More room?

We have lived in the addition on Rob's parents' house for almost 4 years now. We're mostly happy with it, but I would really love to have more space. I know we don't need more "stuff" and I could stand to be more organized with the space I currently have, but I would LOVE to have a room dedicated to learning/art/creativity. I woke up this morning imagining it again. On the walls I'd have large timelines of world history, including scriptural events. There would be maps, alphabet charts and math and scientific tables. Anatomy and other nature diagrams. It would be a place for me to keep my books - those I own and those I'd purchase if I had the space. We could do art in one of the corners. Ideally there would be a nice view from a large window. It would be a good place for doing homework - or even homeschooling if we chose to do that (though I'm still not sure if I'll ever be sufficiently motivated to do that & I do enjoy the breaks that public school can give).

We occasionally talk of moving to some distant place with less expensive land and home prices. Maybe somewhere in some state's "country" with lots of green surrounding fields. I feel tied to this place partially because of family and I think part of me doesn't fight staying here, in this addition, because I built it. I designed much of it - picked the colors, chose the closet sizes, the tub, the shelves, the molding. Packing up and moving would be a pain......but maybe it really would be for the best. Something to think about anyway.

2009 Summary

Every year I tell myself we'll write a family letter, take a family photo, and send them out to friends and family. Sometimes I plan to get a jump on things and send them out at Thanksgiving - a "we're thankful for all our blessings and for our wonderful friends" type thing, sometimes I plan to go for the traditional Christmas mailing, and usually we're late so I tell myself we'll go for a "Happy New Year" letter. Never have I been successful in actually sending anything out. This year I made no attempt....though I really had no excuse. Maybe next year though! I did attempt a goodie making session, but didn't get beyond family gifts. Oh well.

If you're interested, here's a summary of what our year was like.

Jan - New Year's Eve in Arizona with some of the Ludlows. Picked lots of oranges with Uncle Michael and made lots of OJ when we got back. Ice skating w/Alana in Walnut Creek.

....horses, dance, school, joy school, callings, reunions...

Okay, now I'm remembering why I haven't succeeded in sending out any family letters yet. :) Well, maybe I'll add to this at some point and you'll have a full summary of our year....but I wouldn't hold my breath. Maybe I'll start my 2010 summary letter now and I can add to it throughout the year to make things simpler next time!

The Mary / Martha Delimma

I started a blog post last year mostly focused on this same topic, and while I like what I was writing, it's super long and still not finished, so that post will have to wait for another day. :)

My girls & I recently watched the animated scripture video focusing on Lazarus. It showed Jesus meeting Mary and Martha, along with Lazarus, and spending time in their home. Mary always sat with the Savior and listened to his teachings while Martha busied herself cooking and cleaning. In the scriptures, Martha asks Mary to do more work and Jesus answers her that Mary had chosen the better of the two activities. I know that the spiritual aspect of things is of far more worth than the temporal, but I wonder if Martha weren't cooking/cleaning, how would it get done? Didn't they need food to eat and a clean, orderly house to spend their time in? Maybe Martha should have just saved the chores until after Jesus had left??

I'm definitely no skilled "Martha" but I feel that I really should be. My house is honestly a disaster. How do we balance the more "Martha" role of creating a "house of order" type home where the Spirit can dwell / feeding our families healthy foods, with the "Mary" role of feeding ourselves spiritually? I haven't managed to do ONE well, let alone both.

Any ideas?

Okay, I'm Lame

Somehow, instead of writing a lame blog entry (which does concern me) I find it better to do something even lamer, and not write anything at all for months. What a fun blogger I am! Yeesh. All my eloquent espousing of mediocrity - even making it the focus of my blog identity, and yet I'm still running from it! You'd think I'd realize that writing SOMETHING is going to be better than the nothing I've been posting.

Oh well. Here's my pledge to begin posting regular thoughts and pictures, regardless of profundity and without regard to how less-than-perfect - or even less-than-mediocre - people are able to see that I am!

What We Can't Live Without

Okay, so I can live without two of these - I am currently, but it is a pretty cool shoe. :) (I just needed a graphic to make the post more interesting!)

Sunday in Relief Society (our Church women's group), we had an activity/object lesson I really enjoyed. The instructor had taped a number of papers to the board and asked us which one of all the many things written on them we could not live without physically/spriritually. We were to call out things that we thought we could part with and she would remove them one-by-one. Here are the ones I can remember:

Mobile home, vacation, radio, TV, music, Prophet, family, apostles, spouse, job, indoor plumbing, children, home, shoes, boat, testimony, ability to walk, music, car, spouse, temples, ability to see, internet, boat, home teachers, sunday school, public school, church meetinghouse, priesthood, secondary education, prayer, ability to hear, shoes, grocery store, scriptures, furniture, electricity, friends.

What do you think you could do without? Some of these things were hard to take away. There were some strong arguments made for why we needed a number of these items. No internet/electricity means no facebook or blogs! :) Luckily we don't live where it snows so I didn't think the shoes were a huge deal. Without money/home/grocery store I figured I could wander & live off the land. Losing the ability to walk would make that a bit more difficult. There were a number of people who felt very strongly that we could not live without the priesthood. It was by the priesthood that our world was created, and without it we would not exist....

When I looked at the board in the beginning of the exercise, I came to the realization that with a strong testimony, all the rest could be taken away and it really wouldn't matter so much to me. I'd know that everything would be alright in the end. I'd have hope for the life after this one and what trials I experienced here, though hard, would be viewed as the temporary things they were. There have been many times in the world when groups of people (and once where all of them) were without priesthood keys and ordinances. Though priesthood is an essential part of the world and of Christ's church, we can live temporarily without it. If I were taken into bondage, the one thing I would need - and the one thing I could take with me if I were to die - would be my testimony. If prayer were against the law or if my brain were not working to form the words/thoughts I would at least want to have my testimony & faith to get me through.

I feel so blessed to have the faith & strength of testimony I have developed throughout my life. It feels like it has always been there. At times it is weaker and sometimes stronger than others, but I am blessed that it has ALWAYS been there.

I just finished reading the Chronicles of Narnia. What an amazing man C.S. Lewis must be! The books made me picture the Lord a little as a lion :), but I loved reading them & they did a lot to solidify my faith & testimony. The helped to sharpen my perspective on life. When we are about the Lord's work, we cannot really go wrong. Trials (or difficult adventures) may come, but if we have a testimony of the Lord & strive do His will, come what may, all will be alright in the end.

twilight Took Over My Life!

Not necessarily a bad thing, but I realized that for the past week and a half I have been almost entirely engrossed in Stephenie Meyer's books. It was so hard to put them down - to eat, shower, sleep, feed children, clean, blog - pretty much anything that wasn't reading one of the four books in the twilight saga. She did a wonderful job with her writing. It felt kind of weird to return to normal life after I completed them. I almost wasn't sure what to do with myself at first and kind of missed the book world. :) But I think I'm alright now (My house, my husband, & probably my children are grateful for that). I truly LOVED the books, but am now back to the goal of creating a life I love as much. I may blog some twilight thoughts, but for now am just announcing my return to human life. Thank you to Allysa for loaning me your books! Thank you, Stephenie Meyer, for helping us average people to see the possibility that we may really be something amazing in our next life though we may appear to be solely mediocre here!

5-Year-Old Wedding Planning

I was helping in Alana's class Wednesday and had the incredible good fortune of hearing this conversation between Alana and a boy who was her partner for the Learning Center rotations. They both came running up to me when it was their turn to come to my center looking excited. Alana gave me a hug and her friend said, "I am so excited I get to be with Alana!" They were so cute. As they started to go to their seats at my table he told me, "I hope one day I can marry Alana." I couldn't believe what I was hearing and was inwardly totally laughing. As they took their seats I said "Well, there's a long time before you'll be old enough to marry anyone and you'll meet lots of friends between now and then."
Alana: "Okay, ___________. I'll marry you."
Oh my goodness!

I was anticipating having the talk someday with Alana about how it's important to start group dating at 16 years old and not skip the step by going straight to single-dating/going steady. But she's skipping right to the engagement part without even going on a date! Guess I should've had the "dating around" discussion at FIVE-YEARS-OLD.....