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Since I was awake naturally by 4:30am (yay, insomnia!), I decided to capitalize on the early hour and go for a swim. While I swam, I prayed a lot to know what to do with these next couple months of life before the baby comes. Specifically, I wanted to know what I could do to be a better mom and homemaker. I don’t want the time to zip by while I bury my nose in books and then realize that my opportunity to create a beautiful childhood for my kids has completely passed.

Ironically, the last two books I read came to mind while I pondered my question. I thought about Stephanie Nielson and realized I wanted to be a great homemaker like she is, and then I thought about Marie Kondo’s Konmari method and realized that would help me get there. I want to apply the Konmari method of tidying up to create a literal structural foundation for peace and beauty in my house. The Konmari method requires that you touch every object you own and determine whether it brings you joy or not. She has you start off with clothes, and then works systematically through the rest of items in your house.

Marie Kondo promises that when you deep clean in this manner, you will never relapse to untidiness again. She estimates it takes about six months to properly tidy your house, but afterward, you’re so traumatized by the experience (my interpretation) that you never, ever allow yourself to accumulate unnecessary clutter again.

I love the idea of a house free of clutter and filled with only meaningful items. Even if my kids don’t notice an obvious difference at first, I feel like this exercise will enhance their experience in this home.

So, ironically (again), I ignored the kids all day and started cleaning my closet. Honestly, I felt that the decision must have been inspired because the kids played together beautifully all day. My faith in their ability to continue without incident wavered after lunch, and I tried to set them on a movie–but to no avail! They loved playing on this rainy day, and during her afternoon snack, Lydia announced, “This is the day I wanted.”

My jaw dropped open because I had literally done nothing for her except feed her. She even had to dress herself, brush her teeth by herself, and bring me a brush to get me to comb her hair. Since Mary had no interest in participating in her outfit change, she got to stay in pj’s all day.

In the evening I drove to Draper to get a massage Karin gifted me almost a year ago, and while I was gone, Abe took up the tidying banner–at which point the kids finally lost steam and settled in front of the TV.

Today I went swimming, and that helped my back (and whole body, actually) feel better. I think I am going to swim more. Abe and I also got to go to the temple tonight, and that helped us both feel more spiritually calibrated. Last Friday when we were on Abe’s work retreat, all of the wives sat around talking about God for hours, and I was so impressed with their spiritual abilities. I was particularly impressed by their capacity to receive and act on frequent revelation; hearing their stories and feeling their spirits and testimony made me want to open myself more to daily revelation. The temple tonight felt like a step in the right direction.

I also felt spiritually motivated by the book I read today. I read Stephanie Nielson’s memoir, Heaven is Here. I bawled through much of it, and after I finished I spent the rest of the day thinking about how I should be a better, more grateful person in general. She is just such an inspiring person. I actually saw her in IKEA a couple months ago, and she probably thought I was one of those rude people who stare at her scarred face, but really I just recognized her because of her blog, and I felt slightly star struck.

I took some pictures of the girls on a short neighborhood walk we did today.

As I was planning the day this morning, I realized two things: 1) It was a gorgeous morning 2) I had time to make my favorite bran muffins 3) I have never been to Bridal Veil Falls, even though it’s only ten minutes away. 1+2+3 = We must have a breakfast hike and picnic to Bridal Veil Falls this morning!

So I hopped out of bed, made muffins, and packed the girls up to go to the falls. It was so pretty! Lydia and Mary are in a stage where they love holding hands with me and with each other, and between holding little happy hands, walking a beautiful path in the sunshine to a dramatic waterfall, and eating our picnic together I felt peaceful and magical and “this-is-everything-good-that-I-ever-anticipated-in-motherhood”esque. Of course, we still had tantrums and messes later in the day, but this morning felt perfect.

Today we took a walk in a beautiful field a block away from our house. You can see our house so clearly from the field–that’s how close it is! I can’t believe we haven’t made it here before. It is very well hidden, but some neighbors told us about it last week, and we decided it would be a great setting for our after-work walk. The weather was perfect, and the grass had just been cut. I love the smell of fresh-cut grass. We all walked laps, and occasionally Abe and the girls played chase. Mom, you would love this field. It feels like you are right underneath the mountains–I should have gotten a picture of what you can see while you walk. I did get some pictures, though.

Then we went home and had FHE in our back yard.

Even though I already turned in my food portfolio, I’ve decided to keep taking pictures of the food I make. It felt good to go through the blog and see pictures of what my family eats; it helps me on days like today when I feel like I got nothing accomplished to know that at least I fed my family.

Happy Mother’s Day, Mom and Grandma! I hope you both know how much we love you. I know today wasn’t great for Grandma, but I hope by tomorrow you are feeling better.

Today was really happy here. Abe worked his little tail off for all the mothers in his life, and I felt celebrated and loved all day. He really outdid himself today, and I feel so grateful and happy.

Here are some pictures from the day:

In the above card, Lydia thought I was sick. Abe explained to her afterward that I wasn’t sick, but that we were going to celebrate Mother’s Day.

This is Abe, catching up for two days here.

Friday was a great day, both for Lily and myself.  At work, I had a few sales come through and Lily got to see the mother’s day program at Lydia’s preschool (Click here for video of Lydia singing).

After my work, Lily and I packed up, loaded the kids, and went to an over-night get-together in Heber with my team at work.  We had incredible steaks from a former restaurant manager and played games late into the night. Lydia and Mary had a great time with all the other kids running around.

Today (Saturday) has also been quite good.  Lily and I had a great breakfast in Heber with my team and we were home by around noon to do all of our shopping.  Once we were home, we mostly stayed inside because it was still raining (it has been raining on and off all week.)

While we stayed inside, we played together, ate amazing Paella (Lily was sad she burnt it, but it still tasted amazing), face-timed with Clark and Swathi and put stickers in our new National Parks Passports.

It was a cozy evening!

 

 

 

This morning I took the girls to the Payson Temple open house. In the process, I discovered how beautiful Payson is. The mountains were green! I know that color is fleeting, but the verdant setting and spring smells were the perfect precursor to our experience in the temple.

Before we left, we had a quick lesson on how the temple is the house of God. I told the girls to pay attention to how they felt while we were there because peace and joy come from the Holy Ghost, and since the temple is God’s house, we can easily feel the Holy Ghost there. I don’t know if they identified their feelings while we were there, but I can say that they were so reverent during our visit. I was grateful and happy to be there with them. The three of us held hands for the entire tour, and I felt the Spirit. When we entered the baptistry, Mary asked me if we were going to see Jesus, and I felt a spiritual charge when I explained even if we didn’t see him, we were in His house.

The Payson temple is very original. There is a fruit blossom motif throughout because it is built where there used to be orchards. The baptistry was stunning, and the girls loved the chandeliers in the celestial room.

After the temple, we all came home for lunch and naps. When I woke up, I had the strongest craving for chocolate chip cookies. I have been in love with Tate’s cookies lately, and even though I’ve always preferred chewy cookies over crunchy, today all I wanted was a thin, crisp, buttery, crunchy cookie. Tate’s cookies remind me of your chocolate chip cookies that I used to find in your cookie tin, Grandma. After trying the recipe out, I realized that every tray of cookies I made came out slightly differently. It turns out that the texture of these cookies depends on how much batter you put into each cookie. The last tray I put in came out just like Tate’s, but all of my other trays had thicker cookies. I learned my lesson! Next time, I will put less than 2 tablespoons of batter into each cookie and cook them for fifteen minutes.

The girls were thrilled to wake up to cookies, and then Abe came home in time for us all to go to the gym. We deposited the girls in childcare for half an hour while Abe and I worked out. My OB gave me permission to start working out again, and it felt so great to move around.

Then we came home for dinner and another finance meeting with Ingrid and Patrick. It was very educational, and I learned a lot.

Here’s a video I caught before we left for the temple open house. Lydia is teaching Mary her letters using a “game” I play with Lydia. I watched them secretly from the stairs and felt so grateful we had the girls so close together. It was so sweet to hear their exchanges.

I have no idea how Abe managed to blog while we were on our trip; I had internet issues the entire time. It was so frustrating, especially because every day I remembered to take pictures for the blog.

Saturday, May 2

After I passed my final(!!!!!!!), I came home and got myself ready for our trip. Abe got everyone and everything else ready. We set off for Steamboat Springs around 3 pm, and we took the scenic route through Provo Canyon. It was a gorgeous, gorgeous drive. We pulled into Steamboat Springs around 10 pm, and we are so grateful to Karin, who let us use her lovely time-share there.

Sunday

We were really impressed with the ward at Steamboat Springs. It was small, but in testimony meeting it became clear that everyone had a lot of love for each other and the gospel. The girls were out of control from the previous day’s car ride, so we cut out of sacrament five minutes early and headed back to the time-share for a quick dip in the outdoor pool before lunch and more driving. We figured swimming on the Sabbath was justifiable because it felt only humane; our poor girls had been and would be pent up in their car seats for hours, and they so enjoyed splashing around in the sunshine and getting their wiggles out.

In the evening, we had a barbecue with Abe’s family and picked David up from his relatives’ house. Then we drove to Estes Park, where Karin had gotten us all a cabin with her time-share. It was one of the most magical settings I have ever experienced.

Monday

On Monday we headed to the viewing and the funeral. In a way, we have been recovering ever since. I watched the girls in the church foyer so Abe could fully experience the funeral, and he was deeply moved by the funeral. His grandpa was a huge influence on him growing up, and it was hard for him to say goodbye.

After the funeral, we went to Abe’s other grandparents’ house to visit. I stayed in the car with the sleeping children, but Abe’s grandma came out and we had a sweet visit.

 

Tuesday

I took the girls to the park by the river and took a bunch of cute photos which are on my phone in my purse. After that, we picked up breakfast and headed over to the visitor’s center and Rocky Mountain National Park. This is one of my absolute favorite national parks now. My favorite landscapes–alpine mountains and lakes–make up the entire park. It was stunning. We want to go back when we are properly attired to actually hike some of those alluring trails. (I only brought one pair of shoes on the trip, and they were suede flats. They weren’t exactly made for hiking in snow. None of us had anything heavier than a sweater. Next time we will prepare better.)

Today, Wednesday

Today I can’t think of anything exciting that happened, but we did get two cute pictures of the girls making pizza.

Today was the funeral for my dear Grandpa Forsyth. I was completely unprepared for the amount of emotion I would be feeling today.  I admit that over the past 13 years, my relationship with my Grandpa has been sporadic, due to me living all over the country, his poor health, then him moving to Denver, and well, my lack of keeping better touch.

But today, as all the stories were shared at the funeral, I was hit by a wave of memories of him, and I was struck with the recollection of how involved he was with my childhood.

When I was in elementary school, my Grandpa and Grandma Forsyth only lived two blocks away from me.  I would often walk to their house after school.  Grandma and Grandpa would babysit me regularly. Later, Grandpa and I would have multiple paper-routes together.  There were times when he would help me with my route, and times when I would help him with his.  When I was in high school, he would frequently give me rides home because I would miss the bus due to debate or track or other extra curricular activities. I’ve only only described some of the mechanics of how he and I most often interacted, but let me next describe the attitude, example and spirit that always would pervade our encounters.

He was always cheerful. That is what I always remember about him.  He liked to laugh. He was jolly. He was always smiling. He had a spring in his step. His life had just as many deep challenges as the next person’s, but he always seemed to be above the challenges in his life so that he was able to  put on a happy smiling face.  He’s one of the happiest people I ever knew, and also one of the hardest workers.  I knew that he was not happy because his life was easy, but because he chose to be and because his faith was in God, who could truly deliver happiness to Him.

He used to be in my church unit (ward) and he would share his testimony almost every single month.  (Once a month in the Mormon religion members of the congregation are invited to utilize an open microphone to share their feelings of Jesus and His gospel and the LDS church).  Not only would Grandpa be the only one I knew to get up and share almost every single month, but he was always so full of Joy as he spoke.  He would beam with joy as he shared about God’s goodness to him in giving him the gospel and his posterity and as he shared about other things that had filled his heart with gratitude.

Grandpa is truly one of my heroes.  He was always upbeat.  And he was so devoted to God.  I remember about 5 years ag0, when his health arleady was no that great, he was the ward mission leader.  I remember him asking my help to print something from his computer so he could fulfill his calling and he was so incredibly grateful to me that I helped him do that.  Service to God and obeying God were paramount in his life and those things brought him great joy.

He took righteousness seriously and I remember that once he washed one of my brother’s mouths (or was it my mouth?) out with soap after one of us had said something truly innapropriate.

It’s amazing to me that he took such an interest in me.  Technically speaking, I was his step-grandson.  And it wasn’t just that he treated me like a true grandson, but as exhibited by

-the countless rides from school

-teaching me work through paper routes

-showing me the the power of optimism and having a good attitude

-showing me he loved me enough to correct me

and everything else he did for me, he truly treated me like a son.

I love my grandpa. I’m sure he was not perfect as I remember him to be because I know he was human. Perhaps doing so much right has the effect of helping people  to forget the little that one has done wrong. I certainly remember him as perfect.   There is surely so much more he did for me and so much more worthy of sharing, but the passage of time has left my memory mostly with his thematic impressions on my heart.

Below are some pictures of my grandpa during his last couple year, when things were really tough for him medically.  You will notice that yes, he is still smiling. I miss him dearly, mostly because I want him here on this earth to be one more shining light to remind me how to live right. I love you grandpa. You are and always will be one of my heroes.

I realized as the day was getting closer to dinnertime: A) I have very little cookable food in the house B) I need to grocery shop C) My homework assignment for my online class is to go to a restaurant and critique my experience, so woo-hoo! I’m off the hook for dinner tonight.

That was a good thing, because I had to spend a couple hours going to and from school to prep for my final tomorrow morning. Eek! I am so, so scared. I realized en route that when I get really scared, I listen to the Christian radio station a lot more. They direct a lot of their messages to people in crisis, and it’s so reassuring to hear over and over again how God is there and won’t let you down.

In this case, I was very happy to discover that the chef there was my favorite chef at the school, and he let me use his already cut-up chicken for my final. I didn’t even have to cut a chicken! I hate working with raw chicken, so that felt like a tender mercy.

Then I came home just in time for pest control to come de-bug our house. They also washed the entire exterior of our house with peppermint spray to deter mice, my #1 phobia. I continue to use mint scented products for my personal care because I believe so strongly this will deter the rodents from my presence. The idea that my whole house has just been bathed in peppermint spray is unbelievably invigorating.

After that, we went out to dinner. We found a Groupon for a restaurant called Oregano’s. The food and service were a let-down, but the ambiance scored perfect points!

Here are my pictures:

Then we came home and I did my homework assignment while Abe and the girls packed. Lydia and Mary’s respective personalities shine through in their packing techniques and finished products shown below: