Hello, friends!
I hope you are well, and I am sending my love from this little corner of the internet.
My last post was about how my mom was doing, and it has now been almost exactly three years since she passed. I wrote about the beautiful way she transitioned to the other side in this post on Power of Moms, if you’d like to read it.
And do you know that she is still such a beautiful part of our lives? I can’t even tell you how many stories I’ve heard from my siblings, friends, and extended family members about her influence—in addition to my own special experiences. Oh, it’s so sweet.
And then this past March, our dear dad joined her. He developed brain cancer and had a fairly quick transition, and while I want to record all of the details and stories now, I’m going to leave it with this drawing that Grace made for me:
A lot has been going on behind the scenes here—our family moved from Southern California to Utah, Alia left to Ukraine to serve a mission for our church, Grace started college, and Eric and I are now raising two teenage boys (Ethan, 17, and Spencer, 13), running LearnDoBecome.com together, and serving in our church callings. Life is full, beautiful, challenging, and fun, and we are growing each day.
Okay, so why am I writing here again?
Today I took a couple of hours to think (sitting on a blanket at a local park), and I asked myself a series of questions. The process has been really helpful, so I’ll include the questions here, in case you’d like to do something similar:
- What do I need to start doing/stop doing?
- How can I set up my life more optimally so I have more to look forward to?
- How and where can I speak more of Christ?
- How can I set up my scripture study schedule so I can make the most of my time and learn what God wants for me?
- What am I hungry for?
- What do I want to say with my life?
- What would my life need to look like in order to consider myself a true instrument in the hands of God?
- How can I let God prevail in my life?
- If I were to live my true purpose—and be a support to others—what would that look like?
Thank you for sharing April. I love your questions and some have been similar to mine. I hope that you will share more of yourself with all of us. I learn so much from you and you are so inspiring. You make me want to be a better mother, daughter, sister, friend, neighbor...
ReplyDeleteThank you, Susan! I love you!!
DeleteI’m going write these questions out. This is just what I needed right now! So many highs and lows in life and I’m feeling like I need to sit down and do this so I can easily re-calibrate and keep my focus on the right things and not get discouraged. Thank you as always for being an incredible mentor.
ReplyDeleteLOVE how you prioritize recalibration. I think you have become an expert on that over the past couple of years. You are doing great work Andrea!!
DeleteApril! It’s me!! I’m delighted to see you posting here again—and I’m rather amazed that I found it since it rather magically appeared on my phone. I think it was meant to be! I love your questions! I love that you take time to deeply ponder questions like these. It inspires me to do the same, especially as a follow-up to conference. I believe the Lord will tell me more if I put myself in more of a LISTENING mode. But I also love the idea of writing/voicing your insights as they come. Beautiful! And simple too. I’m so grateful for you & your positive influence in my life!!
ReplyDeleteThank you! And I love your emphasis on being in a "listening" mode.... So good! Your name comes up as "Still Trying" so I'm not sure who this is--but I'm so glad you're here! :)
DeleteALSO! I meant to ask you more about incubating! I would love to hear your follow-up about that! <3
ReplyDeleteI'm so sorry to hear about the loss of your father. I lost my father 4 years ago, and I know how hard it is to lose a parent, but I can only imagine what it is like to have lost both parents. I used to love your updates about your mother. I'm glad that both your parents are together in Heaven now, and hope that your earthly family is doing well.
ReplyDeleteI live in upstate NY, in a suburb of Albany. This year I am homeschooling my 7th grade ADHD son for the first time, and we're facing a homebound winter until the pandemic is more resolved. We had fabulous outdoor socialization experiences during the spring, summer and fall that we hope will sustain us until then.
Claire, I am sending you a huge hug!! A homebound winter when you're managing ADHD has got to feel daunting. I am cheering you on--and hopefully we can all work together this winter to help one another to keep our sanity and focus in the midst of what may be quite challenging. Thank you for your kind words and support!
ReplyDeleteI'm excited you're writing on this blog again! I've missed your posts here! I'm so sorry about your dad. It's so hard, but what a wonderful thing that he and your mother are together again, never to be apart.
ReplyDeleteI live in suburban Boston and have two sons, ages 15 and 11. Life is busy, and it's hard in a lot of ways right now, but it's also full of joy and I'm thankful for it! I've been asking myself the same question since Conference--how can I better let God prevail in my life? It's such an important thing to do, especially in these days in which we're living!
It is great to hear from you again. I miss the "Power of Mom" days and all I learned from you.
ReplyDeleteHi Tasha! Thank you for connecting here! I'm so happy to have friends from around the world so we can learn from each other!
ReplyDeleteHi April! I'm Heidi in Arizona. Thanks for sharing your questions. I learn so much from you. I have been, and need to, ponder some of the same questions as you. I have been also thinking about self care and ways to integrate small self care more fully into my life. Also how to navigate friendships and ministering in the midst of this pandemic. How to teach my kids some important life skills in areas where they are really struggling. What direction to take my hobby/personal pursuits and whether to try to grow that into something more. How to help me and my youngest child adapt to just him at home for the first time ever after so many months of everyone at home.
ReplyDeleteHi Heidi! Oh, I can so relate to the self-care/navigating friendships/ministering/teaching kids in the pandemic. It is definitely a daily effort. I am so proud of you for continuing to work toward these things. :) Thank you for connecting, and keep up the great work!
DeleteHello! I’m kristyn in Southern California. I’ve been following you in your different formats for years, and I LOVE how spiritually grounded you are. It’s one thing to read a book of what to do, but it’s another (really helpful) thing for me to see it acted out. Seeing you take time away to write and ponder like that is a great reminder that I need to do that too. So, basically, I would love, love, love to have you write more of the things of your heart here on this blog. You’ve been a great inspiration to me over the years!! Thank you for that influence!
ReplyDeleteKristyn, thank you for connecting here! I'm so glad that this was helpful for you. Thank you for your kind words! xoxo
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