Two Chompers

I may stop nursing.

Isn't this the best little chair?

A Walk in Bryce

Last weekend we were here. There are many beautiful places in the world, but I don't know that anything quite measures up to Southern Utah. I may be a little biased;-)
We had a great time, despite missing the memo about who can visit Bryce. Apparently to visit, you need to fit one of three categories: slightly older couple (no children), young REI yuppie person (no children), or person from another country (no children). We stood out with our group.All the children did really well hiking although Katie spent a lot of time doing this:

"Pick me up Dad!"

Fortunately for her, Paul is a sucker for those big blue eyes and carried her most of the way. BTW, she has been eating licorice and is not bleeding terribly.
At one point we came across a mini Bryce Canyon where people had built all these little cairns. We added our own to the collection.
I particularly loved these trees growing out of the canyon. I also love the colors of the rocks. I told Adrie "These are perfect rocks for you because they are your favorite color!" She said "Mom, pink is not my favorite color anymore. I like blue. And periwinkle. But I still like these rocks."

Nathan was quite worn out from all the walking he did.

A Bubble

Little Miss A loves gum. A pack of gum is not safe in our house. I completely understand the dangers of children chewing gum (gum in hair, gum in carpet, gum in sister's hair, gum in stomach for seven years;-). However, for my children to stop chewing gum, I would need to stop chewing gum first. It is a habit I picked up in Jr High and have never stopped. I try to keep my chewing within socially acceptable bounds (I understand that many people argue that any gum chewing is not socially acceptable). I do find it funny that my children will copy many of my less desirable behaviors and not pick up on the nice ones- like washing dishes- I do it all the time, but none of my children feel a great need to copy this behavior. I think I will call it: Selective Mimicry.

I love to watch my children's obsessions with learning certain things like whistling, cartwheels, handstands, stacking dominoes, etc. They are persistent in attaining these important skills. In their eyes, the ability to blow bubbles ranks among the top desirable talents. They ask me countless questions about how to do it, they practice whenever they get their little mouths on gum, and until recently, none of them had achieved the feat.

In our family "first to blow a bubble race," Adrie has blown away the competition.

Amazon Women

Last night I was able to get together with my best friends from AZ. We grew up together and have some fantastic memories. One of our YW advisors always called us the three Amazon Women because of our love of all things adventurous. I don't have any pictures of us hiking or rappelling, but I do have a picture of us on the first day of our senior year.One memory we discussed was a conversation we had about 15 years ago while walking home from church. We were dreaming and planning as teenage girls do, and decided to predict what our futures held. It was fun to look back over the last few years and see how those predictions played out. We didn't predict the next 10 years, but hopefully we will be able to get together to discuss them anyway!

I love you girls!

Today in Relief Society the teacher taught Elder Uchtdorf's talk The Influence of Righteous Women from the Sept 2009 Ensign. She asked the class to share personal stories about women who have influenced their life. I didn't share my story in class, but I wanted to share it here.

Elder Uchtdorf states:

"The scriptures give us names of several women who have blessed individuals and generations with their spiritual gifts. Eve, the mother of all living; Sarah; Rebekah; Rachel; Martha; Elisabeth; and Mary, the mother of our Savior, will always be honored and remembered. The scriptures also mention women whose names are unknown to us but who bless our lives through their examples and teachings, like the woman of Samaria whom Jesus met at the well of Sychar (see John 4), the ideal wife and mother described inProverbs 31, and the faithful woman who was made whole just by touching the Savior’s clothes (see Mark 5:25-34).

As we look at the history of this earth and at the history of the restored Church of Jesus Christ, it becomes obvious that women hold a special place in our Father’s plan for the eternal happiness and well-being of His children.

I hope that my dear sisters throughout the world—grandmothers, mothers, aunts, and friends—never underestimate the power of their influence for good, especially in the lives of our precious children and youth!"

A week or so ago I had a hard morning with the children. After the older children got off to school, I sat down in my room feeling overwhelmed. Actually I was a little more than overwhelmed. Have you ever had one of those mornings where everything just seems to weigh down your spirit? As I thought about my children, about the state of my house, about the weeds in the backyard, about projects left undone; my list of "abouts" kept getting longer and my heart kept getting heavier. I had a little pity party with myself and shed quite a few tears. Then, because I have been taught what to do when I am feeling down, I knelt and said a little selfish prayer: "Heavenly Father, I know I need to count my blessings, I know I need to get to work, I know I need to serve someone else, but I am just sad. I feel alone. I know this is not generally the way things work, but if possible, could I have someone let me know that they are thinking about me today?" Then I stood up and went to work.

A few hours later the phone rang. I started laughing when I saw the caller ID "Jackson White" (my Mom's cell phone). Mom, "Hi, I have been thinking about you all morning and just wanted to call to see how you were doing."

I am grateful for a Mother who is an instrument in the Lord's hands. I am grateful for a Heavenly Father that answers even selfish prayers.

Does your ward do Super Saturday?!

As part of my ward's Enrichment committee, I am gearing up for Super Saturday. I must admit I have mixed feelings about Super Saturday. On the one hand it is a ton of work for the committee and sometimes I find myself asking "Does anyone really care about all this stuff?" However, somewhere along the way (usually on the day of the activity) I find myself realizing that it is a great time for women to get together to learn, to create, and to build friendship. At that point, the day is worth it. This year we are keeping our projects simple and so I am really excited about the day (I am not cutting a single piece of wood;-). We even created a little blog to display our items:

http://mm1enrichment.blogspot.com/

The other picture

We did get some good pictures of Nathan. The photographer took this picture about thirty seconds before the frown picture. She took the picture thinking he was going to smile again, but I guess he had other ideas. He went right back to being happy after the frown!
One night this week we had a really busy night. I was gone at a meeting and Paul was trying to get ready for Scouts. Nathan wasn't too happy, so Paul asked Skye to help entertain him. How do you entertain a fussy baby? Skye wrapped various parts of her body in diapers and did little dances for Nathan. Of course. It kept him entertained for quite awhile and also entertained me when I got home!
I have been busy getting ready for Super Saturday. I am not in charge this year, but I still get to help on a couple of fun projects! I worked on this apron while Paul was on Scout campout this weekend. I think it turned out great and it was really easy!

Skye has also been praying very hard each night that "Satan will repent and start to be good." One night I thought "Oh wouldn't that be so nice. I can just imagine the headlines: "Satan Repents. End of Temptation."" I don't know if it will do much good to pray for Satan, but I do love Skye's empathy- she feels really badly that he can't have a body.

On a final note, one of the kids brought home a chant from school. Has anyone ever done a study to show how the same jokes/ chants/ songs are passed down through generations of children? They always seem to hit the same age group- for instance, I think all Kindergartners come home and tell the "Are you afraid of a man this big?" joke. I don't think anything can prepare you for the part of parenting that includes listening to the same phrase over two hundred times in two days (all four girls singing it constantly):

I like bananas, coconuts and grapes!
That's why they call me Tarzan of the apes!

Ha. Now it is stuck in your head too. Just don't teach it to your children.