Gratitude

I have been pondering a lot lately about some of the things I am thankful for and just wanted to share a couple of thoughts that I had.

I would like to share this weeks Mormon Message. It is on gratitude. It is a great message- here is the link to the gratitude website where you can watch the message and learn more about gratitude.

Gratitude (link to church website)

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I really like this quote from the website:

"A grateful heart is the beginning of greatness. Gratitude builds humility as we recognize an act of kindness, service, or caring from someone else. True gratitude is a foundation for faith, courage, contentment, happiness, love, and well-being. Being grateful leads us to look outside ourselves and turn to the bestower of the blessings.
As we regularly express our gratitude to our Heavenly Father, we cultivate an uplifting attitude. The Savior has promised, “He who receiveth all things with thankfulness shall be made glorious” (D&C 78:19). Bitterness, resentful feelings, or mean-spiritedness cannot exist in a grateful heart. Greater happiness is achieved as deeper gratitude is developed."

I just love reading that. I want to have an uplifting attitude and have greater happiness every day and the way to achieve that goal is one simple word GRATITUDE. Isn't that just amazing. I would like to share with you some things that I am grateful for.

Monte is such a good man, husband, and father. I couldn't have asked for a better person. We have had such a great opportunity to get to know one another more these last couple of months as we have moved away from our family and friends. I have realized even more how blessed I am to have him. One thing I am especially grateful for is his willingness to help and serve. My parents moved this last week to Oklahoma and we drove down to help then get all settled in. As I watched Monte help in so many ways I felt so grateful for him and his desires to help and to do good continually. He is also such a great daddy to our girls. There is nothing like growing up wanting to marry someone that will be a good father to your children, and then watching it happen before your eyes. I love the way he plays with and talks to the girls. I am so grateful to have him in my life.

I am so grateful to be a mother. What a great honor and responsibility we as mothers have to be responsible for the nurture of our children. I feel so honored to have that great responsibility and grateful for the blessing that is mine to have two beautiful daughters to love and care for. I feel so grateful to be able to bare children. Children bring sorrow and great joys and I am so thankful to our Heavenly Father for the things that I have learned and am learning every day from my little ones.

I am grateful.....

for the opportunity we had to move to Kansas

for this beautiful world God has created

for our little puppies

that we were able to find a renter for our house

for the health of my family

that my parents were able to create a new job for us

that I am a primary teacher

that I am a member of the only true church on this earth

for the atonement of Jesus Christ that makes it possible for me to repent

for prayer

for all of the people that helped us move and for the love and support they gave

for our house we live in now

that I can see

that we have a living prophet on the earth today

for my testimony of Jesus Christ

for the temple blessings

for eternal families

for a fireplace

for personal revelation

for the prophet Joseph Smith

for safety in all of our travels

for beautiful trees, plants, and flowers

for indoor plumbing

for our bishop

to live in a free country

to have a wonderful family

for my patriarchal blessing

for the scriptures

for modern revelation

to be a wife and mother

to be a sister and daughter

to laugh and smile

to be sealed for time and eternity

to have the knowledge of the gospel

I could go on but I will just stop there. I do want to end that I am grateful for my testimony of our Savior Jesus Christ. I love the scripture in Moses 1:39

"For behold, this is my work and my glory—to bring to pass the immortality and eternal life of man"

It is my testimony that Christ came to earth and died that we may gain immortality and that he atoned for our sins so that we, through our faithfulness, might have eternal life.

Pumpkin Carving and Halloween

The girls LOVED carving the pumpkins! They were SO excited!! They worked on this one for seriously over 30 minutes and loved every minute of it!

The girls and their pumpkins...
A couple of days later Monte and I carved our pumpkins (with our little helpers of course!).
I love this picture because the pumpkin is as big as her and she was determined to get EVERY seed out!I can't even remember what she was upset about but she sure was mad about something!

Monte worked long and hard on his pumpkin and it turned out Awesome! Me and my pumpkin

The girls standing by the row of pumpkins. They were so excited to see them all lit up.

Monte's Pumpkin

On Halloween Cinderella helped me make pumpkin squares.

and Cinderella shared her pumpkin square with Snow White.
Cinderella all dressed and ready for Trick or Treating!!

Snow White would not hold still to get her picture taken. This was the best shot of her. The girls love to play under this tree.

Cinderella had so much fun. We took the princesses to this nice subdivision that has some really nice big houses in it about 20 minutes from where we live. Cinderella LOVED knocking and saying "trick or treat" (before they even got to the door) on the door while Snow White was more interested in looking and touching all the pretty decorations at the door step. We had such a fun time!!