The thing about new years resolutions is I feel I'm setting myself up for failure. Last year I thought I had some pretty weighty - yet attainable - goals. Aw who am I kidding? I've NEVER kept a SINGLE new years goal I've set for myself.
My dad made us make goals when we were little and so from a young age I've proven to be a failure in the goal-keeping department.
That doesn't mean I don't try.
But this year will be different. Oh, don't you worry, I'm not setting myself up for failure this year. No Way! This year I'm not making any hefty goals. I'm making one. One goal that I KNOW I can keep.
....drumroll....

This year I am going to try harder.

That's it. I'll try a little harder at reading my scriptures. I'm going to try harder at fitting into my skinny clothes (which I'm getting there already - ahem, 6 pounds and 6.75 inches in 2 weeks). I'm going to try harder at being a great wife and mother.
I read a blog post (located on my piterest board under 'parenting made easy') recently from a woman who started to belittle herself while walking her son to the bus stop. It was the first time she had done it in ages and at first she gave herself a pat on the back but then the negative thoughts started flooding in. Thoughts such as, "Who are you kidding? One time in months? You're a horrible mother!" After the barrage of negativity she pushed the thoughts away and thought something like, "Yes, but you did it today. And THAT is a drop of awesomeness in your bucket." And then she picked up a marker that was on the floor instead of stepping over it for the umpteenth time - drop of awesomeness. She kept doing those little things (a piece of fruit with her daughter's lunch, running a load of laundry, wiping the counters, etc...) and kept adding to her little bucket of aweesomeness. Well, turns out there's more to this spiritually.
She teaches the young women at her church and asked them to use the medicine dropper to put in drops of awesomeness (water) into a bucket on the table and to get it to fill up. By the end of the lesson, the girls had been coming up with all kinds of awesome things they had done that week but didn't get anywhere close to the top of the bucket. That's where her pitcher of water came into play. She dumped it into the bucket, causing it to overflow (she had the bucket inside a large bowl) and explained that it was Christ filling the bucket for them. He picks up our slack. :) I LOVED that.
So. This year's resolution is to try harder to fill my bucket of awesomeness. And then I'll let Christ fill it the rest of the way up and we can be a team!

On that note, it's time for me to wake up the munchkins and get them ready for school.
Have a wonderful week!

Christmas in the Royal House

This year we got an elf assigned to our family from Santa. Her name is Trixie. The first day she came, the girls were quick to point out that she needed a skirt. So I went downstairs and whipped that little number up for her and set it on the window next to her.

 

 

We left for the afternoon and came home to find her attempting to make another skirt. She sure did make a mess of my sewing area. I knew from that moment on that we needed to learn patience a little more since she didn't clean up after herself.

(She had already moved on when I took this picture.)

 

 

She was a very mischievous elf.

She baked cookies.

 

 

She went on a date with Ken.

 

She undecorated our Christmas tree.

 

She decorated a smaller tree isntead.

She had a marshmallow roast over a candle.

 

Some other things she did was clean up the girls' room and hide in their stuffed animals, go for a joy ride on the tricycle, stacked the kitchen chairs, turned our milk green (the kids were convinced they would receive some of her magical powers if they drank the green milk).

It was a lot of fun for the kids and for Popeye and myself.

 

The next few pics are of the kids before their Christmas concert.

 

 

Their performances were fun to watch AND listen to.

 

We had a wonderful Christmas this year! Our family was sponsored by Toys for Tots again this year so what was going to be a rather meager Christmas turned out to be a fun morning. Popeye bought me a new beater for my kitchenAid - it has a built-in scraper on it (LOVE!). He also bought me my first gun - a .22 rifle. I can't wait to go shoot it. He took it to work that night and cleaned it for me.

I ended up getting Popeye a bike trainer and a new stereo for his jeep. He was really wanting a new puppy, but I couldn't bring myself to go down a puppy-training trail.

It was a fun, quiet Christmas spent performing random acts of kindness to strangers. we were trying to do as our Savior did and bring people closer to Him through our actions.

I hope you all had a wonderful Christmas and I pray that 2013 will bring us all some excitement and peace and happiness!