Still Climbing

This is seriously my new favorite song. I have always LOVED Hillary Weeks, but she really hits it right on with this song. The song is about having your life planned out the way you wanted it to be and then finding a "mountain" in the middle of the road. Wow! She couldn't have summed up my life any better than that. The rest of the song is about climbing the mountain and realizing had that mountain never existed, you wouldn't be able to see such a beautiful view. Losing Easton has definitely been the biggest mountain I have ever found blocking the "road" on the route I want my life to take. I honestly feel like there has never been a mom in this world more excited to have twin boys as I was. But, I am climbing that mountain and one day I hope to be able to feel like the "view" from up there is better than it would've been had I not faced the "mountain." Right now I am still in the process of climbing and sometimes I even slip down the steep cliff a little bit and sometimes that is for days at a time. The things I have learned on this climb so far have been hard and amazing all at the same time. One day I know I will be able to accept that this is truly the way it's supposed to be for me and my family. I have learned that losing a child the way we lost Easton is difficult (as I am sure any way of losing a child is). It seems sometimes that people feel we should "get over it" and "move on" because we never really (in their opinion) got to bond with this child (which any woman who has ever been pregnant knows is false, the bonding begins with the first positive pregnancy test). Or that by remembering Easton and honoring him we are "dwelling" or giving ourselves a "pity party" when really all we are doing is giving him a small portion of the attention he would've gotten from us had he lived and grown up like his siblings. We will never see him take his first steps, say his first word, play baseball, go to school, get married (in this life anyway). Part of my "climb up the mountain" is to learn that most people haven't and never will experience what we have experienced and so they really can't understand what we are going through. I have learned that this isn't something you get over, it's something you get through and sometimes you get through it one day at a time, sometimes one hour at a time, sometimes one minute at a time but you just do what you have to do and hope that you reach the top a better, more insightful, less judgmental person than you were before. One of the biggest things I have learned on my journey so far is to be more compassionate towards others, especially perfect strangers in public. I had an interesting experience with this just last week. I was in Target and just had Asher with me. There was a Grandma pushing a cart with two darling twin boys in it (they actually ended up being 2 out of 3 triplets). I told the grandma how cute I thought the boys were and then I had to walk away because I was getting all teary-eyed. I was about to burst so I started walking as fast as I could to get to the checkout so I could just get out of there before I did burst. Well, I had Asher's car seat wedged in the cart making it difficult to see what was ahead of me (the tears weren't helping either). In my hurry, I accidentally ran into another lady's cart. I looked at her and told her how sorry I was and she was so rude to me!!!! She said something to the effect of "ya right you're sorry!" and rolled her eyes at me. It hurt me so badly that she would treat someone she didn't even know that way. There was no way she didn't notice I was crying and she still acted like that. When I got out to my car I realized that yes, she may have judged me and been harsh on me when she had no idea what I was going through at the moment, but I was doing the same to her. Maybe she was so rude because she found out a loved one has cancer, or maybe she had just had a miscarriage, or whatever. So my goal right now is to try and remember that we never know what others are going through and that I should treat others as Christ would. Hopefully at the end of my climb I will find that I am a more compassionate, Christ-like person.

Halloween!

We had a very fun and eventual Halloween weekend. On Saturday we had our ward's Trunk-or-Treat and chili cook off. The kids loved it and it was fun (even though I ran out of candy in like 15 minutes). On Sunday, we took Easton's pumpkin to his grave and left it there with a little battery operated candle in it. We wanted it to be lit up, but we didn't think it would a good idea to burn the whole place down :). Then came Monday. School was out so I was faced with entertaining two very excited kids all day. We went to Chick-fil-A and Target. Very exciting, but it seemed to entertain the little munchkins. My mom and dad had us over for yummy chili and rolls for dinner and then it was time for Trick-or-Treating. Ryan took the kids and they had so much fun. I gotta admit, I'm kind of glad Halloween is over and now we can focus on one of my favorite holidays-THANKSGIVING!!!!!!

Cute Ballerina and her buddy Dracula! Rylee wanted to put her arm around Carter for the picture but he said "Draculas don't do that!"

Twins forever!

All four kiddos!

Now we are going to play a little game. Carter, Rylee, and Asher have all been the same thing for Halloween when they are babies and they have all been roughly around the same age. Can you guess which one is which????

Give up???? 1st one is Rylee, 2nd one is Carter, and then Asher. I think they all look alike don't you???