Inspiring

I love this story of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. We also learned about Handel last week in our homeschool, from the December Ensign.
Two things that stood out to me from these learning experiences were:
1. These men were ordinary people, like all of us.
2. They were inspired to do something and ACTED on it. As a result, the world or mankind is blessed.
This gives me great hope as journey through the adventures of homeschooling. It is so easy to get discouraged and want to give up. I'm learning that every mother in this same journey, experiences all the same feelings. Even as mothers we have feelings of despair at times. These challenging experiences are what help us grow, and keep us on our knees seeking guidance from the one who knows our children the best.

Click here to watch a brief story of Longfellow's writing of I heard the Bells

Brynn is 8

I've been reflecting over the last 8 years today. I still can't believe that all that time has passed. It's fun to think of the ball of energy she has always been and continues to be, but more fun is seeing how she is growing and maturing. She has a testimony and is so excited to be baptized in a few weeks. I'll post some pictures of her friend party and other stuff when I get around to it.
The other thing I discovered and wanted to share was a new website linked with Lds.org. It's all about Christmas, there are videos, songs traditions, etc. It's great, check it out here:
http://lds.org/topic/christmas/christmas_video_2.html

Stan and I have listened to two interviews of apostles on the Mormon Channel. It is inspiring to learn of their lives. We listened to Elder Holland's most recently. Amazing! He and his wife have been through a lot in their lives, holding several busy church positions, and varying large responsibilities. It was inspiring to me to hear how they made it through. Spouses first, family next, then the rest of their energy was spent for all the rest. Plain and simple. Having a husband who is generally super busy, I can attest to this simple formula. Over the last few months we've spent 15 minutes together every day some time after he returns home from work. He lets me talk about concerns, excitement, or whatever. Occasionally he talks. I can't tell you what a HUGE difference this has made in our marriage. I feel heard and understood and loved, by only 15 minutes of focused time. I guess it suits my love language more than anything else right now. Random thoughts for the day...
HAPPY BIRTHDAY, SWEET BRYNN!

Thanksgiving

After I moved to Canada I often wondered why Thanksgiving was celebrated in October instead of November, like I was used to. As I read about the pilgrims this year, I think I learned why. The pilgrims first landed in Massachussets at the end of November but didn't reach their settling point, Plymouth Rock, until December. It was too late for a feast that year. The Indians were kind enough to share their food so the pilgrims didn't starve and die. Although, many did die because of exposure and sickness. The first Thanksgiving was celebrated the following mid-October where they invited the Indians to feast with them, expressing their thanks for their help in teaching them how to plant and care for their crops. I was happy to learn that, and put my wonder to rest for that question.

The test

I've recently been reading in my scriptures about righteous peopleof high church position, recieving great temptations to prove them, see if they are as strong as they are striving to be. Today must have been one of those days for me. I don't aspire to be someone of high church position, but I do try my best to live the commandments and do what I should be doing. I failed the test without even realizing it was a test but it has brought me to where I need to be, on my knees asking Heavenly Father for help. Being a mom is hard, I've always been one to admit it. Over the last year, since we started homeschool, many people say, "I don't know how you do it," or "you are so amazing to do that," or "I could never do that," or "you are so brave." The reply to those statements are "neither do I, it's not about me, yes you could, and brave is not the right word." The challenge I'm having this week with homeschool is being with the children on a never ending basis. At least it feels that way. I feel like a maid, a drill sargeant, and a servant. It's not even that the kids aren't always obedient, well-behaved, respectful, and kind. It's just that my personality demands a certain amount of rejuvination time and alone time. I never realize I didn't get enough until it's too late and I've gone crazy.
The positive note to this ordeal is that my husband is amazing. I would have left the house but it's -30C and I'm not crazy enough to go out alone in it. Stan locked me in my room with a book, a warm bath, and dinner by myself. He is currently working on an action plan with the kids of how they can regain my trust. Then he'll tuck them nicely into bed and I won't see them until tomorrow morning, when I hope to be refreshed. Why didn't I think of this earlier? Why did I wait until I was ready to sell the children to the neighbor? I'll have to remember to book myself some regular room time, it might just be all I need...

busted

I often find Brynn and Joel in her room talking or playing or reading. They were anxious to go in her room to spend some time together. After a little while, I decided to see what they were doing because I hadn't heard a sound. This was their confession...
Their expressions truly describe their reaction to being caught with the candy.

Joel's turn

It's so fun to see Joel doing what we all love.

HALLOWEEN

The Young Men and Women in our ward did a trunk or treat. It was simple and short and the kids came home with WAY too much candy.



Macy was completely worn out. It was a long week of late nights...

memorize

As part of our school, we have been working on the Articles of Faith. Macy is getting more than I realize. Here she is performing.

Brynn's project

My dad made this bookshelf for the girls and Brynn wanted to paint it pink, since I won't let her paint her walls pink. She also painted the wall shelf. She was pretty proud of herself.

dress up fun

Stan went to India in September and brought us back some clothes. For school one afternoon, we dressed up and made paper dolls and talked about different clothing around the world. It was really fun.

BOOKS

I love this. To me it portrays happiness, contentment and education. Macy had a class at the library
this morning. While she was busy, the older two scoured through the library books to pick their stack to bring home. It's so fun to watch them as they get so excited about the adventures they will read. Then, to come home and have perfect stillness as they all read and read and read. Guess what I was doing? Online scrapbooking. I should have been reading but they were so content, I had to get a jump on my first real project. It's for family history, after all.

front yard

We completed a project this summer. I don't even want to remember how many hours we put into this project. It used to be rocks, dying shrubs, a nice lily, and TONS of weeds. After removing all the unwanted stuff, we had to bring in some topsoil and then we got to lay sod. We are so happy with the final result. Everytime I look at it, I'm so grateful that we have nice grass that is growing. It makes a huge difference. I can't find a picture of the mess it was before so you'll just have to imagine a weed bed and some ugly shrubs.

Reality

I have been toting around my wedding dress for 9 years now. I'm not very attached to "things" and wondered what I could do with it. I thought of selling it but wasn't sure I'd get anything for it now, after 9 years. I wanted to make a blessing dress or suit out of it but the timing didn't work out, at least not yet. So, I had this great idea to use it to make a baptism dress for Brynn. I'm actually really excited about it. She turns 8 in December. I had to try on my dress one more time, just to see.... I hadn't worn it since I was married and I was positive that I wasn't the same size. Guess what I learned? It didn't fit. I didn't feel bad about cutting it up. =)

Thought for today

(this picture is from Whitney's wedding. Stan's oldest brother is with lots of the girl cousins)
I visited my sister-in-law's ward where she taught the Sunday School lesson and she gave me this quote to read. I don't believe it was by accident. It was exactly what I needed:
Elder Richard G. Scott said: "You must be willing to forgo personal pleasure and self-interest for family-centered activity, and not turn over to church, school, or society the principal role of fostering a child's well-rounded development. It takes time, great effort, and significant personal sacrifice to 'train up a child in the way he should go.' But where can you find greater rewards for a job well done?" (in conference Report, Apr. 1993, 43)
Anyone can read this and find something that will help them to be a better parent. For me, it was to not give up as a home schooling parent. It is so hard to home school but I think it is more for me than the kids, even though they love it and are benefiting from it. The hardest part for me is remembering and discovering the kids different abilities, interests, and strengths. There is no one-size-fits school program here, which makes it hard, but in the end, I believe for us, it will be better.

New Age Kids

Lots to update sometime.
For now, we just started our new year of homeschool. I have a little more structure than I did previously and I think it will help. It sure helps me to be organized but homeschooling is so hard! Today was day 2.
The thing about my "new age kids" is that I have to force them to play outside in very sunny and warm weather with lots of exploring to do, a trampoline, acres of land, etc.(we are at my parents' house). For some reason they think it's my job to entertain them all day everyday. Does anyone else have this problem? I can't relate. One day I had to negotiate lunch. If they didn't play outside for 30 minutes, there would be no lunch served. It sounds cruel but honestly, kids who don't want to play outside??? Maybe they'll remember that when it's 30 below this winter and there's lot of snow on the ground.
They are slightly better now that I call it recess, during the school day. What's the difference?

Fort Edmonton

Friends of ours invited us to go to Fort Edmonton with them. It was really fun.
We rode the train...

played checkers

And ate ice cream.

We also had some bannock, walked around the neat buildings, rode the ferris wheel, and the carousel, rode the streetcar, had a picnic, pet chickens and ponies and enjoyed a beautiful day.

Forgiveness: My Burden Was Made Light

Check out this video that was on lds.org:

Forgiveness: My Burden Was Made Light

Stan and I watched this last night. I wanted to cry! Then, inside I thought, if something like that ever happened, I hope I could do the same with the Savior's help. He makes these kinds of miracles possible!

Final trek

Thursday was our difficult trek day. On Friday, we had pioneer games, reenactments, crafts and a hoedown. The band in the back was brought in. They were awesome. The music was great and we had lots of fun dancing. This was the macarena. My least favorite. We did an interesting version of the virginia reel. they didn't have a caller so we made do and tried to figure out what was going on.

This picture is of the Sweet water crossing reenactment. It was hard to pretend that the water was icy because it was 30 C outside but I think the kids had fun with it. We were glad to be camping by the river. most everyone got in the dirty river, at least once to cool off and play. We found a crayfish, which was kind of cool but it was trying to make it's way in my shorts and so I was ready to get out of the water.
We had devotionals with everyone, every night and that was fun and neat. Then the last morning was the testimony meeting. I'm so impressed with the youth. Everyone was happy and having a good time, got along really well, etc. I haven't been with the youth since I was one and it was really fun for me.
Stan and I pondered our experience and decided in order for it to be meaningful to us we needed to think of how the experience changed us for the better and what we are going to do to act on those feelings we had. A big one was for us to help our kids catch the spirit of Elijah while they are young. There is so much you can do with family history. I want to make it a regular part of our homeschool. I was reminded several times of the primary song that goes like this "you don't have to push a handcart, leave your family dear, or walk a thousand miles or more to be a pioneer. You do need to have great courage, faith to conquer fear, and work with a might for a cause that's right, to be a pioneer."
We haven't been asked to leave our homes and our possessions behind to travel to a far off place. But the Prophet asks us each conference to do something. We need to have courage to do what he has asked us to do.
It helped me to realize that I need to camp more with the kids. i don't really like to camp but kids love it and I need to buck up and help them make memories.
I also learned how well you can get to know people in such a short time, working and having fun together. I love those kids who were in my family and hope to keep in touch with them.
I appreciate little things that are so common for us who live in first world countries, running water, warm or cold, beds, shelter, vehicles with air conditioning, washing machines, etc.
My parents were awesome and watched the kids while we were gone. They've had them for a week. We went to church without them today. We missed them but it sure was nice to have a break and for Stan and I to have some time together. Back to reality on Tuesday, stronger and more determined to act with courage and faith.

More trek pictures

A common sight for the pioneers. The story here was told of a man who had lost his whole family, 9 children and his wife. He continued on in faith to the Salt Lake Valley.


This was after the women's pull. My face describes how most of us felt. The U.S. govt called away the men for the Mormon Battalion. The way they portrayed it was neat. The men were there next to us to see the experience but they weren't allowed to talk or help us. It was HOT and we went up a pretty steep hill. Many families had only 2 girls so several of us helped many of the carts. We thought we were going to pass out from the heat and the exertion. We all felt similar, yet we weren't going to leave the other handcarts to themselves. It was a great sight of service. We were bonded as women, knowing we all needed each other to make it to the top. Many of the boys commented how hard it was to watch us. they wanted to help so badly.

Stan picked these wildflowers for me, on the trail. We took the picture for Brynn. She LOVES flowers and always wants to use my money to buy me some.

We went trekking

Instead of YM and YW camp this year, a Bishop from our stake, decided to organize a trek. It hasn't been done in this area for 20 years or so. He picked the outlying wards/branches so it was only about half of the stake. Our ward was one of the lucky ones involved. Since Stan workds with the YM, I knew he would be going and because women were involved, I asked if I could come along. We got to be a Ma and Pa of 6 great kids, half of them from our ward. Our ward was the largest unit there.
The scenery was beautiful, the enthusiasm and energy of the kids was contagious and exciting, the weather perfect, the food amazing, the trekking hard and much appreciated.

This is Brigham Young quoting parts of D&C 136.

Here are our children. This is the beginning after we assembled our handcarts and were preparing to walk and push.
Here are our blood children. Aren't they cute? Stan got these hats for free from a business trip to Calgary during the stampede.