tonight

Oops, here is my post that I originally wrote that I thought got deleted..

Tonight as I was driving with Maddix in the car, I felt an overwhelming feeling of gratitude. Tears streamed down my face. I turned around, held Maddix's chunky thighs, and told him how much I love being his mom and how much I love spending time with him.
The other day I was telling Brig how much I love Maddix at this age. He laughed, only because we are in the process of potty training, and experiencing the "terrible twos" so not every moment in our house is exactly pleasent, but every day I feel that I grow so much. I learn patience or I learn the importance of meal time together. I learn that playing horses, legos, football, and baseball all day gives me the opportunity to bond with my boy. I learn more about my handsome little guy's personality and realize that what I do really does rub off on him and he really is learning by example. The other day Maddix and I were swimming in the pool and he walked over to the step, knelt down and began to pray. It went like this, "Heavenly Father, thank you body, thank you dada, thank you momma, keep momma safe, thank you happy, thank you swimming pool, thank you cereal, thank you prophet, thank you Jesus, Amen." He looked up at me with such a proud face and said, "Make Jesus happy." After the conference talk given that discussed the importance of teaching our children to understand, I have been trying really hard to explain why we pray, why we go to church, etc. I showed him a few examples in the Ensign where there were pictures of stories and I explained why the people were praying and how Heavenly Father helped them. Every time I teach him this, I can tell that he is really trying to understand. He looks at me with the cutest serious face ever and asks questions or repeats back what I say. It is so hard to teach a 2 year old, but they do absorb everything so I am really trying hard to be a good example.

This summer has been perfect. Yes potty training can be frustrating, but I love being home with Maddix. I love being there to watch him learn new things. I love our daily swims, our (almost) daily trips to Costco, our walks to the park to play football, baseball or golf. I love singing him songs before he goes down for his nap or to sleep at night. We sing the same three songs every night, "I love to see the temple", "I am a child of God", and "I hope they call me on a mission". I love watching his sweet tired eyes slowly close at he falls asleep. Some day's it isn't until that moment that I realize how precious and innocent he is. I love being a mom.