Missing the Arizona Sun

Rain, rain, go away!  I feel like I am singing this song everyday..... all year.... what. the. heck.

We got to go to Logan's cousin Mason's wedding in Arizona at the end of January.  The other day Elsy turned to me and said, "I miss the sun in Arizona."  Oh my goodness, girl.  I feel you.

That being said, today was actually sunny which was oh so nice.  I am so ready for suuuuumerrrrrr.

But until then I will continue to try and come up with crazy ideas to keep us entertained in the house.  Which means more sensory bins!  I cooked up some spaghetti and then tossed it with some food coloring and a little cooking oil so it wouldn't stick and then kids played with it forever.  Elsy said it was even better than playing in the sugar from the week before so I felt like that was a win.  They played with it forever and once I told them they could actually eat it they did... as you can see from Elsy's blue mouth.  Ewww.  Seriously, Tommy will eat cold spaghetti but he wont even touch a pasta noodle that is covered in yummy homemade mac n cheesy, ooey gooey goodness? I just really can't wrap my mind around that.  I will say that for the next few times we had pasta for dinner he actually ate it!  Which was my whole goal going into this sensory bin nonsense.  Seriously, I used to think sensory bins were a joke... Come on, just send them outside to play and discover!... but then I lived in rainy Seattle.   So this one was fun but it was a one timer because the noodles get old and gross quick... and there is oily cooking oil all over the floor that is not quite as hard to get up as sticky sugar... but almost. ;)

My workout buddies.  It used to just be Elsy on the treadmill but Tommy has now joined in these days and I think its cute.

Logan has started coming to the grocery store with me a little more lately.  I think it is because we are bored in the evenings and have nothing else to do in this winter weather.  When he comes he always picks out the good stuff that I never buy because I'm cheap (or don't want the extra calories in the house!).  Things like extra sharp cheddar cheese... that kind of thing.  Lately when he comes he takes the kids to the fruit stand and helps them pick out an 'exotic' fruit for us to take home and try.  We have now done pomegranates, kiwi, grapefruit, and coconut.  And maybe you don't think those are exotic but they are to us!  Haha!  I am a banana, apple, strawberry, orange, and grape kind of mom.  Tommy liked them all but Elsy not so much.  

 Tommy liked them all but Elsy not so much.  I couldn't believe it when Logan poured the coconut water into a glass and Tommy downed the entire thing.  Everybody else wasn't to keen on it.  Although, Logan does like coconut meat because it reminds him of his mission.

Some other things we have been doing is cooking experiments.  One of my goals is to try to make more healthy snacks for my kids to eat.  Many of which are fails.  (Look at those cute waiting feet, though!)

One of which was homemade gummy bears.  Ew. Gross. They were super sour and nobody really liked them.  I thought they turned out cute though.

Homemade Cheesy Carrot Crackers... fail.

Banana Applesauce Oatmeal Bars... fail... well I guess those ones turned out but nobody liked them but Logan and I.

Zucchini chips... fail. (If anyone knows how to actually get them crispy before they burn to a crisp I'd like to know.

Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Granola Bars... I actually really liked these but the kids weren't to crazy over them.

Another fail were my baked pumpkin chocolate chip chia seed muffins I made last week.  They were ultra yummy... until the middle of the night when they weren't.  Why do I always forget chia seeds give me such stomach problems?  I was soooooo so sick after those.

My kids still love to eat No Bake Energy Bites and constantly have those in our fridge.  I make those seriously all the time.  And we also always make Buttermilk Banana Bread Muffins all the time as well.  Those are great to have on hand for quick breakfasts.

Like I said, she has grown out of naps.  BUT! If you put her pillow and blankie on the couch and tell her to 'rest' that apparently doesn't count as a nap hehe.

So our stake has this awesome Zumba class that meets at the church every MWF from 9:30-10:30 that I love to go to!  It is a hard time of day for me because I usually want to be done getting ready for the day by 9:30am but when Elsy has Joy School its easy to just go over there and dance a good workout.  They open the nursery toy closet and the kids play in the overflow.  Anyway, Tommy really likes to lay in the middle of the gym floor where everyone is dancing and play with his cars.  Can you see him right there in the middle?  He is to cute.  When Elsy comes she likes to dance by me.  Today Tommy even joined in and it was so fun.

Our friend BriElle invited us to the park to play.  It was the first time back at the park in like, two months probably!  All the kids wanted to do was swing on the swings though.  And Tommy wanted his hat down over his eyes the whole time.

Elsy has been complaining about leg pain for months.  She always is telling me her knees or her legs are sore.  "No they don't hurt!  They are sore!"  I did some digging and figured it was just growing pains and left it alone for a few months.  But then it started to get more frequent and several times a day and it would interrupt her play even.  I did more research and started to get worried it was something more serious so we decided to take her into the doctor.  She was a trooper as they felt all over her legs, had her run, walk, jump, etc.  And of course, her legs weren't feeling sore then.  Doesn't that just always happen when you go to the doctor?  The all the sudden aren't hurting anymore, or aren't wheezing anymore, or aren't coughing anymore.  Ugh.  Anyway I asked if they would do an X-ray and they did.  She looked so cute and small up there on the X-ray table and she was giggly and just did a great job.  Turns out she was fine after all!  She had something called an ossification center in her right knee but they said that shouldn't be causing her any pain and is totally normal.  I decided to stop worrying about it.  And it turns out, all we needed to do was pay for an expensive X-ray for her to stop telling us her legs were sore.  *sigh*  I have been working with her a lot and am starting to realize when she does say she is sore she is usually just tired or even bored.  So we are working on correctly labeling our feelings.

For family home evening we decided to practice flying on an airplane!  Tommy turned two the day after we flew back from Arizona so he still qualified as a lap sitter.  Logan found a YouTube video of someone's view taking off and landing from an airplane window so we acted it all out a few times.  The kids were so excited to fly and I was too.  

We sadly booked both flights there and back super early in the morning... like, wake up at 2am to get there in time type of early. 

Here are the kids so early in the morning eating breakfast before we go to the airport!  Elsy always gets a Go-Gurt for snacks because she doesn't like cheese sticks and Tommy gets a cheese stick because he can't figure Go-Gurts out.

Sadly, all four of us got little colds right before we left that ailed us whilst being in Arizona.  But that's life I guess.

Elsy and Logan before take off!

And my little lap buddy and me!  Tommy was so fascinated with the luggage trains.  The kids were just so excited and were such troopers on the whole trip.  I was really proud of them, especially since Logan and I may have been more cranky than the kids..  Eeek.

A nice lady on the flight was reading the new Chip and Joanna Gaines book (from Fixer Upper), The Magnolia Story.  I asked if she liked it and she ended up giving it to me as we landed because she finished reading it on the flight.  I thought that was so sweet of her!

When we landed the sunshine, palm trees, and cactus greeted us.  Since we had just had a coconut, it was still fresh in Elsy's mind and she was so excited to see "coconut trees!" and she got Tommy to chant about them with her on the bus ride to the car rental center.  I had never been to Arizona before so it was all a new adventure for me as well.  I got all excited about the tall cactus that were "just like the movies!"  I really need to get out more haha!

The kids fell asleep in the car on the way to the hotel.  Elsy woke up first and got to spend some quality time with Great Grandma Atkin, who actually funded our trip out to Arizona, along with Great Grandpa of course!  We were so grateful for the opportunity to see everyone.

The night we got there was Logan's cousin Emma's baby shower.  It was Peter Rabbit themed and was just absolutely darling.  When they told me it was going to be outside on the patio that night I couldn't believe it.  An outdoor baby shower in January!!  But it was just fine and so fun.  Elsy got to go with me and she followed the example of a couple other little girls there and started eating a whole carrot!  I was amazed and she loved it.  

We shared a hotel suite with Logan's parents and it was fun to just hang out with them and chat.  They had some room service phones that we unplugged and the kids played with them the entire time we were there.

So Logan's cousin Mason was getting married to a super sweet girl named Dallas.  We spent a lot of time at Logan's aunt Tracy's house.  Near their house was a walk along a canal and a pretty nature reserve area that we saw tons and tons of bunnies in.

Along the walk was a little mini farm with some donkeys, goats, dogs, a pig and some ducks.  We got to feed and pet them and the kids loved that too.

One of the places we went that I really enjoyed was the Gilbert, AZ temple.

While we were walking around Elsy fell and smacked her knees and nose on the pavement.  I got to sit with her and try and calm her down and it was a sweet moment.  Logan took a picture of us sitting.

A few family photos. :)

We got to sit and talk about some of the architectural symbolism while we were there.  I just thought it was one of the most beautiful temples and in the lighting it just seemed like such a calm, pristine place.  I loved how there were rows and rows of palm trees.  Did you know that the palm leaf is a symbol of victory?  I thought it was so neat that there were rows of palm trees leading to the entrances and all around, as if they trees were shouting hurrah! just for us.  And I thought about how neat it is to be worth to enter the temple, and really what a victory that is in today's day and age.  It felt like all the trees were saying, "Hurray!  You did it!  Welcome to the temple!"

We showed up on Thursday and on Friday the Hanes showed up!  Elsy and Ella were so happy to see each other.

We went on another walk again.  This time my kids stole some carrots from the donkeys and an apple.  I never thought I'd see the day when my kids were eating raw carrots like that but they were!  I attribute it to the great Octonaut, Tweak.  She is a rabbit and always has a carrot in her hand and is always saying, "Faster than you can say, 'Buncha muncha crunchy carrots!"  The kids really like Tweak so I guess it was natural for them to want to be like her.  There is just something so satisfying seeing a half eaten apple in one hand and a half eaten carrot in the other.

Last time I was at the grocery store I bought a big bag of long carrots and the kids have actually been eating them now and then.

Saturday was the wedding day and we had a lot of fun!  Again I couldn't believe we were going to an outdoor wedding and reception in January but it was just beautiful outside.  And it was such a pretty wedding.  I can't believe we didn't take one picture with the bride and groom.  That is just awful.

Before many guests showed up to the reception Elsy rocked the dance floor all by herself.  She danced and danced for such a long time.  The food was amazing, the company was even better, and the weather was fantastic.

Ella and Elsy dancing with Uncle Marshall!  He ended up coming last minute and that was fun to get to see him as well.

Off to the side of the reception they had a bunch of games for the kids to play.  There was a hat stand with a bunch of cowboy hats, lassos to practice with, bean bag tosses, etc.  Elsy found a wheelbarrow that I think was a decoration but she just wheeled it all around.

And this little girl ate several tops off of several cupcakes.  I loved the fact that they had a crepe bar. :P

And then all too soon it was time to wake up in the middle of the night again to go home.  We had so much fun and were sad to leave.  We loved hanging out with David and Natalie, Marshall, Holly's family, and everyone else!

I didn't say much about our travel get-up but I will here real quick.  We were a little worried about trying to get the car seats and all our other gear through security and the entire airport.  We went back and forth on bringing a stroller and we finally decided we just didn't need to bring one.  Instead we put Tommy in the hiking backpack and Logan carried him while pulling our two carry-ons.  I wore another backpack plus my diaper bag while pulling Elsy in one of the car seats.  We bought a Roll n Go Car Seat Transporter that you can strap your car seat to and make it like a little stroller in and of itself.  Then we borrowed a car seat backpack from my good friend Laura that we checked at the baggage.  She taught me a trick, which was to take all our coats off when we got to the airport and store them in the backpack with the car seat so we didn't have to lug around our coats as well.  It ended up working well for us, although it was quite the workout. ;)

Tommy loved riding in the backpack and Elsy loved rolling around in the car seat.  Security got a little funky but it all worked out.  I felt bad but I had to smile at how seriously Logan was taking everything.  He was 'in the zone' trying to get us to where we needed to be.  But we got there with time to spare so that was a blessing.





Here we are!  Off to conquer the world at 4am.  Phew.  Those were some tire days and I'm not sure when we will be ready for another trip like that but it was a great one for the books.

When we got home we all went straight to bed.  When we woke up we looked up a random ward (since it was Sunday) and went to their sacrament mtg.  We have been trying to make it to a sacrament meeting, even when we travel and I have really liked it.  For a while in our marriage if we traveled on Sunday we just treated it like a regular day of the week.  After all, you have to buy gas when you are driving so might as well pick up lunch too!  But we have really been making the effort to try and pack lunches and make it to some sort of church on the Sabbath in order to honor it and still make it special in some way, even though we can't do it in the traditional manner.  And I have really felt like it makes a difference for us.  It helps bring the Spirit into an otherwise crazy and long day.

Rockin' At This Mom Thing

To kick of this year we started by having a Family Home Evening in which we wrote down our goals for the year.  We always did that growing up and I just think its a really great way to dive into a new chapter of life.  I put them on the fridge and in our bedroom so that we could see them throughout the year and be re-inspired when we read through them.  

Tommy's Goals:

1. Potty Train
2. Be reverent and fold arms during the prayer (it is seriously a battle every time guys)
3. Taste one bite of dinner (the other serious battle).

Elsy's Goals:

1. Make bed every day (that hasn't happened once yet... eek)
2. Pray - say morning prayers (oops... that hasn't happened either...)
3. Cook with Mom every Monday (wow... we only did that once so far!)

Dang, see its good to review them now and then to remember that you need to resubmit yourself to trying!

While most of Logan and my goals are personal I will share a couple with you.  For example Logan wants to go to the temple once a month, start running, and get some career goals accomplished.  I made goals to have weekly family history time, cook a vegetable for dinner every day, and have a spiritual experience every day.

Of course, goals were meant to be broken!  But that is what makes them goals!  So we are going to keep trying when we forget or mess up.  We are only in February after all... we only have to be completely better at them by December, right? Haha!

Well, one of my goals was to do more sensory bins for my kids.  Both of them have texture issues, especially Elsy!, and it is greatly manifested at the dinner table.  I read somewhere that playing with new and interesting textures can help kids when it comes to being able to try and eat new and different foods.  So I decided to try it.  Logan got me an amazing, cordless Dyson vacuum for Christmas and I figured I could tackle messes more conveniently with it so we got down and dirty.  The first bin I started with was just plain sugar that I shook in ziplock bags with food coloring in them.  The kids LOVED it.  I feel like something is a success when the kids play with something for longer than 15 minutes.  These two played in the sugar ALL MORNING!  Granted, there was sugar snow all over the floor but thanks to my trusty Dyson I had it all up in a jiffy.

(NOTE:  Sugar is super fun the first couple times, but after a while it starts to get sticky... especially if your kid has a runny nose *gag* or discovers that it is the same sugar you put into recipes and decides to eat it and lick it off their hands.  In either of these cases, a Dyson will not do the job.  Neither will moping the floor 4 times.  Or scrubbing the floor on your hands and knees.  And then the sugar will end up not being a play thing any longer.  Just saying.)

Oh my Elsy girl!  She is just a doll!  When we got home from Christmas break we officially decided to let her stay up from naps.  It was just time.  She is three and a half and was starting to have a really hard time going to sleep at night because she just wasn't tired enough.  She also started to wake up in the middle of the night and not be able to go back to sleep for over an hour.  So we decided it was time.  This has been a big challenge for me because nap time is a huge pick-me-up for me.  It is when I usually read my scriptures, get chores done, plan piano lessons, craft and sew, and even catch my own nap.  Elsy just wants me to play play play with her and I just can't.  Those two and a half hours are times where I just get so much done.  I struggled with the idea of letting her play on the iPad or watching a movie every day but I just couldn't quite do it.  I am pretty strict with the kids with screen time and I decided 2.5 hrs a day was just not what I wanted for her.  So we have been experimenting with what works.  I bought her some fun workbooks that she loves and sometimes she will paint.  But I have found that the best thing during nap time is to have a friend over for her.  She leaves me completely alone and her and her friend play non stop and it is just wonderful.  I can get everything done... even a nap in! (shhh don't tell the friends mom haha!)  I usually let her have a friend over during naps about twice a week.

Wednesday's are my family history days.  During nap time I read and learn about my ancestors and then in the evening I write on my blog to keep our own family history.  Elsy has been snuggling up to me the past couple weeks while I read from the family history books my grandpa and grandma Volmer gave us and I will read to her out loud.  I never think she is listening but then she will chime in and comment on things every now and then.  Its been pretty fun.

Good ole Tommy boy.  He is such a hoot.  He is so rambuncious and we just can NOT get him to hold still.... ever.  We just switched him out of the high chair and into a booster seat at the table because he kept trying to stand in the high chair... but now he just stands on the booster seat!  He has fallen a few times but always catches himself and he will be yelling and I will find him holding the edge of the table with his fingertips and his body suspended between the chair and the floor.  He really is so strong.

I mentioned above that it is a battle for prayers every morning, noon, and night.  And it is really just because he doesn't want to sit still!  He wants to keep playing, eat his food, jump, skip, ribbit like a frog.  He only holds still if he has a pacifier in his mouth.... speaking of which we just stopped letting him have it during the day, its only an 'in-the-crib' thing now.  It was hard at first but it only took a day or two and now he is fine with it.  He has started to do what Elsy used to do though when we did the same to her and that is him saying he is sleepy all the time because he hopes he will get it. "I seepy!" he will say when he is sad, "I seepy!" he says when he gets in trouble, "I seepy, when he doesn't want to do something.

We had a thunder storm this week and a big clap of thunder made him jump so high he skipped and then he ran straight to me bawling.  He clung to me with his arms and legs and I had to pry him off limb by limb to change his diaper.  He loves to pretend he is tough but he sure is tenderhearted.

We decided to renew our lease here at our housing complex for another year.  In order to do that though we decided we needed to de-junk our lives!  We watched a documentary on minimalism of Netflix that inspired us to get rid of a lot of things that we had been holding onto for no reason.  We went through every inch of our apartment and got rid of so much stuff!  We filled the whole back of our van with clothes, toys, books, kitchen appliances, shoe racks, etc.  I couldn't believe we had so much stuff we never use.  We got rid of a whole bookcase, bar stools, and a dresser.  I haven't missed a single thing yet and it has been over a month.

One of the things we decided we wanted to do when we renewed our lease was to make our room feel more like a bedroom.  It was a bedroom/office/piano room combo and it just never felt clean to me.  We decided in all our cleaning out that we would clean out our closet, buy a dresser, and move Logan's "office" into our walk in closet.  That really opened up our room and makes it feel so much more cozy to me.  We got a nice dresser at IKEA as well as a shoe cabinet to free up some space in the closets to put more things in storage.  Elsy and Tommy were great helpers to Logan at first but I finally had to step in and let him have his space... and sanity!

This year Elsy became a Sunbeam at church!  Here she is on her first day at primary.  Ugh, I'm rolling my eyes because she wouldn't take a picture.  She got that little head on a stick and on the other side is a mirror.  She wouldn't stop looking in the mirror sadly.  Since I am the primary pianist I get to watch her while she is singing and I just think she is so darling and grown up!  I may have messed up on the piano a couple times because I was watching her sing over the top of my music.  After two weeks I taught her how to raise her hand... she seemed confused as to why she never got asked to do anything!  Hehe!  I taught her but she still didn't get picked for a couple weeks, there are a lot of kids!  But she got picked for the first time this week and it was an answer to my prayer because she wanted it so badly.  She just soaks up all that knowledge and all the music and sings everything at home.

So one of my goals this year is to potty train Tommy.  I am in no hurry, even though we started potty training Elsy when she was 22 months old.  I just want him potty trained before we have another kid, so I have at least 9+ months to accomplish that.  But he has started to get interested in sitting on the potty now and then so I let him just sit in there.  Sometimes he likes to read a book but mostly he wants me to sit on the stool next to him and talk to him.  So far my patience has led to three poops and one pee into the potty!  I'd say that is pretty good!  Usually, he just poops in his diaper and then asks me "a tote!" (a toilet!).  He likes to watch me dump his poo in the toilet and then he wants to sit on the toilet for a minute or two before I clean him up.  He is so silly.  If I could just get him to tell me "a tote!" before he poops... that would be great.

One of the things that I have discovered that helps Elsy stay occupied during nap time is stringing pony beads on yarn.  She loves to do this and loves to make me nice long necklaces.  I guess in this picture you can't see but I am wearing a matching necklace to Elsy's.  

Elsy always gives me boosts in my confidence.  She tells me I look beautiful all the time.  And even better she will often give me a big tight hug and tell me "You are the best mommy ever!".  It is so sweet and makes me feel special and like I am doing a good job.  I really am trying to get this Mom Thing down.  It is a challenge every day but a good challenge never hurt anybody... at least I keep telling myself that.

Tommy absolutely loves books.  Here he is reading a book in his crib at night.  His favorites are I SPY books and look and find type books... or anything to do with cars.  Grandma Bean gave him the Richard Scary book about Cars and Trucks and Things That Go for Christmas.  Each page he has to look for the Goldbug and since he loves look and finds he loves to just pour over the pages and find that little Goldbug.  Grandma Volmer gave him a Micky Mouse look and find book for Christmas as well.  He loves looking through that one too.  I hate to admit it but I ended up hiding both of those books for a while because I just couldn't stand to read them one more time.  I probably read the Richard Scary one 2-3x a day for a few weeks straight because Elsy got hooked on that one too!  But Tommy is so so sweet about books.  He always caries one around and when he finds me he will say, "Book, please!" and want to sit on my lap to read it.  Today he bawled his eyes out outside the bathroom door because I was in there when he wanted me to read a book, please.  His other favorite book was given to Elsy by Grandpa Bean a few years ago when she was Tommy's age.  It is called "The Approved Inter-Universal Pan-Dimensional Omni-Galactic Alphabetical Guide to the Cosmos for Beginning Space Explorers".  And if the title didn't give you a hint as to how hard that book is to read, let me just give you a sample of a few of the words that you have to read while trying to teach your kids the letters of the alphabet, "U is for Urganticonian Maximum Capacity Star Bus," "X is for Xylomortipraxian Automated Moon Buggy," "C is for Carthalonian Supersonic Dyna-tron," and my favorite, "E is for Elephantine Hair Creature of Winklehutniczortlebladder 9."  Not to brag, but I have actually gotten pretty good at reading all the crazy words in that book. ;)  And the kids even have some of those words memorized.  It is hilarious.  But the most surprising thing is that it is actually teaching Tommy his letters.  On every page I say, "Where is the A?" and he will point to the big A on the page, "Where is the B?".  This week I started saying, "What letter is that?" instead and he knew over half of them.  So that was pretty cool.

Elsy and Tommy's new favorite nightly activity is playing Trap.  We used to go out on a walk or to the park after dinner but since it is winter and dark we have to be imaginative.  My dad used to play trap with us which just basically included him laying on the floor on his back and holding onto any limbs he could grab and then not letting go while the rest of the siblings try to wrestle him and/or save the trapped victim.  It almost always ended in somebody getting hurt and crying.  He still plays it with my younger siblings... and they are in high school haha!  But Elsy loves to play it.  Its kind of nice because I get to just lay on the floor and basically do nothing except hold onto an ankle for a while.

Elsy has discovered how to take pictures with my phone.  Most of them are random and just take up tons of space (especially the burst photos of like 57 images) but some of them I really like.  Like this one, for instance.  I just love her pink chubby toes and chunky legs.

Elsy learned how to write her name!  This was actually taken a couple months ago but I had to remember to include it.  We were visiting Logan at his work and Elsy was writting on the white board and she just wrote her name, right there, for the very fist time!  We were so proud of her and she was so proud of herself so we had to take a picture.  Her S could still use some work, but hey! She is only three.

Book time with my buddies!

We decided for scripture time, in an effort to get Tom to hold still during it, to give him his own picture scriptures to follow along.  I can't tell you it has been successful... because it hasn't exactly been successful really.  But we are trying, nonetheless.  I just feel like it has been so easy to teach Elsy about the gospel because she just sits and loves to listen and learn.  But Tommy just wants to crash his cars together or fight with his Link sward and it has been a real challenge for me.  I am trying to think of ways to help him out.  Let me know if you have any ideas...

My dear Logan has perfected the cottage loaf of bread.  Oh yum it is so delicious.  I am the WORST at making bread.  It never comes out right.  But Logan has always had a knack for it and I am so grateful... and I am even more grateful that we have had these cottage loaves around quite often now days.

Elsy came home from Joy School one day as an owl.  She wouldn't stop "Whooooo"-ing, even for the picture.

Two of our family goals this year involved Saturday morning activities.  We decided that on Saturday mornings we will be doing chores as a family.  And then, if everyone helps and does their part we will go out for a Saturday Snack.  We have only done this twice because Saturdays can be pretty up in the air sometimes, but it has been a lot of fun.

We just love Panera!  And the kids love the cinnamon rolls there now haha!

Here is my pretty Elsy girl holding the bag my mom made her for Christmas.  It has become her scripture bag for church and she carries a Book of Mormon and a mini Children's Songbook in it.  She loves to sit in the pew on Sundays and just flip through her Book of Mormon.  She is so close to the Spirit, even at her young young age.  I am grateful for her example to me.

I feel like my focus so far this year has been finding peace and joy along this crazy journey we call life.  There is so much hardship and suffering that we each go through on a daily basis.  But I have also discovered there are so many blessings and so much good in each day as well.  I have been praying for God to help remind me throughout the day to see those little bright spots.  At first I started noticing them after the fact but after a lot of practice, and more praying for help remembering, I feel like I am starting to recognize those little blessings in the moment more often.  I often forget that the reason I am living each day is not to get dinner made, clean my house, workout, and keep the kids happy but is to help me prepare for my eternal destiny after this life.  I often get swept up in all the to do's and forget all the whys.  It is definitely a work in progress but I have been finding more and more that when I remember the why I can find joy in each day and even a little bit of peace.