Joy in the Journey

We had an interesting week. Starting on Monday, one plan after another fell through all week long due to causes that were out of our hands. It could easily have turned into an exercise in frustration, and I wouldn't have blamed my kids if they had thrown a tantrum or two when these plans they were excited about had to be changed. But my kids taught me an excellent lesson this week; they taught me about having joy in the journey. For instance, on Tuesday we were planning to go strawberry picking with a friend and her daughter, but the daughter woke up sick that morning. Instead of moping, my kids became fully engaged in a project of their making - using my scrapbooking chalk to color several dinosaur cutouts made with my handy-dandy Cricut machine. They probably spent two hours coloring these little cutouts and then more time gluing them on to butcher paper. Here they are busy at work (pictured with our friend's son, who we now watch two days a week).


This week's experiences brought to mind President Thomas S. Monson's October 2009 General Conference talk, Finding Joy in the Journey. Below I'll share a couple of my favorite quotes.

"This is our one and only chance at mortal life—here and now. The longer we live, the greater is our realization that it is brief. Opportunities come, and then they are gone. I believe that among the greatest lessons we are to learn in this short sojourn upon the earth are lessons that help us distinguish between what is important and what is not. I plead with you not to let those most important things pass you by as you plan for that illusive and non-existent future when you will have time to do all that you want to do. Instead, find joy in the journey—now."

I was reminded this week that letting kids have time to jump in puddles and make mudpies for birds is important; getting everywhere I think we need to go on time is not so important.

"If you are still in the process of raising children, be aware that the tiny fingerprints that show up on almost every newly cleaned surface, the toys scattered about the house, the piles and piles of laundry to be tackled will disappear all too soon and that you will—to your surprise—miss them profoundly."

This quote captures the essence of why I want to have joy in the journey now. I want to look back when my kids are grown and know that we spent much of our time making memories and ignoring fingerprints.

We finally did make it strawberry picking on Saturday and made some fun memories then. Kaia was very serious about her strawberry picking:

Asher was very serious about his strawberry sampling (despite my many attempts to get him to wait!):


We put our strawberries to good use. I highly recommend this strawberry shortcake recipe; the shortcake itself had such a wonderful flavor, and with the strawberries and Cool Whip it was out of this world!