February

Goal Updates
1. Prayer as a couple
I have really enjoyed this time together. I am so grateful for the power of prayer. I know that this will continue to be a good habit for us. I am so grateful for Michael.  He really is such and amazing man.  He has so much patience and love for me.  As our family is growing up he amazes me with all that he does for us.  I am lucky he is mine for forever.

2. Speak softer with my kids. I think this goal will be a forever goal for me.  Although I am improving and I don't feel that I am a horrible screamer; I am so sarcastic!! It is awful of me and a horrible habit I am trying desperately to break.  I am get so frustrated at myself I especially have a hard time talking to Seth and I need to stop it! I am going to push my sweet boy away and he won't even want to talk to me if I am not careful. So I am setting new goals for my kids.

Seth~ he is growing into an amazing Young man.  he sometimes intimidates me and I am not quite sure I know how to be his mother.  I am really going to try to work on things with him by saying positive things to him each day.  Because he is the oldest I know that he can often feel like I am always correcting his behavior. I want him to feel positive things also.

Sydney~ I am so surprised by her ability to just take life has it comes.  Syd can be sensitive and sometimes cry at the most random time about the silliest of things but she is also the most easy going kid I have.  I just love this about her.  I am so grateful for her ability as an amazing big sister her imagination has taught us all how to play!  I love that my girls can play together for hours usually with minimal fighting and this is all because Sydney is just so good with all of her siblings.  She knows how to include everyone and I know that this makes her such a great friend. I want to have you and me time with her.  Time a couple times a week to color and talk.  She hurt her wrist rollerblading downstairs so I took her in to get it checked out.  It was so fun to have an hour with her and talk about school the friends she is making.  I realized and need more time like this.  I am hoping to make it more consistent one on one time.

Chloe~ Our little Chloe is such a sweet heart. She has had the most challenge with school so far (I am afraid that she seems to be the one who learns the most like me. )  I am hoping that I can still help her be excited for learning.  Mike and I have talked about the different ways we can help her.  We are going to do You and Me time.  20 mins each evening with her so that she can read with us for at lest part of the time and work on her letters.  I know that this will help her so much it can be challenging to be consistent so my goal is at least 3 times a week hopefully more.

Claire~  We have been working on reverence with claire.  If she can't be reverent during prayer of Scripture time she has to sit in the reverent chair and practice being reverent.  I put the timer on for  1 1/2 mins. It has helped so much she has improved greatly over the last few weeks.  Now we need to work on bedtime. We need to work on our night time routine and hoping for a smoother evening as
well as morning.  She is such a stink and will talk, talk, talk, to Syd and wiggle and kick the wall!  I hoping to use the reverence idea for bedtime to help her stay still long enough to go to sleep.

Samuel~ Our baby is growing up! He started walking a week before his birthday and is getting stronger and braver each day.  He is so Strong and can get into everything.  He currents loves are the Toilet YUCK!! Llama Llama books, Sydney, Daddy and occasionally Mom. He is so busy and reminds us often of Seth when he was a baby. We all adore him. We are currently working on sleeping thorough the night again!  Mike tells me that I get up too quickly to help him so I am trying to let him fuss more and hoping for a more consistent sleep. We have tried switching him over to whole milk but he didn't seem to tolerate it. So we will keep him on formula for another month and will try again.

Kids Goals
Seth: Say positive things each day
Syd: You and Me Time 2 X's a week
Chloe: you and me time 3-5X's a week (with mike)
Claire:  Bedtime routine
Sam: sleeping thorough the night/ Let him fuss it out

3. Exercise and have healthy eating habits.  It can be amazing how easy life can get busy and make it hard. This will always be a battle I am sure.  I miss a few days last week so I am going to be better this week.
4. Journal I have enjoyed blogging again. I am planing on starting a scripture journal as well but do not want to overwhelm myself so I will continue to work toward this but for now have this blog continue to be my journal.



Family Update:

Sam turned 1!! I can not believe my baby is 1!  I am so grateful for this boy.  He has taught me so much.  While pregnant with him I was able to have such a great experience. I was in so much pain with Claire it was such a long pregnancy but with Sam my uncomfortableness, although present was at a minimal.  I was about to enjoy the amazing ability that my body was growing baby! I just loved it! Something that I never really enjoyed before.  We had a wonderful birthday celebration Mamaw and Papa Eaton, Sandra and her kids were able to come up for Sam's birthday!  We also Celebrated Claire Dixie's birthday with a fabulous Owl birthday party. at her party after her presents she said Oh This is the best Owl party ever!  It was a lot of fun. (I will need to add pictures of Claire's Owl party when I find them)

 Lake Michigan With our Visitors

 We went and saw the lake with Mom it was sooo neat the lake had huge chunks of ice floating in it it was incredible.

We went back on February 7th and we had gotten more snow it was so frozen the water wasn't moving anymore it was COLD!

Ice skating with Papa 

Birthday Boy!
Sammy got a Dump truck which he loves to push around.  It was great to have the Eaton's and Sandra and her kids in town for a few days we love having visitors.  We are excited to be heading down to Tn at the end of the Month.  The kids have a Mid winter break the last weekend in February.  It will be nice to go back and visit.  Mike and I plan on attending the temple while we are there. We are 2 hours away form the detroit and Chicago temples but it will be hard to go for a day trip with our kids being so young. Attending when we are visiting Tn seems like the best option.

I really felt that the spirt was teaching me things while I was pregnant with Sam that I hadn't learned  my mothering journey just yet and I haven't recorded them so I thought I would. remember laying down and asking my Heavenly Father if this was my last baby. Something that I wan't sure about I knew that mike was ready for it to be the last little one but I also knew that he would be ok if I felt we needed to have another.  I was just laying there rubbing my belly and I had the amazing sense of wonder. Its like I saw small glimpses of our life, of our children growing up.  I knew it was the right time to be done with babies.  I sadness was there also because I have a confidence in the baby stage I know how to do it.  It's this new stage of preteen I am not so sure about.  But I knew that my older kids need me now.  They have been amazingly self reliant something I have needed while I have been growing a babies.  They can get up get ready, make lunches, do chores all by themselves.  I have many friends that talk about how needy there kids are and I am feel like they don't need be sometimes. While I was pregnant with Sam I was feeling a disconnect with Seth and Sydney and I knew that it was time to not be so busy with babies that I couldn't be the Mom they would need.  While I will miss the baby stage I needed this clear confirmation that it was ok with me to move on to the next stage. Although I am terrified.

After Sam was born I have never felt so close with Michael.  I guess after 4 babies he learned somethings!  I feel again that part of this closeness was the spirit witnessing to me again that our eternal family was complete. That this was the plan from the beginning that these sweet spirits were mine from the beginning!  I felt an overwhelming joy for the plan of Salvation for the knowledge that our family can be together forever! It's like I fell in love with Michael all over again I remember the spirt speaking to my heart while we were dating I have never doubted that he was the man that I should be married to.  I am always trying to live up to these blessing to be worthy of this little family I have. To be the wife and mother they need. Oh how My hear burst with love for these people I get to call mine!!!!

This last experience that comes to mind is my Mother.  I am so grateful for this women I am grateful beyond words that she was able to be at each of my children's birth's! Her love and kindness as she has helped me welcome my babies into the world means so much to me.  I often think about her as a new mom and all the things that she did for us as children and I sometimes feel that I can never measure up to all that she did and has done for me.  She gave be a silver heart necklace when Sam was born and I love it!  To me it represents my journey has a Mom from my first baby Seth when I felt completely overwhelmed with the task at hand to my last sweet boy Sam! When I wear it I am reminded of all my babies and of my Mom and I am forever grateful for her!

I have no doubt that Sam will be the one to teach me so much in my mothering journey I have learned so much form each of my amazing kids but My boys really know how to speak to my spirt and help me learn about the things my Father in Heaven wants me to know.