Mother's Day 2013

I am SO thankful to be a mother! I used to hate Mother's Day before we had children. All I have ever wanted to be (since I was 4 or 5 years old) was a mom. It felt incredibly unfair to see people all around me being blessed with children, when I just kept having miscarriages. It was the most painful part of my life. I felt angry and hurt and couldn't understand why my Heavenly Father wouldn't just send me one little baby. I knew I would be a good mom. I knew that was my purpose in life and my reason for being on the earth, and yet my dearest dream seemed to slip further and further from me. It was devastating. And one day I read an article in a Good Housekeeping magazine about a lady who had adopted a little girl from China. I knew in that very instant that this was MY path to motherhood. My heart started pounding and I felt goosebumps rise all over my body. I had always wanted to adopt kids. It wasn't a foreign concept to me. But for some reason, that was when I actually knew I would be a mother and that my child would join our family via adoption. That was in 1995. Since then we have been blessed with 10 beautiful children. They have come to us in a variety of ways, but each was meant to be here. They have enriched my life in ways I never could have imagined. I am a better person because of them. They are everything to me and I love them deeply. I am the luckiest woman on earth!