Tax software

Lord, thank you so much for smart people who make tax software, I really stink at math.

A Church Journal

I don't know which General Authority it was, or which Stake leader it was that quoted him, but because of their words I started keeping a journal in my church bag. I sit there in meetings, writing away, sometimes paraphrasing the things I hear, but often just writing down the things I don't hear, but needed to hear. I really do get more out of meetings this way.

Thank you Lord, for inspiration passed down through my leaders, that lead to personal inspiration. I am so very thankful that both channels are open to me.

Simple service

We had a baptism tonight, ANOTHER! God has just opened the windows and poured out blessings on our little ward. I kind of got caught up doing other things today so I was a bit late, okay really late. My contribution to the meal afterward was two bags of store bought meatballs that I cooked in tomato sauce right there at the church.
I was a real Martha, missing the talks to set up tables and chairs, stir the food, quiet the kids, close the doors. I got to see the ordinance, but the rest... yeah I was "cumbered about much serving" and kicking myself for missing the meeting part of the evening.
I did notice though that the floor in the Relief Society room needed attention. Small wonder with all the traffic it has gotten lately. So after we ate I grabbed the vacuum and headed in to do it.
The ward mission leader poked his head in at one point and said, "The Lord sees what you are doing, and you'll get paid." I smiled at him as I continued to work and he left, but then my heart filled completely as my answer rang out from the deepest depths of my soul, "He's already paid me, more than I could ever repay!"

Funny that the best part of my day was pushing a vacuum, just doing simple service that was for no one else but Him.

Lord, thank you for accepting my simple act of service as a token of my love for you and my gratitude for all you have done for me.

Fun clothes

I saw a picture the other day of a little girl inside the laundry basket, playing with the clothes.

I used to do that. I loved clothes even way back then.

Lord, thank you for the rich variety of clothes I own and have access to. Thank you for making me a clothes horse.

People who love people with special needs

(this is my post for yesterday)

Sometimes I feel like I'm on the inside on the best secret ever. Funnily enough it's not a secret that we insiders share and don't want to get out; it's just something that others, somehow, don't understand:

People with special needs are one of God's greatest gifts to us.

Luckily for me, through my work and unique family situation I know a lot of people who share this understanding. They may not even understand what it is they understand. They may simply call it loving to help, but whether they would put it in the same words as I, or not, they know. We know that by helping people with special needs we are helping God help us, that we are helping them help others to God, that we are privileged to know them.

Lord, thank you for people who love people with special needs.

My kids have a Momma

I can't really go into the details, and it's not like I know all of them anyway, but I know a little girl whose mom is not around.
It breaks my heart to think of anyone not having a mom. I know any good woman will take any time she is allowed to give that girl a little mothering, like I got to do today, but it isn't enough. Kids deserve to have a mom in their lives.

I know I'm not the best mom, far from it, but at least I'm here and trying. I'm so thankful that somewhere along the way I made some choice that lead me to being here, to having what I have, to being a loving mother.

Lord, thank you for giving my children someone to hold them.

A good job

I don't know how it is that we have been so fortunate for so long. We took a pay cut for a while during the "downturn" but my husband has been well employed our entire marriage. We have had health insurance our entire marriage.

I know this is a very rare thing, and I know people who's homes are being re-possessed right now and they are looking states away to share a roof with family.

Lord, thank you so much for our steady employment, for not making me face my children's hunger with nothing to combat it. Please, please be with my friends and help me find a way to help them.

Snuggly little boys

We had a new kid tonight. I scooped him up to show him the toys and then he just wanted to be held from then on. I love it when they are snuggly like that. It just makes my day.

Lord, thank you for snuggly little boys.

Best Friends, note the plural

I've lived all over the place, and along the way I've met some very rare souls. I get along with nearly everyone I meet, and try to love even the ones I don't get along with, but there are some people that are just "the best."

They just get me, they take all my idiosyncrasies into stride, they are loyal and loving, they are my best friends. They are the kind of friend I would cheerfully hack off a limb for, though I'd run out of limbs if they all needed one. Thankfully they are content with a listening ear and their own personal suite in my heart.

I'm so blessed to have them, all of them, and each of them individually. I'm so thankful that my love has been multiplied to include them.

Thank you Lord, for my best friends, near and far.

The Ward Family

My ward is not perfect. Our Sacrament Meeting attendance rate is... well really low. Everyone struggles, everyone wears multiple hats, and yet I love it. I love my ward. I love the people in my ward and they way they take care of each other. I love the love I feel from people in the ward and the support I get.

Lord, thank you for my ward family, and for giving us this love that we share.

Another's Blessing

My friend arrived at her house to find fire trucks. The fire was contained in the chimney and the damage is localised. It could have been so much worse.

Lord, thank you for protecting them.

Water Aerobics

I took my first water aerobics class today. I can't take regular aerobics anymore. I've got a bum heel on one side and a bum knee on the other. Nothing terribly serious but bad enough I can't push it. Just running around the gym with the kiddos can put me in pain the next day.

Water aerobics has me sore too, but in that I got a good workout kind of way. I took the advice of my friends and put a float belt on and went down to the deep end for it. That way I didn't use my feet and couldn't aggravate either joint.

Thank you Lord for humbling me enough to listen to exercise-smart people and get in the pool.

Understanding Call Center Employees

I wrote the checks, I put them in the envelopes. I put the envelopes in the bags, but Jordan's did not make it to her teachers hands, and therefore not to the photographer's hands.

Discovering this I pinned my hopes on picture re-take day. I watched for the notice, I kept the date in mind, and then it slipped my mind that morning and I was out of luck.

Or was I?

The school sent home little ID cards with the kids, and on them was a picture code and a telephone number. I called it today and the lady on the line pulled Jordi's pictures right up. Normally they would have charged me an arm and a leg for a special order of the prints, but when I explained the above scenario to her, the woman took pitty on me and let me have the package at the price I would have paid for it originally, plus shipping.

Lord, thank you for people who understand lost envelopes and first graders and for putting one on the phone with me today.

A quick mind

Okay, another one of those post that will make me look big headed, but I have to express this so I can finish wrapping my head around it and get some sleep.

So, I'm sitting there next to someone I don't even know, discussing a variety of topics from Art to Zoroastrianism (literally, we discussed both) and I get a text message to my phone. It was from one of the college students I know via work who has taken a shine to the kids and I. She needs help, bad, because she has to write a 5 paragraph essay on what she thinks Racism is.

Now, I remember when 5 paragraph essays scared me, because no one had explained to me how to structure them. After that, well I churned them out daily in 45 minutes. Man, I'd love to write an essay on Racism, but I'd need a lot more than 5 paragraphs. It's a subject I have thought about a lot over the years.

So I texted her back (and called her when I got home to get her ball rolling) but that moment started me thinking.

I am smart, and I'm smart about a lot of stuff.

There's stuff I am not good at, like math. The way people take a completely abstract set of rules and treat it like it's the most concrete thing in the world is mind boggling to me. People say "2+2=4, always, it's unchanging," and I look at them like they have two heads. What on earth is 2? Seriously.

But I am good at understanding other things, and tonight I am so very thankful for that. I am so thankful that I have this hunger to learn, weather it is from my spirit, my genetics, or my upbringing, I have this precious gift of a sharp and understanding mind. I'm thankful for the opportunities that I have had of improving my mind, the people that have aided me, and most of all I am so thankful for the things that I never have to question again because my spirit now knows them.

Lord, thank you for making me like you did, and teaching me like you have. I feel so unusually blessed, and I'm sure I don't deserve it, but I am truly grateful.

No Carpet

Man I get so frustrated with myself, I keep forgetting to do this. I guess I need to get it at a solid time in my schedule, like to do it with my scripture reading before bed or something.

So, this is yesterday's post and I'll have to post again tonight.

Yesterday I was thankful I don't have carpet in my house. I had a sick kid, and well, I'm sure you can imagine how fun that was to clean up at 1:30 or so, but it was nothing to what it could have been if I had carpet in the hall between her room and the bathroom. The poor thing felt so bad, she's such an angel even when she's sick.

Lord, thank you for giving me the foresight to not have carpet, and for M who covered my shift so I could stay home with my sick baby.

What I needed, not what I wanted

I had prayed that my voice be returned to me by today. Sunday is hands down my favorite day of the week, and a big part of that is getting to sing hymns. I thought surely the Lord could give me that little concession as it was part of my worship.

Oh how wrong I was, and how right He was. I couldn't sing. Not only did it hurt, my voice wouldn't stay even in the right octave. So I sat and listened and read along with the hymns.

I'm so thankful that He gave me the chance to do that. The spirit was so strong, the words were so poignant, and James' sweet voice ringing in my ear was so sweet.

He is often in a mood all of sacrament, and I had forgotten how lovely his voice is. I told him how beautiful it was, and he said, "I know, I got it from you Mom." It was so touching to hear the words I have so often spoken uttered by another generation.

I also picked up the quiet but skilled Alto coming from the new face down the bench. She has just started coming to our ward because she is now 30 and no longer in the singles ward. I am terribly excited to have her in our ward. It was like God was saying, no you can't have your show-off-soprano today, but you can have a new sister instead. I think she and I will be great friends.

O Lord, thank you so much for giving me what I needed instead of granting my selfish desire. I love you.

A soft, warm blanket and kind employees

(Another two day post, but in my defence the Tylenol wasn't working last night. )

I'm sick. Just some little cold. I wouldn't let it bother me except that it's taken away my voice. Usually to lose my voice like this I have to cough and hack for a week, but this time it was gone before I was even sure I was sick.
Naturally, alternately sounding like a bird and a man with throat cancer makes me sound a lot sicker than I feel. The sinus meds aren't helping, making me sleepy.
Yesterday I decided I'd better call off for my evening shift, so I called an employee and she was kind enough to switch Friday nights with me. It was really kind of her to re-arrange her life like that for me, just so I don't get the kiddos sick.

I am also thankful for our warm blankets. It's such a little thing, but for thousands of years people have shivered under itchy wool blankets, and I've got downy faux fleece throws to rub on my face as I cuddle under them.

Lord, thank you for the kind people and the comforts in my life that make sick days so pleasant.

The smell of food

Right now I have a pork roast in the oven. It's in a bag with soy sauce, garlic, onion, and a little liquid smoke. It smells so very very good. I've been enjoying the scent for hours and just realised what a beautiful thing it is to have the house full of delectable scents that don't make my lungs seize and throat close up like perfumes and air fresheners do.

Thank you Lord, for the wonderful smell of my dinner.

It didn't happen to me

I'll admit it, I should have written this an hour ago, before I got the call that there is no school tomorrow. This means a shift at work when I was going to spend the morning away from kids and all kid related things, grumble grumble sigh.

But then I remembered that a tsunami just hit Australia and millions of people are worried about loved ones or homeless, or dead.

Perspective, eh?

Lord, I thank you that my home has not been hit by a tsunami and my loved ones are all safe and sound. Please, please be with the people who have been impacted by this tragedy, and please forgive me for being so shallow.

Snow suits and driving skills

I don't know how I missed doing this yesterday.... sigh.

I think I'm the only person in a ten mile radius that has snowsuits for all of their kids. After all, where would they get them? They certainly don't stock them here. We got them last year in PA and bought big so they would last more than a year. We will have to get Tali a new one next year I am sure, but the others will just have hand me downs.
So they went out and played in the snow, all snug and cozy in thier suits, after they cleaned thier rooms. The dog had so much fun going in and out and romping in the snow with the kids.

I wrote a chapter, yipee!

Today I need to go to work, and I've got a great big truck to do it in. That's just a fringe benefit, the truth is I'm not freaked out like some people because I've lived in places where snow is a common thing and I know how to handle it pretty well.

Thank you Lord for snowsuits and all the years I lived in the snowbelt.

Brother Shaw

He's our teacher in Gospel Doctrine, and I just love him. Truthfully I don't think I've ever disliked a Gospel Doctrine teacher, but Brother Shaw brings this energy to class and I just love him for it.

Thank you Lord, for Brother Shaw.

Annual events

Some we look forward to, like Christmas. Others we dread, like science fair time, incidentally right after Christmas.
I'm just glad these things happen just once a year, so we don't wear out the good ones and we don't have to live through the bad ones monthly.

Lord, thank you for the wisdom with which you have ordered the world.

Bobby the Pizza guy

Funny how one person you hardly know can make your day. Bobby works at Papa Johns, the only pizza we like, he's one of the managers. Since going off tomatoes I thought my pizza days were over, until I discussed it with Bobby and he told me if he is working he will personally make me a pizza with ranch instead of tomato sauce.
My hero.
Lord, thank you for Bobby and other people like him who make life so good with their thoughtfulness.

Eventuality

This really was a wonderful day, filled with so many things to be thankful for. I got a good review at work, I had a lovely lunch with two ladies I love to bits and crumbs, I got to write while two kids were in the pool and one was doing homework. I am so very, very blessed and I really am so thankful for those things.

However, right now, foremost on my mind is that come Monday, Tali turns in the science project and the torture of completing it with her will be over.

I'd like to know how they expect a 4th grader to follow the 17 pages of "helpful information" that make my eyes glaze over and my stubborn side kick in.
She doesn't even know what a bibliography is and she's supposed to write one? Wait, you think I'm going to find a book at the library on this to even cite? ARGGGHH! People I GOOGLED potato battery! Our library is tiny!

Sigh.

Lord, thank you for trials with an expiration date.

The mantle

If I hadn't seen it so many times and felt it myself I don't know if I would believe in it, but there is something special that happens when a Bishop or a President is called. I can remember so clearly the strength and overpowering spirit that came with my call as Primary President. I see that same thing in the RSP's that I have served with, I see it in the Bishops. I am so thankful that it is there, that God sends this overflowing love for the people we serve to flow through us, that he sustains us as we strive to do his work.

Thank you Lord, for the mantle of our callings.

Beautiful Music

As I write this my iPod is updating with the music from the CD I just got off of Ebay. It's called "Apricot Blossoms Against the Sky" by Chang Jing. Ms. Chang does the most incredible music and I have been checking my online sources regularly for real copies of her music.
I REALLY want her CD "Open Music" but it came out in 2005 and no one seems to have it. So this one will do. The tracks are lovely, incredible really. Here, see what I mean about her music. That's Breathe, her most popular song. See? Amazing.

Lord, I thank you for the beautiful music you inspire in people around the world and for the tools that bring it to my soul.

Competent people

We had several kids in the room tonight. One started throwing up. I had a baby in my arms, so without a second thought my employee just jumped in and handled it. I kept putting the baby down to handle the other kids, and fetching and such, but she just handled it like a pro.

Lord, thank you for her, not just because I didn't have to clean it up, but because she's like this about everything. She makes my life so much easier and brighter.

Catching up, again.

Man, I keep slipping up, but I blame Joe, lol. We so rarely sleep on the same schedule that when he's ready for a nap I often skip everything so I can go with him. Beds are so much warmer with two.

Yesterday I was very thankful that my simple lesson went so well. On first Sunday we have the Asian sisters in the room with us. We love having them there, but they usually have a separate class. This is because it is hard to get through even a few key points when you are doing it in three languages. They manage in two languages weekly (because they are completely amazing!) but are kind enough to translate for us on first Sunday so we can have them in the room.
I based the lesson off of a few inspiring verses in Deuteronomy chapters 5 and 6, with a little Matthew and Mark mixed in. It was about having the Lord at the right place, at the front of your mind and always in your heart.

The kids and I also finished listening to the Book of Mormon on the way to church. Those last two chapters cover some off the scale stuff, in both extremes. I thought about how desperate the situation was for Mormon and Moroni, and yet how STRONG they were because of it. It gives me hope for the future, that when things do go from bad to worse we as individuals can go from good to better.

Today I am thankful that my kids got ready so quickly this morning. I was dreading the fight to get them out of bed, and it was a bit tough, but once they were going it went really well. Not only did we get to school on time, I got home and back to school in time to give James the forgotten backpack before class started.

Lord, I thank thee for thy attendant spirit, and for obedient children.

4 Souls

Four boys were baptised tonight.

Lord, thank you for the little things you set in motion years ago that made this happy day possible.