One Year of Kissing

We celebrated our one year of kissing anniversary! A few weeks ago, we went back to the place where the kissing all began. We smooched for the first time on October 11th, 2018, at the Village in Meridian. (Pictured above.) On October 11th, 2019, we went back to take a walk down memory lane, so we could smooch some more. (Pictured below.)

Look how much David has changed?! Crazy!

Before our first kiss, we had been on a few dates, and we talked on the phone, over the course of almost 2 months. It took me a while to warm up to David, and it was just simply weird to try and love and be affectionate with someone new.

David slowly and patiently worked his way into my heart. My first impression of him was that he was a guy who needed some love in his life. I felt he needed to loosen up, and relax. After a few more dates, we both relaxed (I realized I was also super uptight, and on guard), and on our third date, our real personalities began to shine through, and we started to really like each other.

Before that, I had pushed David away multiple times, because I was not ready for serious dating. He continued going to singles activities and dating, while I worked through some of my feelings. One day, while sitting in the temple, I heard the Spirit whisper, "Do not push David away." I had not been able to stop thinking about him, even as I was trying to just let him go. But I was just so afraid to open myself up to someone new.

One day, after I had not talked to David for a few weeks, I decided to just relax and ponder deeply about him, since I could not seem to get him out of my mind. As I thought of David and my feelings about him, I ended up falling asleep. When I woke up, I found a text message from him. He simply wrote that he hoped I was doing okay and that sometimes he just wished he could talk to me. I was shocked that he texted me, since I had pretty much called it all off. But after that text from him -- that came at an inspired moment -- I allowed myself to be open to him. We started talking and dating again.

It was our fourth date. We met at the Boise Temple parking lot, and then I got into his car. We held hands as we drove out towards the Village in Meridian. Just holding his strong hand felt like a piece of Heaven. (It was the second time I had held his hand. We held hands on our third date.) We got to our date location, and David just looked different to me than he had before. He was letting his beard grow out a little, he seemed more relaxed, and he was wearing a down jacket that made him look really attractive. I was also allowing myself to see him.

As we walked through the Village courtyard, the fountain light show was dancing to the music. We found an outdoor couch to sit on to watch it. It was such a magical location. It was slightly chilly, but the air was invigorating. We sat really close to each other, snuggled in to stay warm and cozy. He smelled really good.

It was not my plan to kiss him that night, and he was not planning on it either. But, there was magic in the air. So, as I was snuggled into his fluffy down jacketed chest, I looked up into his beautiful blue eyes, and suddenly, our lips were touching.

Once our lips touched, the whole world seemed to transform.

At first, it felt so wrong to be kissing someone new, but it did not take long for it to feel so right.

It was strange, I did not used to enjoy being overly affectionate in public, but suddenly, with David, I didn't care. We kissed on the outdoor couch right in the middle of a courtyard full of people, and then we got up and slow danced to the music, and kissed some more. It was like the rest of the world was irrelevant, and all I could see and feel was him.

We were both each other's first kiss after experiencing death and divorce. To say we were hungry for physical affection is a total understatement! We were famished, starving, dying, for love and intimacy!

We walked around for a bit, stopping here and there to steal another kiss. And then we got back in the car, to head to a restaurant, and then home. David was so funny, he kept stopping at all the stop signs in the mall parking lot, just so we could kiss. That is when I knew he was my kind of guy. We were making "all the stops along the way," just like the song says to do.

It was a beautiful night of kissing for the first time.

It was the kind of magic I needed, to get me to move forward into a new relationship.

I could not have imagined a more perfect location full of enchantment and music, for our first kiss.

Since that magical night, over a year ago, we haven't stopped kissing.

We never plan to stop making all the stops along the way...

Can I Come Home, Please?

There are times I wish I could visit Heaven. Sometimes, when life is so hard, and when feelings of sorrow become so heavy and intense, I just want to take a break, and walk the streets of paradise for awhile.

I just want to breathe the fresh air of peace and freedom.

Sometimes it feels like life is specifically designed to test me, at my weakest points. For example, if I desire to jump into the arena and fight the good fight against my weaknesses of pride or jealousy, then I will surely be tested to my very core, until the pride and jealousy are pummeled out of me.

I have had some of those "pummeled" feelings lately.

I feel like I am in the process of being broken, like a wild Stallion.

I know that God wants me to be something I have never been before, and the process of changing my wild-Stallion-core makes me want to implode, or explode; or both.

I am trying to learn how to manage my new roles as a wife, a mother, and a stepmother.

To be blunt, it is hard.

So very hard.

It has been the hardest thing I have experienced in my life.

Lately, I often teeter-totter between feelings of extreme elation and total deflation.

When Charles died, I thought that would surely be the greatest trial and test I would have to endure.

I was wrong.

Trials have no limit, and no end, in this life.

Charles dying was just the beginning of a life forever changed. Because he died, my path forward will forever be altered, and it will be more complicated and complex than what I imagined my life would have been with him.

The challenge of combining two families has been far more emotionally and physically taxing than I could have anticipated. David and I are doing our best to figure out how to manage our collaborative chaos. There are so many moving pieces in our big family puzzle. Another struggle is that we are all working with a different picture in mind, of what the puzzle should look like, when it is put together.

Putting together a family puzzle with pieces from two different boxes seems impossible.

And it would be impossible, without Heavenly help.

All the members of our family have been through serious trauma, and have experienced the grief of losing the family life they had hoped for. Each child has their specific needs -- physically, spiritually, and emotionally -- and each child requires a certain kind of love and attention.

There are nine of them.

Nine children!

Five of them are not from my womb.

I am doing my best to open my heart to them, though it is not always easy.

Do you know what happens to a mother's brain and heart when she has to think about nine different children?

No wonder my head hurts and my heart often aches! No wonder I eat so much ice cream to try and soothe my soul.

I find I am losing my ability to remember things very well, because there is so much going on right in front of me. My brain can be quite fuzzy, but I wonder if that is not just a protectant layer that keeps me from seeing reality sometimes.

Please forgive me if I seem crazy currently, because, well, I am!

Did I mention I am very introverted, and I need a lot of space and alone time to function well? Did I mention I can become overwhelmed by being around too many people all at once? Did I mention that I am not the girl who would babysit, or want to watch other people's children?

Sometimes I just laugh at myself, and the ridiculousness of my new life filled with people and children.

God is clearly squishing the old Mari out of me.

Oh how squishy I am becoming! (Maybe it's the ice cream? Nah. Couldn't be.)

I am becoming a new creature -- God wants me to be more than I have been -- and it is an extremely painful process. I know it is all part of becoming who I am meant to be; but it is a battle, to be sure.

Last night, as I was laying on my big fluffy carpet downstairs, I just stared at the ceiling and I had a desire to go home to Heaven, just to visit. (I know my work on Earth is far from finished.)

I wanted to see my loved ones who have passed on. I wanted to hug my grandma Nan, and meet my powerful ancestors who have gone before me. I wanted to meet with women who mothered and loved children that were not their own. I wanted to talk to them, to learn from them, and receive their other-worldly motherly advice. I wanted to be filled with their strength and their power for goodness.

I do believe that one day, I will sit with the Pioneer women in my family, and I might just feel worthy to be in their company; because of the things I have gone through, and the trials I know are yet to come. I look forward to that day of joy and gladness!

I also just wanted to be with Jesus and feel His love.

Because above all, I love Him the most.

For just a moment, I wanted to go where the cares of this world were far from me.

I wanted to go back to my Heavenly home, where things make sense.

As I laid there on the floor, struggling, a voice from Heaven whispered to me,

"No, Mari, you cannot come home yet, but I will come to you...."

The Beauty of Nature

I captured pictures on a glorious Autumn day. I love being in nature. It enlivens me and gives me joy. I am so grateful for this beautiful world we live in.