It's A Wonderful Life

Just to preface, I wish I was a better writer. These situations today were pretty profound but I just don't know how to do them justice. I wish you could have been there to see it. Today was a day to watch the hand of God at work. We took the children to Temple Square in Downtown Salt Lake City. It was important to us to have Scott have a spiritual experience and hopefully find someone that spoke Mandarin that could communicate with him about God. Most children from China don't know that a God even exists so we weren't sure how to help Scott understand. The very first thing we did was go see the Christus statue. There is a recording of many of the things Christ said like, "Come unto me, In my house are many mansions" and so forth. There is a strong feeling of peace and love in the room with the Christus. Some missionaries played the Mandarin version and then the English for the rest of the kids. I wasn't sure how much of it Scott was understanding but in ...

  You want to take a guess why this picture is so AWESOME?   No?  Ok, I'll tell you then.   Those red flip flops are Scott's. Sitting right out in the family room with two other pair of shoes that don't belong there. Why in the world would I think that is awesome? Well, this is the first time that Scott has left anything out of his possession or out of it's proper place. He walked off to bed tonight and left his shoes out!!!   This means that he is feeling safer and more at home. Beyond awesome!!   Since I already broke my rule of no two posts a day I might as well post more pictures of a boy that is transforming before our very eyes..     Tyler, Scott's oldest brother, so cool to say Scott has a brother, is in the production The Scarlet Pimpernel. We took all the older kids that wanted to go and met Ressa and Jason there. Scott chose to sit by Jason, he loves older males. Scott LOVED the play....

As moms we all have moments that remind us of why we do what we do. Why we give up our lives for our children and for the most part love it. Today I had one of those moments. Actually a few of those moments today. I wanted to make bread for lunch and bring a loaf to some friends. I was in the middle of the process when Olivia showed signs of emotional distress. I kind of felt if coming but today I saw it clearly. (I don't say any of this to reveal Olivia's story but I have decided more openness is in order.) I was sitting at the computer while I waited for the next step in the bread making process. I called Olivia over. She didn't move. That is not like Olivia, she obeys quickly most of the time. I could see in her eyes that she couldn't do it. She couldn't emotionally bridge that gap between us. I tried to coax her over as thoughts of going to her crossed my mind. Immediately I knew I needed to stay put and have her come to me. She HAD to trust me. I said "...

Today Gideon was hiding from me in the corner of the couch and wall. I decided to play along and hide from him so I laid on the couch so he couldn't see me. The next thing I knew children were piling on. Gideon joined in on the fun and climbed on my back. This interaction then took place. Bria, "Mom you're a Butt" Pierce, "Mom Bria just called you a Butt." said as he is laughing his head off. Time for some narration here. We DON'T use the word Butt in our home. I was raised that it was a bad word and though I know it really isn't that bad I just can't bring myself to say it nor do I allow my children to say it either. Now on to the rest of the story. Mom, "You just called me what?" Pierce, "A Butt" still laughing. It dawns on me that Bria is pretending. Mom."Oh, you mean a boat?" like in Finding Nemo. Pierce, "No, a Butt" Mom, "Wait, a Bus." Bria climbs down and comes over...

Well, Doug, Creed, Pierce, and Scott made it home safe and sound. Doug kept telling me he was going to post and catch up but he has been so busy trying to catch up with the other parts of life posting has not happened. So here I am. I will fill in the part since they came home and encourage Doug to do the rest. The boys were scheduled to come home at 12:10am Wednesday night. I got a call at 6:00pm from Doug telling me that their flight was delayed an hour. The ticketing agent offered for them to go standby on the next flight that left at 6:30pm if there was room. Doug had checked on that option and was told it would cost $170 to change flights but because their flight was delayed they could try to get on for free. At the gate the agent let them know that there were about 20 people in line for the available seats but they didn't know how many they would get on board. Just a few minutes later Doug and the boys names were called to board the plane. Someone must have liked them beca...