Friday, February 25, 2011

Becoming Fully Present in Life...

A few weeks ago my good friend, Maria C., agreed to meet me for lunch to talk about my options for going back to school.

"I want to do something meaningful with the extra hours I find I have in the middle of most days," I bemoaned to her, "but I don't know what that something meaningful is."

We talked about courses of study I would be interested in pursuing (English Lit? Humanities? History?) and what the various schools offered (BYU, UofU, Weber), what kind of classes it would involve, and the time commitment. We had a wonderful visit, and she gave me a lot to think about. But when all was said and done, I came to the realization that I am not yet ready to put my whole heart, mind, and soul with it's accompanying singular focus on school when I have daughters who still need me to be their mommy. When I go back to school, or spend my time pursuing something, I want to SAVOR the experience (Maria's perfectly descriptive word). What I am doing right now--being a mom and wife and daughter and friend--are the things I want to "savor."

Soon after this lunch meeting, I went to St. George with Madi for a few days and spent some precious time with her before the rest of the family came down to join us. Although it was a rainy weekend, which curtailed some of our planned activities, it was still heaven to "laze" around with Steve, Ashley, Madi, Kelsey and Covey. We watched "I Love Lucy" episodes, basketball, movies, ate good food, did an "Insanity" workout and logged in some great running miles. We attended a local ward on Sunday, and the family that spoke had the assignment of talking about Family Home Evening. The mother of the family told us that in preparation for her talk, the following three words kept coming to her mind: Stronger Than Ever. Those words, along with the rest of her talk, struck a chord in my heart of the very thing I had been struggling with (what to do with my extra time) and helped me to see very clearly that my extra time is sacred time to be dedicated to my family: my husband and my four girls/their current and future spouses, my parents, my in-laws, my extended family, my ward family, my world family...in that order.

A day after getting home from St. George, Markelle called up very sick and needing some mommy love time. I had the luxury of a free day to take her to the doctor, get her Rx filled, take her to lunch, help her order glasses, and even try on clothes together at the mall (while waiting for the lenses to be made). This was such a gift to both Markelle and myself, to have this quality one on one time to be together, with all of the grief and pain behind us, and a chance to be our true selves with each other.

The final icing on the cake, the personal message from Heavenly Father to let me know that I am on the right track with my relationship with my family, and that I AM doing something fulfilling with my time, was this little book that Maria gave me for my birthday:

On the back cover it reads: "Coming home to ourselves, we are able to offer our children the one thing they need more than anything else: our own quiet presence. And we receive something priceless in return--the chance to savor our lives and the precious people in them."

Wednesday, February 16, 2011

Oh, Yes I Did!


One nice thing about turning 44 is that you can wear the Birthday Hat with PRIDE!

Tuesday, February 15, 2011

V-day epilogue

Note to self: don't spend ALL the V-day energy on the kids....leave a little something for the TRUE Valentine of your life.

May we have a do-over, honey?

Monday, February 14, 2011

A Lover of Lover's Day, and proud of it!


This is my Valentine shout out to all of the lovely people of this magnificent planet!


When people are asked to name their favorite holiday, they will most likely choose Christmas, Thanksgiving, or Halloween. But me? If you were to ask me, I would tell you that Valentine's is my holiday of choice. Because of it's close proximity to my birthday, I have always considered it my personal holiday. And it's all about LOVE! Not necessarily boy/girl love, but love of everyone in your life--past, present and future. The ability to love is one of the most glorious thing about being a son or daughter of loving Heavenly Parents.

Many years ago, our family's Valentines Day tradition morphed into a celebratory breakfast, complete with sugar cookies, strawberry crepes, hand written Valentines cards and flowers. What girl does not love receiving flowers? No matter what ever else is going on in their personal lives, all of our girls get some loving from their mommy and daddy.

This year, we have a daughter with a built-in flowergiver, but we wanted to show her and husband how much we love and appreciate them. On a whim, we drove down to Provo and heart attacked their humble little patch of grass and front door. Then we stayed and had a nice visit. They didn't even know about the heart attack until we left to go home!

Last night, Steve and I stayed up after the girls went to bed to make our Valentine's Day preparations: table set? check. Flowers? check. Cookies? check.

Love sentiments in cards? check.

Happy Valentine's Day, darling girls! We love you!



Sunday, February 13, 2011

Holly Golightly goes to a dance....

We love Audrey Hepburn at our house...especially Madi. She has a lot of Audrey inspired clothing, and she definitely has the body type...although she isn't as tall as Audrey.


When it was time to find a dress for the Bountiful Sweetheart dance, Madi took a page out of Audrey's design book. She found this luscious little number:

She looked absolutely stunning!

I've decided that I have to pose with my arms bent so that you can't see my "bat wings."

Thanks, Adam, for inviting her with 50 beautiful and perfect long-stemmed roses. We have been enjoying them in our entryway for the last two weeks!

Saturday, February 5, 2011

It's All about the Hills

Last week I received an email from my Ragnar team (RunWalkCrawl) with our "assigned" legs, and I noticed that, although I had requested leg 11 or 12, I was asked to do leg 10. The asking was followed by a bunch of "please, please, please!" All I remember about leg #10 during last year's race was watching Lisa S. run 4 miles straight up a gravel path on a very hot day. She had her Camelback on, but as her support vehicle we were still worried about dehydration. We all watched in wonder at her studliness while at the same time silently sending up prayers to the heavens that we weren't running that leg. So, with great trepidation at receiving this "assignment," I pulled up the Ragnar course map:


Yep, it is still as gnarly as it was last year. But with a huge "gulp," I typed back a "yes," closed my eyes and hit the "send" button. I am committed to leg #10, with it's Easy 3.6, Hard 7.7 and Very Hard 4.0.

Now for the training. I am so lucky to live in the foothills of Bountiful. If I want to go anywhere, it involves going up or down a hill. I knew that I could come up with a good simulation for Ragnar. I clocked a great training run in my car, and today I ran it and it felt great! Mentally and physically, I know I can do this. And I will definitely live up to our team name of Run, Walk, Crawl (as I will be doing all three!).