In the arms of a Mother

Wake up.

Make breakfast.

Make lunches.

Bundle up babies and take the older ones to school.

Kisses, hugs and I love you’s. See you after school.

Feed the baby.

Clean the house.

Make lunch for kids still at home. 

Make your lunch...

Baby’s hungry. 

Forget to eat your lunch. 

Play with kids.

Remember you need to eat still

Remember that you needed to pee 5hrs ago. 

Oh wait, time for kids to come home from school. 

Help with homework. 

Make dinner. 

Everyone sits down to eat. 

Baby’s hungry.

Bath time, scripture time and don’t forget family prayer. 

Kisses, hugs and I love you’s. Off to bed sleepy heads. 

Sit down on the couch, see a sink full of dishes

You want to be responsible. You don’t want to come into the kitchen tomorrow morning to that. 

Couch and TV win. 

Tired, but rest and relaxation trump. 

Baby’s hungry. 

Still need to pee. 

And eat. 

In between all these things there’s lots more to see and do. But it’s not all chores, and it’s not all chaos. Let’s not let those kisses, hugs and I love you’s be looked over. Let’s not let the spontaneous bear squeeze hug on your leg from your toddler, while he says, “I love you mom” be forgotten. Or what about the way your kids eyes light up when daddy comes home?  The squeals and laughter that come from wrestle time with dad. The towers built with magnetic blocks, all kinds of car noises coming from little mouths while playing car town with their siblings. The tiny hands that help make cookies. The little adorable  bodies that prefer to just be in boxers playing up in their room at night. The goofy things they say. So many GOOD things. So many good things that should tower over the few not so pleasant things that may occur in a day as a mother. 

My four month old was laying on the floor, after I had just changed his bum the other day. I went to throw the diaper away and make him a bottle. He, very abruptly, decided he was starving and began crying like nobody’s business. As I was preparing his bottle a thought came to me that made me want to adopt every single baby out there that needed a safe place.  A place to be loved. I picked up my sweet baby, and he immediately stopped crying. In my arms, he was in his safe place. I was his safe place. I am his safe place. No matter what the day brings my little boy needs me for his comfort. All his needs are meant as I provide constant love. 

So all you mamas of littles, babies don’t keep. Toddlers and their spontaneous hugs and endless forgiveness for our shortcomings won’t always come as easy. The squeals and giggles of children wrestling with daddy will one day fade away. For just a moment today, just sit and look at your children, individually.  Just look at their sweet faces, take it ALL in, soak it up. Recognize the little humans they are. They don’t mean to drive us crazy sometimes. They don’t mean to spill the milk, miss the toilet and pee on the floor, smear toothpaste all over the bathroom mirror (ok maybe that one is intentional, but still). They don’t mean to do things intentionally to make us frustrated. All they want is for us to continue to be their safe place. Enjoy your littles, mamas, while they are, just that, little. 

Love One Another

You might be familiar with the story about Lehi’s vision in The Book of Mormon. If you’re not, you can watch a video dipection of it HERE. 

For the longest time, ok honestly, up until a couple days ago my view on the people in the “big and spacious building” were people who were not members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. They didn’t believe. They had never been baptized. But then this quiet whispering touched my heart. The people who occupied that big and spacious building were not just non members. There were also members pointing, laughing and making fun of the people who were partaking of the fruit. 

I know, that so often this is the cause of faithful members falling away from the Church.  It breaks my heart. Yes, we all have free agency. Of course, we can choose to take offense or let it slide off our backs. But I also know, we all know, that words and actions of others can really hurt. It would be hard to walk into a building and have to be in the same room with people who have offended you for two hours. Especially when you know that was the one place where you should feel loved and accepted. 
If this speaks to you personally, I am sorry you have felt this. If you are currently facing this, I am also sorry. You shouldn’t have to feel that way. But here’s the thing. None of us are perfect. Please don’t let the actions or words of others keep you from going to church. Their stuff is their stuff. If you were once an active member and you are suffering from this please come back. I know that the Church is true. I know deep in my heart that our Savior wants you there. Don’t do it for you. Don’t do it for the people there. Do it for Him. Go so you can feel His love for you when you sing the hymns. Go and feel the peace and forgiveness He has awaiting for you as you partake of the Sacrament. Go feel His embrace. Sit and feel it. Soak it in. Do it, because you love Him. 
On another note, bringing it back to those people in “the big and spacious building.”  And I’m not just speaking to members. I am speaking to all. We don’t know what others have gone through. We don’t know their stories. We have not walked in their shoes so we do not know what they are truly feeling.  The greatest and best thing we can do as human beings is to love. Love everybody. Be a friend and be kind. Be the one that helps others feel loved and accepted as they are. 

Daughters of Divinity

(This is my gorgeous friend, Mandi Clarke.  You can check out her photography HERE)

We were listening to the Frozen 2 soundtrack on the way to school this morning, and the song “Show Yourself” was requested. As I listened to these words from the song I started thinking about our Heavenly Mother. 

Come, my darling, homeward bound

Show yourself

Step into your power

Grow yourself 

Into something new 

When I saw this movie in the theatres I got the chills during this part. I immediately thought of my earthly mother and how she always shows so much joy when she sees me growing and learning. 

But this morning I thought of our Heavenly Mother, and how she probably, most definitely, feels the same way. She knows our worth, our potential. We are her daughters, and what a sacred and special relationship each of us must have had with her before we came to earth. As we stumble our way through this life I know she is watching from afar cheering us on to “step into our power.”  As we do so we can rest assured she is beaming from ear to ear, yearning to kiss us on our head and desperately hoping we can feel her love for us. 

Longing for Home

“Every inch of me is trembling

But not from the cold

Something is familiar 

Like a dream I can reach but not quite hold 

I can sense you there

Like a friend I’ve always known

I’m arriving

And it feels like I am home”

There are so many good lines in Frozen 2 that can really be looked at in a spiritual perspective, and I absolutely love it. If you know me, you know I often tend to see small everyday things and somehow relate it to something spiritual. So when the girls over at Line Upon Line challenged us to do just that, and share our experiences; I knew I just had to join.  

Ok so, our Prophet, President Nelson, said once that we should read the Book of Mormon, learn to love the Book of Mormon, to the point where we don’t want to go one day without reading from it; we should long to read from its pages on a daily basis. I will be the first one to admit I am not quite to that point. I do love the Book of Mormon, and I do have a testimony of its truthfulness, but I’m not quite to the point where I long to read it. There are days where I really do long to just sit and immerse myself into the Book of Mormon, but there are also days where I just quickly read something, because I know I should. 

Going back to what our Prophet said about longing to read The Book of Mormon each and every day...have you ever longed for Home?  Have you ever been spiritually homesick?  I still, to this day, remember one of my friends saying in high school once that she felt homesick for her heavenly home. Like, she longed and yearned to be with her Heavenly Father. I remember thinking, “wow she has a strong testimony. I wish I felt that way sometimes.” But at the time I didn’t have a testimony. I had faith, but I didn’t know much, and I had very little knowledge of how to get to that point, and I was too afraid and embarrassed to ask anybody. 

“and it feels like I am Home”

I’ve felt it since. I’ve felt that very strong pull. I’ve felt that deep sting of wanting so badly to be Home. To be with my family at the feet of my Savior. To dwell in the presence of our Father in Heaven. I have felt homesick for my heavenly home. It’s hard...to feel homesick, but in feeling homesick for my heavenly home there was a peace. Which so perfectly coincides with the peace that comes from Christ is not of this world. This feeling of longing to be Home was another witness to me that He really is there and Heaven does exist. That I really am a daughter of my Father Who is in Heaven. 

Inhale...Exhale

Parents.  We all have them. Biological, step, in laws, adopted, grandparents, aunt, uncle... we were all raised by somebody. Not all of our family dynamics consisted of a mother and father. That’d most definitely be ideal, but it’s just not the case. So whoever raised you, my hope for you is that you were raised by someone who did the best they could. I hope you were loved. 

For me, growing up, it took a village. Literally. However my home base was with my biological mother. A single mother. A hard working mother. A mother who loved me with her whole heart and soul and did the best she could.  Yes, I spent time in day care. Yes I spent a lot of time with cousins, aunts and uncles. No, she wasn’t at home all the time giving me 24/7 attention. But honestly?  She didn’t need to be. I was safe and having fun with other family while she was doing what she needed to do to provide, not only for herself but for me. 

Fast forward into today’s world. Where stay at home moms have the great opportunity, and dare I say it, curse, of social media. We beat ourselves up over if we are doing enough and in turn, worrying about how our kids are going to turn out to be. We compare our children’s milestones and achievements to each other and stress out when our kids seem to not be at the same level as other kids we might see on social media. We worry about if we spend enough time or too much time entertaining our kids. We want the best for them and feel like we have to do it ALL. 

My beautiful friend Casey said it perfectly though, “we want to set our kids up to succeed.”  But that’s the thing. We need to remind ourselves that that success looks different for every single child.  That can seem overwhelming. But guess what?  We can pray to our Heavenly Father and ask Him for help; He knows our children; our children are His children. He knows them even more than we do, and He knows exactly what they need. So if we go to Him and plead for His help and grace He can help us to know what each of our children need, individually, to help them to succeed. 

I may not have had my mother around ALL the time, and when she was able to be home with me I didn’t get her constant undivided attention. I did, however, receive unconditional love from her. I knew, because she said it AND showed it all the time. I knew I could always talk to her, and I knew she was always going to be there for me no matter what. She built a confidence in me that I was LOVED. 

And guys, that’s really mostly what a child needs to know. So let’s let ourselves breathe a little more and just know you are who your child needs. Please know that Heavenly Father is there to help you!  Your children love you. They need to know you love them too. 

Overcoming the Natural Man

We are taught and taught and taught to read our scriptures and say our prayers on a daily basis.  In fact, it's taught to do these things more than once a day. Most of the time we hear we need to read morning and night and always have a prayer in our hearts.  But if I know I'm supposed to, and I know that I feel like a better me when I do, why do I always put it off? Why do I think it's okay to go to bed without reading my scriptures or saying my prayers?  Isn't that, in a way, saying, "Hey I got this under control...I don't need your help?" Like really, if I think about it, that's what I am pretty much saying. My life is going pretty good lately...I must be doing alright on my own.  Oh my heavens! That is so false. There is no way I could do this on my own. I need Him. I need His strength and His example and love in my life all the time.

So if I know this why are these two simple things such big things?  Maybe it's because I need to personally strengthen my testimony even deeper.  When we are strong in our testimonies in certain things we are more inclined to do those things.  For instance, I know this church is true, and therefore, there is nothing that could make me decide to become inactive or fall away.  So if I work on my testimony of the simple act of reading my scriptures reading them will become natural. It will become a thing I look forward to doing instead of something I am doing just because I am told to do so. 

It's the natural man that does this.  That's my answer. I need to overcome the natural man and remember who I am and WHOSE I am.  I am a daughter of God. There are things bigger than this life. There are things of greater importance. I love this story shared by Quentin L. Cook:

"I learned the importance of this early in my career. After finishing my education at Stanford Law School, I sought employment at a particular law firm. No members of the Church were associated with the firm, but the firm was made up of lawyers of character and ability. After a morning of interviews, the senior partner and two other partners invited me to lunch. The senior partner inquired if I would like a prelunch alcoholic drink and later if I would like wine. In both cases, I declined. The second time, I informed him that I was an active Latter-day Saint and did not drink alcoholic beverages.

I received an offer of employment from the firm. A few months later, the senior partner told me the offer of the alcoholic beverages was a test. He noted that my resume made it clear that I had served an LDS mission. He had determined that he would hire me only if I was true to the teachings of my own church. He considered it a significant matter of character and integrity."

He stood up for what he knew was right in his heart.  He could have easily given in and said yes to the alcoholic beverage, because he thought if he didn't he may not get the job, but he didn't.  He turned down the offer, stayed true to his heart and to his Father in Heaven, and he was blessed because of it. However, on the flip side, the senior partner could have just as easily not given him the job because he chose not to drink, but that would've just made it clear that that job wasn't the job for him after all. 

People who are not of our faith, or even those who are and are just not as active, know a lot about what we stand for.  I've been told in conversation by a friend of another faith that she would expect more from a Mormon than somebody of her faith.  We have a responsibility to set the right example of members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. We not only have a responsibility, but it is our privilege and honor to be able to stand as witnesses of God at all times and in all things and in all places.  He trusts us. He knows all that we are capable of. He knows that we are valiant and are capable of living a good life. We are the ones who need to be strong and stand up for the truth, even when we are standing alone.