Our Personal Pavilions.

The first Sunday of November I taught the Young Women in our ward.  I shared with them some lessons that I've been learning as of late.  The main point I wanted to get across was that although it may not be obvious to us, we sometimes unintentionally build walls around our hearts that keep us from God.  Then suddenly we'll find ourselves feeling alone and hopeless and wonder where God is.  President Eyring (in the First Presidency in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints) sheds light on this predicament...

Last month I thought things were fine...I was at least keeping busy.  It wasn't until one day when something happened that I fell to my knees and sobbed to my Heavenly Father...muttering that I couldn't do it anymore and that my best efforts had failed me.  I felt like my little world had come crashing down.  Although I tend to overreact and get emotional about things (especially during pregnancy), in a way things had fallen apart, and that was OK because it brought me to my knees...and brought me finally to the Lord.  As I prayed my humiliation turned to humility.  I felt the Lord's love for me.  I felt that with His help, IF I continued to turn to Him, I could pick up the pieces and make something better than was before.  For honestly the first time in my life I really felt a connection with the phrase "a broken heart and contrite spirit."

Sometimes when we're busy or hurting or feeling hopeless we turn to things of the world to numb us and to help us forget reality.  We all turn to different things.  For me it's often Pinterest and Facebook, or food.  But I'm starting to recognize that these things are just bandaids that can never fill the holes or heal our hearts. Instead they create walls, a pavilion of sorts, and cause our hearts to harden.

Like it says in the scriptures (Alma 32:16, James 4:10), we can either humble ourselves or BE humbled.      In any case, the Lord can help us break down those walls.   He can give us a "new" heart (Ezekial 36:26).  The wonderful thing is that it's a soft heart, that stays close to the Lord, that is blessed by the fruits of His spirit...

In the end we may fool our families, our friends, or even ourselves if we just go through the motions of life, but we can't fool the Lord.  He sees our heart (1 Samuel 16:7).  If He were to look at our hearts today what would He see?  No matter what the Lord sees, He LOVES us and desires to help make us whole...to heal us...and to help us find happiness.  No matter what pavilions we have built, we can choose to turn to Him instead!

Doctrine & Covenants 6: 36 ^aLook unto me [the Lord] in every ^bthought; ^cdoubt not, fear not.

(a Personal Progress challenge I left with the young women and leaders.)

Tucked in with Food Storage.

Ever since we moved here to St. Louis we've been talking a lot about being frugal, self-sufficient and prepared.  For years wise prophets have asked us to build up a food storage so that we're prepared and  needn't fear when hard times come our way.  Finally this year we made a game plan to make this happen.  For the last six months or so we've budgeted $25 towards food storage.  As I make my weekly rounds at Aldi I try to get 2 of all the non-perishable items, especially if they're on sale.  So if I'm getting bran flakes, brown sugar, peanut butter, tuna and fruit cocktail that week...I throw in another of each for my food storage.  I do this each week until I've hit my budget.  When I do, I start again the next month.  When I get home I take a permanent marker and in large print write the expiration month and year on the front.  Then I enter each item into an excel spreadsheet.  I really feel like in this case knowledge is power, and order helps things to run smoothly.  With a few clicks I can know exactly what food items need to be rotated, how many canned veggies we have, what kinds of protein we've got on hand, etc.

Our latest project, thanks to Mom & Dad, was getting shelves to put next to our bed to store all the food.  (We couldn't think of a good place to put it where it'd be out of the kids reach and my Mom had this idea!)  It's a little funny to walk in a see us surrounded by food, but at least we're seeking to follow the prophet and to be prepared.  And hey, maybe it'll come in handy sometime for an easy midnight snack ;0)

Our next goal is to order the "non-persihable" items in a dehydrated form---powdered milk, cheese, butter, etc.--and to bulk up our grains supply (rice, wheat, corn, etc.).  Little by little it's coming together.  After all, "by small and simple things are great things brought to pass (Alma 37:6)".

Pumpkin Pie Spice.

As I've mentioned, Alex LOVES to get into EVERYTHING!  Well the other day I was sitting at the computer (my first mistake) sending an email.  Alex ran into the kitchen, but I thought to myself "everything is out of his reach" (second mistake).  I proceed to hear an odd metal sound coming from his direction, but figured it wasn't a big deal (third mistake).  Suddenly it dawns on me that he's in the spice drawer and that the metal sound is him squeezing one of the spice tins and emptying out its' contents.  I RAN in and sure enough...there was Alex at the spice drawer, with the Pumpkin Pie Spice in hand.  Not only was the drawer COVERED in the brownish-red powder, but so was Alex.  I cleaned him up a bit (to make sure the spice wouldn't get in his eyes...and so his jammies wouldn't get stained) and grabbed the camera.

 Here's our guilty little man saying, "cheese!"

 I grabbed the vacuum to clean up the mess...and Alex grabbed his.  How responsible ;0) Here's a zoomed in shot so you can see the residue.  Oh Alex.  You sure keep me on my toes!

Our little Peter Pan & Tinkerbell.

 Before Thanksgiving is here I wanted to finishing documenting Halloween this year.  The Monday before Laura & her kiddos came over to do a "Halloween" dinner together (since Jon was interviewing out of town and Bry had a late class).  Halloween night, Alaa and her girls came over for our traditional Halloween dinner (Mummy Dogs, Witch Chips & Ghastly Guacamole, Frightening Fingers, Sorcière Sweets and Boo Juice) then Layan came trick-or-treating around the complex with us (and Azhar & her boys).  It was fun to see the kids having fun, even in the COLD.  We pushed Alex around in our green umbrella stroller and set his Peter Pan hat on his head at each door...otherwise he looked like a blue marshmallow (thanks to his winter coat) wearing a green dress ;0).  At each door we'd ask him to say "boo."  As we rounded the complex to finish the night off he was slumped in the stroller, tiredly dragging his plastic pumpkin along.

I love this picture because of the distinct shadow in the back...

apparently Peter Pan's shadow was attached at this point ;0)

 our Peter Pan.

 The kids were good sports to suck their lollipops and pose for these few shots.  It was FREEZING the morning we took these...hence Tink cuddling up to her little Peter Pan :0)

Our Tinkerbell.