Daniel was in charge of the family home evening lesson last night and he decided to take us on a hike. We have this great trail 5 minutes from our house that leads to a reservoir and waterfall. It was so green and the hillside was covered in flowers. The boys threw about 2,000 rocks in the lake and we enjoyed the views of the valley from the trail. I loved it.
I asked Paige to give me a copy of her AP art portfolio, so I’ll share some of it over the next few weeks. Happy Memorial Day weekend! Memorial Day always feels like a finish line to me. We made it!
Mark turns 9 years old today. We went to the Payson Temple open house this morning. It was a walking tour without a guide, but in one of the rooms, a volunteer reminded us to “look up.” The ceilings were glorious. Everything was special. It felt like home. I thought of my great-grandparents who had a farm one mile from the temple site. When I saw a painting of a woman with a basket of apples, I thought of my grandmothers who bottled fruit in this area during the Depression and beyond. I hope that Mark remembers some details of this magnificent temple and that it was part of his birthday celebration to be there. I hope that he and the kids remember to “look up” for approval, guidance, and perspective.
We were going for the awkward look, in case you were worried. Sparky is pouting in the corner because he isn’t allowed on the furniture downstairs.
Family home evening last night was a game night. Mark was in charge. He came out carrying a tower of games from which we could choose. Monopoly was among the choices, bless his heart. We played Quirkle with too many people, so it was a long wait between turns. To entertain the restless people, I read stories aloud from my memoir-in-progress, one story each about the children and one about the dog. We laughed and reminisced and then Timothy served the cheesecake.
My goal today is to spend an hour sitting outside in these chairs.
The AP Calculus test is tomorrow. I wonder if bonding over calculus will ever be a sweet memory for these two. They’ve worked hard all year.
At church on Sunday the Young Women teacher set out an outline for a family home evening lesson on the table. It had the activities from her Sunday lesson and a great quote for the young women to share with their families. Only one girl took a copy. And I did, too. I know the value of a ready-made FHE lesson. Timothy was thankful for it when he drew a blank about what he wanted to teach our family last night.
It was a good lesson. We read scriptures about the restoration of the priesthood. Richard and I talked about the big and small blessings in our lives that have come because the priesthood was restored.
We can be together forever.
We can have power in our lives.
We are blessed by he organization of the church.
We have a prophet and apostles on the earth to guide us.
And much, much more.
The blessings of the priesthood are like a blanket that covers and surrounds us all the time.
It is a humbling thing to be taught by Timothy and to hear his testimony.
We enjoyed some strawberry shortcake and then got back to homework and activities. It’s a busy time.
Sometimes when these boys spend a lot of time together they fight, but this weekend there was more laughter than frustration. I opened the door and snapped this picture as quickly as I could to capture what they were doing so happily together. They were listening to Harry Potter CD’s read by Jim Dale as they constructed robots. Their theme lately is to make battle scenes with robots. Each night I walk into Mark’s room to find that he has new robots strung from the blind strings, poised for the fight on the ledges of the window. Enemies are posed in heroic battle scenes across the floor; robots scale the mattresses, climbing, spider-like toward the covers. We scoop them up and dump them back in the bin for tomorrow’s play.
Daniel taught Family Home Evening last night. He pulled out a puzzle with one of following labels written on each piece.
We assembled the puzzle. Daniel taught how Jesus Christ established His Church on the earth, but after the death of the apostles, pieces of the gospel and Church were missing. He removed the puzzle pieces labeled, “priesthood,” “apostles,” and “sacrament.” He said many things were lost, and the puzzle was just an illustration. The Church fell into apostasy.
He handed out scriptures from the Doctrine and Covenants and asked each family member to identify something that was restored by the prophet Joseph Smith. With each scripture, we were able to return a puzzle piece to its rightful place.
He showed us this video that has the words of one of the living apostles.
Daniel shared his testimony that this is the true Church of Jesus Christ. His testimony was the best part of the lesson.
Paige’s lesson was about remembering the messages of General Conference. She told us that one or two days a week during the last several months she has been reading a General Conference talk for her scripture study and that it has blessed her life. She shared the following scripture:
And if my people will hearken unto my voice, and unto the voice of my servants whom I have appointed to lead my people, behold, verily I say unto you, they shall not be moved out of their place. -D&C 124:45
What does it mean to “not be moved out of their place?” she asked. Daniel brought up the talk given by Elder Pearson about Lehi’s vision. The righteous stayed by the tree of life. They didn’t leave it. If we follow the prophets, he said, this is what it means to stay by the tree.
Paige shared this quote:
“We have the Bible, the Book of Mormon and the Book of Doctrine and Covenants; but all these books, without the living oracles and a constant stream of revelation from the Lord, would not lead any people into the Celestial Kingdom of God. Of course, these records are all of infinite value. They cannot be too highly prized, nor can they be too closely studied. But in and of themselves, with all the light that they give, they are insufficient to guide the children of men and to lead them into the presence of God. To be thus led requires a living Priesthood and constant revelation from God to the people according to the circumstances in which they may be placed” (President George Q. Cannon 1827–1901), First Counselor in the First Presidency, Gospel Truth: Discourses and Writings of George Q. Cannon, comp. Jerreld L. Newquist (1987), 252.
Paige asked us to share our favorite messages from General Conference last week. Mark immediately told us the story from Elder Holland’s talk, full of details, about the two brothers who went rock climbing in Southern Utah, one brother saving the other from a fall. As the rest of us shared, Mark rolled on the floor and moaned. I thought he was just bored, but then he said, “The brownies are getting stone cold!” So, midway through sharing our notes on General Conference, Daniel served brownies to the group. Thankfully, they were still warm.
Years ago, a good friend gave us a family home evening journal. Inside were pages to fill in the minutes of our family gatherings each Monday. There was space to list who conducted, which songs were sung, the lesson topic, and family business, but most fun was the place for family news. I go back to our family home evening journals from those early years and smile at the things we listed as accomplishments of the week.
We gave up the practice of keeping a family home evening journal, and the blog seemed to fill in for the “family news” part of our record. However, I have missed the record of what we did together each Monday evening. I’m going to try to give a small recap of what we do for our Monday family home evenings each Tuesday on the blog.
We went to dinner last night with a Christmas gift card. We enjoyed this family time. When we got home, I was in charge of the lesson. I showed this video and then we studied and discussed prayer, referring to the Bible Dictionary:
As soon as we learn the true relationship in which we stand toward God (namely, God is our Father, and we are his children), then at once prayer becomes natural and instinctive on our part (Matt. 7:7-11). Many of the so-called difficulties about prayer arise from forgetting this relationship. Prayer is the act by which the will of the Father and the will of the child are brought into correspondence with each other. The object of prayer is not to change the will of God, but to secure for ourselves and for others blessings that God is already willing to grant, but that are made conditional on our asking for them. Blessings require some work or effort on our part before we can obtain them. Prayer is a form of work, and is an appointed means for obtaining the highest blessings.
Daniel shared that prayer should be a real communication between child and the Father. He said that we need to avoid saying the same things without thinking (vain repetition) and pray often so we develop a relationship. Paige shared that we are children of God and that the video depicts how everything we have is a gift from Him. Richard shared that Heavenly Father doesn’t ask us to pray for his ego, but because everything He asks us to do is for our benefit. I told the kids that prayer is a little bit like playing catch. There are two participants. We show we are ready for answers (or a pitch) by turning to God and preparing ourselves for what he sends to us. If we don’t pray (turn toward the pitch), we aren’t prepared for answers and we aren’t in tune with what Heavenly Father wants for us.