Change is hard!

"I'm starting with the man in the mirror
I'm asking him to change his ways
And no message could have been any clearer
If you want to make the world a better place
Take a look at yourself, and then make a change"


These lyrics have been stuck in my head for weeks now! Because of them, I have been reflecting on my life, wondering what I need to change. How can I make my life better? I raise 4 boys and they mean the absolute world to me. I teach them, I raise them and help them grow up to be future men of the world, and I want them to learn respect, and love, and righteousness. I am changing them and helping them develop. But what about me? 

As I am writing this, my boys are watching The Lion King in the other room, (They are obsessed with this movie and have seen it about 100 times at least. In the past month. And no, I am not crying about Mufasa right now.) I think of Simba, of how he ran away and made a change, even if it was an "Hakuna Matata" change. He had no worries, but he knew that something was missing in his life, and that he couldn't run away from it forever. He was visited by Rafiki, and he was able to have his past brought back to memory, and realize that he couldn't run from it. He had to make a change and realize that it was only him that could do it. He looked inside and found something to hold onto, something that could help him change. "You have forgotten who you are, Remember who you are, you are my son."-Mufasa

Aren't we all like Simba sometimes? We don't want to face our problems, our fears and past. It is too hard to change, but that change has to come from within. Think of the reason you want to change. Who benefits from our change, by bettering the world? 

Have you looked in the mirror and just not been happy with what you see? *Insert hand raise from me*. For a while, it was every day. I hated looking in the mirror and seeing who I saw. Why? Why do we do that to ourselves? KC and I were talking a while ago, and we talked about how hard we are on ourselves. We would never think about saying things like that to other people, so why do we do it to ourselves? After a while, I decided I needed to make a change. I hated that I hated looking at myself. I started reading my scriptures, saying my prayers more frequently, and praying that I could see myself as God sees me. I told Him that I wanted to change, and I couldn't do it without Him. Overtime, I noticed a difference. I was exercising, eating better, studying scriptures, praying, teaching my kids. I am by no means bragging, but I had to change myself! I now look in the mirror and see a daughter of God. I don't look for the flaws, even when I know that they are there. I look for the good. And you know what? I see it! (It also reminds me that I need to clean my mirror because those hairspray marks are just getting out of hand). I can understand that God loves me. 

So who do we change for? Who do we want to be better for? Is it for others, or for ourselves? We are told to love ourselves, and I believe that is the first step to change. Changing for yourself, making yourself better, and really getting to know yourself will help you love yourself truly and want to change for the better. Once we are able to love ourselves, we are better able to love others. We are able to make the small changes around us for good. And pretty soon, those small changes are big changes. We provide a ripple effect. Maybe starting out by having better patience with your kids. You have patience, and soon they catch on and have patience. I believe kids are the biggest copy cats in the world, and when they see you doing something, they copy it.

 My son Josh loves to copy me. Randomly throughout the day he will just start copying everything I say. Talk about pressure! But when I revert that to saying things like "Josh has a cute laugh, Josh has the biggest smile, Josh tells funny jokes, etc.." Think of how different that would be if he started copying me when I was losing my patience! He is learning love, and compliments. I can slowly guide him to where he needs to be, so that he will learn to love himself and not have to make a change!

Christ wants us to love ourselves, but if we don't, He wants us to remember that we have the ability to. Remember that you are His son/daughter, and He loves you so much. He loves us completely, flaws and all.

Take a look at yourself. Is there something that you need to change to make your life better? To make you better?

Change is hard, and it takes time. We can't give up on ourselves. Find one small thing to change and work on it! If you mess up, don't be hard on yourself. Start over and keep working at it. Be your best self.

Being Mom

"Mom, Mom, Mom, Mom! Mooooom! MOOOOOOOM!"
These words were ringing through my house this morning. My little 18 month old followed me around the house as I was cleaning and making lunch, showing me what he found, but mostly just yelling my name. He is just learning how to talk, and "Mom" is on the top of his list, along with "Papa".
How often do we get "stuck" on something? Stuck in a mood, stuck in life, stuck in a decision we made, and we feel like we can't get out of it? How can we combat this "stuckness", and find our way out? Find our way to wherever we need to go?
I found this quote by Vern P. Stanfill



Over these past few weeks I have found that there is so much light in the world. There have been so many hard things that so many close to me are going through, that they feel they can't get out of. They're stuck, and see no way out.
Christ is our way out. Christ is our light, our confidant. He is there for us always. Feeling stuck is a hard thing to overcome, but when we overcome it with the Savior, we can know and feel His love for us. Pray to Him, search the scriptures for Him, love your neighbor for Him. Everything we do should be for Him.
This past week, while preparing for my primary lesson, I was reading in Mark 11. I loved the verses 22-24. It talks about the fig tree that was cursed withered away and gone. Peter reminded Christ about this fig tree, and Christ responded beautifully. He said to "Have Faith in God." Not only that but "whosever shall not doubt in his heart, but shall believe that those things which he saith shall come to pass; he shall have whatsoever he saith...Whatsoever ye desire, when ye pray, believe that ye receive them, and ye shall have them."
When we have faith, and when we pray through our hard times, for specific things, or just for help, We can know and are PROMISED that if we believe them, we will have them. When we pray to get "unstuck", and believe that Christ will help us, then He will. It may take time, and hard work on our part, but He will never leave you, as long as you ask for His help.
I think of it in relation to my 4 boys. When they ask me for breakfast, or to help them get buckled into their carseat because they can't do it by themselves, or to help them get their shoes on because they are still learning, do I leave them? Do I keep them "stuck" in that place, always asking for help? Or do I teach them how to buckle on their own, how to find their shoes, and maybe how to throw a piece of toast in the toaster? (Because let's be real, toast is a favorite over here, and we have it almost every day.). Eventually, they will learn, they will master that skill, and they will find something else that they will need help with, and I will be there guiding and helping them.
So when I am running around the house, with my 18 month old following me, yelling my name at the top of his lungs for no apparent reason, I smile, I hug him, I kiss him, and I know that I can get through whatever is going to be coming at me next.

9 Months already?!

I can't believe it.
My boy is grown up. 9 months old already-when did that happen?? He is so big. Well, big to us. We had his doctor's appointment on Friday, and he is actually really small. He only weighs 16 lbs, but thankfully he has grown much taller-he is now 28"! He's going to be tall and skinny. The doctor said that he is getting enough calories thankfully, since he is growing taller. He now has 4 teeth-that was fun, since three of them came in at the same time-a week after his first tooth came in. But he is over that now, and loving not being sick anymore! he had a fever of 102 and scared us for a little bit-he was so groggy and just wanted to snuggle all day (which is very unusual for him). But, he is back. And I love playing with him. His favorite game to play is hide and seek. He will play with me for an hour or so. We have 4 different hiding spots in the house, and if I go to a "non-regular" one, then he will either pass right by me, or not want to play anymore. It's so cute.

Scott LOVES daddy time. Absolutely loves it. So much so that he doesn't want daddy to leave. Because when he sees that he's stuck with mommy again, he will start crying. I love seeing KC and Scott playing together. They love each other so much.

Scotty can also now eat anything! Well, mostly anything anyways. He hates green beans, never has liked them. He loves apple sauce, and carrots. Which I am glad that he likes some vegetables and not just fruits.



Oh, I gave the lesson in Primary on Sunday. Boy, was that fun. I barely got through the lesson. The kids were crazy. That is one thing that is hard about teaching that young of an age (4 year olds). They have such short attention spans, and really need activities to do. So, the last 20 minutes of class, we had paper airplane throwing contests. Yes, I know, it isn't very spiritual, but they had a ton of fun, and I was almost able to make it through the end of the lesson. So yes, if you teach little kids, they love matching games and paper airplanes. I am teaching this week again, so I hope that it goes better than last week. Wish me luck!

Falling, crawling and Wheels

Are you proud? It has only been 9 days since I posted last-Here's a start to the new year!

Scotty has been crawling like crazy. He started when he was about 7 months, and he LOVES it. He wasn't quite sure about it at first-he loved his army crawling, but he has now learned that crawling on all fours is WAY faster. He is now our little terrorist, and I can't believe that the day has come so quickly that we have to baby proof our house. He's so big! He has one tooth now that is still growing in-but it is SUPER sharp. I didn't even know how sharp a tooth can be.
He has also learned how to stand up. on Everything. and I mean everything. He'll crawl straight into the bathroom and climb right up onto the bathtub and knock everything into the tub, then he'll go right to the toilet and start hitting the lid like a drum. He has also learned how to pull our movies out, and he loves it. When he wakes up in the morning, he'll stand in his crib and just talk to himself while hitting the side of it. I love it! The only thing I don't like is when he falls. He had his first goose egg (luckily it didn't last very long, we tried getting a picture, but it didn't work out too well). He falls ALL the time. I guess it's the process of learning. He's going to be walking soon and it kind of scares me.
Wheels wheels Wheels. He can't get enough of them. He loves all kinds of wheels. Big ones, small ones, moving ones, ones on carts, some on strollers, grandpa's power chair, his little toy car, his big toy truck. No matter the size, he will go straight for them. It is impossible to take him to the grocery store with just one of us, because he will wiggle and wiggle so he can see the cart's wheels. It is so hilarious, but yet frustrating at the same time!

Becca's birthday has come and gone. We did a Megamind birthday party for her. (We now have a tradition in our family of doing birthday parties like you would for little kids). It was super fun! We played tape the baby next to metro man, "Destroy" Titan, and you had to build something out of straws and duct tape that would withhold the most amount of weight! To top it off, we wore blue balloons on our heads with Megamind faces drawn on. We had a delicious pumpkin dessert for cake also. It was fun-we love hanging out with family!

This is my favorite face. IT is his trademark face.

New Years Resolution

SO! Happy Belated 2013. I made a goal to update this at LEAST once a month-hopefully more. We shall see. ;)

2012 was an AMAZING year. Here is a little newsletter from us to you. Also, we have included pictures. :)

Happy New Year!
We had a wonderful year. We were able to go a few places this past year. We went to Bear Lake to visit Great Grandma and Grandpa Daley-it was such a blast! St. George was definitely our favorite temperature though. We visited Great Grandma and Grandpa Baldwin for Thanksgiving. It was so nice to visit and relax. :) In the summer we were at St George also, for a funeral. We were going to head up to Las Vegas to walk around, but it was WAY too hot with Scott. So we just went back to Utah instead. :) Pretty laid back year, but we had a new baby, so we couldn't do TOO much.

KC finished 2 more semesters of school last year. He is now on his final semester before student teaching. The light at the end of the tunnel is finally here! He is so excited to be able to student teach/internship this coming year. He is teaching 3 piano students, 1 voice student and 1 violin student right now, and trying to expand that. He is working at a place called MyFastPC as a technician; he fixes email problems and viruses on computers. (So if you ever need someone to help you out..give him a call!) He loves movies, and being with family. We don't get to see him as often as we like, so we cherish every moment we have together. He is the Ward Choir Director in church, and was complimented many times for the wonderful Christmas performance. Mind you, he only had 3 weeks to get the choir started back up, rehearse and perform, plus it was his first performance as director-he did awesome! He is still an amazing singer, violinist and pianist. He loves his little boy. They have so much fun together.

Erica has been a stay at home mom these past 9 months. She has absolutely loved being home with Scott and being able to teach him new things everyday. She is starting school up this semester, and is so excited to be going back. She is doing just a couple online classes-but that will be plenty. :) She loves being with KC and Scott, and making memories. She is trying to start up photography-not professional, just snapshots here and there of the family. She was just recently called as a Primary teacher for 4 year olds, and she is SO excited! She loves little kids :) She is currently in the process of getting back down to her pre-wedding weight-finally got back to pre-pregnancy! That was an accomplishment. :) She loves her boys.

Scott is just about 9 months old! We can't believe how fast time has flown! He has now been out of Mom's tummy longer than he's been in it. He is adorable. He loves bananas, and playing hide and seek with mommy. He will even come looking for her (after she calls him for a while). He LOVES daddy time. Forget about mom when dad's home! He is crawling all over the place, and his first tooth is almost in. He loves to "fly" with Dad, and is still super camera shy. (That is why there are no pictures of him smiling-he won't do it in front of the camera.) He loves typing on the computer, and will crawl straight for it if you open it. He loves visiting his Grandmas and Grandpas. He is so lucky to have them so close together. His absolute favorite thing though, is to follow his Grandpa Daley around in his car. Grandpa has his power chair, and Scott races around the kitchen in his little walker. It is the cutest thing. He loves watching and feeling any type of wheel. He is our precious little boy, and we love him so much.

We wish you all a wonderful New Year. We love you!

-KC, Erica and Scott

Scott K. McMillan

Wow...It has been what, 5 months since I have updated? Sorry, we haven't had the internet! But, a LOT has happened obviously in these past few months. Last I updated, I was still pregnant. how crazy.


 Beginning the middle of April, I had been put on strict bed rest and we had been going back and forth from the hospital because I had developed preeclampsia-I had high protein levels and high blood pressure. On the 3rd of May we went in, and my protein level had doubled from the day before-which isn't good. The doctor came in to speak with us, and said that we didn't have much of a choice of what to do. So they sent me home to do one more 24 hour urine test, and said that when I come back the next day, if my protein levels were high still, then they would induce me-or even if they weren't any higher but stayed the same, they would still induce. Imagine how I felt then! I was not even close to being ready-I still thought I had a whole month left to get ready. So we went home, and packed the hospital bag-we were so nervous!!! Skip to the next day-we went to the hospital in the afternoon, after my 24 hrs were up, and lo and behold my protein level had gone up. Thus began the induction at 2 am.

On oxygen to keep Scott's heartrate up

I was dilated to a 1 already before they even started-and that was 4 weeks before I was even due-by 4 am I had dilated to a 3 or 4. Apparently I had been having contractions already, but I didn't even feel them at all. Boy, was I in for a surprise. (thank goodness for epidurrals...almost) 6 o'clock rolls around, and they came and broke my water. After that, it sped up quite a bit. My epidurral couldn't keep up with how fast my labor was going, and I have a newfound awe of women who go natural. Contractions HURT! Thankfully my midwife was there and said to start pushing! 20 minutes later, Scott K. McMillan was born. May 6th, 2012. He was perfect. And soo handsome. He was little-weighed only 4 lbs. 11 oz.

My sweet sweet husband, first day as a Dad :)

 He was fully developed, and our little miracle-but he had trouble eating enough and keeping his body temperature up. So he was placed in the NICU. That was the hardest time for me, because I was not able to get up and see him for almost a whole day, because I was still recovering from my epidurral, and they also had me on magnesium and I had a dumb catheter for a while cause I couldn't get out of bed. But, when I did get to see him, I still couldn't believe he is mine. He is so perfect and beautiful, and I wanted to get him out of that hospital!

What a cutie pie!

Two of my most favorite boys

5 days later, he was released from the hospital, and we got to go home!!!

He has been such a joy to KC and I, and we love our little Scotty to pieces. The past 4 months have been incredible, and he has brought such happiness into our lives. At his 4 month checkup, he weighed 12 lbs 1 oz-almost tripling his birth weight.

He has learned how to roll over from his tummy to his back, he can grab at toys, hold them and shake them, he loves chewing on his fingers and still hasn't learned that when he chokes on them, not to take them out :P He loves to smile, and has even given me a laugh a few times. He loves it when daddy comes home, and talks to him like crazy. He has such a wonderful personality already, and we are so excited to raise our little miracle boy :)

1 month old

Beam me up Scotty! (his aunt Tam made this for him)

His first play-the Wizard of Oz

Perfect, cute little face!

2 months old

(I'm sorry I don't have updated pictures..my phone is being dumb)

Oops!!

Wow, it has been a while since the last post!
I thought that I would get so into blogging, but this is only my 3rd post since I started, and there has been so much time in between posts. Sorry to you 2 family members who are following me, you've probably been dying to know what's been going on! ;)

Well, I am now 31 1/2 weeks along. I still can't believe that our little boy is almost here. I have been feeling the normal pregnancy discomforts, and am just trying to push through it all, because I know it is worth it. :) I know this is completely irrelevant, but I don't know how I feel about my belly button now. :P It is neither wanting to pop out nor stay in, so I believe that I have a flat one, but it looks bruised. Kind of gross looking-my sisters don't like looking at it. ;) I still have yet to put the nursery together.. :/ I'm way behind, I know. But, that leads into what I have been so excited about! Cause I was waiting for my sister to get home from her mission to finally put it together and....

She's home!!!!!! :D :D :D :D :D :D :D

haha. yep, we were that excited. ;)

 

Definitely a little difference there!!

It is so much fun having her home!! I missed her so much!! She doesn't have too much of an accent though, just talks a little bit faster. ;) She loved her mission though, I can definitely tell that. :) :) It's been a week today since she has been home. Time definitely has flown, but it has been so fun having her back :D

I have my next doctors appt next week! This will be the last one before I go every 2 weeks. That's kinda scary...that means that he is almost here..

I just found out I was released from YW's too. :'( I am going to miss it a lot!!!

Well, that's all for now my fellow friends. Until next time. (which hopefully won't be so far apart!)