I Really Lived

I Really Lived

By Marjorie Hinckley

I don't want to drive up to the pearly gates in a shiny sports car, wearing beautifully tailored clothes, my hair perfectly coiffed, and with long perfectly manicured fingernails. I want to drive up in a station wagon that has mud on the wheels from taking kids to scout camp.

I want to be there with grass stains on my shoes from mowing Sister Schenk's lawn. I want to be there with a smudge of peanut butter on my shirt from making sandwiches for a sick neighbors children. I want to be there with a little dirt under my fingernails from helping to weed someones garden.

I want to be there with children's sticky kisses on my cheeks and the tears of a friend on my shoulder. I want the lord to know I was really here and that I really lived.

Random cuteness

An added bonus to internet shoping: big boxes Aaron discovers the joy of candy. (Please notice the socks. I am working on that nomination for super mom of the year.)

Kayla dresses up to play in the snow

Walkin' in a winter wonderland

Someday I am going to have it all together. My house will be clean, the laundry will be done, dinner will be planned. But not today. Today I will play. In the snow. With my kids.

Ok- instead, I think I will sit in the car and read until the baby wakes up. Then I will just sit in the car with the baby and the heat on and wait until the other kids get cold and want to go home.

yep- that's what I will do today. Then I think we will stop at McDonalds on the way home so I don't have to make lunch. Now that sounds like a good way to spend a day.

Santa!

Here are some pictures from our church party. Aaron wouldn't even be in the same room with the jolly red man without going into hysterics- so no pictures of him.

"please bring me the Sonic Unleashed game for wii"

"for Christmas I would like a Tinkerbell movie"

My Christmas Dilemma

Every year I feel the same frustration when it comes to Christmas. How do I give my kids a magical Christmas morning with out giving them to much. My kids have so much. More than they need, more than they can appreciate, more than they can value. They can't distinguish between a thirty cent chucky cheese prize and a thirty dollar video game when it comes to valuing and cherishing what they have. I am not in any way saying that my kids are rotten and spoiled because I really don't believe that they are, I just worry that they live in a time where there is so much available to them. They come home from school with little prizes for doing their homework, they like to visit the dollar store, they enjoy happy meals and the little things that come with them. I worry that my kids enjoy getting something more than they enjoy having something, because having something and appreciating it means valuing it and taking care of it and respecting it and having a home for it. The other day, one of the kids left the sleds out and when I said they could get lost, they said "then we can just buy new ones." NO WE CAN"T! This is why I have a Christmas Dilemma. In the book MY GRANDFATHER"S BLESSINGS, by Rachel Naomi Remen she writes

I have come to realize how much stress is caused by the sad fact that most of us believe in one way and live in quite another. Stress may be more a matter of personal integrity than time pressure determined by the distance between our authentic values and how we live our lives

So here I am feeling torn between wanting to give my children a magical Christmas that rewards their faith and buying things that are sometimes against my better judgement, things that will bring a blazing smile for a moment and then will be quickly forgotten, things that they think are cool because they saw the commercial but are things that I know won't live up to the hype.

So here are my questions for you. How do you deal with this dilemma, does it even bother you? Have you found an answer? I have thought that we should take our Christmas money and spend a week at the beach, forgetting all about presents, but I have yet to convince everyone else to try something new. I really struggle with this. Maybe I should just surrender to the Spirit of Christmas Expectations and clean out the kids closets for them in April.

The State of My Mind

Do you ever have one of those days when you get back from Walmart and you look down and notice this: And you wonder- today shoes, tomorrow?.........

In praise of Internet Shopping

The first week in December I made my list, scoured the adds, compared prices, and headed out to Target. I try to get all the shopping done while Kayla is in school, which only gives me about 2 hours plus I have a little elf, named Aaron, with me so I have to be efficient. Let me just say it did not go well. Either they were out of what I needed, didn't have the right size or color, or the price wasn't what it should have been. I left almost empty handed and very frustrated. The hunter/gatherer in me has always liked to get gifts off the shelf and I have been resistant to completely switching and doing all my shopping online. No More. I am completely converted, especially with all the free shipping. Those UPS guys are becoming regulars at my house.