Sneak Peak at Mother's Day pics.

For Mother's Day this year, Dustin got me a gift certificate to one of my very favorite local photographers, Katie Wells. I have been drooling over her vision and artistry for photgraphy for years. She has an at-home, natural light studio and is the best with kids. This was one of the last pictures we took that day, and she got Lillie and Jack (and me) to smile at the same time. Incredible talent, I tell you. (means we have yet to ever take a family picture without atleast ONE of our kids screaming) This also might mean I might get to change my facebook profile pic.

I pick up the 4x6 proofs and CD with high resolution images on Thursday. I can't wait to see how all the others turned out!

And don't worry, Dustin is in them also. :)

A happy marriage or a crappy marriage.

If there's one thing that I've learned in the last six years, it would be that Dustin and I can either have a happy marriage or a crappy marriage. It's a simple choice that I have had to make hundreds of times in six years. When I put Dustin's needs, wants, wishes before my own, then we are happy. When I start getting selfish, nagging, or critical, our marriage starts to feel a little crappy.
Dustin and I read a book by Elder Hafen entitled Covenant Hearts just after we were married. After reading that book together, we decided that we wanted to have a covenant marriage instead of a contractual marriage. What's the difference, you ask?

A contractual marriage is when both spouses give 50%. A covenant marraige is when both spouses give 100%.

I'm grateful that all of our problems are solveable, instead of perpetual. We are both excellent problem solvers, which is the best skill you can have in a marriage. We also have the same views on how to raise our family, and how to treat our marraige.

Here's what works for us (not in any order):

• We both attend the temple every month, or more. There have been some months that have been difficult, but we haven't ever missed a month. Even when I was nursing, we still made it a priority to have me go and do initiatory or baptisms for even a 1/2 hour.
• We pray together each day.
• We read scriptures individually, as a family, and as a couple.
• We have FHE every Monday night. Even before we had kids, we still had an official "opening song, prayer, lesson, activity, treat" and after 312 Monday nights, we've only missed 2.
• We help sustain each other (and remind eachother) in our callings
• We cancelled our TV service. We spend much more quality time together talking, playing games, going to the park, riding bikes, reading scriptures, exersicing, and playing with our kids on the floor now.
• We go on a date each week. It's expensive with babysitters, but is the best investment.
• Each night, we discuss our Best and Worst parts of our day.
• We rely 100% on eachother. We are perfectly happy and content being by ourselves!
• I add extra ice to Dustin's drinks, and he makes sure to exclude mustard from any sandwich for me.
• We sometimes go to bed with unresolved issues. Sometimes a good night's sleep really helps.

So, in our "6-year-wisdom" we probably know nothing. But, so far, things have been wonderful, spontanious, and joyful. I've told people before, I got lucky and married someone who I genuinly get along with. But in reality, we follow what the Prophet's have taught us about marriage, and it seems to be working, especially when the hard times come.

Successful marriages and families are established and maintained on principles of faith, prayer, repentance, forgiveness, respect, love, compassion, work, and wholesome recreational activities. By divine design, fathers are to preside over their families in love and righteousness and are responsible to provide the necessities of life and protection for their families. Mothers are primarily responsible for the nurture of their children. In these sacred responsibilities, fathers and mothers are obligated to help one another as equal partners.

I love you, dear! I pray each day that I can find ways to serve you more, and be a better wife for you. I love the life we've built together, the covenants we've made together, and the wierd, obnoxious memories we have together.
Love, Erika

Other reading I recommend:
Covenant Marriage

Charity-lens.

Charity.

I bet if I truly was Christ-like and had charity, I would never lose my temper, be impatient with the idiot driver in the cool purple intrepid, or blame my 75% graded assignment on the teacher, instead of on myself. Everyone would be much happier and much more compassionate.

So, apparently all I need is charity. But, with me being in the 'natural man' state, charity doesn't come easily or automatically.

C.S. Lewis said this:
When I come to my evening prayers and try to reckon up the sins of the day, nine times out of ten the most obvious one is some sin against charity: I have sulked or snapped or sneered or snubbed or stormed. And the excuse that immediatly springs to my mind is that the provocation was so sudden and unexpected: I was caught off guard... [yet] surely what a man does when he is taken off his guard is the best evidence for what sort of a man he is. Surely what pops out before the man has time to put on a disguise is the truth. If there are rats in the celler you are most likely to see them if you go in very suddenly. But the suddenness does not create the rats: it only prevents them from hiding. In the same way the suddenness of the provocation does not make me an ill-tempered man: it only shows me what an ill-tempered man I am. The rats are always there in the cellar but if you go in shouting and noisily they will have taken cover before you switch on the light. Apprently the rats of resentment and vindictiveness are always there in the cellar of my soul.

In this 'natural man' state, resentment and vindictiveness come much easier than charity. But what I'm realizing, is that all of those negative reactions are a choice. And so is charity.

Obviously, Jesus Christ is the ultimate example of charity. Perhaps if we also had the "charity lens" and could see everyone as Jesus, or as Heavenly Father, sees them, we wouldn't be so judgemental.

Here's what I used to think charity was: small acts of kindness. I thought that by smiling at strangers, or holding the door for a distressed mother with five kids in tote was being charitable. Unfortunatly, in my head I would think, "That mom would look great with a different hair cut. Or a straitener for that matter." My charity was only outwardly. If I really was able to see that mother as Heavenly Father does, I would maybe think, "That woman has sacrificed everything to do what's right and raise five beautiful children. Day in and day out she gets up early, goes to bed late, cleans her home, makes meals, and makes sure each child knows they are loved."

Cheesy? maybe. But maybe that's what charity really is. We all know how it feels to have felt the critical, negative, carping, nit-picking, fault-finding, and grousing attitude that comes easily to the natural man. It hurts. Anytime that happens to me, I also want to say, "If you only knew me better."

So how do I aquire more charity? I think that comes individually. But I can tell a big difference day to day when I'm consistanly praying for it.

Charity is the culminating gift of our spiritual seeking. "And now abideth faith, hope, charity, these three; but the greatest of these is charity."
(1st Corinthians 13:13)