Press Forward

My favorite scripture is 2 Nephi 31:20.  I'd never thought much about it until it was the theme scripture for the year I worked at Brighton.  Something about it, though, just sort of stuck with me.

Anyway, I haven't really been where I need to be spiritually, lately. For whatever reason it's the simple things like scripture reading, prayer, etc, that seem to fall by the wayside when life picks up speed. 

However, this week has reminded me of this scripture.  I love the if/then pattern of it's set up:

If I do the following things:
~Press forward with a steadfastness in Christ
~Have a perfect brightness of hope
~Have a love of God
~Have a love of all men
~Feast upon the word of Christ
~Endure to the end

Then I will have eternal life. 

Seems easy enough, right? You would think so...

Another scripture that I love is Psalms 46:10 (Also found in Doctrine and Covenants 101:16).

Life is a crazy 3-ring-circus juggling act.  Often, I feel like I have so many balls to keep in the air that I don't know how I can carry on a moment more.  It's times like these that I need to remember that it's ok to let them drop.  It's ok to just take some time to be still.  It is in the still and quiet moments that I can truly come to know my Heavenly Father. 

I need to learn to seize the still moments when they present themselves, for they don't come often. 

In the midst of the political, work, emotional, personal, and day-to-day turmoil it is nice to know that I have an anchor in my Heavenly Father.  Even if the winds and the waves toss me about, he can calm the storm of my troubled heart.

T-Bone Update

There are a few T-Bone things (stories, etc) that I need to write down before I lose them, so please be patient with me... and feel free to read, if you'd like.

1. He now recognizes, associates, and knows the sounds for A, B, C, D, E, F, J, M, N, O, P, Q, R, S, T, and Z.

2. He can do all of the actions for Itsy Bitsy Spider, Wise Man/Foolish Man, Popcorn Popping, and Book of Mormon Stories.

3. He is proficient at going up AND down the stairs.  He also prefers running to walking, but has a funny Frankenstein run that trips him up.

4. He loves the words pumpkin and Halloween.

5. Speaking of Halloween, my mom, sister, and I took him to a little spook alley this weekend. While there we met a little cat that belonged to the nursery putting on the spook alley.  He LOVED that freakin' cat.  He was more interested in following it around and petting it than in anything else. While there we also encountered a life-size, singing, dancing Elvis skeleton.  It is pretty safe to say that he is obsessed.  It's been almost a week and he still keeps signing to me about the dancing skeleton.  He also keeps signing about the scary witches.

6. On the subject of signs, he now knows at least 35 signs (that I can think of off the top of my head).

7. After attending the spook alley on Saturday we took him out to dinner with us.  While waiting for our table a man walked into the restaurant.  He was probably in his 50's, about 6'2" or 6'3", and solidly built.  He was wearing cowboy boots, wranglers, a HUGE belt buckle, a western-style shirt, and a cowboy hat.  T-Bone took one look at him and immediately started making his horse noises. Luckily for us, the man was as amused as we were.  That could have been embarrassing.

8. I bought him a giraffe costume to wear for Halloween. He hates it.  Every time I get it out he starts to whine and says, "Nananananana, Fffff." (Translation: No, no, no, no, no, no, giraffe)  Needless to say, we've moved to plan B.  He's going to be a pumpkin for Halloween, because he loves them.

9. He LOVES Mickey Mouse Clubhouse and Little Einsteins. He calls Mickey Mouse "Mow", but he won't say it out loud, he whispers it.  Little Einsteins is "ship", and he keeps telling me about the "Mmmmmbop" (translation: Robot) that we saw on the show last week.

10. He is in the midst of his first ever ear infection.  Poor little bubby.

And that is enough for now. :)

Fall

“I'm so glad I live in a world where there are Octobers.”

~L.M. Montgomery, Anne of Green Gables

I love autumn-time. It is, far and away, my favorite season.  However, this subtle slide from the lazy days of summer into the cool crispness of fall always make me somewhat wistful.
Something happens when we reach this spot on the calendar. Maybe it has something to do with switching out my shorts, tshirts, and summer scarves for boots, sweaters, and jeans.  Maybe it's the anticipation of the holidays (really, who doesn't love Halloween and Thanksgiving?). Maybe it's football season. Maybe it's the food: the Honeycrisp apples, the pumpkin everything, cider, pie, and comfort food.  Maybe the changing color of the leaves simply releases magic into the air.

“Delicious autumn! My very soul is wedded to it, and if I were a bird I would fly about the earth seeking the successive autumns.”

~George Eliot 

I think it has something to do with autumn being a time of harvest: the reaping of what has been sown, the enjoyment of the, literal, fruits of one's labors. Where spring is the time of planting, rebirth, and growth; fall is it's simpler, more relaxed cousin. 

And so, I will embrace this change of season. I will put on my sweater, pull on my boots, and march down the sidewalk through the red and golden leaves.  I will throw open my windows and drink deeply of the richness of autumn. 

For the love of...

This past weekend Greasemonkey and I decided to get away for a little date night.  We had a gift certificate to Rodizio Grille, so we ended up at Trolley Square.  After dinner we had a little time, so we decided to wander around Trolley for a minute.  It was then that we stumbled upon the most magical place I've ever been. I'm sure this isn't a new place, but it was new to me.  The moment we walked through the door of Weller Book Works, I knew I'd be back for more.  Let me tell you about this incredible place:

I walked through the front door into a room full of antique, rare, and vintage collections of books.  Through a small back door labeled "More Books This Way," a whole world opened up. The first thing I noticed was the smell.  Oh, that glorious, wonderful, musty, lovely odor of well loved books. I trailed my hands along the exposed brick wall to the staircase in the corner. I trod down the stairs into a veritable wonderland of mostly used books.

I sent Greasemonkey away on a made up errand so I could have a moment to myself.  It was at this point that my emotions, quite literally, overcame me.  I broke out in goosebumps and got teary-eyed.  You see, that's what books do to me: they reach right into my heart and tug on the strings that reside there. I wandered aimlessly for several minutes trying to compose myself. It wasn't happening. I trailed my fingers along the spines of the well-loved tomes and let the tears flow for a awhile.

Books speak to me in a way that nothing else can.  They are more than just words on a page.  They are more than just stories.  They are more than just pages in a binding.  There are entire worlds contained between those beautiful, worn covers.  There are lives, feelings, hopes, dreams, and so much more in those beautiful pages. It is an escape from the mundane, the every day, and the hardships of the real world. I am a die-hard book lover.  I have been having a love affair with the written word for as long as I can remember. It is a love that I hope to instill in T-Bone, as well.

Anyway, back to my aimless wandering:  I stumbled upon a true hidden treasure.  Many of you know that I am a life-long fan of Roald Dahl.  What a lot of people don't know is that before he wrote some of his better-known books, he wrote many short stories for magazine and newspaper publishing. Well, I found a copy of The Roald Dahl Omnibus. And it was only $10.  Seriously?  I snatched it off the shelf and hugged it to my chest while I went off in search of Greasemonkey. I knew that if I didn't get that book I'd kick myself all the way home.  Forget the fact that we were on the motorcycle and it was 600 pages long.  I would find a way to get it home.  After convincing him that I didn't just want it, I NEEDED it, we left that wonderful book haven the proud new owners of an omnibus. I zipped it into my jacket for safe keeping on the ride home and we ceased the nights adventures.

So, you see, this rare gem of a book store made me forget about life for awhile.  It melted my cares away and it melted my heart.  For my first true love will always be books.

A bit of a whine

I'm not feeling so hot today. Physically, there isn't anything wrong with me, but in my heart I'm hurting. You see, I was supposed to be having a baby next month. True story.  You can read the background here. I've since come to the realization that it wasn't time for us to have another one yet.  T-bone needs me right now, and he needs me all to himself.  I get that.  Emotionally, I'm not ready for another baby yet (you can read more on the "why" of that here).
Anyway, not the point, let me get back to that... The point is this:
In the past year I have had no fewer than 25 friends announce pregnancies. I wish that were a gross exaggeration, but it's not.  If anything, it's an underestimate. In the past 3 days, I've seen at least 5 new announcements, not to mention a phone call from a friend of Greasemonkey's saying that they'd actually just birthed a 3rd child that we didn't know they were expecting.
And all of it kind of hurts. I know, I don't have anything to complain about.  I have several friends that, for whatever reason, aren't able to have children without medical intervention, or can't have children at all.  I am so blessed to know that my body has the ability to get pregnant and carry a baby to full term. I am so blessed to have my sweet T-bone. And I'm so happy for all of my friends expecting children. This isn't to take away from their joy, not in the least. I know that many of them have waited a long time for the children they are expecting. I know that they will be wonderful parents and that they will love their babies with everything they have.
I know it's not our time yet, but it still hurts.

The Women we Become After Children

"We change shape, we buy low-heeled shoes, we cut off our long hair. We begin to carry in our bags half-eaten [snacks], a small tractor, a shred of beloved fabric, a plastic doll. We lose muscle tone, sleep, reason, perspective. Our hearts begin to live outside our bodies. They breathe, they eat, they crawl and-look!-they walk, they begin to speak to us. We learn that we must sometimes walk an inch at a time, to stop and examine every stick, every stone, every squashed tin along the way. We get used to not getting where we were going. We learn to darn, perhaps to cook, to patch the knees of dungarees. We get used to living wtih a love that suffuses us, suffocates us, blinds us, controls us. We live. We contemplate our bodies, our stretched skin, those threads of silver around our brows, our strangely enlarged feet. We learn to look less in the mirror. We put our dry-clean-only clothes to the back of the wardrobe. Eventually, we throw them away. We school ourselves to stop saying 'shit' and 'damn' and learn to say 'my goodness' and 'heavens above'. We give up [parties], we colour our hair, we search the vistas of parks, swimming pools, libraries, cafes for other of our kind. We know each other by our [strollers], our sleepless gazes, the beakers we carry. We learn how to cool a fever, ease a cough, the four indicators of meningitis, that one must sometimes push a swing for two hours. We buy [cookie] cutters, washable paints, aprons, plastic bowls. We no longer tolerate delayed buses, fighting in the street, smoking in [public], sex after midnight, inconsistency, laziness, being cold. We contemplate younger women as they pass us in the street, with their cigarettes, their makeup, their tight-seamed dressed, their tiny handbags, their smooth, washed hair, and we turn away, we put down our heads, we keep on pushing the pram up the hill."

The Hand that First Held Mine

by Marrie O'Farrell

Ask any mom you know and she will tell you that this is the truth... and that she wouldn't change it for the world. 

It's just a hobby

#23- List your top 5 hobbies and why you love them.


I am a dabbler in many things, a master of none.  I think, however, that I can come up with 5 hobbies.

1. Cooking: I like to cook.  It soothes me. I like to try at least one new recipe a week. Pinterest has been my downfall on this one...

2. Needle crafts (knitting, sewing, crocheting, stitchery, quilting, etc): My mom got me started sewing quilts at a young age, and I've loved that ever since.  I learned to crochet in college, I learned to knit last year, and I've been stitching for awhile.  I love the "mindlessness" of these hobbies, I can just let my hands go while my mind wanders elsewhere.

3. Photography: I do this one purely because I love to.  I like having nice pictures of things and people I love.

4. Reading: There is nothing in this world that quite equals curling up with a good book. It is an escape for the heart, mind, and soul.

5. Writing: I don't do this one nearly often enough anymore, but someday I would like to write a book.  Someday...