As Valentine's Day is approaching I think of how we are getting ready to show eachother in cute ,creative ways how much we love eachother. I wonder why we can't have that much enthusiasm throughout the year . I got to thinking about myself and what I do to show the people in my home how much I love them and what I do to show my family and friends I love them all year.Love is important everyday ,all year. Grace and love have been on my mind a lot lately. Giving people grace for everyday things, could you image how the world would be different . I know for myself I've been really working on this. It seems at times I'm the most hard on the people who live in my home. And love ! This is something I've been really aware of. What that word really means and the action that follows. We are reading this book right now, the girls and myself and it's teaching the kids that God IS love. When you sit and think about it, once again for myself, when I sat and thought about it, that is really powerful stuff. If we could all just love, how the world would be different !!! With these thoughts also came ,what is unique about our family ? What is the first thing that comes to mind myself and for others? How are we going to effect the world ? The girls are at an age now that things we taught them several years ago are showing in their character. My middle daughter told me today that she feels so lucky to have parents that explain things to her and help her to understand things in life. She said some parents don't do that and so she feels like she is VIP. How cute is that! I love that at such a young age she realizes some of what we do in our parenting and that she appreciates us and that she feels proud.What a great mommy moment ! Thinking about Valentine's Day and the little things we do as tradition, like starting our day with red pancakes, eating dinner on our red, heart Valentine dishes ,drinking out of valentine glasses and of course we have our candles ! The girls have always loved this and we have always choosen to be with them on this holiday. As the year continue's maybe bringing out those dishes and drinking out of fancy glasses with candles would be a good way to celebrate our love as a family. Wishing my friends and family a very Happy Valentine's Day !!

Well it's the end of the school week and thinking of all we did , all the conversations we had, and stories we read I feel so filled with love. It's amazing how reading can spark such great conversations and new interests for things, and a desire to do better and want more for yourself and life. We started our week with a book we have been reading and it started a conversation about the Easter bunny. We were talking about the true meaning of Easter and my middle daughter was very confused to how the bunny fits in to the true meaning of Easter???? She really wanted answers so I prayed that God would give me the words to say knowing that it was time to come clean.I explained that the bunny is a tradition the world had started and that it's a fun thing that parents like to do for their children, leave eggs for them to find and baskets full of goodies !! She really had a tough time thinking that we had done this. Now, some might think that they are plenty old enough and they should already know. We felt that telling them up to this point was kinda like taking away some of their childhood. You are then entering into the next stage of their childhood years and we weren't ready for that. Talking about the bunny of course lead to Santa and then the tooth fairy. As I told them I couldn't help but cry, thinking to myself I can't beleive this day is here. I remember like yesterday my mom telling me, in 5th grade and standing in the kitchen crying with her. Here I am with my girls having the same moment. Wishing my husband was home to share this time with us, but knowing that God had opened the door for us to have such a good talk.Our girls have known the true meaning of Easter but it seems the bunny overpowered why we even celebrate the holiday.Thinking about this really gave me the peace I needed with having to come clean. The thought that maybe they would ever think that God, and Jesus aren't real because they can't see them was something we didn't want. God is so real, and Jesus DID die on the cross for us and we want our children to know this , and live a faith driven life. I believe that God gives us mommies feelings. You know ,when it's time for your baby to sleep on their own, begin potty training, when your child just doesn't look right and they are getting sick, when they are turning an age when great change is about to happen ,you can just feel it, you know. It was just our time this week to have such good conversations about "stuff" . I love my talks with my girls ! Our good nights especially. We lay together and talk about our day and life . When they were really young we started a tradition of what was your favorite part of the day and we still do it ! Kinda like the story of the mommy who rocks her baby boy to sleep and as he get's older she still does it and then when he becomes a man she still goes over to his house and rocks her baby boy. I love those special things that we do with our children, it makes me so happy to be a mommy and that I have a husband that loves me and his children so much. God has me/us right where He wants me/us and I'm so thankful for that. So blessed, not lucky !!!!!