It's Important to Me

This weekend we watched General Conference as a family and with my most special friend Januari. I found these questions on the blog Diapers and Divinity and thought it would be fun to answer. I love conference. It's such a wonderful opportunity to stop and refocus on what's truly important. And I make cinnamon rolls which may or may not be why my children look forward to it :)

1.  Who were your three favorite speakers?

     Elaine S. Dalton (even though I don't have a daughter), Robert D. Hales, Ian S. Arden

2.  Which talk spoke to you the most?

     There were so many great talks, I can't imagine picking only one! Dieter F. Uchtdorf's talk was good for me to hear. We are never alone. No matter how 
     humble our surroundings we are not invisible to God. I matter to Him and He loves me. I need to exemplify the love and light of Christ in my life, and be 
     kind to everyone.

3.  What was your favorite Hymn and why did it move you?

     "I'll Go Where You Want Me to Go", because He knows what I can become. I need to rely on Him to guide me, and not my own (occasionally foolish) 
     whims.

4.  Which speaker was the best dressed?  (Come on, we can have a little fun.)

     I would have to say the Tabernacle Choir was the best dressed ;)

5.  Were there any topics that you felt like were repeated often?  Any conference “themes”?

     Reading the Book of Mormon consistently, trials can help us grow closer to God, share testimony, service, family is the most important thing

6.  Share a few of your favorite quotes from any of the talks (paraphrasing is fine).

• All wrongs suffered in this life will be righted. (Quentin L. Cook)
• Jesus wants to bless us, but He will not take away our free agency so we must ASK! (J.Devn Cornish)
• Decisions Determine Destiny! (Randall K. Bennett)
• God's laws have not changed and morality is not passe. (Thomas S. Monson)
• We need to bring the spirit of the Book of Mormon into our homes. (Henry B. Eyring)
• We won't be judged according to the world's standards. All the money in all the world will not buy a loaf of bread in heaven. (Dieter F. Uchtodorf)

7.  Name something(s) that made you smile or laugh during conference.

     Thomas S. Monson's story about listening to the spirit and announcing a speaker who wasn't in the building at the time. His facial expressions were 
      hilarious!

8.  Was there any evidence that your children paid attention?

     They laughed a few times. Alvin played General Conference bingo and got a black out almost all 4 sessions.

9.  What doctrine did you learn as you listened to the choir(s) sing?

     I don't know that I learned any specific doctrine, but the spirit that I felt during most of the songs reminded me that I know The Church of Jesus Christ
     of Latter Day Saints is the Lord's church and it's where I need to be.

10.  Did the music enhance your General Conference experience? How?

       I love the music, but usually wish I was there to hear it. I thought the primary choir was sweet, and my kids liked it too.

11.  What are some of your post-conference goals?

• Pray more consistently and more specifically.
• Memorize scriptures.
• Study the Book of Mormon by myself and with my family.
• Find more opportunities to serve outside my family.

For Josh

My brother moved to Alaska a few weeks ago to begin teaching. I know he's missing Logan and Jack so this post if for him.

Ethan left a box of tools on the play set. When Jack and Logan climbed up the "playground" and saw them they were super excited to do some fixing.

Logan using the "chompers".

Jack

Jack stuck a screwdriver in one of the bolt holes and broke off a "crumb" of wood.

Logan trying to break off a "crumb" of wood too.

So many tools, so little time.

Surprisingly Logan didn't go in the pool today, and Jack played in the water for about 30 minutes.

I love Logan's staticy stick-up hair.

Logan watching his shadow as he jumped.

Watching Jack in the pool.

Jack thought it was so funny to pour water on his belly.

Jack shooting at Ethan with the "water shooter".

Throwing a ball at Ethan.

Ethan was spraying water on Jack's belly and cracking him up.

The pool water was pretty low so Jack was able to "swim".

I miss laughing with you as our boys play, but I'm so excited for you to be teaching. I love you, Josh!

Swimming in the Deep

Yesterday was our friend Dallin's 8th birthday. We were invited to his party at his grandparents (in ground) swimming pool. Even with freezing water and an overcast sky my kids were in HEAVEN! We're so blessed to have such awesome friends!

Dallin jumped in first and earned $1.

I made these cupcakes, because Dallin loves making fires with Ethan in our fire pit.

I had to bribe Isaac with a new fishing pole and practically push him off 
the diving board, but after that he had fun going off the board.

Alvin couldn't get in the water fast enough!

Ethan had so much fun jumping off the diving board with 
Katie's nephew Carter. He even did a couple of flips.

Steakburger Putt Putt Pro-Am

My brother Joshua left for Marshall Alaska this morning to teach 5th and 6th graders. Friday evening my siblings and I got together for a game of mini golf. We played 32 holes (just kidding, Josh I know it was 36), and had so much fun!
 

Samuel, Laura, Joshua, Andrea, Christine, and I
(Our older sister Lisa was a life ruiner and didn't come.)

Laura tried to make things exciting by occasionally offering $100 for 
the for the first hole-in-one. Lucky for her we all sucked! 

Josh with my sister in law Shelly. She's going to be single parenting 3-year old

twins and an infant for the next few months until their housing is ready.

I skipped a few holes to hold my adorable nephew Wyatt. He was a sweetheart the whole time!

Josh tempting Andrea to get a hole in one.

The course was tricky so we were all happy with a hole-in-two.

Samuel holding in his excitement.

"Because things are the way they are, things will not stay the way they are." ~Bertoldt Brecht

Josh is the first of my 6 siblings to move away. I'm excited for him and his new adventure, but I'm also sad to lose a friend. I ♥ you Josh!

Park It

Katie had the brilliant idea to go to Lewisville Park this afternoon. It was so fun to watch the kids throw rocks into the river and build a "bridge" with rocks and branches. They also ran through the field and played on the toys.

Fun pic Katie did for me.

Working on the bridge.

Alvin was so proud he could carry giant rocks.


Isaac was playing with his stick in the water and splashed himself

The boys had fun finding the perfect walking
stick. This is Ethan's reasonable sized stick.

$100 Challenge

Not an exciting story and no pictures, but I didn't want to forget this fun experience. I also wanted to remind myself that while homeschooling can be a real drag sometimes, if we didn't do it we wouldn't have fun memories like this.

Yesterday we went to the library. I read somewhere that it opened at 9:00 on Mondays, but when we got there at 9:30 it was closed, and the sign said it opened at 10:00. There's a park right up the road so we went to play for a half hour. They had monkey rings that went in a circle, and to encourage Alvin to try them I told him I'd pay him $20 if he made it all the way around the circle. He made a half-hearted effort, then said that it was too hard, but if I made it $100 then he would for sure do it. I said okay I'll pay you $100 if you can go around the whole circle. Ethan and Isaac started complaining that it wasn't fair. Ethan said that he was going to start acting like he couldn't do anything so I'd pay him to do something easy. I told Ethan his challenge was to climb the basketball pole all the way to the top and I'd pay him $100. His eyes lit up and he ran over to the pole to claim his $100. He tried it with shoes, then just socks and finally in bare feet. Isaac thought it looked like fun so he attempted to climb it with bare feet too. I wished I had my camera, because they looked so cute trying with all their might to climb the pole. On our way back to the library Ethan asked what I would've done if they had actually been able to climb the pole. I told him we'd have one angry dad. (Alvin didn't do the monkey rings, he said his hands hurt too much.)

Extraordinary Kid

When Melinda, a woman from our church who has a super cute crafty blog Under My Umbrella asked me if I would write about our extraordinary young man, I had a hard time getting started. Alvin takes a lot of effort and creativity to raise, and I tend to focus on how much work it is. But He's also a great kid so I decided to start with his strengths. He is thoughtful and considerate. When he gets money the first thing he thinks of is what he can buy for his brothers. He loves animals and is very sweet and gentle with them. He loves babies and though he sometimes has a difficult time interacting with them he adores his younger nephews. He’s great at remembering facts, and knows the birth dates and ages of all our extended family. He’s in his 4^th year of playing the piano, and I rarely have to remind him to practice. He’s a blue stripe in Tae Kwon Do, likes to play board and card games, ride his bike, read and anything football (especially the Oregon Ducks!)

Alvin came to live with us when he was 3 years old through foster care. He didn’t speak, couldn’t walk for more than a few yards, and had a lot of anger/behavior problems. I started teaching him sign language in hopes that his behavior would improve if he had a way to communicate his needs. He picked up on signing right way. A few weeks after he moved in with us we were looking through the Hotwheels box while waiting for the school bus. I was pulling out cars and signing their colors. After a couple of cars he started picking out the red ones and signing “red”. I was so excited, because that was the first time I knew there was a lot more going on in inside his head than his teachers and specialists were giving him credit for. Alvin spoke his first word “mine” when he was 3 ½, and since then has made slow, but steady progress. We adopted Alvin when he was 6.

When he was about 10 we met with a team of doctors and therapists at a local hospital and got a diagnosis of dyspraxia*. While it seems to make the doctors and therapists happy to have a label, it hasn’t changed the way we’re raising him.

Alvin’s now 13. He’s made so much progress, but he’s still very difficult to understand. It also takes him a long time to put his thoughts together so few people have the patience to have a conversation with him. Socially he’s about the age of a 7 year old, and he still has a lot of anger and frustration.

“When God made you He had us in mind.” This is the quote we put on our adoption announcements, and though some days I feel like I’m fighting a losing battle I know that Alvin was meant to be with us. His preschool teacher told us that we saved him, but in so many ways Alvin has made me a better person so I think we’ve mutually benefited. ☺

*Dyspraxia is an impairment or immaturity of the organization of movement. It is an immaturity in the way that the brain processes information, which results in messages not being properly or fully transmitted. Dyspraxia affects the planning of what to do and how to do it. It is associated with problems of perception, language and thought.