Happy Mother's Day

Here's my mom, my mom's mom, and me in Dec 2008.

I just want to share a little about the women who shaped me.

My mom was born in Texas because my Grandpa was in the Airforce. While in Germany, my Grandpa Jon died while flying with the West German Airforce in an airshow. My grandma was a widow in a foreign country with 3 little kids at 31. She came back to the United States and raised her 3 kids in California, near her mother--my great-grandma Tommy.

When my mom was 21, she married my dad and within the next 5 years, they had 3 kids. After a painful divorce, she met and married my step-dad when I was 12. We moved to Tremonton where she took on the daunting task of combining a family and being a mother to 3 more children. Two years later, Nick was born. When Nick was born, Kelli was 16, I was 14, Kim was 13, Jack was 13, Jayson was 10, and Matt was 10. Life was never easy, it was never smooth. My parents were constantly trying to define and redefine their roles as parents and step-parents in an effort to do what was best for the kids--but all 7 of us had different needs. Frankly, I don't know how any of us made it through it. Divorce leaves scars. The absent parents could spoil, but Brent and Diane were required to discipline, as well as love. We had our share of confusion, selfishness, and rage. And through it all, Brent and Diane remained a constant source of stability and constant faith. We could always rely on them to continually strive for honesty, integrity, and the spirit.

Each child comes to earth with it's own personality and set of trials that they must face--and no amount of parenting can protect a child from the path that they are destined to tread. Some of us just need to learn things the hard way. Whenever I lose hope in myself, I have a picture of my parents plodding away, enduring to the end. They still live in the house we lived in while we were growing up. I can still picture them going to church with the same people I went to church with as a teenager. My mother is still an amazing visiting teacher, and I can rely on her to send me books and article clippings in an effort to continually teach me. Her perserverance despite her trials is her greatest lesson to me. That's not to say she was happy every day--but whether happy or sad--she was always there--which is more than I can say for some parents.


Thanks Mom!