Lessons from Jayden

I have been having special life challenges lately . . . one of which is multiple daily physical therapy sessions with Jayden whenever he's at our house. This week he's not at our house but we went over to his mom's to show her how to do a few things and I'll be going over again tomorrow to do some more. Wednesday I will be joining her for an hour and a half physical therapy appointment with a new therapist. Basically, this is consuming a lot of my life and its a major challenge for a few reasons.



The most difficult thing for Justin and I is that Jayden seems to have very little self-motivation to get better. If we don't look he doesn't push himself, and every chance he gets he takes weight off of that left leg. He pretty much avoids pain at all costs (which is natural and would take considerable mental effort to overcome) despite his knowledge that his bone won't heal without weight on it and he won't miraculously be able to walk without the effort. It has been so hard to try everything and anything to help him find some self-motivation, some inner desire and strength and to have nothing work- so we continue to do all we can in therapy to force him to put weight in it and straighten it, which trust me, is no fun at all.


This is very complain-y so far but here comes a more productive part. :) Yesterday after church out of nowhere Jayden says, "Mom, do you know something that God can't do?" I said, "Hmmm, he can't forgive us if we don't repent." He said, "Yeah, and he can't make us choose what he wants us to."

That struck me so perfectly because I've been struggling so much with that same thing. It made me think of how often Heavenly Father wants us to make better choices that will bring us MORE JOY and MORE FREEDOM, but we don't want to put in the required effort. He sits on the sidelines lovingly and does everything he can to encourage us in the right direction and he allows us to feel and experience the consequences of our actions. I wish I could say it is now easy to watch Jaydens painfully slow progress, but at least his little wise spirit is helping me learn a little deeper lesson.

Family Pics

Here's a few of my favorites from our family pictures. Sorry no time to chat! We're lucky I'm posting pictures :).

Birthday and Christmas Idea

Well there are many, many life updates I could share right now but of course I want to keep it short for now. A few weeks ago our Relief Society president came over and talked to us for a little bit as we filled out our paperwork to get food from the Bishop's storehouse. She shared an idea with us that they do in her extended family that I thought was a really good idea.

Sometimes it is overwhelming as a parent to think of providing college and mission funds for all of your children. In this family they decided to all start helping each other with their children s college and mission funds. On the children s birthdays and at Christmas rather than buying them presents, Grandparents and Aunts and Uncles use the money they would have on a gift and put it toward their fund. I know for grandparents it may be especially challenging to not actually give a gift . . . but they could at least give LESS gifts and give a little something toward the fund. This way year after year, holiday after holiday, everyone is helping and supporting the child, even if it's $5, and much of the burden is lifted from the parents.

Mom, I thought Dad may especially like this idea because he was saying he wanted to start some sort of spiritual tradition that was something the kids always knew they would get from Grandpa. You can run it by him and see if this is maybe the kind of thing he was looking for.

Hurray for Potty Training!

Joshua is making me so dang proud these days! He's getting so big and I wish all the family could spend more time with he and Austin and just see how big and funny and cute they are.

Well, I've been working on potty training Joshua for a while now and it's been kind of a struggle. Lots of peed or pooped in underwear, even multiple times 10 minutes after using the potty. I'm sure every mother has gone through this joy. This week we finally crossed a mile stone! Tuesday, for the first time Joshua told me he had to use the bathroom! It came out like, "Uh-oh poo poo" (which often is meant to mean "pee,pee") but when I went over to him he was dry! I took him to the potty then and almost every time since then he has told me when he has to go! It's wonderful! It took probably 2 months for him to open his mouth and tell me, but suddenly potty training just got a lot easier! Hallelujah! I won't have 3 kids in diapers after all! Sing praises!

Air Show

This past Saturday our family went to the air show at Hill Air Force Base in Ogden with my cousin Jeff and his family. It was really nice to get out and do something out of the ordinary, especially since it was free. I would say my favorite part was seeing the cute, boyish smile on the hubby's face as we walked back to our car afterward. It was so clearly such a nourishing day for his inner kid and he was so happy. I pointed it out to Jayden too so he could really soak in his Dad's joy. Me and the kids quite enjoyed the air show with the F16's too. Very cool. I didn't take my camera once again so these pics are from Justin's phone.

St George

So last night we got home from a fabulous 4 night 3.5 day trip to sunny and beautiful St George, Utah!! It's about time! I have no pictures because my camera stayed home with a full memory stick, but Mom will undoubtedly e-mail me some soon . . . and probably post some on her site too. We had such a rejuvenating time as a family. Maybe not mom so much . . . she seemed to become Austin's second mother a lot of the time whenever things were going on and a nap time was happening or approaching. Thank heavens for those breaks with one less child.

Anyway, we had a blast swimming (3 of the 3.5 days), eating at the restaurant Dad manages, walking on temple grounds, child golf cart and motorcycle rides, the boys hitting a few buckets of balls and going to a movie, and me, Justin and Dad having a 3 hour very spiritual conversation about our lives with many tears shed by all. That was outside of the other meaningful conversations split up throughout the whole weekend. And that 3 hour conversation . . . you guessed it, Mom watched the kids with no complaints, even with Jayden very impatiently wanting us to come home so he could get out of the house for the next activity. She should have been paid for our vacation!

It was a very fun and relaxing trip. Mom is getting quite the tan and is looking very cute in her new bathing suit. I would have to say Joshua's favorite part of the trip was jumping off the little wall into the water at the pool. Jayden's favorite . . . driving the golf cart. Austin's. . . . eating. Me and hubby, reconnecting with ourselves, each other, and mom and dad.

My only complaint, I would have liked to see more of Russ . . . I never went on the walk I wanted to take with him all weekend . . . oh, and I would have lived without making so much progress on my pregnancy weight gain. :)

I don't think it will take us another year to get down for the next visit this time!

Pregnancy Symptoms and Recent Happenings

There are a few things that consistently happen to me when pregnant . . .

1. I can find no reason to watch how much I eat, because I'm about to grow anyway . . . so I always put on more in the beginning than necessary but it all evens out in the end.
2. My poor kids have a much less patient mother.
3. I feel more justified in taking my own nap time when the kids take theirs.

So for those who haven't heard, we are 6 weeks pregnant. I still feel good . . . I have a ravenous appetite at times, and some days I never really feel awake, but my stomach still generally feels settled! Let's hope that holds, you never can tell this early on. I seem to want meat more often than I did in any other pregnancy (which I can't remember ever craving) but I'm doing my best to still keep it "sparing." I also have not purchased a pre-natal vitamin yet, so I'm doing my best to take in lots of high nutrient and supplement items.

I'm doing my best to keep my home and the yoga studio in order. Our studio rent went up for April and March was our worst month . . . let's hope it will remain forever our worst month. There's a lady I met last week who has some checklist to help you attract the perfect customers . . . so I plan to get that and put some energy into it. I know I need to put some energy into my vision for the studio for the next 1-5 years . . . and how to get ourselves there. So far I've been going just a little bit at a time. I also heard it's good to have your calendar . . . workshops etc for 4-6 months out! I'm definately behind on that. It's tricky, so maybe by the time the new baby is born I'll have a hang of running the studio baby.

Here are a few more recent pics of the kids. The trampoline picture is Jayden and Joshua with their friends from next door. They are very cute when they play all together.