I want to wish a very Happy Mother's Day to all of the women in my life....I think this quote says it beautifully how I feel about all of you!.


"I wonder if you sisters fully understand the greatness of your gifts and talents and how all of you can achieve the “highest place of honor” in the Church and in the world. One of your unique, precious, and sublime gifts is your femininity, with its natural grace, goodness, and divinity. Femininity is not just lipstick, stylish hairdos, and trendy clothes. It is the divine adornment of humanity. It finds expression in your qualities of your capacity to love, your spirituality, delicacy, radiance, sensitivity, creativity, charm, graciousness, gentleness, dignity, and quiet strength. It is manifest differently in each girl or woman, but each of you possesses it."
~James E. Faust

Life is just zooming past me so fast that sometimes I think I can actually hear this whooshing sound in my ears.

How many times have I caught myself saying "It seems like just yesterday that...." and then an unlimited combination of words finish the sentence. It seems like just yesterday that I was in high school. It seems like just yesterday that I was bringing my baby home from the hospital. And after making these statements, I pause and look around at my children or I look in the mirror at my aging face and quickly realize that it wasn't "just yesterday" but that several yesterdays have gone by since those events occurred.

A couple of things that happened recently have driven this point home for me.

Yesterday I went to lunch with a dear friend of many years. In just a split second, as we paused in our conversation, all the years I have known her and all the experiences we have shared flashed through my mind. I thought to myself, "Where has all that time gone? It seems like just yesterday (here I go again) that we were just meeting and getting to know each other."

After we hugged goodbye, I walked to my car and heard someone whistle the, whoot whoo, kind of whistle. Too embarrassed to look up to see if it was meant for me, (but having a feeling it was since I was the only other person in the parking lot) I continued on to my car. Once safely inside, I raised my eyes to get a glance of the (sure to be) handsome young man who had made the noise when much to my horror, saw a man who looked to be in his mid 40's still looking in my direction.

My first reaction was, "Ewww gross! Gag me!" and then reality hit once again and I realized that I am much closer to this man's age than of the young man whom I had envisioned was the whistler.

Seriously, how does time get away like that?

I don't like the feeling that I have lost time. I don't like missing out on anything. And it is obvious that time certainly isn't going to slow down for me, so I have decided that I need to do more to pay attention to and enjoy what is happening around me. I want to try and savor as much of the little moments in life as I can. Maybe if I do that, time won't seem to flash before my eyes.

I am going to try to learn to make the most of each moment each day- to notice more of the little things that make my life as wonderful and frustrating, as comical and exciting, as exhaustive and rewarding as it is every day. Because it is the little things that make life what it is. Life shouldn't be just about the big events that happen- the ones that we mark our calendars by and include in our family Christmas letters each year.

I have decided that it's not what's in the years, but it's what's in the minutes that matter the most.

It seems as if lately, I am often looking for the easy way to do things or that I am choosing to do things that cause me the least amount of work. I have heard it said that it takes more muscles to frown than to smile (I believe that in all actuality it is only one more muscle, but hey, one more is still more!). Perhaps this is why I choose to focus on the things that make me smile!

Here are some things that have helped me to use my smiley muscles today.

The funny things that come out of Ian's mouth. My favorite today was: "Mom, I don't like my cheeks." I don't know where he comes up with these things! A 4 year old who doesn't like his cheeks?

Leftovers for lunch. I love being able to open the refrigerator and pull something yummy out of it that is already prepared!

Finishing my scholarship application. Those things are a lot of work!

My clean bathroom!

The smell of dinner cooking in my slow cooker and the fact that when dinner time comes around, I already know what we are having!

Having time to sit and read my favorite blogs today. It is one of those pleasures in life that I don't have enough time to do as often as I would like to.

Thinking about my mother's day gift to my mom.

Empty laundry baskets.

Waking up to sunshine filling my room!

The fact that Nicole still wants to say prayers with me before she goes off to school.

How excited Ian was when he found his black spider man! It was so cute! It has been missing for weeks and he has never forgotten him. He woke up this morning and decided he was going to search our toy box down in the "scary" basement. I could hear him down there humming the spider man theme song the whole time he was rummaging around in the big red box. About 30 minutes later, he came running up the stairs screaming I found him!, I found him! It made me smile.

So many things can bring us happiness if we just take a minute to realize what a gift they are!

Keep smiling!

What a week- I love taking time to look back and find all the blessings in my life!

I love all my new marvelous friends that I have made throughout this past semester. I couldn't have survived without them! By the way, I got two marvelous "A's" on my finals!

I attended a marvelous graduation party for an amazing friend who received his PhD! It was the funnest, most entertaining, most emotional and enjoyable party I have ever been to! Marvelous food too! Oh, and Erik and I won a Target gift card! How marvelous is that?!

The sunshine this weekend was marvelous! And the lack of wind! Yes!

Spending the day with Nicole on a girls day out was marvelous! We shopped, we saw Maid of Honor, we got a Jamba Juice, we attended a dance company performance at Cyprus High School, and we even grocery shopped together! So much fun to have one of the sweetest girls I know all to myself for the day!

The unending support of my husband is marvelous! I was stressed for about 4 days waiting for my final grades and he kept reassuring me that everything was going to be ok. He always knows what to say and I am so thankful for him.

The new flip flops at Old Navy are just marv! I cannot wear regular flip flops- anything between my toes just about sends me for a loop. But for some reason the criss cross with the extra strap kind of flip flops don't bother me a bit! Finally, I can wear these next to nothing little shoes that offer no arch support and are probably bad for you to wear- but hey, they are stinkin' cute!

Today is Cinco de Mayo and Mexican food just happens to be one of my favorites! I think it is marvelous to have holidays that feature my favorite foods! Yum!

Ok, that's enough for today. I hope that marvelous things are in store this week for all of us!