I Want To Live!

"I don't want to drive up to the pearly gates in a shiny sports car, wearing beautiful tailored clothes, my hair expertly coiffed, and with long, perfectly manicured fingernails. I want to drive up in a station wagon that has mud on the wheels from taking kids to scout camp. I want to be there with grass stains on my shoes from mowing Sister Schenk's lawn. I want to be there with a smudge of peanut butter on my shirt form making sandwiches for a sick neighbor's children. I want to be there with a little dirt under my nails from helping weed someone's garden. I want to be there with children's sticky kisses on my cheek and the tears of a friend on my shoulder. I want the Lord to know I was really here and that I really lived. "
— Marjorie Pay Hinckley

I LOVE this quote and that is what I mean when I say, "I want to live." I want to be all I can be and serve those around me. I want to live the life that will most please my Heavenly Father. I'm so happy to be finished with the "child-bearing" stage of my life. I'm ready to focus on the "child-rearing" now with all my heart and to feel like I'm moving forward.
I mentioned before how pregnancy and the year after affect my body and emotions. I feel like I've been on auto-pilot for a VERY long time (if not on a rollercoaster!). Right after the baby was born, I was doing GREAT, but just couldn't get myself to keep it up with no sleep and Shane gone all the time. I hit rough patches, but I'm feeling more like the "real" me now. I want to do more than just survive and go through the motions. I want to really LIVE! Life is a precious gift. I've known that for quite awhile, but now I'm ready to live what I know. Thank goodness my hormones straighten out! I love the talk about a Consecrated Life from this past conference. When I get time, I'll post more about it. Right now I need to do more than type on this blog. It's just so theraputic to write what is REALLY in my heart and not just be silly. (I will always be silly, I can't help it, but I'm MORE than that too!). Thank you to dear friends who I look up to so much and who have given me hope through your examples and words! (my friends who blog especially!)