Back to school 2011

I can't believe it. Summer is already over? It feels like it just started. Caleb is in 8th grade. Zach is in 5th. Rachel is 3rd grade and Ethan is 1st and Mayah a Kindergartener. YIKES.....It's a bit sad but exciting too. My kids were super excited this morning. Mayah has been wanting to go to school for sooooooooooo long. Being the youngest she has watched one of her siblings head off to school while she was left behind. FINALLY her day has come. She is in half day kinder and her teacher seems AMAZING. Can't wait to see how this year turns out for Mayah. Zach was excited to have a male teacher and then when he came home from school he said that this teacher is even better than his MOST favorite teacher in Virginia. Caleb had a good day..........so he says. He is a man of few words. We're working on it. He's getting a little more talkative but not much. Rachel and Ethan both had a good day too. At first, when I took Ethan to school he told me he didn't want to go to recess. I told him he didn't have to. He could just sit in the classroom before school started. Then he informed me that he didn't want to go to ANY recesses. That surprised me but I figured he would be fine once the day started. He came home to inform me that he got to go to THREE recesses. He loved it. Rachel was excited to play with a friend from church on the play ground. They are not in the same class at school or church but she knows her and that made her happy. We moved here in the middle of the school year last year. Because of a new elementary school here the boundries changed which caused the kids to be put into a new school. The old school gave us special permission to continue at their school but we would need to provide the transportation. That is understandable but at this time we cannot do that so we switched them over. I think all will be well.

Last night I found myself crying myself to sleep...just thinking of my kids getting older made me sad....and the thought of...Am I doing enough? Am I preparing them? Am I the kind of mother my Father in Heaven wants me to be? That is when the tears came because, honestly, I don't feel like I am. I have so much room to improve and I am always feeling guilty. I can't stop thinking that my kids deserve so much more. But they do teach me so much. They keep me on my toes and I love them. I hope they know just how much. They are truly a blessing to me.

Fun FHE activity

Don was on lesson tonight. He did an awesome job talking about order in the church and home. He read D&C 88:119 where it talks about a house of order. He told a story about Sir Isaac Newton and one of his Atheist friends. Newton built a replica of the Solar System. His friend had come over and couldn't believe his eyes. His friend asked him who built it and he said he didn't know.....it kind of just appreared. LIKE POOF and it was there. Thinking that was impossible......his friend said that it would have taken someone a long time to build that and there is NO way that it just happened. Newton was able to explain to his friend, who thought the Solar System just appeared with a poof, that it was all done in order and that God created it.

To show the kids about order Don made his own replica. He used 16 cups of exact size and lined 12 of them up in a square to represent the 12 apostles. He then stacked two cups on one end. Those represented the prophets counselors (Pres. Eyring and Pres. Uchtdorf)and then stacked one more on top of those two. That represented Pres. Monson. The last cup (which I held up high) represented the Lord or Savior (not that they are one person but they have the same purpose.) The replica of the cups looked like the temple. Mayah (5) was able to spot that right away.

I appreciate my husbands ability to teach. He was so patient as each of the kids layed on their stomachs on the floor with him in a cirlce. He didn't just tell them what each part of the replica represented. He asked questions so they had to think. And he let them take quite a few guesses before asking the adults to help out.

I am so thankful for the gospel. The church is perfectly ordered.

After the lesson and chocolate chip cookies we all went outside to enjoy the activity that Zach planned.....the BB gun...OFCOURSE. He set up pop cans to shoot. The person that could knock one over would get an extra cookie. It was Zach. Then Don set up the cans in a pyramid form. I shot....didn't fall down. Don shot....didn't fall down....then grandma came along and shot the cans down. She wanted to shoot again. Her next shot hit a can and it went flying. We should call her Annie Oakley. It was a super fun FHE.