Eli's Baby Blessing

We had Eli's baby blessing this past Sunday and all I can say was that it was wonderful! An experience I will never forget. For those of you who are not of our faith, a baby blessing is done after your baby is born. His/her father and some other male family members and friends will gather in a circle around the baby and the Father will say a prayer/blessing. This is usually done at the beginning of a church meeting. 
In it, he gives the baby a name and says whatever he feels prompted to say in regards to blessing the baby to have certain qualities and experiences in his/her life. 
Mike has a special gift/talent for giving blessings and there was no exception at Eli's blessing yesterday. Tears came to my eyes as I listened to Mike bless Eli and touch on certain points in his life and what he wished for him to have and accomplish. It made me realize how short of a time we really do have here and how I should work everyday to do something important, to fulfill my role here on the earth.Not just keeping the house clean, but make sure I am helping someone in need, reading and learning more from the scriptures, praying, and being an example to my children. To give my family love and put others before myself. These are the things that really bring true joy to my life. It is funny to me that when you lose yourself in the service of others you really feel more joy than if you were just catering to yourself. My mind would argue with that fact, but the truth is our minds are not the most important things to go by.I think our hearts know and teach us much more. I think our motherly intuition, promptings from our Heavenly Father, they all seem to come straight from our chests, or at least they do for me. So I will follow that over having it make sense in my mind any day. Thanks for reading my rambling thoughts. I will post Eli's blessing on here after I get it typed up. For now enjoy the pictures from the weekend. And thank you to all who came, it means so much to us.
















Cousins- Are these boys cute or what! Grandma Melinda- you have the cutest grand kids ever! ;)

Deacon and Malia

My favorite pic from the weekend. All the cousins with Gabe and Malia (well, some of the cousins). I look at this photo of these sweet beautiful kids and can't help but feel full of love for each of them. I am so lucky to have all of these kids in my life and in my family. They really are choice spirits and I get excited to think about all they will accomplish and how they will grow and just love that I get to be on the side lines watching and routing for them.