All I Ever Wanted.

One thing that I have mentioned a few times on this blog is that I reserve the right to brag about my family at any time on this blog. While it may seem annoying to some, this blog as our family scrapbook and journal is an endless cyberspace canvas just that I get to fill with all of our memories and daily happenings. I have the opportunity to document things that I normally wouldn't bring in normal day-to-day conversation. Whether it's how cute Emery's newest word "baa-paa" (backpack) is, and how dang smart I think that little girl is, or how proud I am of how Jake is kicking butt at his job. Been there 1 year next week and was just presented with the opportunity of a lifetime becoming the head of a new 17 million job their company was just given. He's gone from the new guy in an effort to start expanding a small company, to heading up the largest expansion the company has seen since it was opened. When I look back on these early years of our family, this is what I want to remember.
As most of you know I am in the Young Women's Presidency in our ward, and I. Love. It. I learn so much in there, both from the girls and the other leaders. This past Sunday one of the other ladies in the Presidency with me that I adore and grown so close to in the last few months said something that really struck me. She said, "I have everything I have ever wanted. I am so happy." Now let me explain. She isn't rich, she doesn't wear a size 0, and she doesn't drive the latest, fanciest car. Nope. But she has everything she ever wanted. I really started to think about this. As far back as I can remember what I have wanted most in life is to get married in the temple, be a mother, and stay home with my children. Most people could understand the first 2, but the third would get some people. They'd tell me there was no way that was going to happen in 'today's economy'. But I really wanted to. So I did everything I could to put myself into a position to do so. While being a nurse was also something that I had always wanted to do, it also seemed like the most logical occupation for me to have to be able to stay home with my children. So clear back in high school I set the wheels into motion to achieve that dream. Internships, community service, 3.9 GPA, CNA class, CNA jobs, and lots of applications later I was finally able to start my education in Provo, Utah. During the 1st week of my 3rd semester of Nursing School I was blessed to meet a really great guy. 8 months later I was blessed enough to be sealed to that man, for eternity.  3 months later I graduated from Nursing School, passed my NCLEX, became an actual Registered Nurse AND got a job. I was actually being trusted with actual people's lives! A year later we were blessed with the greatest thing that has happened to us since that sunny, May morning, our sweet daughter Emery joined our eternal family, and now our Heavenly Father has given us another little girl to join our family in just a few short months, how did we get so blessed? 2 months later in December 2011 Jake's hard work payed off and he graduated from Brigham Young University, one of the top schools in the nation, with a degree in Engineering. Not 2 weeks later disaster struck. I was hospitalized for 3 weeks, while I never really felt like my life was in danger, watching your spouse go in and out of surgeries, excruciating pain, uncontrollable fevers of unknown origin, and everything else that happened in the course of that illness I'm sure is not an easy thing. It wasn't easy being the one going through it I'll tell you that much. BUT in the midst of this what seemed to be tragedy, we were once again blessed beyond belief. After just one month of being graduated Jake was offered a job doing exactly what he had gone into Civil Engineering to do, and allowed us to move and live exactly where we wanted to raise our family. Jake started work with this company and now less than one year later is blessed with an incredible opportunity that is going to benefit his career and our family financially unbelievably. And in just 4 short weeks we are set to close on our first home. I really can't believe it. I had specific and clear goals that I set for my life years ago. Before I we moved to Morgan, before we had Emery, before I met Jake, before I started nursing school. I wanted to be sealed to the man I loved for Eternity, have an eternal family complete with lots of kids, graduate from college and be a Registered Nurse, move back to Morgan, buy a home, and raise my family in the amazing community that I was blessed to be raised in. As I listened to my friend tell about this things that she had in her life and that she had everything she wanted, I realized that so did I. I am sealed to one amazing man who I love more than anything, he is forever my number one. I have the sweetest daughter anyone could ask for. She brightens my day multiple times a day. Not a day goes by that I don't thank my Heavenly Father for giving her to us, and wonder what I did to get such a smart, beautiful little girl. I am working together with my Father in Heaven to bring another beautiful little girl into our family who we will wonder about and love just as much as we do our first one. I have a college degree, a small part-time job that is 100% conducive and supportive of my role as a mother first and foremost. How many people get told during their interview that work never comes before your family, you take off whenever you need to to be there for your family first and foremost. I have a husband with a college degree and a job able to provide for our family allowing me to stay home and raise our children. We have found a home that we love and are will be moving in in just one short month. I literally have everything I have ever wanted. I have nothing left to need. Do I want more children, yes! Do I want to be 100% debt free, yes!  Do I need those things right now to be happy, nope. Now don't get me wrong, another part of this happiness is that we have to continually strive to be worth of these blessings given to us. We don't get to sit back and it's easy riding from here on out for the next 80 years. Not at all. Every single day I have to work to keep these blessings in my life. I have to continually live my life in a way that I am worthy of my temple recommend and the blessings given to Jake and I in our sealing to be an eternal family. I have to continually put work and effort into my marriage and role as a mother. I have to do what needs to be done to keep my license as a nurse and not let all of the time, work, money, and everything else that went into that degree go to waste. But when it comes down to it, we don't have to wait to be happy. If we simply look at our lives and where we are at right now we will probably find that we already have everything we have ever wanted, and that really if we will take the time to stop and acknowledge it we are so happy. Along the way when we were blessed with all of these things we have had some major obstacles, illness, car accidents, days when we really didn't know how we were possibly going to pay bills and eat that month. And you can bet that I would ask, why? Why us? Why does this stuff always happen to us. (I'm over dramatic I know.) Because when it comes right down to it we have been blessed beyond belief. I just want to set a goal for myself to recognize these blessings more. That instead of complaining about all of these things that I don't have, that really must not be of that much importance since they never made "the list", focusing on the things that I do have that were and still are the most important things. I still have work to do. I want to be a better mom, a better wife, and many more things but for now, I'm in a good place. Life is far from perfect, but it's good. Really good. Because right now I have everything I have ever wanted.