Nine years ago today I returned from serving a full time mission for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. I served for 18 months in the England London South Mission and it truly was the best mission in the world!
I was recently talking to some of my mission friends and we were reminiscing on our last nights in the mission. I think at the end of something as intense and trying as a mission you can't help but reflect and wonder if you did a good enough job, if you worked hard enough or if God was pleased with you. We all came to the same conclusion- that not matter how much we had seen ourselves fail and struggle we had ultimately worked every single day and completed our time as missionaries with honor. We felt peace that we had done enough, that our work and sacrifice was acceptable to the Lord and that He loved us for how we'd served.
I was eventually companions with all three sisters in this picture of my very first district.
I have often looked back and wondered what more I could have done for those that I taught and served with. While serving I always felt that I was working my hardest but it is so easy to look back and let your failures get the best of you. I am grateful for the members I am still friends with who help me to see that I made a small impact in their wards. I am grateful for the people I taught who continue to live according to the Gospel. I am grateful for those I taught who never accepted the gospel but whose experiences in learning about it changed me forever. And I am especially grateful for my companions who pushed me, loved me, taught me and sometimes annoyed me. I learned so much from them and will always treasure our time together!
Since returning from the best 18 months of my life I have had the best 9 years of my life. It's been filled with struggles and hardships but I can say that it's been wonderful overall. I am not a big goal setting person (don't tell President Swinton) but when I returned from my mission I made it a point to visit the temple as often as I could. In Utah that was easy, I never lived more than 15 minutes from a temple, but when I moved to California it took a little more work to travel the 100 miles to Los Angeles. I decided that I could reasonably go at least once a month and set it as a goal. I often took carloads of friends to LA on Fridays and made a day of it. Other times I went alone or sat in traffic for hours but it was always a good time anyway.
That seemingly simple plan to attend the temple every month has made all the difference in my life. I have been thinking about it's significance lately and it really is the thing that has kept my testimony of the Gospel strong no matter what else seemed to be going wrong. I have gone every single month for the last nine years no matter what- if we were traveling, had a tiny baby, or were so busy our calendars were about to explode. Since the passing of my brother it has meant even more to me and I feel such peace when I am there. I will forever be grateful for my decision to serve a mission and how it set a strong foundation of service in the Church that continues to make my life wonderful today.
This year I have added to my goal and plan to take Topher there once a month to see the temple and walk around the grounds. I am hoping it will help him love it there as much as I do!
Last year was the first time I'd ever gone strawberry picking here in New England and we loved it! There is nothing like fresh, ripe strawberries in the summer! I don't know how anyone eats the ones from the grocery store after tasting these beauties!
Like last year we went up to Parlee Farms for our berries. They have really great staff and they also seem to have larger fields with more fruit than some of the other farms I have seen and heard of.
I was a little surprised at how quickly Topher picked up the concept of choosing the bright red berries and putting them in the basket. He did eat a lot but I would say more than half of what he picked went into the basket and not in his tummy. I love getting to see the world through his eyes and watch him explore and experience things for the first time. I don't think he remembers our trip to the farm last summer but maybe next year he will recognize it when we go back.
We ended up having biscuits and strawberries for dinner because dad was working late and we just couldn't resist! With what we had left over after a few days of eating them plain I made a little batch of freezer jam so we can enjoy the bounty of summer all year long!
Every year we make a trip to Florida in the mid-winter. Sometime between January and March we begin to lose our minds while buried under snow. You forget what it's like to be outside, what the sun looks like and how it felt to not be trapped in your house for days on end.
Our solution to this Winter Madness has been to take a trip to Florida to escape the cold, remember what it feels like to live again and feel the sun on our skin.
This year we decided to go to the Gulf side of Florida, somewhere we'd never been before. Clearwater Beach is one of the nicest beaches in the country so we booked a hotel right on the sand and got ready to go! What ensued over the course of the week was nearly unbelievable. I know it's tough to travel with kids and that vacations are never the same, blah, blah, blah. We've traveled a lot with Christopher (seven trips in 2016 where we flew somewhere) so we aren't completely ignorant of this fact but this trip really put us through the ringer.
I have to preface all of this by saying how grateful I am for the chance we have to travel as much as we do. I am grateful for the work that Thomas puts in to make these vacations inexpensive for us and that he is so passionate about traveling and making memories for our family. I know not everyone has the chance/means/time to do things like this and I don't want to seem ungrateful- this post is going to include some definite downer moments.
The beginning of this story is a few days before we left. Christopher was super sick on Monday night, he was totally fine at dinner but he suddenly became very ill and began throwing up every 30 minutes until the middle of the night. It was terrible to see him like that. Poor kid! I thought Thomas and I were in the clear because we have more developed immune systems but I was wrong. The night before we left I woke up in the night and proceeded to barf up everything I'd eaten for the previous 24 hours. I was barely hanging on when we took off on our flight the next morning. Christopher had one of his best flights ever and played so nicely on the plate. I was feeling better by that evening when we arrived at the hotel-thank heavens!
Thankfully Christopher slept pretty normally the first night in the hotel- we only had one room which is always a struggle with a kid who is used to sleeping in his own room. We went on a little walk Friday morning while Thomas played tennis with a friend of his who retired and moved to Florida last year. We watched some old Italian guys play bocce ball and leisurely strolled back through Clearwater.
We spent a little time at the pool after lunch and then rented a beach umbrella and sat in the sand for a long time. Topher made a little friend and the two of them crawled around after each other for the entire time. I love seeing him make friends and exploring his world.
That night Topher terrorized our waiter at dinner and demanded to eat off of my plate although he didn't actually want to eat anything. It was a little stressful to say the least.
That night was one of the worst we've had in a long time with this kid. He went to sleep alright initially but was up at midnight and again around 3:30 am. When he woke up that second time he refused to go back to sleep. Normally I would let him cry it out but since we were in a sold out hotel I didn't feel like we could do that to our neighbors. Thomas left to take him for a walk around the beach and pier at 5:30 am so I could try and get a little more sleep- bless that papa's heart! Christopher ended up being awake until about 11:30 am before falling asleep on my chest-he still wouldn't go anywhere near the crib.
That afternoon, after much snoozing in the hotel room, my brother Seth, his wife Miranda, and their little boy Owen came out to the beach to see us. They were in Tampa for a conference Miranda was attending so we sort of coordinated our trips to be able to spend time together. We rented one of those beach cabanas with the big umbrellas for the afternoon and I was so glad we did! That is the way to relax at the beach! There was a family with nine kids in the cabana next to us which made Christopher happy as a clam. He played with three of their youngest kids for a good couple of hours.
Thomas had mentioned a few times that he wasn't feeling great but didn't think it was the same stomach bug we'd all had. Turns out it was and he took off running across the beach towards the restroom but ended up barfing all over the beach right in the middle of everything. Poor guy definitely had the same thing we did and he proceeded to be sick the rest of the night. Topher and I had a nice quite dinner together at the hotel restaurant and then took a little sunset walk around Clearwater. It was nice and warm and we just let daddy take an extra long nap.
That night as I sat in the dark hotel room trying not to make any noise or movements I text my brother to see how the rest of their day was going:
Sunday morning things were looking a little better- Thomas wasn't sick anymore and Christopher had slept relatively well. After breakfast we took a walk down the pier and played at the park for a bit. We enjoyed one last trip to the beach before taking off towards Tampa.
We spent the last two days of the trip in the heart of Tampa with my brother and his wife and their baby. We lucked out and got a suite right next door to them with an adjoining door! This was such a blessing (see the above text messages!)
Christopher and Owen are about 9 months apart and I have a feeling they are going to be best friends forever. The first thing they did was stick their fingers in each others' mouths. It was the cutest thing to watch them just giggle and play together. On one occasion Topher looked around at all the adults and then just reached over and pushed Owen from his tummy to his back. They both thought it was hilarious.
Watching these two play was definitely the highlight of the trip! I am so, so glad that we got to spend these days with them! We spent an afternoon at the park and walking around Tampa with my brother while his wife was at the conference. We enjoyed a rainy swim in the hotel pool, had take out for dinner and after the babies were in bed we all hung out in the living room of our suite and laughed SO hard. Some kind of strange magic happens when Thomas and my brother Seth get together- the dad jokes start coming out, puns start flying and they come up with the wackiest business ideas. Those two are really a pair!
On our last day in Florida we went to the manatee viewing area to see some Florida wildlife. It was really windy and chilly and somehow I didn't get any pictures of manatees but we had a great time. Christopher found a toy manatee to take home with him and he carried it around for the rest of the trip.
We found one last beach to visit just before he had to get to the airport. This whole time we kept waiting for our flight home to be cancelled due to the blizzard but it ended up only being delayed by an hour. We were really hoping we would HAVE to spend a couple more days in the sun and sand!
We arrived home just after midnight to cars snowed into the driveway, snow continuing to fall and our thermostat off. It's a miracle we didn't have pipes burst while we were gone because when we got home it was 37 degrees in our house. Thirty-seven. That's very cold. We bundled up and piled all the quilts on the bed and just hunkered down for the night. By morning it was back to normal but I don't even want to know how much that cost us in heating oil!
This trip really tested us. We have so many other adventures planned this year and I hope we will be able to continue adapting and travelling with Christopher. On a few occasions during our week in Florida Thomas and I would look at each other and say- do we really want to take that big trip this summer?? But, in the end, travel is something that we're determined to do with our family and I hope Topher learns to love it as much as we do.
I also hope we never have to come home to a 37-degree house again!
