(248) Home sweet.

I have been really homesick this week.

Going to visit Erin was great and fun and happy, but I have to admit it left me aching for a little bit more. Especially when I called Saturday to congratulate my niece on being baptized and could hear my mom and dad and my brother and sister-in-law in the background. I miss them a lot.

Don't get me wrong, though. I love my family here and while I was in Arizona I ached just as much for them. And also, I know I am lucky to be living less than a mile from Jeigh and her family.

I have been thinking today about how homesick I have been feeling while at the same time feeling so fulfilled and happy in my own little home. It almost seems like the two feelings should be contradictory. But they aren't; they actually almost feed off of each other. =) I don't know if that is a good way to say it, but I find that the happier I am in my own home, the more I miss my parents and my siblings and their families. And, the more I miss them and think of them, the more happiness I find in my own family.

I think it is because we are all so tied together. Erin describes it as a string connected from your own heart to the hearts of the people you love. The further apart you are, the tighter the string is pulled and the more you ache to be close, but you are still connected.

So, even though I miss them terribly, I am so happy to be connected to such amazing people. I'm happy I belong to the families I do. I'm happy I am a Hardy and a Cardell. I am happy I am raising my daughters in a happy family and I am happy to be sealed to Mike. I am happy that families are forever. That is truly what life is all about.