Winding Down 2014...Here We Come 2015

These last few days (back in December I began this post) I've been putting together my Blog Book (I use Blurb Booksmart). It has become a tradition for our family to have a volume of our blog...a full year in colorful pages to look at an read. I am the one that does it...I am the one that loves it. So I have been reminiscing the entire time - looking over our past year and what we have done. That is SUCH an inadequate way of stating it, but really....it is true. We have done a LOT. This year (2014) has been one of the most eventful in our family. I finished school and graduated and we moved away from our home of 13 1/2 years.

Looking over the past year is nostalgic for me. I relive the moments, however big or small, and feel again the joy of those times. Life is beginning to really take on speed. At times I catch myself thinking about it....Jordan is a junior and it will be no time at all and he will be off. Spencer just keeps on growing UP...yesterday he measured himself against Scott. He has long since passed me (actually...that happened this year too). I look at Kelsey and she just gets more and more beautiful. And Cody is no longer LITTLE....tho he agrees that he will always be my little Bubby! (haha)

So I steal away these quiet moments to think about my family! These are good thoughts!

Here are a few highlights for each of us....this past year! I'm just going to say....we MOVED, which was a BIG main part of this year!

Scott: Forever our class clown....the one that brings fun and craziness to all our days

Denise: Let's see....Graduation....moments with friends that I will NEVER forget...a new job

 

 

Jordan: It has been fun for me to watch Jordan and Spencer become great friends

Spencer: Swim team....Cross Country....getting as tall as his dad (check out that smile on his face).

 

Kelsey: Swim team...Friends (old and new)...Basketball

Cody: Friends

And as we come to the end of 2014 and prepare to welcome in 2015 we have been reading in 1 Nephi 17 and have decided to make part of it our motto/goal for this coming year.

 1 ... And we did travel and wade through much affliction in the wilderness; ...

 2 And so great were the blessings of the Lord upon us, ...

We, as a family, want to be able to have THIS type of attitude this year. We will all "travel and wade through much affliction,"  be that whatever it may be either as a family or individually. We want to be able to speak as Nephi did. Regardless of our trials, we will consider the blessings that the Lord will give us to be GREAT! And we will continue to be obedient.

 3 ... And if it so be that the children of men keep the commandments of God he doth nourish them, and strengthen them, and provide means whereby they can accomplish the thing which he has commanded them; wherefore, he did provide means for us while we did sojourn in the wilderness.

 13 And I will also be your light in the wilderness; and I will prepare the way before you, if it so be that ye shall keep my commandments; wherefore, inasmuch as ye shall keep my commandments ye shall be led towards the promised land; and ye shall know that it is by me that ye are led.

 14 Yea, and the Lord said also that: After ye have arrived in the promised land, ye shall know that I, the Lord, am God; and that I, the Lord, did deliver you from destruction; yea, that I did bring you out of the land of Jerusalem.

With our sights set on looking for the blessings God gives us we know we will be led to OUR promised land and that as we are obedient He will 1) nourish and strengthen us, 2) provide means for us to accomplish all He asks of us, and 3) lead us toward OUR OWN promised land (as a family and individually).

 15 Wherefore, I, Nephi, did strive to keep the commandments of the Lord, and I did exhort my brethren to faithfulness and diligence.

I hope that as a family we can remind each other of our goal....to be obedient and to look for the blessings the Lord will give each of us.

And lastly....MY own resolution...This year I didn't set ANY resolutions until yesterday....I am going to try to feel less guilty for things I have NO CONTROL over and allow Christ to save me rather than me somehow believing I ought to be tough enough to do it all myself. I don't believe I have always been this way, in fact...I used to think I did a lot better in this area. Not sure why it has come to this at this time of my life...but ... it has and so I will embrace it. Church was canceled today on account of freezing rain so I spent the morning in the scriptures looking up atonement and grace. Really, cognitively I KNOW I can't do it all on my own. But for some reason....

Well, these are deep thoughts that I can't really pinpoint and define quite yet. I will let them evolve over time as I work on them.

Happy New Year....onward and upward!