My little monkey

Who would have thought that my sweet little girl would be more of a monkey than my boys. When my boys were little I used to have to tip the kitchen chairs over so they laid on their sides so the boys couldn't crawl up on the kitchen table, or drag the chairs to the kitchen to climb on the counters.
Well Becca has one-uppped them. Today I could hear Becca playing around in the back rooms somewhere and as long as I can hear her I don't worry too much about her. She usually wanders around and just keeps herself busy. Well, then I heard water running and immediately knew that she was in the bathroom. When I got there I saw Becca sitting up on the counter, feet in the sink, water running. Becca is only 14 months old. How she has already figured out how to climb things already is amazing to me. Since I haven't seen how she does it I can only guess that she must climb up on the toilet and then use the toilet paper holder as a foothold to get up on the counter.
She is such a determined little girl. Earlier today the boys were painting at the table and apparently Becca didn't want to get left out. She would climb up on the chair and then up on the table. I would get her down, tell her no, try to get her involved in something else, only to have to get her down within less than a minute later. She did this three times in a row - determined to get up in the middle of the action. She is so quick.

How to show thanks

These were not my own ideas, but I thought they were good and worth passing on.

I have been thinking about what I can do to show my love for President
Hinckley and here are my ideas:

*Instead of sending flowers I will donate money to the Perpetual
Education Fund.

*Instead of sending a card to the church, I will take time to send a
card to someone that is not active and share my testimony with them.

*To honor the temple growth under his direction I will go more often
to the temple.

*I will read the Book of Mormon again by the end of the year.

I have felt so strongly that I wanted to honor him in some way and I
hope by posting it here it will help others think of what they can do
to honor him also.

I think I will follow this persons example and honor President Hinckley in these ways.

President Hinckley

Although he wasn't prophet until I was in college, President Hinckley I really feel connected to. I read his biography when it came out years ago - but I need to read it again. His life is one of such faith and devotion. He has worked tirelessly for the church basically his whole life - he gave his all for the church. He had a great vision for the growth of the church, and particularly with the great Temple expansion showed the reality of praying and then going to work to get things done. I think one of the main things I will remember about him is his great optimism. I'm sure there is a great weight to be felt being the prophet, but he never showed discouragement or despair, he was always full of positive words and encouragement and a "can do" attitude. I need to adopt a better "can do" attitude in my life - I get discouraged too easily - I need to remember to just move forward with faith and leave things in the Lord's hands.
The news last night showed footage of President Hinckley's travels around the world and showed saints from around the world. It made vivid how we truly are a worldwide church and I pondered on how truly wonderful that is. - The church is rolling forth to all corners of the world. I can see why President Hinckley says that it is an exciting time to be alive - to see the works of the Lord being fulfilled.

I wish I would have, I'm glad I did...

I just found out about Tuesday tell all, a blog that gives suggestions for a topic to write on. Today is not Tuesday, but I like last weeks topic and thought I would write on it.

I wish I would have...
...learned the habit of keeping my space clean - ie - my room - when I was growing up. I had the bad habit of waiting a couple weeks and then doing a big Saturday cleanup. Now that I have my own house and family I've had to try to establish better habits of cleaning daily. I'm getting better, but I think if I would have developed that habit earlier on it wouldn't be so difficult now. I'm trying to help my kids develop this habit while young and we do a clean up (most nights) before bedtime to put everything back in its place.

...

I'm glad I did...
... have wonderful parents who brought me up in the gospel with strong values and standards and have always been an excellent example to me.

....marry my wonderful husband Jeremy in the Temple and now we have 3 (almost 4) wonderful children - who knew life could be so wonderful.

...have the opportunity to serve a mission. I loved my mission to St. Petersburg Russia - it was a beautiful and interesting country and I love the people I served and the companions I served with. It definitely was faith promoting and testimony growing experience. I feel like I really learned how to lean on the guidance of the Holy Ghost - something I need to learn to apply on a more regular basis in my current life.

...get to be me. I've always loved my life and the experiences that I've have and the people that I've met and the friends that I've had. The first part of this topic - I wish I.. was hard for me because I don't live my life with regrets. I'm sure if I think hard enough maybe I could come up with more things that at the time I wish could have been different, but looking back things in my life have always worked out for the best, so I never regret what was, or what wasn't. I like to think that I (at least usually) learn from my past mistakes or missed opportunities and if I don't take the opportunity to grab onto them or recreate them then that is my problem. I am in charge of my life and I can make it whatever I want it to be.

...go to the Best of EFY this morning. I am a counselor in the Young Women over the Beehives and I really didn't want to have to meet at the church at 8 am and be gone all morning to EFY. But I'm glad I did. It gave me a real boost to be there - sometimes I get bogged down in the daily to-dos and kid things that I need reminders about the big picture and I need spiritual boosts - Sundays, with kids at church, just leaves a little lacking sometimes (walking the halls with Becca because she doesn't like to be in class - Sunday school is her least favorite).

Scared

The other night I had put Tom and Charlie in bed and was in the next room with Becca getting her settled into bed. I could hear Tom and Charlie talking to each other, but couldn't understand what they were saying. After a minute of them talking I then heard them start singing "I am a Child of God". I thought - how cute is that. Then I heard Tom start praying - my heart was touched that my boys were doing such precious things all by themselves - they didn't know I could overhear them. Then I found out why they were doing this because at that point Tom came into Becca's room and said "Mom, we sang and we prayed, but we are still scared, will you come in with us?" so cute, they tried to solve their problem first and then they came to me for help.
Moments like that are what parents live for - it touched my heart and made me feel like I was doing something right as a parent. Some days I wonder because I'm just so happy to get them in bed and have the day finally be over (days are very long with little ones). Other days we have really good days, but they seem all too rare. Most days are okay days, but I really want to make more days fall into the category of great days.

St. George Temple

This is a picture of the St. George Temple I took a few years ago when it was snowing. It doesn't snow often in St. George, maybe once every other year or so. I took the picture the morning the snow started, because it is such a rare thing, and then it proceeded to snow for two more days, unheard of in St. George. I have a 16x20 of it hanging above my fireplace. I have gotten many compliments on it and today a friend got a copy of it to get a print of to give to her husband for their anniversary. It's a favorite of mine, so I can understand that others like it too. All temples are beautiful, but I have a particular connection to this one because it is where I was married - almost 8 years ago, in April.

Toothless

At 13 months old (almost 14) Becca is finally getting her first two teeth on the bottom.










This week has been a rough week for me. I'm still sick. Yesterday I thought I was on the upward bound, but I must have eaten some bad food, and the middle of the night last night I was so sick and throwing up. Today I've been weak and tired. Thankfully I have wonderful in-laws who took my boys for the night and for tomorrow. And my sister Debbie lives with me and has been taking care of Becca. I rested all day today and I'm feeling a little improved tonight.

Piles

Books are good, but piles of books everywhere is not good. This is a typical scene of the table in my living room. (Actually, since I've been sick for the past four days this is the scene all over my house, luckily not the dishes, my dear husband has been wonderful to keep up with the dishes). I've been trying to do better about putting things away where they belong, and for a while I did great -but when I get sick everything goes to pot, my kids have yet to come close to buying into the theory of "everything has a place and everything in its place". Tom drops things at whim, where ever he is, that's where it goes. Charlie isn't quite as bad, at least he doesn't drop things all over the floor, he even put away the bingo game he was playing, put all the pieces back in the box and put the box back in the closet - brownie points for Charlie.

Kids and hair

I don't know if I'm not a very good girl mom or what, but I never do Becca's hair, not even for church. I've tried bows once or twice, but she hates them and pulls them right out. I've thought maybe I should try little pig tails or something, but I don't have any small elastic bands. I'm not for pain for beauty and when I think about doing her hair I envision her turning and twisting and crying and it doesn't even make me want to try. I've never given her a haircut yet and it's amazing how cute her hair is when I just comb it. I did try putting soft sponge curlers in it once, but it just gave her pouffy hair, not curly hair.




Charlie has really thick hair and this picture shows what his hair typically looks like, because I only do it when we go someplace. I tried to cut his hair shorter last haircut, but it is impossible to get him to cooperate for more that 1.4 minutes - no exaggeration. He hates hair cuts so much, the hair itches him and drives him nuts. I have become a fast hair cutter, but still not fast enough for him. After last hair cut he informed me that he is going to grow his hair long. He said that even though he will have long hair he will still be a boy - that having long hair wouldn't make him a girl.




Tom took a pair of scissors to his hair the other night. Jeremy said he was right behind Tom following him into the bathroom to brush teeth, but when he walked in the room Tom was holding scissors with a patch of hair missing. They (kids) always cut front and center. I can't remember for sure, but I think Charlie did the same to his hair a year or two ago. I'm sure it's a rite of passage for children - on their list of things to do while yet a child: #13 - give self haircut, in efforts to help mom out. I haven't decided yet if I should give him a haircut to try to "hide" his haircut, or just leave it. I think if I cut all his hair short it will look worse than it looks right now. Tom has a big head and doesn't look very good with his hair really short.

Slow Start

So I'm not starting off the new year with a bang like I had hoped to. It's been almost a month since I've written. I didn't even get any Christmas stuff posted. We went to Pine Valley (45 minutes north) for Christmas and I forgot to bring my camera, so Christmas wasn't documented with pictures.
The kids and I have been sick all weekend - fevers, coughs, throwing up - all kinds of fun stuff, luckily I have a wonderful husband who is so good to us and took good care of us, he even made a wonderful meatloaf dinner last night that was fantastic.