This time of year is filled with school parties and programs, church activities, neighborhood gifts (I grinched out and didn't do any this year), yw gifts (did final survival kits instead) , Christmas cards (didn't do those either -maybe New Year cards?) shopping, baking, cooking, movies to watch, choir concerts, finals and family to be with.
So, here's what we've been up to so far. Ethan and Jordyn are in the school choir. I overcame my feelings of grinchiness when a paper came home on Tuesday night informing me of a concert and pizza trip for the next day. I almost said there was no way I was going because I still didn't have the house ready for guests on Thursday and I had a youth Temple trip I had to be at by 5 on the opposite side of town from the concert. But lo, I overcame.
Turns out that my heart growing 3 sizes led to 3 other kids getting to attend the concert and pizza party. I warned my friends that I was going to try and keep my kind eyes in when we got to the pizza place and the mathematical hurricane descended upon us of trying to figure out who was there, who paid and who got their drinks and tokens. Luckily for the music teacher I am not shy about taking on such a task and got everything organized and taken care of.
I couldn't believe how well the kids sang. It was beautiful. Some of the parents, on the other hand, not so beautiful. I am always astounded by the world we live in today. Parents seemed to forget that we were there to brighten the lives of the residents of the retirement home not as a video and photo op for their kids. The parents also sent siblings to descend upon the cookies and left none for the performers. What is it about free cookies that brings out the monster in people? But, look at how cute my little troop of Christmas elves were!
This time of year is the most stressful for me as a parent and for my 2 high school age children. Because they do online classes - how fast or slow they move through the course is entirely up to them. They had to pull several all nighters to finish the semester. The picture of Jared with his head in his hand and an entire pitcher of cool-aid next to him pretty much sums up my feelings about the entire process as well as his. The dead plant my visiting teacher gave me also sums up those feelings. Oh my goodness. That plant makes me laugh. She warned me when she gave it to me that she thought it was about to die. Sure enough, next day it looked like that. I am debating on wether or not to tell her the fate of the plant. It's the thought that counts, right? Isn't that how our "helping" other seems to turn out sometimes? We had the best of intentions but we just killed it- in a bad way- not the slang good way.
Our visitors came on Thursday and we couldn't be a happier bunch. Everyone is smitten by "squishy" (my little redheaded niece) My 2 nephews are equally cute and are giving us hours of entertainment. I love the picture of my kids sitting around Livy being completely smitten by her.
**ok, so I started writing this on Friday- it's now Tues and Christmas Eve - I've been a little busy**
You can't come to our house without playing on the 4wheelers or seeing an assassin or playing with our kitties. I even got brave and decided to let Jared take a spin around the block in the car. He starts drivers ed in February. I can't wait to see what this does to our insurance! Jared still has ptsd from our car accident so he was really skittish. I'm not sure if he even got the car up to 25 mph, which he felt was way too fast. Oh dear! haha
I got roped into picking up and putting bows on 34 PMG books for all of our yw. We were out and about when I got the call and a decision about where I was going to go get the ribbon had to be made. I really wanted to go to costco because they have the super rolls of ribbon and we were already right next to it eating lunch. My husband wanted to take the kids out to site the rifles in so he was in too big of a hurry to brave the crowd at costco. I was stuck with the only option by my house and the selection was not good. Everything was about gone. I couldn't find any big rolls and so I got 6 small red ones hoping that it would somehow be enough because - 1 this wasn't a cost efficient way to go and 2 they really didn't have any left. I picked my express checkout lane and what should my wandering eyes see? A super giant roll of silver Christmas ribbon sitting there for me. I knew it was placed there just for me. It was a little Christmas miracle. (why I didn't get a picture with the silver ribbon is beyond me) I ended up using the entire roll and 5 of the small red ones I bought. I wouldn't have had enough to do even half of them with the small ones.
Later that night I had a girl night at the movies with my SILs. Just hours after my Christmas miracle I was driving to the theater and had the thought that I should call the SIL that lives very close to on my way and see if she wanted me to just pick her up instead of her driving herself. What did I do? talked myself out of it. Why? Because while she was pretty much on the way it would have set us back at least 10 minutes and it would have made us late for meeting the other SIL. When we got to the theater I found out that the one I was going to call couldn't come because her husband hadn't made it home yet to give her the car. Really? Why didn't I listen? Just when I think I've got the communication with my Heavenly Father down, I realize that I really don't. Seriously frustrating. But, I find that I learn more from the mistakes than from the successes simply because I find out about the mistakes more than I find out about the successes. Also when you make a mistake you are more meek and humble. When you are successful you get a little "oh yah, I'm awesome" - which is not so meek. A lot of times you never know the outcome of the successes to even celebrate so you have no idea if you are listening or not…..although this time I would have found out either way because she would have said yes and I would have know that I was supposed to call her.
So, I've still got a long way to go when it comes to going where I'm supposed to go and doing what I'm supposed to be doing and having my listening ears on. But, the good news is that Heavenly Father is very patient and is rooting for our success. He is helping me to learn how to communicate with him and start trusting that it's his voice I'm hearing and not my own. It's pretty miraculous and astounding that we have access to this kind of guidance and power in our lives. It's up to us to figure out how to use it.
Merry Christmas!
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