Blessed to love and be loved.

Today is Sunday May 17, 2020, and today is also my last Sunday as an unmarried woman, because I am marrying my best friend in 3 days!!!

This has been a long road, full of loneliness at times, as well as heartache. But I was blessed with amazing friends, mentors, leaders, and a loving Savior and Father in Heaven to guide me along my journey in life. Ricky came into my life unexpectedly, but he was a fresh drink of water. He was just what I needed at that moment in life, and then I realized that I didn't want to live my life without him. Luckily, he realized he didn't want to live his life without me, either. 💜

We are so excited to begin our life together!!! I am so excited to go on adventures with him and to create our life together! I fall more in love with him every day and I am so grateful to be able to keep falling in love with him every day!

Though our wedding planning experience hasn't been what we had expected, it has helped me remember to focus on Ricky and I, and the covenants and promises that we will be making with and to each other and Heavenly Father. I am so grateful for Ricky's tenderness, his kind heart, his compassionate nature, his respectful attitude, and his sweet love towards me. He is a wonderful example to me of being Christlike, and I am SO blessed to be able to love (and be loved by) him!

We are two different people, with two completely different life experiences, and we won't always see eye to eye about things, but I always want to share my life with him. 💜

I am so grateful for the amazing examples of loving and healthy relationships in my life that I have to look up to. My grandparents, my parents, my aunts and uncles, my friends, and all of the General Authorities. The love that they have for, and how they talk about, their wives, is SO sweet, and I hope that Ricky and I will talk about each other like that in the future. 

In a BYU Devotional given by Elder Richard G. Scott in 2010 entitled, To Have Peace and Happiness, he says:

"Pure love is an incomparable, potent power for good. Righteous love is the foundation of a successful marriage. It is the primary cause of contented, well-developed children. Who can justly measure the righteous influence of a mother’s love? What enduring fruits will result from the seeds of truth that you as a mother can carefully plant and lovingly cultivate in the fertile soil of your own child’s trusting mind and heart? As a mother, you have been given divine instincts to help you sense your child’s special talents and unique capacities. With your husband, you can nurture, strengthen, and cause those traits to flower.
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In closing I share an eternal principle that will assure you of a rich, purposeful life whether you are single or married. I have found that the best way to live life is to seek to know the will of the Lord as guided by the Holy Spirit. He knows what is best for you. As you are obedient and exercise faith in Him, He will help you realize His will for you in your life. May the Lord inspire, guide, and richly bless each of you, in the name of Jesus Christ, amen."

I am so grateful for the loving and sweet examples of the prophets and apostles on how to love your spouse. I am looking forward to growing spiritually with Ricky as we move forward in our lives together. He is such a blessing in my life, and I hope that I can be a blessing to him, too.

We will be having a virtual wedding via Zoom! If you would like to celebrate with us, please let me know and I will send the link to you.

I hope you all have an exciting week! I know I will! I'm getting married and then going to St. George with my HUSBAND!!! I am so blessed to love him and to be loved by him!

God loves you and has amazing plans in store for you! You are wonderful, amazing, and loved by so many!

Xoxo
Mattie

There is life after.

It's been quite a week! A lot of things have happened and it's been very stressful but I am just so grateful that it's finally over and that I get a chance to start over.

One thing I've tried to focus on this week is that everyone makes mistakes. Life is full of choices that lead to growth or recognition that you need to grow. And it's important to remember that Heavenly Father loves you no matter what. He is always willing to give us opportunities to fix our mistakes and try again. It's such a blessing because I don't always make the right decisions––I make a lot of mistakes. And sometimes those mistakes weight down on me. But my friend reminded me that He loves us and is willing to give us so many chances to fix our mistakes...and that was a blessing this week.

Sometimes I feel like this comic is me.

Sometimes I think Heavenly Father is disappointed in me, and in the mistakes that I make again, and again, and again. But really...He is just patiently waiting for me to remember who I am and what I'm actually working for. Sometimes I feel like He and I are just caught in this whirlpool––where I am constantly getting back into the ocean because I haven't learned my lesson about that whirlpool yet, but He STILL comes to rescue me. Because He loves me.

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One good thing that happened this week was I started writing a book! I'm very excited about it. I don't have too much written down yet haha but I've got a good little start. It's going to be about my spiritual journey, and I'm going to try to take some stuff from my blog and expound on it. I've got a lot of ideas for the book but I'm excited to see where it takes me.

Yesterday I had the opportunity to go and see a performance of the Lamb of God by Rob Gardner. It was such an amazing experience! The music was beautiful, the message of the music was inspiring, and the spirit of the night was testimony-building and deeply touching. It was a great way to end last week, and start this week.

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You know, each week, I make plans. I make goals. My planner gets COVERED in ink and graphite as I set aside specific times for all of the homework and projects that I have going on in the week. I try to be SO careful and make sure I have a little leeway in case things happen. And sometimes things just happen. Sometimes your dress rehearsal just changes from the time that you thought it was to a new time so you have to miss a class. Again. Sometimes things come up and you have to rearrange your time. You have to rearrange your priorities.

The last couple of weeks...I've been a little more excited about life after graduation. Don't get me wrong––I still have NO idea exactly what I'm doing afterwards haha but I am not quite so stressed anymore. I'm still stressed haha but I've been looking at a lot of different opportunities and I'm feeling good about life. I feel like there is something out there for me. There is something I have to give to this world. I don't know what it is, and sometimes I don't really feel like I have anything different to give to the world than everybody else, but there's a reason I am who I am. There's a reason I was drawn to the Family Life major. There's a reason that––despite a lot of the uncertainties of the future––I am getting ready to GRADUATE. I made it! I never thought that I would make it to graduation day, guys. I never thought I would make it. It seemed never-ending and just too far away...but here we are...about a month out from walking...and three months from being done with school.

God really has blessed the broken road. It didn't lead me to where I thought it would lead me...but it led me here. It led me to graduating in a few months. It led me to searching for a full-time job where I will be doing something I love. It led me to going through the temple. It led me to decide to start writing a book. It led me to wanting to find myself. And I am grateful to be here. I am right where I need to be. I am right where He needs me to be. And luckily this is where I want to be (most of the time 😉 ).

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For the last few years, I have had a scripture written on a sticky note and attached to the front of my Book of Mormon. The scripture is 2nd Nephi 22:2, and it says, "Behold, God is my salvation; I will trust, and not be afraid; for the Lord Jehovah is my strength and my song; he also has become my salvation." I LOVE this scripture because God is my strength. And He is my salvation. I would not be where I am today without Him, and I will not be able to become the best me that I can be without Him.

I am very excited to see where this next turn in the road will take me! Because there is life after...everything. There is life after mistakes...life after success...life after choices...life after sorrow...life after accidents...life after plans...life after graduation. With God at my side, I am sure that this road will take me to the next level of becoming the best Mattie.

Xoxo
Mattie