November 19th

1. I am grateful for my big brother. It's his birthday today. Happy Birthday Bob! We love you. He has made me a better person.

2. I am grateful for granola. We are having a lot of fun making it and eating it. The Friendly Hero calls it gran-no-no-nola!

3. I am grateful for the pilgrims. I finally got Friendly Hero to listen to their story, and he calls them programs. He is a lovely delightful child!

4. I am grateful for the Peaceful Hero. He went with me on an errand, and he charmed everyone there. He is so cute! He was happy and loves spending time opening and closing doors.

5. I am grateful for jet airplanes. Whenever we see the contrails, both boys go crazy! They love that. And I love their joy.

Refocusing

I missed a few days because my dear Bug Hero needed our computer to do work and play. So I'm not putting this off until the end.

1. I am grateful for baptisms. We have a very special young lady in our ward who was baptized yesterday. She has fought off brain cancer, and is having some problems with her brain communicating with the rest of her body. She turned 8 on Friday and on Saturday she was baptized. I am grateful for her example, her smile and her love. She has the biggest smile on her face whenever I see her and she radiates the love of Christ.

2. I am grateful for the spirit at her baptism. You could tell that she is there, even if it's hard for her to communicate  but she was able to sing with her siblings, and she giggled as she came out of the font. There wasn't a dry eye in the room, including a lot of the little kids. The Friendly Hero talked a lot to me about how he was really happy because he felt that Jesus was happy with K***. I am grateful that he felt the spirit and knew where it came from.

3. I am grateful for family pictures. We took them yesterday and I haven't seen them yet, but I know that they are going to be awesome!

4. I am grateful for being kicked. I am feeling our girl move around a lot and I am grateful that she is healthy. I am grateful for her kicks, even though they are starting to become sharp and painful.

5. I am grateful that I know how to clean. Sometimes it doesn't look like I ever clean--but I do, and I am grateful that we are teaching the boys how to pick up their toys.

6. I am grateful for trains. The Peaceful Hero is on a HUGE train kick and loves to play with the trains. He will play with them for an hour--with minimal disruptions. I am grateful that he can focus on something like that. He's adorable as he plays.

7. I am grateful for family. I love talking to my siblings, to my parents, and to the Bug Hero's family. I consider them all to be my family.

8. I am grateful my Sunday School lesson went well. The kids responded to the group questions and were willing to share, even if they said that this was an awkward and uncomfortable topic. We talked about the Law of Chastity. But they were as mature and respectful as I could have hoped for. They are 13 and 14. And it was a much better lesson than last week.

9. I am grateful for the Friendly Hero. He says the funniest things! Yesterday, on our way to family pictures we told him that we were going to Purdue to get them taken. He responded with, "My daddy's work, I presume!" We are still laughing about it!

10. I am grateful for the Bug Hero. He is back from his conference, and it's so amazing to see things get done that I didn't do. He is so loving and helpful! I love his smile and his enthusiasm for toys and games. He competed in another tournament for his new game, and he won again! He got a prize gift card for winning. He's really happy about an inconsequential thing (his words, not mine).

11. We are grateful for extended family! We are going to go see an Aunt and Uncle for Thanksgiving and we are really excited about it! We love to expand our family circles!

Grateful 14th and 15th

Once again I missed a day.
Yesterday:
1. Some days I think to myself, that I'm really glad that I'm pregnant because there is a reason why I'm so disconnected. I can forget things very easily and I hope that I can get some back--or just adjust to my new memory.

2. I am grateful for the new "Come unto Christ" curriculum. My lesson this week--I am going to try to teach with a lot of the principles. I am really excited for it, because that's how I was trained to teach math--engage the students and let them do the talking, testifying and teaching. It's really powerful when it works, and totally flops when it doesn't.

3. I am grateful for the Stake President. I had an appointment scheduled to see him, and he went home as I was driving there, and so then I went to his house. I've practically been adopted into that family on the account of the cuteness of my boys and that I tutored their daughter for two years, so it wasn't as weird as it sounds. And he was very gracious and interviewed me for a temple recommend.

4. I am grateful that days end. The boys woke up on the wrong side of the bed and it felt like we spent half the day in the penalty box and the other half in time out. (two different locations, because if they went to the same place then they would have continued fighting.)

5. I am grateful for the Peaceful Hero's desire to learn. As we spent several times in the penalty box or the time out chair he got to practice learning the answers to the questions. "Do we hit our brother?" His response, "Yes!" said very emphatically. I told him "No. We don't." He quickly changed his answer to a long, "Nooooo." And then when I asked him if Jesus hit other people, he responded emphatically, "Yes." My correction, "No." and then his quick change, "Nooooo." His responses were the only reason why I could keep going.

6. I'm grateful that the Bug Hero had a good time at his conference and then came home last night. I was especially grateful that he came home on the day that was especially taxing because the kids were grumpy and non-distract-able.

Today:
1. I am grateful for my testimony. We had a scare this morning--I started bleeding, but I knew that Heavenly Father was aware of us and He was going to take care of us. I got to share that with the Friendly Hero, because he could tell that Mom and Dad were worried about something, and I was able to share with him that Heavenly Father loves us dearly, and He knows what is supposed to happen and will take care of us.

2. I am grateful for priesthood blessings, and for a husband who honors his priesthood and a great neighborhood of friends who are also worthy priesthood holders and are happy and willing to serve. God's power is priesthood power.

3. I am grateful for friends. After I had made an emergency appointment with a doctor, I had friends offering and willing to take care of the boys so I could go to the doctor. And then I knew that they were also praying for me.

4. I am grateful for understanding medical staff. I called and I was trying to hold back tears and everyone I talked to was understanding and patient and genuinely concerned with helping me see a doctor to make sure everything was healthy and fine. I am grateful for doctors who are willing to make time for me. I saw a doctor in my doctor's office since my doctor is on vacation. I know it put their schedule out of wack, but they were willing to check me out and make sure everything is healthy. I am also grateful for medicine advances--I also got my rhogram shot, because we have the Rh factor, and I am so grateful for technology and for advances in medicine.

5. I am grateful that everything is fine. My cervix is responding differently to the hormones this time, (probably because I'm having a girl) and it's healthy. It's staying closed and it's doing it's job to keep the baby in, it just can bleed if the baby kicks it, or it gets knocked around. Apparently this is in the normal range, even though it was extremely scary to see a blood this morning. I am grateful that the bleeding stopped.

6. I am grateful that I had wonderful news to share with the few people who were there with me on the emotional and scary ride this morning. I am grateful too, that I knew that I would have been taken care of if I needed to go on bed rest or anything else, my ward is awesome and I would have only needed to tell one person and they could have gotten the rest of the ward mobilized with out me having to tell five or six people and cry about it.

7. I am grateful that I am still considered low risk and both of us are healthy and growing well. I am also grateful that if it happens again, I know what is going on.

8. I am grateful for this picture. It has made me smile all day long. I really am totally and madly in love with this boy.

November 13th

1. Cleaning. I am grateful for deep cleaning certain areas in my home. I let a few areas that no one sees but me get out of control, and I cleaned them today and I feel so much better. I feel like I can create a good atmosphere in my home because of it.

2. I'm grateful for toys. The boys pulled out three sets of toys while I was deep cleaning, and it kept them occupied. You couldn't walk in the home, but they were happy.

3. I'm grateful I got to help teach my boys how to clean up today. We spent about twenty times the time it would have taken me to clean up, cleaning up with their help. I told them I would pick up one toy for every toy they picked up (I picked up what they picked up combined). When they moved fast, I moved fast, and when they moved slow or stopped working, so did I. The Friendly Hero loved it when I helped pick up, but when he stopped working so I would do it, I stopped working too....he found that frustrating, but we got it done.

4. I'm grateful for leftovers. I didn't want to cook today and we had enough in our fridge that I didn't have too.

5. I am grateful that the Peaceful Hero has only had one accident in the last week. I am starting to call him potty trained. He is so proud of his new skills. So am I.

Silly Friends

Today I am grateful for Friends.

1. The Friendly Hero has a great group of boys that he does Joy School with. Today they talked about what to do to take care of their bodies. He has taken pretend naps all day so he can grow as he sleeps.

2. The Peaceful Hero is getting into playing. he LOVES trains. He gets down on the floor and lays on his belly and hordes trains. It's cute to see him have five or six trains in his arms and reach and fending off others. But he is always willing to share one or two if you ask him to. It's really sweet.

3. I am grateful for my friends. I was able to support some of them by attending a meeting about moving the bus stop to a safer location.

4. I am grateful for The Bug Hero's friends. We laugh that most of his friends in the ward are the 11 year old boys that play with Legos and Pokemon.

5. I am grateful for the friendship we have with the Savior. It is an honor to be considered one of His friends, because I'm trying to follow His footsteps. I don't do it well on my own, but He is willing to help me, and I'm grateful for His help.

Cooking

1. I am grateful for my kitchen. I love Sundays that I get to spend time in there making a wonderful meal. I don't always get to do that, because of tutoring right before or little boys wanting to 'help' me cook. I like to let them help--but it limits what I can do. On Sundays, The Bug Hero lets me spend as much time in the kitchen as I want, usually hours making and baking and it's great!

2. I am grateful that the Bug Hero does the dishes. I like to do dishes, but if I've spent several hours cooking I usually don't feel like doing dishes for an hour. And he cheerfully does them.

3. I am grateful for our Sunday Tradition. We got to share it with another family, and it made it new again. Most of the kids mentioned the baptism on yesterday as when they were happy and felt the spirit. It's a great way to talk about the gospel and the spirit again.

4. I am grateful for the new curriculum for the Youth. I'm excited to really get into it. I'm nervous about it, especially after this week--Sunday School was just about as crazy as it could possibly be. I don't know where it went wrong, but I trust that next week it won't go bad again. We have good days and bad days. I look forward to being an even more powerful teacher to lead them to conversion.

5. I am grateful for the spirit. I am grateful that I get to feel it daily and that I take opportunities to share the gospel with my boys, and help them feel the Savior's love.

Friday and Saturday

I missed yesterday because we have had 2 crazy days here.

Yesterday:
1. I am grateful for friends. I was having a hard time trying to get something worked out at Walmart. I spent 45 minutes at the service desk, 30 of those minutes on the phone with my bank trying to get things worked out with my credit card and with the machine, only to find out at the end that I couldn't get done what I wanted to get done because it was too large--they couldn't handle it, but they couldn't tell me that until I'd been there for 45 minutes. The two boys were as good as they could be, but it was a long time and I was trying to be patient, and they had lost it. I was so grateful that a friend happened by about a half hour into this crazy experience and took the boys to look at the fish. They were so happy and I was so happy and grateful. She really saved my sanity.

2. I am grateful for food. I am grateful for my fridge and freezer that hold food and store them well.

3. I am grateful for nap time. I was able to put both boys down and have a little bit of time to recover from the stress of Walmart.

4. I am grateful for the playground. Once nap time was over, we went outside, because it was 68 degrees outside and we got in one more day at the playground. We love being outside, when it's sunny and playing with all our friends.

5. I am grateful for the Bug Hero. He beat us home, because we went tutoring and he vacuumed and got dinner ready--that I had put out on the counter. He is amazing!

Today:
1. I am grateful for our new arrival. We don't have a gender, or a name yet, but at 2 plus tons and 202.9 inches long and 68.4 inches tall we are in love! All day I have been smiling. (not that strange) I am really excited and so proud of our new arrival. The color of "polished metal" is awesome! (Even if it's not green like the Friendly Hero requested.) The Friendly Hero loves the hatch back, and the sliding doors. The Peaceful Hero loves the four wheels. We are all happy with our new arrival!

2. I am grateful for friends. We had a friend watch the two boys while we drove almost 80 miles to get our new arrival and then sign all the papers to get everything cleared out. It made the whole experience one I could really smile about, because we didn't have two active boys waiting around for us, and driving us crazy while we talked to really nice people.

3. I am grateful for great sales at the grocery store. I love it when the turkeys go on sale before Thanksgiving.

4. I am grateful for baptisms. We were able to go to our dear neighbors (practically family) baptism. He asked me to give a talk about baptism and I was honored to be a part of his big day. The Friendly Hero said his baptism was his favorite part of the day. When further questioned, he loved it because he got a peanut butter bar at the end of it.

5. I am grateful that crazy days end. We had two crazy busy days back to back, and while everything worked out and went mostly smoothly, it's nice to know that we have a day of rest tomorrow to worship Heavenly Father and to relax and enjoy each others company.