Write at the Heart

The first time I remember reading that the brother of Jared was chastened by the Lord- for THREE hours- I was like, wait, wait, back up the trolley, what?! The brother of Jared? The guy known for the stones of light, the guy who saw the finger of God, and ultimately, God? The guy to whom the Lord said, “Never has man come before me with such exceeding faith as thou hast” (Ether 3:9)? The man who “could not be kept from within the veil” (3:20)?  My mind was blown. You mean, like, the brother of Jared wasn’t PERFECT? He “remembered not to call upon the name of the Lord” (2:14), he forgot to... pray? It was like I’d never read that part of scripture before. For 4 years the journey halted at the seashore. For 4 years their progression ceased. For 4 years they didn’t think to call upon God. I have so many questions about those years. What were they doing?? All we know is it at the end of those 4 years, the Lord came down to chasten the brother of Jared.  And he immediately repented...

When my second oldest was baptized, it started off great. We carefully got everything ready at the house for the gathering afterward and I even got all 6 kids nicely dressed with a couple minutes to spare!  Then we got to the church and I realized I’d forgotten the diaper bag. Ohh no. Between my wriggly baby and my mischievous toddler who wouldn’t listen to a WORD I said, I spent most of the program out in the hallway. I managed to slip in to see my good husband baptize my son, but was right back out in the hallway chasing my runaway child. When I tried listening to the confirmation, I heard nothing due to naughty kids.  As I left for the restroom with the two crazies in tow, I could feel my eyes burning and I willed myself to stop the tears. But I couldn’t. I cried and cried in that restroom! I was like, Erika! PULL YOURSELF TOGETHER! I’m not like this! I deal with crazy kids all the time! Still I cried. I felt like a failure! I was so sad & frustrated at not feeling part...

One time I was at my son’s baseball game with five little kids. The game had just ended when a gigantic hailstorm hit. I ushered the kids under the ledge of a nearby building where we huddled until it let up. I thought, maybe we can make a run for it to the van. So off we raced toward the parking lot, which now seemed MILES away.  No sooner had we started our little jaunt when the charcoal sky burst open again, worse than before. It was CHAOS! I was like, do we turn back?! NO no no, we are too far out now, just gotta keep going! We're getting more drenched every second, I'm running with a 2-year-old in my arms while trying to herd 4 other bodies, and they are all SCREAMING THEIR HEADS OFF as thunder shakes the ground and hail pelts us in the face, and the van is still SO FAR AWAY! I’m yelling over the noise, “Come on! Just follow me! Keep following me!!” We FINALLY made it to the van, the kids scrambled into their seats in RECORD time, and I slammed the doors shut. The kids are...

The movie “The Iron Giant” makes me cry. Yep, the animated one about a kid finding a giant alien robot. The robot had lost his memory, so a boy teaches him about life and humans, and the robot is curious, gentle, and friendly. Eventually his memory is triggered when he is attacked by the military. He instinctively converts to what he was actually built for- a weapon of destruction. The boy desperately reminds him that he doesn't have to be that way, “You are who you choose to be!" The robot has to make a choice, and I won’t spoil it for you, but trust me, it gets me every time. And those words ring so true, “You are who you choose to be." I know it's easier said than done. But I do believe we all can choose who we really want to be. We can make excuses and wallow and tell ourselves it just isn't possible, that it's too hard, or not in our programming. But what kind of life would it be if we didn't have that choice? No matter where we came from, there is no...

We found some natural sandstone water slides during our camping trip this weekend. What an adrenaline rush! But, as they say, it’s all fun and games until someone dislocates a finger. My husband came out of the water and really freaked the kids out with his crooked, bloody finger. OH, AND ME. It was pretty grotesque. After an x-ray determined it was NOT broken (whew), the doctor took his finger and gave it a nice, big YANK. And boom, just like that, his crooked finger was made straight. What’s funny is his pain level was actually pretty tolerable BEFORE the yanking of the finger. BUT- it was inevitable... It had to be fixed. To realign the bone, to promote function, to bring healing, Great pain was required. We might think we are “okay.” The pain is manageable. Maybe we don’t even need a doctor? We can live with it. But if nothing is done, proper healing cannot take place. Sometimes fixing what is broken is an EXCRUCIATING process. But in the whole scheme of things, one excruciating mo...

We are on day 3 of camping, which is pretty big for us “non-campers.” (We love the outdoors, but are more... cabin people? AirBNB people?) But we are doing it! We are proving to ourselves we CAN be campers, we CAN! However, the first night we got here, it was POURING rain. And THEN when we tried to set up our tent, we realized a pole was broken! Like, when you go camping, isn’t the tent a pretty important part?! We proceeded to jimmy-rig it and hoped for the best! To our frustration, the tent collapsed like three times as we were setting up camp. Yeah. And that night as I listened to it rain, I was like, PLEASE let us just make it through the night without the tent collapsing on us!!! And we did. The tent STOOD. I think it hung on, just for us. Cause then it collapsed again that morning. But our tent had done exactly what it was supposed to do. Did it look great? No. It looked like a sad, droopy, deformed thing. But did it do the one thing I asked it to do? The one thing it was meant t...

I made peach freezer jam yesterday, and I gotta say, I am feeling pret-ty darn proud of myself! It turned out amazing! Just call me Suzy Homemaker! While I know freezer jam is actually kinda easy, it IS time consuming. The peeling, pitting, lots and lots of stirring, waiting, more stirring, more waiting. My 8-year-old was super excited to help me, and she did some great stirring in the beginning, but after so much she got bored and gave up. But then came the reward for my efforts- delicious jam! I think about the process it took for those peaches to become jam, and I think about Alma the Younger’s amazing conversion. His story is one of my favorites!! I love any story where someone chooses to completely change for the better. “And oh, what joy, and what marvelous light I did behold; yea, my soul was filled with joy as exceeding as was my pain! Yea, I say unto you, my son, that there could be nothing so exquisite and so bitter as were my pains. Yea, and again I say unto you, my son, tha...