Things I am Thankful for

On Sunday the topic of the lesson I taught was on the importance of keeping a journal. I challenged the youth to go home that day and write about how they saw the hand of God in their life the past week. Since this is my journal and I should follow my own advice and so my posterity knows I see God in my life, I thought I better do the challenge myself. I don't do a lot of sharing of spiritual stuff on blog, but probably should add a little more.

For me there is something about adding a member to your family that brings about more spiritual awareness. Last week there was a night in which I made a poor choice and did not go to bed early enough once Tanner was finally asleep for the night. I did not get enough sleep and the next day I felt it. I was determined to do better the next night. Well Tanner didn't want to cooperate. His second time awake he didn't seem to want to go back to bed. I was so tired. I began to cry because I just wanted to go back to sleep. That was when I prayed/begged Heavenly Father to help him sleep. Soon after the prayer I was calmer and Tanner went to sleep. I was so grateful to crawl back into bed. The next night Heavenly Father continued to answer my prayer. I did as I should and went to sleep at a better time. Tanner then slept 5 hours the first leg of the night and 3 more after that. Also he didn't give me any trouble about going to bed right after eating. I felt amazing the following morning. I was so grateful he answered my prayer so that I could be a happier, more patient mom.

Another answer to a prayer came yesterday. Over the weekend Braden played with my wedding ring while I was getting dressed. I asked him to stop when I found out. Instead of putting the ring back where he found it, he placed it elsewhere. I didn't notice this until Monday. Of course when I asked him he couldn't remember where it was. Brian suggested praying for help to find it. Monday night in Braden's personal prayer he asked that we would find my ring. I am sure you can guess what happened. Tuesday after school Macy found it in her jewelry box. Not sure why it was there but I would never have looked in her jewelry. The neat part of this story was on Monday night for FHE Macy gave a lesson on prayer. I was able to share my story with Tanner and then on Tuesday I was able to follow up her lesson with another example of prayers being answered. I hope this helped Macy and Kelsey have a little more faith in answers. They both are a little negative about that topic thinking that they never receive answers. Part of it may be they don't really pray for a lot and if they do they don't put much effort into finding things or answers. Hopefully they will have experiences that change that.

Recently I have seen God's love for me while sitting back and watching my kids play. I have been able to be in the moment and have felt overwhelming joy and love for the gift of my children. Several times this past week I have watched as they interacted with each other. These were times when they were really getting along with each other or so excited to show me their magic tricks. When they were getting along with each other they were outside by our little play pool. I was watching from the window. Kelsey was being the big tease and pretending/possibly going to throw water on Macy. Luckily she controlled herself and just kept teasing otherwise I might not have had the magical moment I did because there would have been a fight. Macy then shared her water bottle with Braden and Kelsey, however, they were not allowed to put their mouths on the bottle so they looked like little birds. Macy then teased and dumped some water on Braden. He took it in stride and there was much laughter and happiness with a little more teasing. My heart just swelled. I am sure Heavenly Father looks on us much the same way and has much joy when we find the moments of pure happiness. The joy I felt during the magic tricks was because I gave Braden and Kelsey my full attention. I did what they asked and cheered when was appropriate. They were so happy and proud of themselves. There was such an innocence that surrounded them. It was such a peaceful, joyous moment. I normally let too many of these times fly by me. Again something about a new baby causes me to slow down. Maybe because I do so much sitting to feed the hungry little guy.

Macy's baptism came at a time of chaos in our life so I am just now leaving the post about it. She has been bugging me for awhile because she wrote about her baptism and wants it published with pictures.

She was baptized and confirmed a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints on May 5. Luckily that day was peaceful and exciting. I don't remember much besides that it wasn't too hectic because the baptism was scheduled for 4 PM. That gave plenty of time to have everything ready. Everything about the event was enjoyable. There was a great talk by a member of the stake presidency, Brian shared his testimony with Macy, I talked about Macy (and of course cried) and then we went home for dinner with all of our family.

Macy's thoughts on her baptism:

MY BAPTISM!

When you get to your church you get your suit. Then you go into the chapel. The people give talks about baptism. Then you go into the font and get baptized. When you get baptized you go fully under water.

After you get dressed you go to a room and get confirmed. Then it’s over.

THE END!


By: Macy

YOU WILL LOVE YOUR BAPTISM!

Busy Beavers

So I finally finished my other post from last week when I realized another week has gone by. Much has been accomplished.

1. I finished all my "needs" shopping for the baby.
2. My house is clean.
3. My sugar snap peas grown from seeds sprouted. I have never been successful with seeds but thought I should try since the transplants provided were not sugar snap. (This was a Relief Society project.)
4. I played most of the day yesterday. First it was to the gym and then off to lunch with friends. Then a small amount of prep for a party at my house. And finally a get together with some of our friends from Brian's MBA class, without kids. We were actually able to talk and hear one another.
5. Today I cleaned up the pool from the massive wind storm on Thursday (I think). I took a nap and painted Macy and Kelsey's fingernails and toenails. I did a little more cleaning before my mom gets here. I helped Macy write and practice her talk for Primary tomorrow. She seems confident and like she wants to do it. We will see what tomorrow brings. She has not given a talk yet. I have given two.
6. Thursday the doctor thought I would have the baby this weekend and got my hopes up. I told him not to cancel the induction date because it never works that way for me. I don't go into labor on my own.

Brian also has been a busy beaver.

1. He has spent time looking at for boats and cars. He has done a 180 since he was able to keep a job, but there are no promises that anything will come about. See the next line.
2. He has also considered buying a rental property. Home prices have fallen so bad here that he figures we should have some cash flow from it.
3. He helped some friends pack their moving truck.
4. He played tennis this morning. It has been a few weeks.
5. He finished painting our old bar stools black.
6. He trimmed our palm trees.
7. He did our taxes. It looks like we are getting a little bit back. We may owe Arizona a couple of bucks.
8. He hung my new wall hanging we won at his companies employee auction. It was an item from a model home. I think he wanted to curse for buying this because it was a pain to hang and get it level. It took longer than he thought.
9. Numbers 3 through 8 were done today. Number 3 was also done on Thursday night.

Here are my auction purchases. The top picture was Brian's project tonight.

PS: I claim no photography skills. My new decor are cages with fake plants in them.

I need to make a note here for remembrance sake. A few weeks back I was released from my calling as Laurel advisor. I was sad to give this up, but feel at peace with what the Lord wants. I thought I would have a break from service because of the baby, but that is not how the Lord works. A week later I was called to the Enrichment committee. Not a big deal. I like to be involved, but this is something new for me. I am not even sure of everything the Enrichment committee does. I have spent most of my married life in YWs. My two other callings (the only ones I can recall) were cub scout leader and ward literacy specialist. These totaled maybe a year.

The Temple

My favorite time of year to visit the Arizona temple is right now. As you walk into the building you pass by beautiful flowers, but seeing the flowers is not the best thing. It is smelling them. The fragrance is so wonderful and starts to put you on cloud nine before you even get through the doors. Then you add nice weather to the mix and life couldn't be better.

I love to visit the temple because of the Spirit that exists there. I love to feel peaceful, joyful, happy, and contemplative. Tonight was no exception and when I reached my car after the session I couldn't have been happier. All was well. The church is true. We can all receive personal revelation. I will always be grateful for the temple.

By the way, visiting the temple on a Tuesday night is so much faster than a Friday or Saturday night because it is a lot less crowded so things move along much more quickly. I think we could have been done close to an hour and a half (we took our time in the Celestial room and were in no hurry to get anywhere).

The only bad thing that happened tonight was Brian scared the babysitter. I stopped by the store to get some money for the sitter and buy ice cream, so he arrived home a little before I did. Well he opened the garage and then remembered he had to run an errand so left. Well she heard the garage door, but no one came in. She went to look and the garage door was wide open and she knew that it was shut before. This made her really nervous. Luckily I came home soon after and assured her it was probably Brian. I was correct and he felt really bad.

Tree Planting at the Temple

Saturday morning we took our kids to the temple grounds. It was our stakes turn to help out on the grounds. As part of this project the all the kids in the primary earned and donated money to help buy 10 trees (one for each ward) to plant on the Mesa temple grounds. Saturday was the day of the tree planting. It seemed that almost every family in the stake were there (I felt bad for the bride and groom that were trying to take pictures because I don't know if there was any place without people). The kids each got to take a turn in digging the hole for the tree. It was funny to watch the 8 and 9 year olds try to break through the ground on the first few shovel loads. They tried to do what they had seen their dads do. They would jump on the shovel but did not have the body weight to have any impact. Eventually they got it going. Each of the kids took a turn at digging, some took a couple. Of course Macy wouldn't help out. She is shy when there are too many people around. After awhile they turned the digging over to the fathers or it could have been another hour.

The hope for this experience is that as the kids grow older and they visit the temple they will be able to remember the tree they helped buy and plant and have a desire to see it often.

Sorry there are no pictures but I am not a good photography mom and again didn't even think to bring my camera. If anyone has any pictures of my family, I would love a copy so we can remember this event.