Missing Home

     Today I am missing being home!  Cooking, cleaning, and just enjoying my home, being a home maker and a Mom!  I have been working full time for 10 1/2 months now and dont get me wrong, I mean, I love my job!  I work for great people in a very friendly doctors office.  I love all of our patients and they seem to like me too:)  I mean what's there not to like about that?  However, maybe it's just the time of year it is once again.  I want to be home baking, cooking and cleaning.  Truly, I miss it!  I miss being home when the kids leave for school and just taking my time to look around the house to see what needs to be done.  I miss sitting in my spotless kitchen all newly cleaned and shiny.  Then going shopping for whatever I might need that day. Coming home and eating lunch in front of the TV.  I miss baking cookies right before the kids get home from school!  I miss looking for a new recipe to try and just the smell of home baked goods from my own hands.  I mss being a stay at home Mom! 

     I am thankful for all the years I did get to be a stay at home Mom.  Although looking back now, there are many things I have come to appreciate and wished I had done with my time.  But most importantly is that I was there at all the cross roads with my kids. I guess that is all that really matters. But, now I want to be home to do all of those motherly domestic things that I stressed over all those years.  I just miss home.

"Still Missing being a Stay at Home Mom"

Bruschetta

     Lately it seems that everyone is bringing in garden tomatoes!  And I love it!  On Friday's we like to have a little snack at work and so today I decided to make some Bruschetta!  And boy is it yummy!

4 large garden tomatoes
4 cloves garlic finely chopped
4-5 fresh basil leaves finely chopped
Olive oil to taste
Salt and Pepper to taste

Mix it up and eat with triscuits or bagetts sliced and lightly baked.

Love this stuff!  Enjoy!

"Still trying new recipes"!

HABLA ESPANOL?

     So, this year my youngest son Bryce, started 9th grade.  In California he would be starting High School but here in Utah he is still in middle school.  However, he is still a freshman.  And this year he is taking his first language class.  All of my boys have taken spanish in high school now and of course My Man knows spanish from his mission in Argentina.  I have always said that one day I am going to learn the language too especially since it is part of my heritage being half Mexican and all:) 

    So, yesterday I did it!  I signed myself up for a beginning Spanish class.  I took a class in high school but then dropped out of it.  So, this is finally my chance!  I am excited.  Mike is excited , my kids are excited.  A friend of mine suggested that we assign one room in our house for speaking spanish only.  I think that is a great idea.  So, we'll see how it goes.  The class starts on September 20th. So, wish me luck! I'm nervous:)

"Still learning new things"!

Fresh Salsa

     
     The other day at work Gina brought in a bunch of homegrown tomatoes from her garden and so I took them home because I am the kind of person who can not say NO to homegrown tomatoes. However, I knew that I could not eat them all before they went bad. So, I decided to make this yummy fresh salsa!

5 Fresh Garden Tomatoes
1/2 bunch of cilantro chopped
1/2 white or yellow onion chopped
1-2 cloves of garlic chopped
2 limes - juice o nly
salt and pepper to taste

So, that is it!  Man oh Man there is nothing like some Fresh Salsa!!

"Still making fresh salsa"!

Falling to Heaven

I strongly recommend this fantastic book!  Falling to Heaven, The surprising path to Happiness. It was given to me by a friend for my birthday.  I had read one other book by this author who is James L. Ferrell.  The book is called The Peacegiver.  The Peacegiver gives you quite the insight into a deeper committment and perspective on marriage, pure love and service to one another.  It is fantastic!  You might have heard of it or read it yourself.  It is another fantastic book!  That was about 3 or 4 years ago.  After reading it I atteneded a Time out for Women Conference in Sacramento James Ferrell was one of the speakers there.  He spoke about how "Up is Down and Down is Up if Down is before the Lord".  I found this concept very intriguing.  I wondered if he had written another book regarding this concept and looked and looked but never found one.  Then this year one of my best friends gives me this book and so I started reading it and after the first few pages I had to look at who the author was before I realized this was exactly the book I had hoped he would write.  The friend who gave it to me had not read it and so I told her about it and she went out and bought herself a copy too and we read it at the same time.

I love this kind of stuff! These are the kind of books I feel are worth reading.  I am not a big reader especially where novels and fiction are involved.  I just cant get into them. . But!  This kind of book is right up my alley.  A good book that I can learn from. A book that makes you take a deeper look at what is true, what is real and what is important in life.  A book that helps you explore where your priorities lie.  The greatest concept that I gleamed from reading this book is this,  until we learn to humble ourselves in all aspects of our lives, we will never really know the Lord or feel deserving of his grace.  We are all so very blessed through the atonement and we are all equally deserving in his eyes!  Falling to Heaven is the only way to real happiness. Read it!  It is fantastic! 

"Still reading good books"!

Raising kids, it's good therapy!

Okay, have you ever noticed that raising kids is like going through therapy?  I've been thinking about this alot lately. It seems that when the kids were young I constantly thought about how I reacted so much like one or the other of my parents in each situation that I handled and it forced me to make conscious choices and to set goals about how I would do things differently with them.  I learned so much about children and about what shapes their character and who they become.  I also learned that each of my children had such different personalities and abilities and gifts and that so much of who they turned out to be would depend on what we did with each of these characteristics.  I learned so much about myself and what kind of child I was and what had shaped me.

Now that my children are so much older and they are growing into adults, it's happening again.  It is so therapeutic for me.  I dont know why.  Probably because I am able to advise them on how to handle their choices better than I did.  My kids are so much more wise and on the ball than I was at their ages.  Yet I can see myself in each one of them.  It is so satisfying as we analyze together each situation and I feel this weight lifted from the "what ifs" of my past life.  And I am blessed with the vision of the "whys" and "why nots".  It is very freeing and awesome to see so clearly now what the Lord really had in store for me all along. 

I love my kids more than anything in this world.  They are everything I dreamed they would be and more.  They inspire me to be a better person.  I am so blessed to have been chosen to be their mother.  What an awesome privilege!  The Lord's plan is so perfect and all encompassing. 


"Still learning about myself"!

Nelson = Hopeless Romantic

So, lately I've been dealing with some matters of the heart with one of my children.  It has taken me back to those days and I've been doing a lot of reminising of past relationships I had when I was his age.  But what is funny is that as I look at each of my children and at My Man and I, I can see so clearly what a bunch of Hopeless Romatics we all are. 

My Man cracks me up because he will preach and preach to the kids about dating and not getting caught up in one person too soon. Which is great advice.  But, when it comes right down to it, he is the first person to fall in love with any of the kids' "love interests" that they might bring home.  He said to me not too long ago after one of our sons ended a relationship that he was in, "Honey, I dont think he should bring anymore girls home to meet us, because this is too hard".  I totally got him!  I really did.  That's the sad truth about it all.  Even Michael said to me the other day, "I swear I cant help it, I take after you and Dad, I'm so impatient I cant wait to fall in love".

Well, it's so true.  Nelson = Hopeless Romantic.  I do love that about my boys though.  They will each make wonderful husbands because they love with all their hearts and so very deeply.  My Man and I fell in love so quickly and we couldn't wait to be together forever.  We preach to the boys to be patient and not to rush things but then when you look at us, after 3 dates we knew we were hooked and there was no turning back!

 I have to admitt it is a bit heart wrenching going thru the process of watching our oldest date and break up and learn and grow as he is seeking to find that special someone whom he will spend the rest of his life with.  Hopefully he will soon find that special someone and my heart can take a break!  Love sure can be a roller coaster ride!

"Still a hopeless romantic"!