I just recently watched a video on Lds.org called "Mountains to Climb."It was a very inspiring video for me, because of the trials I am facing at this time in my life. I know that through the hard times and trials I may be facing the lord is always there. If I have faith, the lord has promised "I will not forsake thee..." It takes time to fully recover from physical trials as well as spiritual and mental trials. There have been times where I have felt very a lone and unloved in my life and hearing the words of President Eyring I felt peace and comfort that I am loved by a loving husband and daughter and especially my Father in Heaven. It's comforting to know that even when I feel alone...I am never alone.
"If we have faith in Jesus Christ the hardest as well as the easiest of times in life can be a blessing. In all conditions we can choose the right with the guidance of the spirit. We have the gospel of Jesus Christ to shape and guide our lives if we choose it. We never need feel we are alone or unloved in the lords service, because we never are. We can feel the love of God. The Savior has promised angels on our left and on our right to bare us up and he always keeps his word. His love is unfailing!"
- President Henry B. Eyring
http://www.lds.org/pages/mormon-messages?lang=eng#mountains-to-climb
Wednesday, February 27, 2013
Monday, February 25, 2013
Taking Time to Love
I love my family! The best part of everyday is waking up to our sweet little girl talking and laughing to herself. I love listening to that little voice! She is a great joy and blessing to us. I've been thinking about love languages. I recently read the book "The 5 love languages," by Gary Chapman. He shares each love language in detail about what is needed for a person with each specific love language to feel loved. The 5 languages are Physical Touch, Quality Time, Receiving Gifts, Acts of Service and Words of Affirmation. For example, my love language is Quality Time. For me to really feel loved having someone take the time to listen to me and to talk to me without distraction of a cell phone, T.V., computer, or even just things in daily life really makes me feel like someone cares. But really taking the time to the listen and to understand how I'm feeling is really important to me.
I've been thinking about my days growing up and there were times where I don't think I received that quality time that I needed. Even today when I visit family, there are times where I really just need someone to listen to me and it's hard when I don't receive that time. But I've been thinking about my sweet little girl Emree. There are things I wished I had with my family that I want her to have. My goal is to be open minded and to recognize her love language and to strengthen her. I want to make sure that I take the time to listen to my daughter without jumping to conclusions and make sure that she is feeling loved in the way that she needs to feel loved. I want to be able to have a special relationship with her and I think I can do that as long as I pay attention to her and love her in her own way. Right now, as a little child, Emree really needs physical touch and time together to know that she is loved and as she grows she may need something different and I hope that I can recognize these changes as life goes on.Even though we may have our own specific love languages, we still need elements of each language.
It's kind of cool to recognize other peoples love languages. You can usually tell what a person's love language is by how they treat others. We tend to show others love in the way that we want to be loved. Travis and I have been watching our families to see what their languages are. It's kind of fun, because once you notice the language of others you can start loving them in that way and you can see a difference right away in the way they act.Sometimes we can get so caught up in ourselves that we forget to open our eyes to those around us. It's almost like Heavenly Father placed these qualities within us so that we can draw closer to each other. We just have to take the time to notice what it means to really love one another. When we take the time to love we are drawing closer to him.
I've been thinking about my days growing up and there were times where I don't think I received that quality time that I needed. Even today when I visit family, there are times where I really just need someone to listen to me and it's hard when I don't receive that time. But I've been thinking about my sweet little girl Emree. There are things I wished I had with my family that I want her to have. My goal is to be open minded and to recognize her love language and to strengthen her. I want to make sure that I take the time to listen to my daughter without jumping to conclusions and make sure that she is feeling loved in the way that she needs to feel loved. I want to be able to have a special relationship with her and I think I can do that as long as I pay attention to her and love her in her own way. Right now, as a little child, Emree really needs physical touch and time together to know that she is loved and as she grows she may need something different and I hope that I can recognize these changes as life goes on.Even though we may have our own specific love languages, we still need elements of each language.
It's kind of cool to recognize other peoples love languages. You can usually tell what a person's love language is by how they treat others. We tend to show others love in the way that we want to be loved. Travis and I have been watching our families to see what their languages are. It's kind of fun, because once you notice the language of others you can start loving them in that way and you can see a difference right away in the way they act.Sometimes we can get so caught up in ourselves that we forget to open our eyes to those around us. It's almost like Heavenly Father placed these qualities within us so that we can draw closer to each other. We just have to take the time to notice what it means to really love one another. When we take the time to love we are drawing closer to him.
Friday, February 22, 2013
That Blessed Creature...the Cockroach
I've been thinking about our adventures in 2012. There were plenty of events and challenges last year, but the biggest events of them all had to do with the blessed creature...cockroaches.
Well to start off. In January we found out we were going to have a baby. Yeah exciting! We couldn't wait, but of course there was some fear that comes alongside that decision to start our family. We wondered how we would afford anything and where would we be living? These were our two biggest questions. But over time we learned to just keep moving forward.
I was still in school studying at Snow College and let me tell you that, that semester was the hardest semester of my life. I waited, of course to take all of my science classes till the last semester, I now was learning a violin concerto that was extremely difficult and being a music major there is always something to do. Being pregnant and in school with all these responsibilities and things to do, I did not want to do anything! I felt sick and tired all the time and to make a long story short I'm just grateful I passed Chemistry.
In May, Travis and I graduated with our Associates degrees. That was a huge blessing! Then we packed our things and moved from our little apartment in Ephraim to the city.
We had been looking for a place in Salt Lake for awhile and being so far away it was hard to find one. We found a place in Midvale that we thought would be nice. It was a 2 bedroom apartment and off to the side of the complex there was a playground. We thought this would be nice to have when our baby comes. Little did we know there was a surprise in our new apartment. Cockroaches were EVERYWHERE!! It was not a little infestation it was big! We moved our things in and tried to make it work. But everyday we were there I would take Travis to work at 5:00 am and end up spending time elsewhere until I needed to pick him up around 6pm. At this time I was 6 months pregnant.
We dreaded going home! We would visit our families and have a great time and then on our way home a feeling of sadness, frustration, fear, etc. would come over us. Sleeping there was a nightmare. We lasted 3 weeks in that infested apartment. On top of which, diseased looking birds would get in and poop all over the place. I don't know how we lived there, but one night we were over at Travis's parents house and decided then and there we were going to move out...that night!
We got out of our contract and moved in with Travis's parents for 3 weeks and then found an apartment in downtown Salt Lake. We knew there were cockroaches in this apartment as well, but according to the landlord it was not nearly as bad as our last place. It was a small studio apartment, but wanting to find a home we took the risk with the bugs and moved on in. It took us a while to get all of our things there. We didn't want to bring more cockroaches with us so we left most of our things in a storage shed for about a month. We slept on an air mattress. And at this time I was 8 months pregnant. Travis had a construction job and so I had to drive him every morning Mon-Sat. at 4:30 am. Sleep was minimal at this time, which is really hard being pregnant. I climbed 4 flights of stairs everyday with a basketball inside of me. Boy, was that a workout!
Eventually, Travis's job ended and in September our little girl Emree was born. The cockroaches at this time began to appear more and more. But I felt better about bringing a new baby home to that place than the one in Midvale. Not only did they appear more and more, but we also started to find bedbugs. On top of that we had problems with our neighbors below us. There were several occasions where we were not able to sleep in our apartment because when we came home it was filled with smoke. Apparently they had been a lot of trouble anyway and they ended up getting evicted.
We thought things would get better with the bugs and such once they left, but they got worse. It was our nightmare of Midvale all over again. There came a point where we couldn't live that way any more and we worked things out with our landlord and moved out once again. This time across the street. We were very cautious this time in deciding where to move. We wanted to be sure there were no bugs, preferably no cockroaches.
It took us 2 weeks to move all our things. We went through every little item in our apartment to make sure we weren't going to bring them over with us and even then we found three we had brought with us. We threw out all of our furniture and anything that could possibly hide bedbugs or cockroaches. We slept, once again, on an an air mattress for a few weeks. It was rough, especially with a new baby. There were a lot of challenges that we had to face, but by the end of November we were settled in our new home and new it was bug free!
We learned our lesson. Moving from a completely infested apartment to a possible infestation was not the smartest decision, but we learned not to settle for less. This scenario is kind of how Satan works. You might get caught up in a bad situation and know that it is wrong and work your way out. But when you see there is a possibility for evil to abide somewhere else and it's not that bad yet, he catches you and you get stuck.
During these though times our Heavenly Father pulls us through and we remember all that our Savior has done for us. Although we had a tough year, we learned a lot and have grown from these experiences. Our home is a sacred place where no evil and no bugs are allowed. What blessings we have received after the storm has passed. Even with all the worries of taking care of finances and a child we have found that money means nothing. We found peace in our hearts in knowing that as long as we are doing what the lord asks of us he will provide us with our needs.
Well to start off. In January we found out we were going to have a baby. Yeah exciting! We couldn't wait, but of course there was some fear that comes alongside that decision to start our family. We wondered how we would afford anything and where would we be living? These were our two biggest questions. But over time we learned to just keep moving forward.
I was still in school studying at Snow College and let me tell you that, that semester was the hardest semester of my life. I waited, of course to take all of my science classes till the last semester, I now was learning a violin concerto that was extremely difficult and being a music major there is always something to do. Being pregnant and in school with all these responsibilities and things to do, I did not want to do anything! I felt sick and tired all the time and to make a long story short I'm just grateful I passed Chemistry.
In May, Travis and I graduated with our Associates degrees. That was a huge blessing! Then we packed our things and moved from our little apartment in Ephraim to the city.
We had been looking for a place in Salt Lake for awhile and being so far away it was hard to find one. We found a place in Midvale that we thought would be nice. It was a 2 bedroom apartment and off to the side of the complex there was a playground. We thought this would be nice to have when our baby comes. Little did we know there was a surprise in our new apartment. Cockroaches were EVERYWHERE!! It was not a little infestation it was big! We moved our things in and tried to make it work. But everyday we were there I would take Travis to work at 5:00 am and end up spending time elsewhere until I needed to pick him up around 6pm. At this time I was 6 months pregnant.
We dreaded going home! We would visit our families and have a great time and then on our way home a feeling of sadness, frustration, fear, etc. would come over us. Sleeping there was a nightmare. We lasted 3 weeks in that infested apartment. On top of which, diseased looking birds would get in and poop all over the place. I don't know how we lived there, but one night we were over at Travis's parents house and decided then and there we were going to move out...that night!
We got out of our contract and moved in with Travis's parents for 3 weeks and then found an apartment in downtown Salt Lake. We knew there were cockroaches in this apartment as well, but according to the landlord it was not nearly as bad as our last place. It was a small studio apartment, but wanting to find a home we took the risk with the bugs and moved on in. It took us a while to get all of our things there. We didn't want to bring more cockroaches with us so we left most of our things in a storage shed for about a month. We slept on an air mattress. And at this time I was 8 months pregnant. Travis had a construction job and so I had to drive him every morning Mon-Sat. at 4:30 am. Sleep was minimal at this time, which is really hard being pregnant. I climbed 4 flights of stairs everyday with a basketball inside of me. Boy, was that a workout!
Eventually, Travis's job ended and in September our little girl Emree was born. The cockroaches at this time began to appear more and more. But I felt better about bringing a new baby home to that place than the one in Midvale. Not only did they appear more and more, but we also started to find bedbugs. On top of that we had problems with our neighbors below us. There were several occasions where we were not able to sleep in our apartment because when we came home it was filled with smoke. Apparently they had been a lot of trouble anyway and they ended up getting evicted.
We thought things would get better with the bugs and such once they left, but they got worse. It was our nightmare of Midvale all over again. There came a point where we couldn't live that way any more and we worked things out with our landlord and moved out once again. This time across the street. We were very cautious this time in deciding where to move. We wanted to be sure there were no bugs, preferably no cockroaches.
It took us 2 weeks to move all our things. We went through every little item in our apartment to make sure we weren't going to bring them over with us and even then we found three we had brought with us. We threw out all of our furniture and anything that could possibly hide bedbugs or cockroaches. We slept, once again, on an an air mattress for a few weeks. It was rough, especially with a new baby. There were a lot of challenges that we had to face, but by the end of November we were settled in our new home and new it was bug free!
We learned our lesson. Moving from a completely infested apartment to a possible infestation was not the smartest decision, but we learned not to settle for less. This scenario is kind of how Satan works. You might get caught up in a bad situation and know that it is wrong and work your way out. But when you see there is a possibility for evil to abide somewhere else and it's not that bad yet, he catches you and you get stuck.
During these though times our Heavenly Father pulls us through and we remember all that our Savior has done for us. Although we had a tough year, we learned a lot and have grown from these experiences. Our home is a sacred place where no evil and no bugs are allowed. What blessings we have received after the storm has passed. Even with all the worries of taking care of finances and a child we have found that money means nothing. We found peace in our hearts in knowing that as long as we are doing what the lord asks of us he will provide us with our needs.
Tuesday, February 19, 2013
To be Humble?
Yesterday Travis and I were talking and the subject of humility came up. Travis posed the question what is humility? What does it mean to be humble? Christ was humble and how is it that a man who is so humble could say such powerful things? He knew who he was and yet humility was in his character.
Often times our definition of being humble isn't really humility. Some may say if I don't talk myself up then I am humble. Another person may receive comments about their wardrobe such as "I like your shoes" and in response will say "I know. Aren't they awesome?!" In that person's mind humility is expressing knowledge instead of giving a simple "Thank You."
It's hard to fully comprehend what humility really is. It takes a lifetime to fully grasp that knowledge. With the thoughts of yesterday we came up with a few ideas of what humility may really be.
Humility doesn't mean you tell yourself you are no good. It is having confidence in yourself and knowing you have talents without pointing them out to others. Tearing yourself down is not humility, but building yourself up is. Expressing gratitude by saying thank you often and expressing appreciation to others is another example of humility. Travis reminds me often that I am beautiful and at times I tend to reply with "eh...it's not what I was hoping for." He tells me "just simply reply with a thank you."
We all are striving to becoming more like Christ. That's what we're here for and what a great thing humility is. Until yesterday it never clicked in my mind that humility is so much more then I could ever comprehend. So I pose the question to you what is humility?
Often times our definition of being humble isn't really humility. Some may say if I don't talk myself up then I am humble. Another person may receive comments about their wardrobe such as "I like your shoes" and in response will say "I know. Aren't they awesome?!" In that person's mind humility is expressing knowledge instead of giving a simple "Thank You."
It's hard to fully comprehend what humility really is. It takes a lifetime to fully grasp that knowledge. With the thoughts of yesterday we came up with a few ideas of what humility may really be.
Humility doesn't mean you tell yourself you are no good. It is having confidence in yourself and knowing you have talents without pointing them out to others. Tearing yourself down is not humility, but building yourself up is. Expressing gratitude by saying thank you often and expressing appreciation to others is another example of humility. Travis reminds me often that I am beautiful and at times I tend to reply with "eh...it's not what I was hoping for." He tells me "just simply reply with a thank you."
We all are striving to becoming more like Christ. That's what we're here for and what a great thing humility is. Until yesterday it never clicked in my mind that humility is so much more then I could ever comprehend. So I pose the question to you what is humility?
Monday, February 18, 2013
Thy Faith Hath Made Thee Whole
I started this blog to share thoughts, miracles, and adventures of our day to day life. It's not much, but it's a start. I needed a hobby aside from the day to day family routine.
Well as my first post I wanted to share a miracle that happened just a week ago. I have been sick for the past 5 months off and on, with an infection that I haven't been able to get rid of. I have now had it about 6 times. It's an infection that comes from nursing and feels as though you have the flu. With a brand new baby it's not easy to be sick so often when all you want to do is enjoy your little one. But nursing has been one of my goals to be able to do since I was young.
I've felt like nursing not only helped provide the nourishment and such for what my baby needed, but also brought special bonding time for me and my daughter. Since my Mom didn't have that opportunity with me, It has been something very important to me to have that special bond with my little girl, but it seemed as thought it was coming to an end.
Emree, my daughter, has struggled with nursing from the beginning and there were many other things that happened that played a part in that struggle, but this illness was the worst of it. This last time that I was sick I felt as though it was never going to end. I was taking an antibiotic, but it wasn't really making much of a difference and I kept wondering if I was ever going to get over this cycle of being sick.
My sweet husband watched me lay on the couch in pain and wanted so badly to see me well. And then he thought to ask me if I would like a blessing. I had received many blessing previous to this one, but I said yes anyway and this time it was a different blessing. This blessing was a blessing of healing. I could hear that it was not my husband speaking, but my Father in Heaven. He expressed that through my faith that I would be made whole. It felt as if the Savior had said "take up thy bed and walk."
Immediately afterwards I felt my aches and pains leave my body and by morning I had been completely healed of my afflictions. "Thy faith hath made thee whole." It was an incredible blessing to me to have felt that love from my Father and a great reminder of what pains and suffering my Savior went through for me. It was incredible to know that I had the faith necessary to be healed and that brought so much peace to my mind and heart.
I never thought that I could feel anything or experience anything like what I did that night. My testimony of my Savior and his atonement has been strengthened and I can honestly say that I know without a shadow of a doubt that my Redeemer lives!
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