Friday Letters

Dear Children, you  have had to go through most of the week without me. You guys really are doing great everything considered. Dear Gilbert Temple, the first day I was able to get out of bed we drove the kids down to walk through the Temple. It was so worth it, absolutely beautiful. And creating memories for our family. Dear Church, this was the first time I've been able to go to church in a month. It felt so good to take the sacrament, even if I spent half the time laying on Will's shoulder with my eyes "watering" Dear Surgery, I am not a fan. Especially when the pain meds don't do anything and you have to figure out what in the world will help. It's been rough, oh so rough. Hopefully it will all be worth it and I can be myself again. Dear Hospital, I got so lucky. All of the staff was so nice and helpful and you put me in the biggest room on the OB floor so I was well taken care of. It was a little ironic to be right were I was six years ago having my last baby. Dear K, Thank You so very much for taking care of my kids while I was in the hospital. You were so willing and kind. I didn't have to worry about them the whole time because they love you so much right from the start. Are you sneaking them candy or something? They were so excited you would be staying with them. You have no idea how much you have helped me. Peace of mind is priceless. Dear B, Thank You for helping with my kids and bringing us dinner. I didn't even have to ask you. I didn't ask because you are seriously the service queen and I hate to make you more busy. But you did anyway. Love You! Dear Fam, thanks for coming to see me and making sure I was still alive after losing some body parts. You cheered me up. Dear Mom & Sis, thank you for coming 3 hours and staying the night just to help take care of me and my kids while I recover. It means so much to me and hopefully I will be able to recover more quickly. Dear Sis, I hope you had a wonderful Birthday. I still don't think it's fair that you look so young, are you ever going to age? Dear Little Sis, I wish I could be there for your Birthday and I could take you out to PF Changs and we could laugh and laugh together. Know that I love you! You might be getting older but you are also getting better. Dear Sherrie, I hope you have your sweet baby boy today and I'm hoping he has a full head of hair!You are in my prayers that everything goes perfectly. Dear Awkward, deciding to change into loose pj's for the 3 hr ride home after surgery in the parking lot. I was going to change IN the car, but my body wasn't so cooperative. So, behind the open door to the car really just seemed perfectly fine to me at the time. Pain can do funny things to you. Dear Willie, the way that you have loved and cared for me this week has meant the world to me. I was scared, but you were right next to me holding my hand the entire time, doing everything you could to help me. Once again having to help me pee. That is always just....awesome. I felt so much comfort just having you be there with me. And then coming home you just took care of all the kids and had to go right back to work the next morning. I love you William. Dear Self, I have made it through Jan. That was my goal. Now to heal and  move on. I expect this year to be the best and pain free. I've had to humble myself and ask for help from others not just the Lord. That is always a hard thing for me to do.

Friday Letter-s

this may look meaningless, but don't let it fool you. The old one kept falling down and hitting me in the head and making me furious. Every. Day. I am VERY happy to see this thing all shiny and staying where it is supposed to be.

Dear Children, it has been a long couple of weeks and you have survived it pretty well. You have made good friends with our new neighbors while I've been in bed, which seems to be a good thing. You have done your best to just make the best of it all. Dear Everything Else, there are so many things that happen, get squeezed in, worked out, fit in. I don't remember now. Dear Sis's, you came to my rescue when I needed you the most. Picking up prescriptions, when I am certain it was not convenient. To driving 3 hours with your children in tow to take care of me ALL night and all day long. Not just me but my kids too. It was a relief for them to have you here when I have been so useless. I really can't thank you enough. For real. And it's a perk when your sis is a CNA and she has to help you pee cause you know she has had to see and do much worse. Although...she's in the NICU now...great...well I LOVE you so so much for all that you did for me. It makes me cry I am so grateful. Dear Just so You Know, when I needed help I texted my sis, and she replied asking if I had become a drunkard. So I had Will read it and it was indeed drunkardness and unintelligible. So he called asked one if she could drop everything and run to the Dr. for a new script, which she did. And asked the other if she could get in her car and drive 3 hours straight here to take care of me because Will had to go out of town and I was in a bad way. They did this for me! It was no vacation, she even got my kids to clean. I am blessed that it fell on her day off of work, but she went home and had to work that night. I'm still a little fragile emotionally apparently. Because it makes me cry. Dear Life, you just keep on going on. Even when a mans down life goes on. And I have failed miserably this last couple of weeks at keeping up and getting the kids where they need to be. I admit they have skipped some things. Dear Janice, thankyou for setting up my Norwex party online for me. I can't do my in home party this month (for obvious reasons) but I am so excited about it. I have absolutely loved everything I have that is Norwex. And I save so much money on chemical free cleaner. We have asthma/allergies around here so this is the absolute best stuff I have found. I have so many favorites I can't live without any of them now. Here is a link if you want to know more. And this is just because I love it. www.janiceswilor.norwex.biz Remember to put me as your hostess with the mostess! (Camille Clark). Dear Friends, thank you all of you have been checking on me. Even though I try and keep most things under the wraps that are super hard for me. I do appreciate you. Dear Will, are there words for you. True, you had one grumpy morning and day and made me cry. And I said you were a MeanFace. But that has been overshadowed by all the wonderful selfless things you do for me and my kids. I know that right now there really isn't anything I can do for you, I can't even make you yummy food to fatten you up for heaven sake! What has my life come to! Even so I know that you have been trying so hard to do what you can. You work long hours and come home and have been taking care of me and then trying not to lose one of the seven kids running around. I admire this because I know that you have absolutely no. idea. what I am going through physically or emotionally, even though I try to explain it to you a million times, when you haven't felt extreme physical pain how do you imagine it? You get a back ache and take a Tylenol and I'm baffled. What I appreciate so much is that you are so lost on experience here, but you are giving so much of yourself to help me. I do love you more than you will ever know in this life. Dear Self, I should give myself a pep talk. I'm really not up for it today. Some days I can think positive and others I feel so useless. Some days I just know that with this, hopefully last, surgery life is going to change and be so different, I know I will be healed. And others I just want to cry. I won't lose my faith though. And when it gets low I beg the Lord for more. I know I am being shaped into the person that the Lord needs me to be, sometimes I feel like I am failing there, but I want to become the person He sees in me. And boy, do I have a long way to go.

Friday Letters

The only picture I took.

Dear Children, back to school. We had a great winter break and lots of fun with family. Only one of you had to take a spoon full of vinegar. Dear Family, I am so glad you came to visit. Thanks Dad for building a dresser into the closet for 4 kids for me. You are the best Dad. I was surprised the kids had such a hard time getting the fire to burn. Good thing wee had the Christmas tree. Sorry I spent most of the time being sick and not as fun as usual. The kids were so sad when you left. You better come back soon!! Dear Dr.'s, I've had to see too much of you. Dear Chiropractor, the only part I enjoyed was when I got the little muscle thingys put on my neck with a warm blanket. I could have stayed like that forever. Dear Sick, you can go now. Dear massage, I needed you. I could need you every day. But my head still hurts. Dear Will, when I was so sick and in pain and puking, you stayed with me took care of me. That meant so much to me. Thank you for being so good to me when I can't do as much for you. I'm thinking I will never let you get away. Love you long time. Dear Self, are there words? I'm not sure. I need my head to stop hurting, like about right now!

In beautiful ways

I had an...eventful...2013 And not always in good or happy ways. It was hard in lots of different ways with lots of different trials.

The last bit of the year was hard for me, but I kept on thinking as soon as the year is over it will just get better! Ha. I got sick, really sick, Christmas Eve and have been ever since. I’ve had so many health problems last year that this was just a huge blow to me. Remember it can always be worse.

It is so frustrating to not be able to do what I want to, to not just be able to get up and do the laundry and vacuum the room and scrub the floor when I feel like it. I can’t just run to the store or whip up some dinner.

 I haven’t been able to stand up without feeling like

 I just got hit in the back of the head with a metal baseball bat.

 It makes me Mad. It makes me Sad. I try and push my body to do what I want only to pay a bigger price.

There is a purpose. I know.

The hardest times of my life I can look back and say, but I learned and grew and gained things in myself that are priceless to me.

I have still been able to feel grateful every day for something. I am so lucky to have Will.

We have had so many happy times this year also.

 It can always be worse. But! It can always get better also.

So far this year sucks. But I just know that this year will be great. It will be better.

I’m a believer that you have to make a happy life. I keep thinking Choose Happy. I keep thinking, there are things that I need to be teaching my kids in this experience. I know God wants us to be happy. Learn? Yes. But He truly does want us to be happy. He wants us to find happiness.

I also believe in miracles and love and kindness…and lots of other things. I believe things will get better…on Gods timetable. And I trust Him. I still get discouraged, but I’m going to try and do better with that.

Today I came across these words and they are exactly what I believe. Exactly one of the things that I want my children to understand.

“God expects you not simply to face the future; He expects you to embrace and shape the future—to love it and rejoice in it and delight in your opportunities.”

 Jeffery R. Holland

There is so much joy to be found and shared, and your life should be embraced and lived fully. God wants you to capture that joy, and use it to build up the world in beautiful ways.

Friday Letters

Dear Children, we had a great end of the year, all things considered. Dear Flu, you made things very difficult and not fun for me this week. Ready for you to move on. We started a new year and you weren't invited. Dear New Years Eve, whew. I didn't know if I was going to make it. We managed to occupy 7 kids and survived well past midnight. Way too far past midnight. Dear Family, you have a house full of littles anxiously awaiting your arrival. We are so happy you are coming! Warning---the house is a disaster, half of it is buried in laundry and there are still bins out. Just pretend you don't see it and we can laugh and have fun. Dear Christmas Break, I am not ready for you to end, truthfully. I dream of a luxurious break, but I do love having my kids at home with me. It would have been better if I had felt well. Dear Kidney Stone, why can't I just pass them in a week or two? Mine just have to torture me as long as humanly possible before they try and kill me. please have mercy. Dear Other Broken Body Parts, I'm ready to just rip you out. The constant pain is so draining and so discouraging. Although it does make me grateful for every part of my body that happens to work properly. Dear Will, I loved ending one and beginning another year with you. We started it off right in the backyard looking at the stars, in the freezing cold, and watching our neighbor with a flashlight break into his own house and crawl through the window. Well, I hope it was the neighbor. He didn't seem to notice us watching and giggling at him. It seems like a burglar would. Dear Self, some days I have such high hopes for the new year. And then half way through the day I'm like nope it's all crap. I haven't decided yet if I can stick to just one way yet. Let me get my hopes and dreams settled and then add reality to that and see how it goes. At this moment I say it will be the best year yet. Just don't ask me in an hour.

What a wonderful

Thought it is

That some of the

Best days of our

Lives haven’t

Happened yet