All About the Argyles

I really , really, really like this kid.  Everything about him makes me smile.  We have considered him a gift from the moment he joined us.  He has a wacky personality, can you tell?  And SO much enthusiasm for life...  He has such a good heart,   and yet fierce determination.  One of the greatest gifts my Heavenly FAther has ever given me is having the privilege of being a mother to this sweet boy. Ten thing we celebrate about Brady on his tenth birthday: 1.  He is a good friend,  2.  He has a great attitude. 3.  He is quick to apologize when he knows he has done something wrong. 4.  He is a hard worker, in every sense of the word. 5.  Never complains about taking the trash out which is his daily "job". 6.  He STILL comes in our room and snuggles with us every morning before the start of the day. 7.  He wants to do what is right. 8.  He has a qui...

I have been thinking a great deal lately about a time many many moons ago when I was given the stewardship to be a visiting teacher for someone who HATED me.  I have written about it here before.   Man, that was a tough time. I look back on it lately and realize how much I learned from that experience.   I prayed many many months during that two year period, pleading with Heavenly Father to give me the okay to go to the Relief Society President or the Bishop (who happened to be Brent) and ask to be reassigned to someone else.  It didn't make sense to me that I would be asked to take a spiritual though teach month to someone who would never be able to learn anything from me.  The ire I felt from her each time I entered her home was palpable.  Time and time again the answer was the same, "no, you need to remain her visiting teacher".   During that time I had to soften my heart and get creative about ways to serve her.  She would NEVE...

Jensen had the time of her life in the UK in her study abroad program and made lots of new friends. We kept track of her with the LIFE 360 app.  She would check in each day and we could see where she was without her having to call and text.   This "A Team" made teacher appreciation week a breeze.  I love these ladies that I get to work with through PTO. Apparently it was blue day.  Sheri and I snapped a quick after school picture of these guys.  It was purely a coincidence.  Such cute girls. Love this quote. One of my favorite things every 6 weeks is taking this girl to her ortho appointments and our Smashburger lunch dates.  It is so good to get one on one time with her. Prosper Ladies Association hosted our first town prayer breakfast on the national prayer day and it was a smashing success. We had Uncle Greg and Aunt Sharon over for dinner on Mother's Day and ...

THE LANYARD The other day as I was ricocheting slowly off the blue walls of this room bouncing from typewriter to piano from bookshelf to an envelope lying on the floor, I found myself in the "L"section of the dictionary where my eyes fell upon the word, Lanyard. No cookie nibbled by a French novelist could send one more suddenly into the past. A past where I sat at a workbench at a camp by a deep Adirondack lake learning how to braid thin plastic strips into a lanyard. A gift for my mother. I had never seen anyone use a lanyard. Or wear one, if that's what you did with them. But that did not keep me from crossing strand over strand again and again until I had made a boxy, red and white lanyard for my mother. She gave me life and milk from her breasts, and I gave her a lanyard She nursed me in many a sick room, lifted teaspoons of medicine to my lips, set cold facecloths on my forehead then led me out into the airy light and taught me to walk and swim and I in t...

We have been kinda struggling over here at the Argyle house of late.  One of our teenage girls recently came to me and suggested that she (paraphrasing here) "wasn't really feeling the love" from some of the girls in her youth group and she wondered if she could occasionally skip out on going to her youth midweek activities. I was so sad. This is something we have been trying to navigate for the better part of the school year.  It is nothing that most teenage girls don't experience at some point.    I resolved pretty early on that we were going to deal with it as a family and not involve anyone else.  When I prayed for guidance the last six months or so, it was clear to me that was the  best course of action. Admittedly, however, when she came to me with this latest request - to bow out of her activities- albeit "occasionally", I knew the problem was bigger than I had previously thought. I worried.  A lot.  I sought counsel from friends of...

I borrowed this from this blog here .    This is such a fantastic analogy and I just think it is right on! Your testimony is like a rock wall. (Don't worry about the purpose of the wall--the analogy doesn't stretch that far.) Everyone is constantly building to their walls, stone by stone. And every now and then, you may stumble upon a stone and not see exactly where it fits. It may be labeled "gay marriage" or "visiting teaching" or "hymns are boring" or "why do we have so many freaking meetings and why are they so freaking long." But that doesn't mean you abandon the wall. It means you set the stone aside and keep building with what you DO know. And as you build, you may suddenly see where that stone fits. Some people have likened this process to a jigsaw puzzle, but that implies that everyone's testimony looks the same eventually. I like the stone wall better because everyone's will look completely different, and have d...

Thirteen or so years ago someone sent me an anonymous letter that was pretty bold and extremely unkind.  At the time it bothered me for a few days, maybe even weeks.  My gut gave me a pretty good idea of who had written it to me but I didn't have any proof.  Ultimately, I struggled with the hurt that it brought to me for a few weeks and with a lot of prayer, forgot about it. Last week I got a phone call from the woman who wrote it to me.  I was a little surprised when I saw her number on my caller id.  I have not seen her or really had an opportunity to visit with her in years and although she is a member of my church, she is not part of my local congregation or any of the neighboring congregations.   She was very meek and humble and kind when she called.  She said that she was embarrassed that this had taken her so long to do because she had known for years that she should reach out to me and apologize but she had just never followed through ...