Beauty of Being Human: Joy in the Journey

I remember when I was younger, time seemed to move as fast as a snail. Now, as an adult, I sit here and wonder, "Where did the time go?!" Funny how we want so badly to grow up when we are younger, then wish we only had our youthful stresses when we are older. Thus, why one of my favorite quotes is, "The past is behind us; learn from it. The future is ahead; prepare for it. The present is now; live in it" (Thomas S. Monson, Finding Joy in the Journey). Some may be scratching their heads thinking, "What was the whole point to that little tangent of an intro?!" Basically, WE'RE IN MARCH?! What happened to February? No, no. Wait. What happened to JANUARY?! Seriously, time just whizzes past and if we don't make an effort, we miss sweet moments.

February brought some snow, but mostly sunshine and clean air. I was not complaining. It felt so good to go on walks, play at the park, hear the birds, open the windows and enjoy the pre-spring air.

So happy to have morning walks!

Auntie Lexi came out for Valentine's Day to see her sweetie. We stole her one afternoon to give Luke his first official swim lesson. Despite the slightly chilly water and being dunked multiple times, he was a champ. He clung to me most of the time that first swimming venture. The second, about two weeks later, he got a bit braver after 15 minutes of clinging to me like a koala to a tree. Once he got comfortable, he started splashing, putting his face in the water, jumping and pushing off me a bit. He just takes awhile to warm up to new things. Same story with the baby swing, his jumper, the car, the baby Bjorn....good thing he has a mom who keeps exposing him to these terrifying experiences.

Snuggles after swimming

After getting dunked

Auntie Lexi rocks our socks

As I mentioned, we have been able to go on walks again with the snow being melted and the temperatures being above the point of having to Ralphie-wrap Spud. This means the cemetery jaunts have commenced. For those of you who are not aware, I have a little thing for cemeteries. Not in a creepy exorcist or seance way. Mainly, I enjoy the peacefulness of walking in cemeteries, looking at the headstones and maybe creating a few stories about some of their lives. Also, deer love to chill in cemeteries as well as some of the most gorgeous trees. We have a cemetery not more than a mile from our house, which Luke and I frequented quite often when he was just born seeing as he could cry his little heart out and the only ones who could hear him were in the ground or operating heavy machinery, digging holes. See? Peace. Also, he eventually would fall asleep on those walks, seemingly always as we passed the same group of graves. I always joked that some little grandma spirit would want to uphold her RIP promise on her headstone and calm him down for me. Some may think, "Yeah, Kel. That is creepy." But, to each his own.

After a cemetery stroll

Anyway, with the warm weather, Luke and I were able to walk our cemeteries again. We visited the one by our house, as well as the Salt Lake Cemetery, which is quite a massive one, containing most of the LDS prophet's grave sites and a lot of the original pioneers. It is quite pretty, peaceful and a good work out with all the hills!

Great view from Salt Lake Cemetery

We also have gone to the park a few times. He is hit and miss with the swing. So far, we are two for three with them. Two times we put him in the swing, he laughed and smiled the whole time. One time, he whimpered and kept grabbing for me every time he would swing forward. That time may have been because we got bullied out of a swing by a snotty 4-year-old. Maybe. Or maybe it was because it was stinkin' cold...

One trip to the park was with Aspen, who is gun-ho about trying new things. While we were packing everything up, Luke was gnawing on a stick he had found. An older lady walked by and snarkly commented, "Oh. That's probably good for him to be chewing that stick." Really?! Its a stick. Honestly, there are a lot worse things he could, and probably has, chewed. It boggles my mind, sometimes, how people feel they can say such snarky comments about babies and pregnant women. My friend, who is due in April, and I were talking about how somehow a baby and a pregnant belly elicit the need for people to say things they would not dream of saying to anyone else. Statements like, "You're huge!" or "He's got kind of a big nose" or "Are you/he/she eating enough?" There must be some magic truth serum pheromone that babies and pregnant ladies emit to inspire such comments because, my golly people are ruthless around those two populations. Anyway, yes, I let my child chew on sticks, grass, keys and other things. A few germs are good for them. Sweet Dallin's response to the lady after I relayed the story, "Her parents probably let her chew on the ugly stick."

Poopers is incredibly close to taking off on all fours. Heaven help us. When this happens, we will be outside as often as we possibly can because he will destroy our hobbit hole.

Luke has been pushing back his bedtime, which is bittersweet. Bitter because it was kind of nice having the whole evening to ourselves starting at 6pm. Sweet because we can actually go out past 6pm. Anyway, the first few nights he did this, we captured the activities he did to procrastinate counting sheep: