Deep Beauty is Reflected from Within

"I wonder if you sisters fully understand the greatness of your gifts and talents and how all of you can achieve the 'highest place of honor' in the Church and in the world. One of your unique, precious, and sublime gifts is your femininity, with its natural grace, goodness, and divinity. Femininity is not just lipstick, stylish hairdos, and trendy clothes. It is the divine adornment of humanity. It finds expression in your qualities of your capacity to love, your spirituality, delicacy, radiance, sensitivity, creativity, charm, graciousness, gentleness, dignity, and quiet strength. It is manifest differently in each girl or woman, but each of you possesses it. Femininity is part of your inner beauty." - James E Faust

Today was my birthday and I turned the big old 2-4!  Usually I am sad each year that my number gets higher but this year I am excited to be 24 because of the journey that lies ahead. I am excited to be a mother and have a beautiful daughter, that I will have the opportunity to teach, love, parent, and friend throughout our lifetime together here on earth.    Once I was told that there are two times each year in your life that determine how the year ahead will go.  One is New Year's Eve and the other is your birthday.  Who you are with and who you spend it with, determines how your year to come will be.  I don't know if that is necessarily true but I felt like this is something that I wanted to ring true for my birthday.  Mr hubbins asked me if I wanted to have a party and have friends come celebrate and truthfully I didn't.  I just wanted a day to spend just him and I to do the things that we liked to do together before the hectic life of a new baby comes and we no longer have just him and I time.  

So we decided to have a fun day together.  One thing I miss about living back in Calgary is being with my mom and going on shopping adventures with her from goodwill, to liquidation world, to last chance liquidators and many other places.  It is fun just to look at all the wonderful things people come up with that you really love or really don't like and you try to imagine who could come up with something so silly!     But that was what I had craved to do was just to go to goodwill and shop around, to go to AMA and get my driver's license renewed, and just go shopping; not even to buy things just to go look.  I have really started nesting today and so I hit the jackpot when I went to Goodwill.  I found some cute little dresses for baby, a little jumper outfit, and a whole pack of Baby Einstein videos (for the great price of 11.99).  At first I didn't know if I should grab them or not but with a little encouragement from the mom department I picked them up.  I really am glad I did because I just looked up the price and found that one dvd costs 16.99... I got 9 dvd's all for my bargain price.  The fun does not just stop there, when I got home and untaped the package I found that some of the dvd's were brand new and hadn't even been opened.  They still had their stickers on the top of the dvd!  Oh I love a good find!  J had an interview for a part time position with benefits at the hospital instead of working on a casual position and so I asked him to drop me off so I could go to AMA and then wander Goodwill, while he was in his interview that he readily agreed to.  

After going to Goodwill, J needed to go to Walmart and so we wandered over there and I of course went to the baby section.  I think I am getting a bit antsy with getting prepared for the baby and today with diapers on sale, I asked J if we could pick up a box for newborns.  I opened the box when I got home and those things are tiny!!  I keep focusing on how big baby is going to be trying to come out of me that I never stopped to realize how really teeny tiny baby girl will be compared to the world around her.  J and I had a fun time looking around; we like to look and talk about the items we would decorate our future home with.  I have to be honest mr hubbin's mom is a fantastic decorator and she can fancy a home on a penny.  She is just amazing at putting cheap things together and making it look as if it was the most expensive thing ever.  J has picked up this talent and so our house looks like we are a lot better off than we really are as poor students.   I guess we are not very poor students because Heavenly Father has blessed us immensely and that I am humbly grateful for.  

After we went to Wal-Mart J and I decided to head off to Edo to try their new pineapple dish they had and it was delicious and filling, and then we headed off to the local swimming pool to have some fun.  It was nice being in the water and having all the weight of baby and the extras carried by the water instead of by me.  We swam for 2 and a half hours and came home.  It was also nice because J and I laughed and had fun like when we were dating and we forgot about the cares of the world.  It was so nice just being focused on one another and having fun people watching, and secretly laughing at some of the swimsuits people wear.  We also had a great time watching the parents interacting with their children and seeing the sparkle of light that filled their children's eyes to be the center of mom and dad's attention.  It made me that much more excited to be a mom.  I feel like every day we get closer to baby's due date the more excited and nervous I become.  Nervous because I am starting to feel like I am not physically prepared to have a baby in our home but we are moving in the right direction.  I feel prepared other than that because of all the schooling in early learning and education I have.  I realize and know I am not going to be perfect when baby comes but I know how to change a diaper, how to swaddle a baby, how to rock bounce them to sleep, and I have watched multiple videos on how to breastfeed a baby so I should be set.  I might not have it down pat but I know I will get the hang of it sooner or later, and that's okay with me.  

On another note, the other day I received a beautiful birthday gift that taught me a simple lesson that I needed to learn, that Heavenly Father was trying to teach me but I am so clueless and I missed it completely the first time.  Remember this post about how I had found an article in the Ensign that was teaching me to look up and not to the side?  Well that wasn't the only lesson Heavenly Father was trying to teach me.  Sister C sent me the video Deep Beauty and tears filled my eyes as the spirit hit me so strongly.  I realized that this past month I have been grumbling and complaining about my trials and how hard they have been.  I have been asking "Why Me!? Why now?!" instead of trusting in the Lord to bring me through the trial and allow it to be a teaching opportunity.  As Sister. Dalton spoke about David O'McKay's wife and the spirit that she had and her divine role as a woman of God, I realized that I needed to be more like the daughter Heavenly Father wanted and needed me to be. Sister Dalton's words about Sister. McKay that struck me to my very core were these,  "Her beauty was not a beauty that could be purchased,... it came from years of hard work of faithfully enduring trials with optimism, trust, strength and courage... [it was] the kind of beauty that shines from the inside out."

And it was these words the tears so freely began to flow from my eyes.  In the trials I was experiencing I had truly forgotten who I was and how I was supposed to handle myself.  I had missed the opportunity to view myself the way Heavenly Father sees me and realize it doesn't matter what anyone else was doing, or who/ how I was being compared.  It was time for me to stop and look up and realize that Heavenly Father sees me how I need to be seen and not how the world sees me.  

In these times it is so easy to forget to look into the "mirrors of eternity" to remember who we are and why we are here.  I am so blessed to have such a beautiful support system who teach me lessons whether that was their intention or not; to loving teach and allow the spirit to beacon me to come to higher ground.  

So maybe that is why my birthday this year has been so special is because the best gift I received for my birthday was the simple reminder for me that I am also born to be a queen and divine is my purpose here on earth.  I need to allow my light to shine forth no matter what trials come my way and turn to a loving Father in Heaven way more often than I do so I can be shaped and molded by his hands.  

All in all, it was a great birthday and I am filled with a sense of wonderment and awe I feel from Heavenly Father when my soul has been so rebellious.  

Thanks to that special someone for this beautiful birthday gift that you have given me <3