I have been thinking a lot lately about what makes families unique and special.
It is so interesting to look at the families that we know and all the many ways that they grow.
I know that each child is unique, distinct and unrepeatable, but so is each family.
I have really enjoyed my career as a wife and mother. I love keeping my home, cooking, schooling all my kids and watching the girls grow into women that are totally devoted to home and family. It is one of the things that I treasure most, being able to share the adventures of my girls as they begin their own careers as wives and mothers.
They both have such special gifts from God to carry them through. 
It is never easy, nothing is that is worth doing, but it is truly a vocation that is close to the heart of God.Our family has had such an interesting history and it comes from so many people with their own histories that blend together to make our domestic church what it is.
I learned to be a wife and mother from my own mom, who has been totally devoted to her vocation since she married my dad. I learned to find fulfillment within the walls of my home and the arms of my family, because she made that such a reality.
My Grandmas taught me perseverance and to be happy with what you have. There are lessons in my heart that come from the depression, from Calabasas CA, from the life of a woman who loved reading and thinking, my grandma Betty.
Grandma Maggie was a great woman and had to make do with a lot less that I will ever have to. She loved her home and family and worked so hard to be sure that they felt rich in all the important things. She told me so many stories about how she raised her kids without a lot of material extras. I still give thanks for my washing machine with every load when I think about how she had to wash clothes in camp. She was so happy!
I learned some amazing lessons in acceptance of God's Will from Alice Matthews, a young woman, and so brave. Stricken with MS in a horrific way, she never complained, always had a smile, and had the ability to inspire joy in all of us who spent time with her. I pray that if I ever go through something like that that I will be able to bear it that gracefully.
Letitia Merkel was another woman who chose to be a mother first, and yet never lost her love for Art, Music and Literature. She showed me so many things about growing in mind and heart and soul even as the obligations of the family seem to be never ending. She has given me the inspiration to keep reading and exploring and creating.
There are so many others that have influenced my family life. So many families that I know that have come through things or are going through trials so much more challenging than anything I have ever faced, and it affects the way our family grows every day. Whether we are praying in response to prayer requests, making a meal, or helping out with childcare in a crisis, we take with us a bit of the experience of the people we encounter and it changes us.
Gandalf in "The Lord of the Rings", said something like - It is not for us to choose the time in which we live, only to do the best we can with the time that is given to us.
If we do our best in the time we have, it may serve others well in the future. That is a very important thing to remember, I think.
I am so grateful to the people in my life who took that idea to heart, and I hope I can be a person that will continue the momentum of their gifts.
