away for future use. Muy eficaz.]

One hymn that really stuck out to me was #48, “Glorious Things Are Sung of Zion.” The lyrics of the 4th verse were particularly compelling:
When the Lord returns with Zion,
And we hear the watchman cry,
Then we’ll surely be united,
And we’ll all see eye to eye.

We’ll be united and all see eye to eye?? I can’t even conceptualize how that would be! 14,000 people dislike a recording of Beethoven’s 9th symphony on Youtube. Somehow Sonic and Dairy Queen are still in business. There are people who write with 0.7mm pens. A majority of my state voted for DJT. The Oxford comma continues to not be employed by AP style.

As mind-boggling as perfect unity feels to me, I have faith that it will happen. This is the remainder of the verse:
Then we’ll mingle with the angels,
And the Lord will bless His own.
Then the earth will be as Eden,
And we’ll know as we are known.

I can’t really think of anything more beautiful and hopeful than the vision of life with the Lord, where we know as we are known. That seems like the epitome of peace.

In the meantime, I think we should strive for as much unity as possible. My plan is to associate with people of differing opinions from mine. I believe that the two groups of people on Earth are ones I love, and ones I don’t know. So as I come to know people from a variety of thought patterns and belief systems, I can grow to love them and maybe even become united with them. More immediately I can grow to be more united with the people closest to me as we prepare for the return of our King.

Let’s Talk About Dating

I’m just going to come out and say it: I don’t like dating. I’m sick of it, it stresses me out, and I would love nothing more than to never go on another first date in my life.

That’s not to say that everything about dating is bad. (#freefood) In fact I went on an uncharacteristically fantastic first date on Friday. (I go on a lot of first dates.) It’s just the whole processssss that I hate.

So I’ve recently discovered the musical Waitress (LOVE LOVE LOVE), and one song in Act 1 pretty much perfectly presents my feelings about dating.

Amazing, right? Now let’s break it down:
*Dating is stressful because there’s so much unknown
*What if I’m totally authentically Amber and he hates it?
*What if I’m totally authentically Amber and he likes it??
*I’m scared of breaking open. It’s terrifying.

Sheesh, this turned out to be a way more vulnerable post than I was planning. The point is that I’m always talking about how dating is the worst, but the truth is there’s way more to it than that. It’s scary to show up and be seen, and risk rejection. It’s also scary to be on the other end, potentially hurting someone who is showing up and being seen. It’s all a painful process that I would dearly love to be done with.

What I Learned From Losing my Duolingo Streak

One of my new year’s resolutions for 2018 was to do Duolingo French every day. I did awesome for 69 days straight, and then one day I missed and the streak was over.

This green crying owl accurately embodies the emotion I experienced when I realized my streak was broken. (This image is NOT mine. My streak was 69 DAYS, and it was French!)

So I was bummed for a bit, and I’ll admit I even considered paying $7 to repair the damage (as I mindlessly did the other day for Spanish, which is a language I’m already fluent in. #whatismyproblem). But I was able to put it out of my mind until the end of the day, when I called my dad to tell him all the horrible things that had happened that day.

I started telling him about how I’d gone to bed at 2:30 the night before because my friend got kicked out of her apartment by her evil roommates and she told me the whole story which took 4 hours, and by the the time she was done telling me the story it was waaaay past my bedtime and already a new day so my duolingo streak was broken and I couldn’t work out either so my goals were failed and I suck………

Then my dad cut in. He was like, “If I’m understanding you correctly, you didn’t do duolingo or work out because you were helping a friend.” Ummm yes… “So what do you think is more important? Meeting a personal, arbitrary goal? Or serving someone in need?

Obvi service. My only real goal is to become more like Jesus, and let’s be honest doing duolingo isn’t really getting me there. When it comes to good, better, and best, SERVICE and putting others’ needs before my own are the best things we can possibly do to become more like the Savior.

So now whenever I open the duolingo app and see my broken streak, I’m reminded that I broke it because I care more about people than numbers. I’d even go so far as to say that helping my friend would have been more important than my scripture study or other super important things I do every day. Mosiah 2:17.

Lesson learned: people first.

The Day I Realized I’m Rachel Lynde

Okay, Imma get super real today. Or tonight, rather. It’s almost 3am, and I’m wide awake as I toss and turn in my bed, pondering on some of my deep flaws. Tbh it’s been pretty overwhelming.

Here’s the situation: I’ve always known I was opinionated. Amber Blair has opinions about everything, and she’s not afraid to share them. But whhhhhhhhy? Why do I always have to give my opinion? Literally nobody asked for it. I was thinking about that when this line from Anne of Green Gables popped into my head:

“Mrs Rachel was one of those delightful and popular people who pride themselves on speaking their mind without fear or favour.”

lol that’s me. But not really lol, because this is not funny. Rachel Lynde is not a character you’re supposed to like. She’s kind of the worst.

Also this:

“Mrs. Lynde dearly loved to be asked for advice.”

I LOVE it when people ask my advice.

So here I am at a moment of reckoning: that awkward moment when you realize you embody the characteristics of one of the least-likeable literary characters of fictional history.

How do I feel? Ashamed. Scared. Angry. Like I want to run away to Iceland, where no one knows me, and start a new life where I never give my opinion on anything unless expressly asked. Oh to be able to start over.

Unfortunately that doesn’t seem like the most plausible or productive option for me at this point in my life. As wonderful as Iceland is, and as much as I loved vacationing there last Summer, opportunities to progress in my career and in other aspects of my life are probably pretty thin on the line over there. Alas.

So what am I going to do? Hiding away in my shame won’t get me anywhere. (As a side note– it kind of sucks to realize that it is in fact my own fault that I’m not married.) So I’ll do my best to get over my shame, and then work as hard as I possibly can to never give opinions. Obviously I can’t do this on my own, so this will involve serious help from my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, who knows exactly how to help me. (Alma 7:11-13)

I think things will be okay. I’m still super embarrassed of the last 26 years of my life and how I made people feel uncomfortable and judged all the time. But I am capable of change through Christ. Hopefully everyone who has known me will be able to forgive me and allow me to progress. I am hands-down the most flawed person I know, but I believe my weaknesses can become strengths.