My Own Sweet Tender Mercy From Trek...

Coming home from Trek, Garrett dropped me off at home to round up the kids while he went back to the stake center to help sort through everyone's gear. Ashlyn was the first one to come barrelling through the door and about knocked me over. She hugged me so tightly and kept saying over and over "Mom, I missed you so much!" I kept squeezing her, then held her at arms length so I could look into her eyes and asked "What happened?" She got teary-eyed and told me she had cried every night into her pillow because she missed us so much. Wow...that was not something I wasn't expecting or even thinking would happen.
Before leaving on Trek, our Stake Presidency told us we would have blessings and promises fulfilled because of our service and experience of being on Trek. Ashlyn missing me was a huge blessing to me.
About a year ago when Garrett and I went away for the week, about half way through our trip, my friend, Amy asked Ashlyn if she were missing me...Ashlyn repied "No, but I'm sure missing the flat iron my mom took with her!" Since then it's kind of been a joke that Ashlyn doesn't ever miss me, only my flat iron, so this meant so much to me. Ashlyn has always been so independent, she really takes care of herself so easily, but lately I've noticed a bit of a change in her...she's reaching out to me more and letting me in more and I'm loving it....so this change of heart from Ashlyn was my own sweet tender mercy from a loving Heavenly Father who truly knows what I need (and want).

p.s. Downloading my pictures from Trek, I found this one of Ashlyn at the very end...just like her to see my camera, seize the moment and snap a picture of herself. She makes me smile. She is a rockstar!