The Merry Merry Month of May

May has come and gone and we were so so busy that I never had a chance to blog. So here is my month of May. It started with Mother's Day. I must say I approached Mother's Day with trepidation. I was unsure how I would feel or how it would go, this being my "first" as a single mother. The day, to my surprise, was fantastic. The kids and I got in the kitchen and cooked our meal together. I have to say this has become the best part of my Sundays. It has turned into a sort of tradition and the kids LOVE it. Then the kids "made" me take a nap. While I was sleeping they made a stage on the front porch, decorated the house with cars of love and appreciation and made up a skit. They all got on their make shift stage and sang a song then separately each one of them got up and told me how much they loved me and how much they appreciated me. Last, they handed me a special gift from a secret friend. It was amazing and I felt very, very loved! My cup runneth over!



Here they are all dressed up in their mis-matched Sunday clothes in a pose at the end of the song. Gotta LOVE LOVE LOVE those kids.





The next big step in my merry month of May was a 5K. Grace and I signed up to do the 5K with the Ogden Marathon. I trained all winter and really fell in love with running. I used to hate to run but it seems to bring me clarity and stress relief. When I am grumpy the kids even say, "Mom, you have got to go get on the treadmill!" A couple weeks before the race I had an asthma attack and had to stop running for a bit. This really made me feel unprepared for the race but I was determined to do it. So race day came and guess what I DID IT! Grace and I ran it in 42 min 11 secs. not as fast as I had hope for but still. Coming across that finish line I just kept thinking, I can REALLY do anything I set my mind to! What a light bulb moment for me. Grace and I are running another 5K in June and I hope to improve my time and I decided to run a 1/2 marathon. Yep folks, one year from May I am going to do it!

After the 5K Olivia and Cole came up to run the kids K. It was a 1 mile run and I was SO very proud of them...they ran it in 14 minutes. Liv was strong and steady, she ran almost the whole way. Cole has no idea about pacing himself but he will learn. What a proud day it was for all of us!


Next in this great month was the wrap up of school. The kids have field day and crazy hair day. It was a ton of fun and of course Cole did not want to be left out so he went to preschool with blue spikes that day.

Here is Olivia in her crazy hair and field day t-shirt. The next pic is of her playing a tug of war game with a kid from her class.

Here is Miss Grace.

She is playing a game where she had to bounce with this ball between her legs. She was so funny using her arms like a bird to propel her forward.

May also brought the end of soccer season. Cole was a little soccer demon as I knew he would be. He loved it so much and can't wait to start wrestling in October. I think we have an athlete on our hands. Grace's Thunderfoot team had a very successful and fun season. Tryouts brought more change and re-arranging and we are sad that she will be starting on a whole new team with only four of her previous team members but we also know that change equals growth so we will go with the flow.

This years changes are so hard to put into words. For me it was a lot of firsts. The first Holidays single, a first date, a first year without. There are really no words to express the he things that have occurred in our lives this year. Through it all I have been amazed at the kids and their resilience. They are strong and though these changes have not come without scars they are for the better. There is more love, softer words and more compassion in our home. Things that I believe were missing before. For this I will be forever grateful. With loss comes growth. I am a different person and although it was not my choice it is my change. I rely more on the Lord, on his direction to shape the course of my life. His choices may not be the ones I would make on my own but I know that he has more wisdom and concern for me than anyone else in my life. So I follow. Could I have found this peace, this "knowing" without this strife? Maybe, but I know that eventually I will look back and say, "Yes! This too was for my good"