Celebrate--should have done it sooner...

I've been feeling for several days now that I needed to post in response to Elder Uchdorf's talk in conference. 

He encouraged us to celebrate the little successes in life, and I knew it would be a good exercise for me.

I didn't make time for it, however, and ended up letting life get me down yesterday.  I realized that there were things I was going to write down that I couldn't even remember when I needed them. 

I've made some pretty major parenting mistakes in the past few days.  One of which was standing paralized in panic while my 3 year old rolled down a parking lot on his bike.  I just kept yelling for him to put his feet on the brakes.  Why didn't I run after him and at least TRY to catch him?   The image of him flying over the handlebars into a pile of railroad ties makes my heart sick!  And all of the what-ifs that make me grateful that his face is only swollen and scratched and bruised...
And I botched a batch of bread.  All of that effort!
And I had a sore throat on Monday night.  I'd been waiting all week for a treat!
Then most of a day spent in bed getting over the sore throat and fatigue and aches that I felt.  Haven't I spent enough days in bed this year???

After lots of tears and prayers and thinking in a quiet dark room, I found some peace.

Some days it is so easy to see the things that aren't getting done.  And they seem like such really important things.  The stakes seem so high when my kids' futures depend so much on me. 

So if I'm ridiculously tired, who is going to pick up the slack?  Can it possibly be okay to rest when so much needs to be done?  How hard do I push myself? 

It was getting to the point where things I normally enjoy were becoming challenges to endure.  Motivation was completely gone.  I told Dallin, "I feel like all of my creative energy is gone.  I feel my reservoirs being drained even as I try to fill them." 

Even as I said the words, my thoughts were drawn to the little person growing inside of me.  Of course my creative energy is not gone, it is just being used for a pretty important job right now. 
How grateful I am for the encouragement I received about this important job from Elder Anderson's conference talk. 

And as I lay there alone, thinking about what to do, I remembered.  I am not alone.  There IS someone to pick up the slack when I need to rest.  If I do my best, the vast deficit between what is ideal and what I can really do will be paid.  If I trust that, I can be joyful.  I can be joyful and accept the season or day or hour that I am currently living.  I can be joyful even on the days when that deficit seems so very overwhelming.
What would I do if I didn't know this?
How I hope I can hold on to it and remember it!

So, better late than never, I have had some triumphs in the past month.  I will share what I can remember.

I spent a morning building a wooden train track and playing trains with Simon.  We hauled all kinds of cargo, including animals.  Simon was a little disturbed at first by picking up animals with a crane and loading them onto a boat.  He is such a fun person to be with.  Playing with my kids is a rare treat these days.  So glad I took that opportunity.
Our first month of school was good.  Even though my preparations took a week away, we fit all of the important stuff in.  We were able to do a few fun dionsaur projects.  We've had some interesting discussions about our timeline and how everything fits.  We realize that there are so many interesting and unanswered questions about our Earth's history.  Nathan has conducted several fun science experiments for us. 
The kids have been amazing with their independent work.  Nathan is doing great in Algebra and proud to be getting mostly A's on his assignments.  The boys are doing the hard work of studying Shakespeare plays for their class.  They don't always like it, but I can see that they are beginning to take an interest and enjoy something difficult. 
Our "4th week" is supposed to be a week off for me each month.  The idea is that I will be able to focus on school for the first 3 weeks, and then focus on my projects during the last week.  This time the kids still did their independent work, but I had time to take care of appointments, kid portraits, shopping, and fruit.  I also fit in a few school things that we hadn't gotten to, and that was actually really fun.

I thought for sure that school was priority #1, and there would be no way for me to do any canning or preserving.  Guided by the Spirit, I have been able to do plenty!  I did grape juice and dried plums, pears, and peaches.  My wonderful mom did a whole bunch of dried apricots and apricot jam for us.  I froze several gallons of fresh apricots that she brought by.

We are finally getting around to taking some healthy steps that I've had nagging me for several months.  We are restricting desserts or treats to Monday nights only.  I'm taking steps to use less refined sugar in my cooking as well.  We're also off of milk.  I miss it less than I thought I would.  We tried almond milk, but most of us think it is pretty gross.  We are excited for a raw milk dairy to open up near us again.  Until then, we are experimenting with no milk to see if it helps us stay healthier this winter.  We've had way too many allergies and colds in the past couple of years.  Hopefully we can get by without having to go off cheese and other dairy, but we'll see.  We're grinding wheat again and using it for most of our cooking.

Today the bread turned out beautifully!  Whew!

I stayed caught up with the laundry really well.

I drove a vanload of women to the Conference Center for the General Relief Society meeting.  It was great!

I went to my ward's book club

Sarajoy is learning to talk, and it is so amazingly adorable.

Tonight I feel much better about setting my alarm clock for 6am...

..