Focusing on me!

So I have decided that this year I will focus on me. I have to say it is going pretty well. And I feel surprisingly more incontrol of my life. I have been working really hard these last 2 weeks to get myself back into the routine of controling my appetite as as well as start working out! I am doing pretty good! I have been blogging a lot on my feelings and successes and that seems to be helping a lot! Along with the support I have been getting from my online Weight Watchers groups :)
This week has been difficult, but I made it through and feel great!

I'm Puttin it ALL out there!

Ok, so I am now going to put my New Years goals out there for everyone to see! I check in with these on a daily and weekly basis, but I figured if they were out there where anyone can see them, then I would be held more accountable. So here is my list for the year of goals that I want to accomplish:

1. Read the scriptures daily, with both the children and personally.
2. Say prayers daily, morning and night, personally and as a family.
3. Have Family Home Evening once a week.
4. Go to church every week, early or on time.
5. Go to Temple monthly.
6. Do the genealogy for my family.
7. Lose my last 25 lbs and gain a healthier more active lifestyle.
8. Take time every week to write my 4 novels that I have yet to finish.
9. Read the lesson for church ever week before church. For both Sunday School and Relief Society.
10. Learn how to use my camera better and take a photography class.
11. Learn how to do zippers and pockets in sewing pants.
12. Spend time every week for myself. Do something for myself every week.
13. Brush my teeth, my hair, take a shower, get dressed everyday.

Ok! I know some of them sound like simple things but believe me when you're a homeschooling Mama of 4, sometimes those things aren't so easy!
Ok, so that is my list for the year! I guess I should also add that I want to blog every week on there too :)

I have 2 new blogs!

I have 2 new blogs. One of them has nothing on it yet so I will post it later when i have stuff on there. It is for my sewing business. The second is for my new years goals to change who i am and what i do for my body and my health. Feel free to stop by and make a comment. Feel free to voice your encourangement or come feel inspired! Thanx for looking!
http://www.DoItOrDontDoItThereIsNoTry.blogspot.com

It Has been too long! It is all in the perspective!

So, the reason it has been so long since I have blogged is that we have been in transition since May of this year. We were losing our house due to my husband being out of work for over a year. Then he started to build us a new house on our farm land and it seemed that time and time again he was thwarted in his efforts. He almost cut is finger off. Then he pulled 2 vertebrae in his back out. Finally that healed only to have him fall off a ladder and shatter his elbow resulting in his having to have surgery on it and now not have use of it. Because the bone was shattered, they removed it and just used tendons and ligaments to hold the bones in place. He can lift about 2 lbs. with that arm and that is all.
However, we were blessed that the house was finished enough for us to move into! And by finished I mean that there were walls and floors and a roof.
We moved in with no flooring, i.e. only the sub-floor is in. We have no running water as the well filled up and has yet to be finished. The solar panels arrived late and incomplete so the only electricity we have is through a generator that we have on for most of the day, but it runs on gas so that is expensive. We had only 1 toilet when we moved in, now we have 3, but we still have to fill the tanks by hand to flush them.
Water to drink and wash with are carried in by hand, we are blessed enough to have a kind neighbor 3 miles down the road who lets us get water from him.
James got the roofing on a couple of weeks ago because there was a storm coming. We were blessed to not have the storm hit us. However while we were away for Thanksgiving with family it rained hard for a day, and the roof leaked. We came home to large puddles on our floors. And quite a bit of the drywall in the ceilings being ruined.
We were blessed though, the water didn't land on anything important. No beds were wet, and none of our electronics were destroyed. We were truly blessed!
The next day James went out and bought us a wood burning stove. Did i mention we have had no heat? And that it has been getting down to freezing at night. I have been having to bundle up the children as warm as possible. But now we have a wood burning stove and it is keeping us at about 65 degrees in the house.
You know, it is all about perspective! For as much as i feel we are living much like people did 100 years ago, we are truly blessed! I have 4 beautiful children that are healthy and happy. I have a wonderful husband who works himself to death to provide for us. I have a Heavenly Father that has watched over us every step of the way and provided for us even when it has looked like we would have nothing.
Trust me there are moments when i feel like i might just stress out and die, but then i think about how much we have been blessed and i become truly grateful for what we have been given.
This season, my prayer is that you will see all that the Lord has done for you in your life and appreciate His hand in all things. I know that i probably cannot even comprehend all the other things that the Lord has done for me and does for me on a daily basis. However for the things i can see, i am truly grateful!
Merry Christmas and Happy Hanukkah!

Has it been that long?

Oh my gosh! So i log into my Blog here and see that it has actually been a month and a half since i have posted! What the heck? Man have i been busy or what?
Well, it all started when we decided to move and build a house out on our land in Buttonwillow. We decided to do that and with me thinking we were going to be getting out of our house in May or early June. I decided the best thing to do was to take the kids and go down to my mom and dad's for the summer. So i packed up the house as much as i could and trekked down there for the summer. Only to realize that we weren't going to be getting out of the house till the end of the summer. But by then, i had already moved all the kids clothes down there and signed them up for piano lessons down there for the summer.
So, where does that leave me, you ask? Well, that has left me going back and forth from L.A. where my girls are, to Bakersfield, where my husband is, every week this summer.
The only reason i am on the computer right now is because i came home on Friday, and i am leaving tomorrow to go back for piano and then coming back on Thursday, and then going back down next Wednesday.
I never thought i would say this, but i CANNOT WAIT for summer to be over and for us to get back into our routine! However, i am not too sure if we will be getting e regular routine anytime soon, since our house is packed, but i am not sure when the new house will be done!
I hate the interim! However, i must say that it has been good to be down at my mom's for the summer. i have been able to get a lot of fun reading done. And a bit of rest. Plus we have gone out and done fun things. Then i come home and do lots and lots of sewing!
It has also been good for me because I have been able to sit back for the first time in 11 years of marriage and take stock of where i am in life, where i want to be and what i need to do to change.
I have decided that i have no willpower! I put things off all the time instead of just doing them. I say, oh i will clean that tomorrow. Oh, i will start losing weight tomorrow. And then a year full of tomorrows have passed and i haven't done it. I need to start doing these things now, not tomorrow. So my first goals are to lose weight, read my scriptures everyday, say prayers morning and night and have family home evening with the kids once a week.
I think if i can start making those things a habit then everything else will fall into place. I know that when you put the Lord first in your life, He will always help take care of the rest. Pray for me! Pray that I will be able to achieve these goals and make them a habit before the end of the year! Please!

I'm already a butterfly, by Cherrie Call

Several weeks ago my little two-year-old daughter was playing with her toys and decided to strap on her butterfly wings. She was having a pretty good time for a while, when she got further down in the toy box and found her purple super hero cape. She wanted to put it on. When my husband tried to convince her to take of the wings, she refused. So he velcroed the cape on right over the wings. It was awkward. She yanked on it for a while to keep it from being so jagged, but she looked like a jagged purple hunchback. She tried to go with it for as long as she could, but pretty soon she flew back over to us and uttered a very profound truth. I only wish I could remember her exact toddler jargon for this. But essentially, she said, "No cape. Alrey butterfly." Think about it. You don't need a cape if you're already a butterfly! The moment I heard her say it, I knew it meant something. But it has taken a little bit of time for the meaning to unfold for me. Maybe it means something different to you. But for me, this is it. I spend a lot of time, too much time, really, trying to fit into a cape. I see my neighbor in a beautiful cape, making incredible gourmet dinners with vegetables from her backyard. It's usually on a day I hardly had time to pick up a pizza. I see songwriting friends writing songs I truly wish I had written, they're so good. I see their capes billowing in the wind. I go to the mall and try to find something that can make me look amazing, and I notice the ridiculous price tag. Capes I can't afford. I get discouraged. All the while I don't remember that I have wings! If I paid better attention, I might notice some of those super hero ladies admiring them, and wishing for them. I have my own set of gifts. My own list of things I do best. Is being a butterfly better than being a super hero? Not necessarily. But is a super hero better than a butterfly? I'd say not. Could butterflies do some of the same things that super heros can? Sometimes, maybe. If they practiced. But that's not the point. I'm already something pretty great. I'm a butterfly! I have to admit that most of the time I feel more like a caterpillar than a butterfly. But I'm starting to remember more often that I really do have wings. I want to use them to do what they're best at, and fill this world with the things that only I can give. I want to quit trying so hard to be someone else. Easier said than done, I know. I have lots of heroes in my life and I'm so grateful for them. I will always try to be more like them. But I'll try to do it in my own special butterfly way, because that's who I am. And I get the feeling that God loves butterflies quite a lot.

Celebrating US!!

I got this great article From my Time Out For Women email. I just loved it! Especially the quote from the book by Elder Ballard which explains the kind fo women that we need to be! Just great! Have a Happy Mother's day if i dont talk to everyone before then!


Celebrating US!!
Everyone's talking about us this month.Have you heard it?They are celebrating us...as mothers...as daughters...as women. Oh, sure…everyone’s calling it “Mother’s Day”...but we know what it really is. It’s a celebration of women…every single one of us. We really believe that. All women are represented here at TOFW. Those that fit the traditional "mother’s day" card recipient and those who do not. And while we will all take time to honor and thank OUR moms, really, we want this year’s holiday to be about all of us. And so, this Mother’s Day we celebrate…
The service we give.
The time we sacrifice.
The love we share.
The lessons we teach.
The examples we are.
The SWEET ASSURANCE we bring to the lives around us.
This is a holiday about each of us...for each of us.

Elder Ballard’s new book Daughters of God shares some of the most powerful counsel from a latter-day prophet given on the subject of women. He specifically shares what we should be focusing on as we strive to become "a woman of influence."

"More than ever before we need women of faith, virtue, vision, and charity, as the Relief Society declaration proclaims. We need women who can hear and who will respond to the voice of the Lord, women who at all costs will defend and protect the family. We don’t need women who want to be like men, sound like men, dress like men, drive like some men drive, or act like men. We do need women who rejoice in their womanhood and have a spiritual confirmation of their identity, their value, and their eternal destiny. Above all, we need women who will stand up for truth and righteousness and decry evil at every turn and simply say, "Lord, here am I, send me." (p. 64-65)So let this month be a celebration of all the women in your life...but mostly, let it be a celebration of YOU. "