happiness is..

Dani Grace

Is getting more and more mobile by the day. She is crawling now with the occasional belly flop worm move. But for the most part she is pretty much on her knees, which is good for me because I don't have to lint roll her as often. (She has started to pull herself up to things as well!)

She waves now too and says "HI YA!" It is pretty cute and spastic, and she is pretty funny to watch her wave at others, who don't know what she is doing. She will wave to just about anyone.

She is following in her brother's footsteps and becoming quite the chatter box she says Mom, Dad, Bath and bob (for Grandpa bob, just kidding for bottle, or boobles is what we call them around here.)

She is REALLY into baths. If she hears any water running, she comes very quickly to our bathroom, and tries to climb up to the tub. The other morning she hit Kory on the face all morning saying Dad, bath, dad bath over and over.

She still has not cut a tooth! I am pretty sure Axel had 3 or 4 by now, I keep waiting and checking, because she will have random days of pure sad grumpy sack of baby, which makes for a heinously LONG night for all. But nada. Sometimes they will swell and get a line but then go away.

She LOVES music and when people sing to her. Sometimes when she is fussy I will tell Story to sing her song to her, and Story will come to her rescue and sing "Oh I wuv my oh I wuv my Dami Grace!" both girls faces light up and it possibly is the cutest thing cousins could share.

Speaking of cousins, she is starting to play lots now. (Which is nice, I get lots done) But it was pretty cute the other day I was dealing with Axel and Story drama. I went to check on the babies, and they were both just sitting on the floor by each other peacefully playing with toys. Neither was taking the others toy, hitting, yelling or mauling each other, they were just content to be playing side by side with out any interference from older siblings. (oh the JOYS of being the younger sibling) I am pretty glad Dani has Gauge, I hope he will look after her and be like a body guard and not let people be mean to her. The seem to be such good friends!

This little girl LOVES her baby. Seriously if she sees it she will start laughing and squeeling, she snuggles with it every single night in hr bed. It is so dirty and gross, it is hard to believe she only has had it for a month, cause it looks super sick now. She drags it with her everywhere! 

 

Axel

Man oh man is he growing up! I seriously can not even remember what it was like for him to be a baby now! He is such a good kid and helper, he pretty much is that kid that I know would thrive on a chore chart if I made one for him. He loves to help, and do what mom or dad are doing, all the time. I guess that is why he came first, he will be a great older brother to watch out and keep track of his sibs. That is if he can stop fighting with them.

His newest thing is he is potty trained. Well sorta, he has bad days and really good days, but we're getting there. I say he is potty trained because he doesn't wear diapers anymore and uses the toilet on his own. Sometimes he gets distracted and will have an accident. He is really hard on himself when he as an accident. It is pretty sad, I feel bad he feels so upset by it. We have been trying to tell him accidents happen and it is ok! (Thanks to Elmo)


He likes his privacy, and being a big kid and using the potty all by himself. So he has a hard time wearing pants, but is getting much better at letting us help, so he is not commando all day anymore, only when my visiting teachers came over, he went in his room came out butt naked, and showed everyone his business. Yikes!  We're not there just yet completely but we are on our way! I am pretty proud of him, I know it has been a hard journey for him, but it was something he decided he wanted to do, and has stuck to it. We have more good days then bad, so that is a good thing.

It finally snowed some here, by some I mean we had it on our drive way, but because Axel LOVES "Snowman" we got all bundled up one saturday and went outside to make the best of it, and boy did he!  building a snowman

Making footprints

  

 Throwing snowballs at mom!

  

Afterwards we came in and had a cup of Hot Cocoa, with candy canes! 

me

I have been in a really good place with my life this past month, and it feels really good.

Before you ask, no we did not come into a large sum of money, or buy a new home. In fact nothing has changed other than one thing. My attitude.

About a month ago, I was down, pretty down, and had been for quiet a few months. Nothing I was doing was really helping me get out of my slump. I was exercising for endorphins, and trying my hardest to count my blessings, but really I was down. I was frustrated with just about every aspect of my life to a certain extent and had been for quite some time. It was putting huge strain on my marriage, my mothering, and my ability to serve the lord to my fullest capacity.

Kory and I went to the temple one evening with his family last month, and I had this concern in my mind, that I wanted to be happy again. I wanted to find a way out of this darkness, I was determined to do something about it. So with that prayer in my heart I went to the Temple, to draw nearer to my heavenly father in hopes I would find my answer.

During the session I had this distinct impression, not once, not twice but three times that I needed to be better about my personal study of the scriptures. Kory and I already read them together at night, but truth be told, since I became a mom, I rarely have time to sit down to study the scriptures by myself, and to truly study them. I DO have a desire to be knowledgeable about scriptures. I want to be able to teach my children scripture stories (Besides Nephi and the Gold Plates) You may laugh but really that is the only one I could confidently sit down and tell my kids without feeling like I was preaching false doctrine, or outlandish things. (And I am pretty sure it is from The Living Scriptures videos I watched as a kid, or could be that I have read and re-read the first of the scriptures too many times to count.)

So I told Kory about my desire, and he offered some great suggestions (like always, he is such a rock when it comes to gospel stuff, and is always my go to for church stuff). The next day before my day started I decided I would try to help myself get into the habit, and start with something that I am more motivated to read, and maybe from there could find topics to study more fully in the scriptures.

I pulled out January's Ensign and turned to the first article, which is the First Presidency Message. It was entitled "Living the Abundant Life" by Thomas S. Monson.

As I read through the talk, I was then reminded that I was supposed to teach on this article in Relief Society in February (next week actually) I always find it humorous that whenever I sub for RS, it is always about something I have had recent experience on. It is as if Heavenly Father wants to teach me the lesson, and he knows I am not there testimony wise to bear my testimony any other way, so he makes me teach a lesson on it. clever clever.

 The article was great, more than great it was like the windows of heaven opened up and heavenly father told me exactly what I needed to work on. I remember hearing once upon a time that if you want to talk to heavenly father read your scriptures. How true that is! Often times I think when we pray we just list off to heavenly father all our issues, but then we don't or maybe I don't wait for him or allow him to tell us how to fix said problems, we just expect them to be fixed.

I am grateful for a modern day prophet who receives revelation and who can offer comforting advice to those in need.

President Monson mentions 3 key areas that counsels members to focus on to live an "Abundant Life" He calls them the ABC's the fundamentals to living a happy life.
Have a Positive Attitude
Believe in Yourself
Face Challenges with Courage

I struggle in ALL of those areas. And decided right then that I was going to follow the prophets council and move forward from that day forward doing such. And you know what it has made a HUGE difference. I am feeling like I can do what I need to do because I have this understanding, and it puts me in control of my life again. All these outside things that I was letting affect my life and my happiness no longer have been.

Since I have been taking on this new mantra, I am a better loving wife, mother and I feel balanced.

Maybe this post was too revealing about me, and perhaps I shared too much, but maybe there is someone out there who like me needs to read it. Take it for what it is worth I guess.

Kory
Well he works so hard. He has been pulling in lots of extra hours with work this month, and working any spare moment getting his studio stuff done. He took some time to put up a shelf for me the other Saturday in my craft room for all my fabric, and it has been so nice and inspiring to see it all out so I know what I have to work with. I have loved it. SO glad he is such a handy man, I try not to fill my honey do list too full of items for him, but it is hard when he can do it so easily and knows so much.

He also has been crazy supportive to me during my hard days recently, I am sure he doesn't think anything of it, but it has meant a lot to me to have his support.

His calling keeps him sooo busy too, he has a pretty good attitude about it too, he never complains when people call and ask for this or that, he is always so willing to help and come to their aid. I am trying to be more like that. He is such a great example.

He and Axel are pretty much best buds.  Both my kids love him so much, the minute he comes in the door, they both scream and get so excited to see him. Dani is starting to get pretty ticked if he spends too much time with Axel before coming to her, she is quite the princess, and is has him wrapped around her little finger!