Beautiful Days

Last week a sister from our church ward stopped by with these gorgeous flowers with no reason other than just because she was thinking of me. It was so sweet of her. She's not someone that we have the opportunity to connect with on a regular basis. Her husband is the Stake President and has served in leadership positions for years and she has been the one to be on the bench taking care of her large family, and taking care of things at home while he fulfills his church responsibilities. There are a few other sisters in similar circumstances that I just felt a connection to or felt like they understood what it was like to wrestle your family by yourself while your husband was on the stand in his Bishopric calling or now as he is gone fulfilling his stake callings.

She had noticed that I wasn't there with the kids for the Stake Easter Choir concert, and I admited that it was a battle I decided I didn't want to fight. Beau was singing in the choir with the Young men from the stake, so I would be sitting with all of them by myself at the same time they are used to going to bed. I explained that we had been traveling all weekend and the kids were ornery. I felt was better to end the day good, with everyone happy from our Easter sunday, and getting to bed on time, than to drag them to the extra fireside that night. There I would just have to fight them, get frustrated with them because they had already sat through 3 hours of meetings and didn't want to sit through any more. I would leave frustrated, exhausted, upset and they would too.

She completely understood. It feels good to know that other mothers know the battles we sometimes are going through. She made my day, my week, and even this week everytime I see those gorgeous flowers and knew someone had been thinking of me. Why don't I do that more often for someone else. I need to.
Someone else also enjoyed them. :)
Last week was our spring break and we were able to enjoy this beautiful white weather... needless to say it wasn't much of a 'spring' break stuck indoors all week. Luckily Saturday was beautiful. We had the chance to just hang out as a family, stack up on library books, run errands, get ice cream cones, get the garden ready, clean up and babysit for some friends of ours so they could go on a date. It was a wonderful day of enjoying the great weather.
This girl would be escaping the house every minute if she could figure out how to open doors. On a good beautiful day if her siblings leave the door open she is gone. She loved being out on Saturday although it was a handful for mom and dad to try and convince her that dirt and rocks just aren't that good. We did not win the battle. She was convinced that they were the best things that she has ever tasted. Handfuls of dirt at a time. Whole rocks. Dirt never killed anyone right?
Last fall right before the snow fell Beau finished up putting in a sandbox. We still need to dump a bit more sand but the kids are enjoying the chance to dig around, cook all kinds of incredible yummy meals and enjoy the sunshine. Right now we have gorgeous weather and they have been in that sandbox all afternoon. I've been able to sit out with the office door open, enjoy the fresh air, the birds chirping and warm weather with the kids oblivious to anything except their new little houses they keep building to live in.

When all else fails and you can't convince the girl to not eat dirt, you lock her up in the wagon and feed her a graham crackers instead.

Today has been a great start for the week. Despite my few hours of sleep I was able to get my exercise and scriptures study in. So as of now the day is a complete and good day despite anything else that gets done. It's supposed to get up in the 80's this week. A whole week of sunshine... can anything get better than that! Beau mentioned yesterday that we just need to get me out in the sunshine for a few minutes every day. Hmmm.. the drastic change between the grumpiness/discouragement at the beginning of the week and the happy- life is so good attitude on Saturday must have made an impression. :) I admit it's true. I do so much better when I can get outside and be in the sun. Maybe that's why I loved Vegas so much. But little does he know that it was also because we finally had a chance to sit down and really talk... which sometimes is all I need too. Quality spouse time with a little sunshine added in.

This week is going to be a good week. I can feel it and the birds are telling me from the tree tops.