April Pictures

Adult Stake Dance.  It was fun to dress up and have somewhere to go!

Following President Monson's counsel we got temple pictures for our bedroom.  These are all of the temples we've been through.  We were trying to choose our favorite layout.  We settled on #2.

This handsome kid likes to steal the camera now and then...

Why did I even save this picture?  Gross!

She has always loved to take care of babies!

Goofy Girl in Daddy's car.

Easter Bunny Day!  New scooters and a trike. 

She always does this cheesy face when we take pictures of her.  Funny girl Sarajoy!

Poor doggy...

No idea.  But the view of the city offices from our house.

Much Better

Today I studied.

I slept.

And I read to my kids.

We went to the library.

We came home and read some more. 

I read stacks of books to Simon.

Sarajoy got a book about babies--her favorite!

I read chapters and chapters of Despereaux.

And we listened to a few more as we washed the dishes.

We had steamed broccoli for lunch and roasted asparagus for dinner.

The day after a meltdown can be quite refreshing!

Heavy

What right do I have to feel this way when my sister's little boy has leukemia?
Or my friend finds herself moving cross country as a single mom of two special needs kids?
Or my other friend has had a daughter unable to eat and in and out of the hospital for over a month?

What right do I have to feel this way when I have an amazing husband, lovely healthy children, a supportive extended family, a wonderful piece of property in a great ward?

I have no business feeling upset by the almost constant fight against fatigue and hormones and sickness.
Or the sense that I can only ever taste for a moment the sense that I have a grip on things.
Or that maybe I'm just not cut out to be a home school mom.
That no matter how much time and money I spend, I will never be as "prepared" or self reliant as I'd like.
That my spirit wants more children, but that my body could never handle it.
That my home is not the haven that I want my wonderful man to come home to.

I study and I pray.  I learn and listen.  I have big ideas about how tomorrow will be.
But then I wake up and clean up vomit and change diapers and spend an hour on tech support for the cell phone and it is suddenly dinner time and the babies are cranky and the house is a mess and I haven't exercised (again!) and I didn't get to read to my kids (again!) and they're behind in school and they don't even know what logic or latin are.

And the cornbread I just made "tastes weird".

And I think, " please, Jesus, come today because I just don't know if I can do this anymore!"

3 times in my Patriarchial blessing it tells me to be a "doer and not a hearer only".  Oh, how that phrase has haunted me.  How do I get the things that I learn and hear to match up with the "do"?  Why is it that I work until I'm weary every day, but I rarely feel like I've been a doer?

Perhaps it is because I keep seeking rest in my covers instead of rest in my Lord.
And because I keep trying to do things on my own (very limited) strength instead of putting on the yoke of light that is constantly offered to me.  Because it takes more humility for me to access power than knowledge, so I have an overload of knowledge (hearer) and an underload of power (doer) because I forget to ask for help and strength.

I am sorry.  I will go for a walk in the sunshine. It will dry the tears and calm the fears and energize the weary body and soul. 

And I think, "Jesus, please be with me today and give me strength and power to do all that is required for me to be ready for Thy coming."

Light.

Happiness Is...

Thinking of Amy

(A rough draft scribbled onto a program at the Poetry Festival today)

I checked into the Hilton
the same weekend that she
checked into the children's hospital.

It had been years since
I and my husband had left all our
children over night.  Ten, in fact.
We had two then, now six.

But she has six also.
The common grandparents tend all
twelve.
In the house of another sister
with her own six.

Across miles of  ocean, one soldier
waits for an airplane. 
He gets a ten day break from the war
to be home where a battle of another kind begins.

Three years, they say, it takes
to conquer leukemia of this kind.
But three years is a lifetime

when you blew out
three candles only last December.

Today I am Thankful

For shiny waves of almost-black hair that belongs to a girl with her first loose tooth.

For the just-right lavender colored shirt that brings out rosy cheeks and sparkly eyes on a girl who is growing into a big-kid so fast.

For tiny frozen hand and footprints in the snow on the back deck.

For a dirty-faced little ball of energy and hugs who fell asleep singing "I Am A Child of God" with his Mommy.

For the earnest efforts of a boy to please his parents.  He is trying hard to understand the difficult and poetic language of the story Freckles which he chose because he knew how much I love it.

For the incredible 12-year-old mind that can recite Conference Trivia answers nearly verbatim.

For sleep.  Blessed hours of sleep. She is weaned! A little sad, but mostly so right to be moving on to a new kind of relationship!

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Today was so full!  I want to share some of it.  I am so grateful to be reaping the blessings of an earnest effort to create a Christ-centered home and life! 

Because I got a good night's sleep, it was not as difficult to awake at 6am.  In fact, it was a little bit fun. 
I was able to study lots of things: Book of Mormon, New Testament, For the Strength of Youth, Psalms.  And I got to watch a Conference talk that I missed while I helped Nathan make breakfast.
I got the girls up just early enough that they had a good head-start on chores before scripture time.
All of the kids had their chores done by 8:30 and were starting on their Math.
Daisy did her 2 pages of Math all by herself while I showered!
We did devotional and spent some time doing spelling and writing and a little history.  It has been a long time since we've touched on those subjects!
All the while, little Sarajoy was carrying her baby doll from place to place.  She'd wrap it up, then hoist it into her arms and give it a few loving bounces.  Then she'd shift it around or find a cradle for it.  She'd get wet wipes and "change its diaper" and wash its face.  Much of the time, she was singing lovely little lullabies.  So sweet to hear the music before the words are even there! I was just amazed that this little person who has only been here a year has so many little mothering skills down pat already. 
I found time to do a little laundry and a little grocery shopping.
We had a wonderful co-op.  Our lessons were short so the moms had extra time to talk about General Conference.  It is lovely to see how we are strengthened in different ways by it. 
Then dinner and Family Night and read-aloud time.
It has been a blessing to be directed by the Spirit about how to fit little snippets of this and that in--things I've neglected out of what seemed like necessity. 
I am learning that when I thank God for what he gives me and recognize that it is always enough, He makes it enough, or even more than enough.
Just like the loaves and fishes. 

April Showers

Dallin told me he woke up to a strange glow coming through the windows early this morning. 
The tell-tale sign of snow.
Really?  Snow? 
I pictured an inch or so sprinkled over everything that would be melted off by the end of the day.

But no, we had at least a foot of snow.  It was drifted almost to the top of our neighbor's fence.  Tree branches were touching the ground, and all of our bushes were so loaded down I don't know if they'll recover completely. 
And it didn't melt.  There is still a thick, puffy layer of snow on everything and more coming down. 
I don't ever remember this kind of snow in April. 
Despite my disappointment in such un-springy weather-

It takes my breath away.

From the top of the pine-covered peaks out my front window to the sprawling valley and lake out my back windows
And all of the snow-loaded branches and covered roofs in between,

It is beautiful.

Stunning, even. 
And I am so glad to be here.


And then there's the other kind of April shower.
The shower of the wisdom and advice of a living Prophet and Apostles. 
The outpouring of inspiration and Holy Spirit. 
The flood of ideas and resolutions and courage--I will do better!  I will be better!

Couldn't it last a little longer?  A week, maybe?
I could stand to have General Conference every week, or at least every month. 
But no, I think it will take at least 6 months and more for me to process and apply all that I've been taught.
And really, with this nifty little laptop, I can have it every day. 

How grateful I am that this parched soul has the privilege of drinking from the fountain of truth!

Good Earth

There is something about the Saturday of General Conference that makes me want to get my hands in the soil. 

I usually get at least a little planting done in March, but this year we had a very Lion-ish March. 
We also have to start over on our garden, and our garden area is still very rocky and needs to be tilled. 

It has been hard to know where to start with this big yard project. 
We've been thinking and planning and thinking and planning.
What to do first?
Fence? Sprinkler system? trees? dry landscaping?

Sometimes I think I have to start doing something before I really get inspiration.  The work itself gets the creative juices flowing. 

Thanks to my Dad, we got to DO some things today!
He brought some starts from his yard that he thought we could use.


5 sumacs to shade the south-facing front of our house.
4 choke cherry bushes along the west fence near the lilacs and rose bushes already here.
8 bunches of thornless red raspberries for the area behind the shed.
1 apricot tree.  The first in our "orchard" area.
1 hibiscus

The kids helped by cleaning weeds from flower beds. ( I am so excited by all of the flowers coming up! And we have 3 huge forsythia bushes that are just about ready to bloom!)
They also helped fill our water storage buckets.
They dug holes and helped fill them with water before we placed the new trees in.

Simon was especially cute and excited about the whole process. 
He came out just as Dallin and I were about to place a chokecherry tree in a water-filled hole.
"Whatcha doin, Dad?  Oh, planting water?"
"What's that, Dad? An apricot tree?  For popcorn!?"
He was very proud of his strength and helpfulness as he carried gallon jugs of water to each hole and emptied them all by himself.  Then he'd get his little shovel and help Dallin fill the hole in.

Brandon was proud of the fact that he dug a nice big hole and planted the hibiscus all by himself.  Our soil is very rocky and has been covered with gravel.  Digging holes is not easy here!  I am excited to see Brandon's investment pay off when those huge, beautiful flowers bloom.