Friday Fragments – Vol 4

If you were here reading Friday Fragments two weeks ago, you know that I ran a Ragnar Relay. If you want to know how that turned out, I wrote about it when I got home. I feel like Heavenly Father wanted to teach me some things,

and He did.

On the wall next to my bathroom mirror, I hang quotes. It is like my little corner of reminders for how I need to live my life. I recently put this quote about refined speech up there, and I am going to add these five things from an old talk by President James E Faust that Stephanie shared today. Do you have a place in your home where you hang quotes? Reminders? (I have a few above my kitchen sink, too – one is simply a picture of a mountain that says “Faith to move mountains” and the other is a quote about motherhood and needing to spend more time with my children).

If you read our family blog (if you don’t and you want to, just email me at mysouldelighteth (at) gmail and I’ll send you an invite) you know that a while ago, things were rough for our family. Details will remain private, but back in May, I wrote this post on our family blog:

“hope ya know, we had a hard time:

“…many of the trials and hardships we encounter in life are severe and appear to have lasting consequences. Each of us will experience some of these during the vicissitudes of life.” (Elder Quentin L. Cook)

We’re experiencing a little bit of this right now and could use some extra prayers.”

Well, it has been nearly six months since things got really bad, and things are really better now! My friend who has been living with us commented to me that I don’t seem as anxious (me + the kind of stress we had = anxiety … bad, bad, bad anxiety). I feel less anxious, and I feel a lot more like myself! I have been getting things done, I have been playing with the kids, I have been nicer to the kids (I am ashamed to say that I have been a really rotten mom for the past year or so… like I said, I get anxious when I am dealing with the kind of stress that was going on). I am just really grateful to Heavenly Father for 1.) helping me endure the hard times, and 2.) softening hearts so that there could be a change and things could get better. I know we still have a little ways to go, but I feel as if we have burst free from the trial that had been holding us back.

 

I wish I could write more about our family here on this blog, but for now, we have to keep a relatively low public profile. I should probably have a pseudonym, but I really don’t like being anonymous – I like being real. I will continue to use my children’s initials to talk about them, and I don’t mind mentioning the general area where we live, but I’ll try to steer away from talking about the city we live in, etc. If you do want to get to know our family on a more personal level, you are welcome to send me an email at mysouldelighteth (at) gmail and I will send you an invitation to view our family blog. You can also learn more about my kids over at Child’s Play (my “preschool” blog – I don’t post there very often, but you can at least get to meet my kids a little). I like to keep things relatively separated – I also have a gardening blog, which I haven’t posted on for a while, but I’ve got new plans for that one. The blog that will hopefully evolve into a money making blog is Math Savers (I got my degree in Math with a minor in Physics and I dream of someday teaching high school, but until then I content myself with tutoring occasionally, and writing posts for Math Savers). Now that I am struggling less with that anxiety, I will probably start writing more on all of these blogs (especially the math one).

I just watched this Mormon Messages video today with V (my 4 year old). He loved it, and so did I. I think it was really well done, and I love the little animation, the videography. Basically the whole thing was excellent. And the man’s testimony (I can’t remember his name) was powerful.

Read some more Five For Friday posts over here.