Our Tough Muddy Dad

This weekend Beau participated in the Tough Mudder Competition that was here in Utah. As they say "probably the toughest event on the planet."  He was part of a team of friends and a couple of his brothers.  After lots of rain the previous day and evening, he knew it looked like it was going to be a pretty chilly day.  I ended up deciding that it would probably be best if I not go and take the kids.  They wouldn't have lasted that long in the cold, and I don't know if I would have lasted long physically or emotionally myself if I was dealing with meltdowns all day while I still recover. We sent our love and support and told his parents to take lots of picture and videos so we could watch. 

Here they are getting ready to begin, those happy smiles won't last too long.

This was the course of  12 miles and 21 obstacles.  Most of the obstacles were out of view for those watching, and so most of the pictures we have are of only a few of the obstacles.



The first obstacle of the day - the kiss of mud.  Lucky for them the live wires weren't quite working yet.

 Mud pit after mud pit.

 

Lots and Lots of water.

Hurting, cold, tired, hungry and exhausted.

By this point near the end of the obstacles they had no grip left in their hands, and with the bars rolling it was impossible for any of them to stay on it.

Everest or the half pipe was one of the last obstacles. By this point they were so sore and exhausted. All of them but one was able to make it up.

The final event is here in video.  Electroshock therapy.  Next time Beau will just walk past it. There's one thing to prove and push yourself in a tough obstacle, and one that just hurts and gives pain.  You'll see one of his team members in the video get hit wrong. It make him black out, fall and implant his open eye into the mud and straw.  It came out caked, and took a while for the EMT's to clean it out, and they still missed peices. Hopefully it didn't damage it too bad. Hours later, exhausted, hurting and cold they officially finished! 

 He said it was a lot of fun. He enjoyed seeing how he could push himself, he loved the camaraderie that you feel with everyone, as your helping strangers and other team members so that everyone can finish. He'd do it again except for the Electric Shock.  So we'll see come next June when it's in Utah again if they're up for another round.

The kids were so excited to hear all about it. They had been watching all the videos online to know the obstacles and what he would be doing.  Isaac wanted to keep his headband he earned by finishing. I told him he didn't earn it, he'd have to earn his own someday.   The kids also made a poster for him when they he got home.

 Here's Isaac's.  His dad with the electric shocks and the half pipe he had to climb.

Savannah's showing how tough he is in protecting our family.

Mirians. I just love this one.  They all have mustaches, because many grow them for it showing their manhood and toughness.

Here's Caitlyn's.  Mud all over his face and the wires that he had to climb through. I love how they all have their own interpretation of it.

He can hardly walk now, exhausted and drinking lots of fluids, and need of a massage, but had a great time doing and we are proud of him! Way to go Dad!

Last Weekend

 As I mentioned in my earlier post I was excited about our opportunity to hear from our prophet and church leaders at our bi-annual general conference. I really do look forward to this time of year and we have tried to find ways to help our kids enjoy the 8 hours of conference.  Last year we took a family home evening right before conference to talk about what General Conference was. I had some cards of the prophet, the quorum of the twelve and the first presidency.  They had fun facts and information from their lives, and we had each of our little kid pick their apostle they wanted to learn about and pay special attention to at general conference. We had them learn about the apostle and then share something what they had learned with the rest of the family.  We should have done it again this year, but due to recovery it didn't happen. It didn't matter of course because they still remember their apostles to this day, and ask us to reconfirm that when they suddenly see them speaking. "Is this my prophet?" "Is this Mirian's prophet." It's so fun to see them recognize them, know something fun about them, know their names and are more willing to listen to them because they feel like they have a personal connection. (Sorry for my blurry pictures. Not sure what is up.)

The best part is how excited they get to watch it. Beau and I awoke Saturday morning to "Isaac don't do that! You're ruining our desks for general conference."  I hadn't felt well all week to make them conference packets of activities, bingo, and note taking pages.  But that didn't seem to matter to them. They knew it was conference and they were taking matters into their own hands.  They had pulled out the benches and had set up their "own" little cubicles for watching conference. Snack cups, pencil holders, paper, crayons, etc.  They were ready to go.  I am so glad they have a positive feeling and experience with conference. I hope they love to watch it their entire lives, slowly gaining more and more from it as they get older.

My dear friend Amy stopped by right before the first session unexpectedly with a conference basket for the kids full of crayons, activity books, treats, snacks and lunch for us. It was so sweet of her and totally made my kids whole day. 

At the end of the two days I asked my kids to tell me some things that they had learned about conference. It's always amazing that they can each tell me at least two or three concepts or directions from talks, even though they aren't able to hold out for all 8 hours. Mostly 2 hours, and then the prophet's talk. But they were telling me things from talks that I wasn't even sure they were listening to.  I love seeing them even leaving with one thing they remembered from the talks.

Mirian and Savannah did a page about their favorite talk in the morning session. It made me smile which one they picked.

Between sessions Beau and the kids worked more on the yard, by Saturday night they were filthy and the bathwater was basically mud.  We are getting so much closer to getting the yard back to semi-normal.

We were also excited to hear about the change in ages for missionary service.  I was excited, and although it didn't have an immediate impact on me (since Isaac is only 5), I did suddenly think, that it's very likely that my girls will now have the opportunity to serve missions. They could now be serving missions too, which I don't know that I ever really counted on. I'm feeling that if I really teach them right, and help them develop that desire to serve that it's very likely they will go, and that is exciting to me. 

And what better way to end a post than with this cutie.  

My baby, running around and loving her green smoothie popcicle. Seriously. Can you get any cuter than this?  Here's to a great weekend in our home, I hope you were able to enjoy yours as well. 

   

The Lord will do nothing....

"The Lord will do nothing, but he revealeth his secret unto his servants the prophets."
Amos 3: 7

I love this time of year. It's the time of the year where the prophet of God will give the Lord's desires to all who will listen.  I believe that God has called a prophet and apostles to give direction to us today, just as he did in the Bible.  God still loves and cares for his children. He has always had a spokesman and prophet that he called and gave revelation to concerning all things.  I know for myself they are men of God, and have been called into the special calling of Prophets and apostles. I have been in congregations with many of them, and have felt the spirit testify that he has called them to direct the world today.  Why would he call Prophets through all dispensations of time and leave this dispensation alone, with no direction or guidance. He hasn't.  I love the fact that I can hear that direction and guidance regularly through the internet and other resources, but especially twice a year during general conference.  For two days they speak the will and mind of the Lord for us now.  I have been inspired, uplifted and given direction every time I have taken the time to sit down and hear what they have to say. Every time I have come to general conference with a question in mind... I have always received guidance and direction as to what I should do.

I think it's also a great opportunity to find out what the Mormon's believe. What we preach.  You can hear it straight from us.  At this time there is such a huge light on Mitt Romney as a presidential candidate, and being a Mormon. Many wonder what it is that he believes, what his faith is about. Who are the Mormons.  Here is your chance to sit and listen for yourself to the leaders of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latterday Saints.  You can hear for yourselves what we preach and believe.  We'd love to have you join us.

It's broadcast here over the internet, 10:00 am MST and 2:00 pm MST, Saturday October 6 and Sunday October 7.  If you choose to listen, you will hear over the two day period from Thomas S. Monson who has been called as a Prophet of God, his Counselors, and the 12 apostles who have been called as special witnesses of Jesus Christ. You will also have the chance to listen to other church leaders who serve in various capacities over the youth, women, men, children or humanitarian efforts.

If you can't listen to it then. It will be posted on the internet here where you can re-listen, watch or read it after it concludes. I always love to revisit their messages through the years and next six months until they speak to us again.  I think if you sincerely watch and listen, you will have answers to your own questions answered, you will receive direction in your own life, no matter what denomination of faith you belong to. You will be uplifted and have a desire to be better, no matter your faith.  I hope you'll join me, and feel free to share your thoughts and experience watching it.  If you have any questions about it you can also feel free to email me or comment and I'd be happy to try and answer them for you.

My New Chore Method

I just want to thank all of you that have sent me well wishes, condolences and uplifting notes. They mean a lot. We are doing better. There's nothing like getting your hair cut to help you feel better too. (Thanks Marie for the home visit! ) We've had wonderful people taking our kids for part of the day so I can sleep, with visits and phone calls from many of you. We feel so loved and appreciated.

Right now my husband is doing my dishes, while watching a movie rigged to the window from his little tablet. According to him, they are almost tolerable (like running on a treadmill), if you have something to watch. (So your lucky Amanda, he'll spare you having to do the job.) Unfortunately it also takes him as long as the movie to get them done... so I'm still waiting to head to bed.  So here's a lighter blog post for you.

Chores...
Oh I love them. My kids adore them. We live for them. Yeah I wish. That has not been the attitude in our house. It has gotten a little bit better and I thought I would share my simple solution.  I have had a thousand different methods to getting them done. Chore charts, allowances, zones they were responsible for. You name it. The problem I kept running into was the arguing. "His zone isn't messy, it's not fair that I have to clean up his mess in my zone."  "I'm sick of doing the same chore over and over!  It's the hardest one."  I'm sure you've all heard them.  It also wasn't really helping in getting jobs done that needed done.  They'd be doing their assigned chores, but those weren't the messy areas or the jobs I needed help with.  So I changed my plan. So far it's been working out great.  So here it is:

I want my kids to get dressed and ready for the day as soon as possible. Make beds, pick up rooms, brush their teeth.  I don't want them in their pajamas still at noon. Which happens more frequently than it should.  I'd ask them to get ready and do their chores. I'd have to ask again, and again, and again... it was getting frustrating.

The next day I approached it differently. I declared that the first one ready for the day got to pick his chores first. The last person ready for the day had whatever chores were left.  These kids were dressed and ready in less than five minutes. They've never moved so fast. That's our new method of getting ready now. It actually happens quickly.

As for the chores... I now look around my house at what jobs actually need done.  I don't assign too many in the morning because I want to get started on school.  But if I have laundry piles, that goes on the chore list. If the floor needs picked up, that goes on the list. Only jobs that actually need done are on the list. I put enough chores on the list for 2-3 chores per kid. They get to pick which chores they would like in the order that they were ready for the day.  First one ready gets to choose all of his chores first from the list and write his name next to them. Then the next child ready gets to pick. And so on. The arguing has almost stopped. I now only hear complaints from the last person ready who didn't get what they wanted. It takes me explaining to him or her that they were up 2 hours ago. They could have gotten dressed and been ready before anyone else even woke and been the first one to choose. Instead they waited till last minute.

They now happily do their chores because they get to choose from the list. I usually have a couple of extras on there so that even the last person still feels like they have a choice. It's no longer so horrible to do the chore because they own it more.  Plus now the work that needs to be done is finally getting done.  If they get ready for the day, and do their morning chores then they can mark off their daily list to earn their extra money.

I've been doing it about a month, and so far it has beat all my other systems. Now I want to focus a bit more on training them to do a good job with their work and doing it correctly. How do you guys do chores. I'd love to hear any suggestions or tips.

Why I Homeschool: Life Lessons

I had different ideas for how I was originally going to write this post, and then life happened. It really happened. In the process I realized that I had a great opportunity to show you a real life example of what I would have been trying to explain in a post. Instead I can actually show you.

I feel pretty strongly that there are lessons that I want my children to learn that will not be learned best in the school system. Some can be practiced there, but to really learn them I believe you need time, unplanned moments, and you need real life examples that aren't part of a "planned curriculum."  Lessons about character, service, hard work, and life in general. Lessons that are only learned when you are actually living life.  There's nothing like learning about life and death than from the real experience of loosing someone or something. There's nothing like learning how to work, then spending all day doing hard, back breaking physical work. There's nothing like learning about service than doing it, or having it being done to you. There are certain life issues that you would learn at school as well, more than you might in a home environment. But to me the important thing was what teaching happens during these life lessons.

There were times when my kids were in school dealing with hard issues.  I didn't feel like I had adequate time to help them learn from it. I couldn't give them time needed between the few hours they were home and before they went to bed.  Between homework, any after school activities, dinner, chores, baths and getting ready for bed, there were few opportunities to deal with the real issues of life.  I wanted those teaching moments, that were short and fleeting. I wanted the opportunity and time to really help them work through them. I also wanted them to experience those magical moments that just happen, such as this one.

We had one of those life experiences this last weekend. It was a life experience that I've gone through before, but there always seems to be different lessons to learn. On Thursday I found out during an ultrasound at 16 weeks, that there was no heart beat. I had already felt that it was not going to be a good pregnancy, but that still never prepares you for the loss you feel, and the many emotions you'll go through. We hadn't told our kids yet that we were expecting, and so it was hard to explain "why I was crying" to them when I picked them up after the appointment.  They had that instant excitement of mom being pregnant to the sad "oh" of realizing that the baby had died.  They had an idea of what it meant since I had gone through 2 other ones, but they are still kids and not fully aware of what it entails.  But what an opportunity for everyone to learn.  

There's nothing like the moment later that evening, when I'm crying and Savannah puts her arm around me, hugs me and says. "Don't worry mom, Heavenly Father will make everything all right."

There's opportunities for priesthood blessings, to be comforted and blessed. To know that no matter what happens, we would be taken care of. Things went wrong with the miscarriage, I was hemorraging and after passing out a couple of times was taken to the ER via ambulance. Sitting and crying to my husband in the ER about how much I hate feeling like this. I hate being so weak and passing out. I hate the pain. I hate the fact that my body shuts down and they can't find an IV. I hate that an hour later, with sticks all over my arms they finally get one in so they can rush me into the operating room. I hate coming out of anesthesia, of just physcially feeling like crap, while emotionally being an absolute mess. I hate sitting there worrying about my children, because moms will just do that no matter how many times you tell them not worry about them.  But despite all that I hate about the experience, there were many blessings that still came out of it. Many lessons learned. Moments where the Lord showed his tender mercies through people, his earthly angels. 

I look back and started seeing his hand in it all. The phone call that was an answer to prayer, as we were desperately searching for someone to take the kids to a friends house. She called just in time, and got the kids just as Beau came back to the house and found me passed out. If he had taken them, and had been gone for too long, I could have been a lot worse. To also have had the knowledge from past miscarriages, that we could act quicker and get help faster. There was also the sister from our ward who happened to be one of my ER nurses. To just see a familiar face was such a welcome sight. 

There were the people who immediately jumped at the chance to watch all of my kids, to come and spend the night with them while we stayed over night in the hospital. Dozens of people who called, emailed and stopped by, asking how things were going and offered to help.  There have been so many meals brought, planned and unplanned from people showing they care.  Family members who helped out, took kids, gave support from a distance and sent paper plates since they couldn't be here to help.  

People who felt like they needed to just stop by and lighten my load, and brighten my spirit.  People who were here just because I didn't want to be left alone. My visiting teacher and dear friend who showed up at the hospital just as my blood pressured dropped. I started passing out, was scared to death and didn't have Beau around. She held my hand and cried with me till I started pulling out of it.  And just the love, dedication and service my husband alone has shown me. Who has willingly missed work, because I wasn't emotionally nor physically ready for him to leave me alone yet. Who is willing to come and be here just because I need him.

I have never felt so loved and so taken care of. Neither has my family. Last night Savannah told me before she went to bed. "Mom I feel like we are being treated like royalty. I feel funny, it doesn't seem right." She was experiencing for herself what it is like to let other people serve you, even when you may not feel like you deserve it. She was feeling it herself, after all the service and kindness she had been shown.  She was learning what real service is about.  It gave us the opportunity to talk about learning to let others serve us and making sure we do the same thing for others when they are in need of help.

They have also been learning for themselves what service means. We explained that physically my blood level is really low, and that I can't do very much at all. They are learning that they are going to have to help, chip in and serve mom so I can get better. They are realizing the need of being around family to help everyone heal during a time like this.  They have spent a lot of time at other peoples houses and today  expressed the desire to just want to be home with us.  A need that I have too. To just have my children around, to see my many blessings, and help heal the loss I still feel. But realizing that sometimes we still need to do things we'd rather not do, to help to long term goal - getting mom better.

They are learning the real lessons. The vital lessons. The ones that are the whole purpose of this earth life. The lessons that help us become more like Christ.  The lessons of how much God does love us, watches over us and helps us in times of need. The lessons of genuine service and love. That's not even counting the real science lessons they are learning too. What is a miscarriage? Why does it happen? How big was the baby? What did they do in surgery? Did it hurt? Why does it mean to go under? Why do you have bruises all over your arms? Why do they have these tubes hooked up to you? Why can't you do anything and how long will it take you to get better?  Why do you need to take iron (supplements)? Why do you need to sleep so much?  etc. 

It's times like this that although difficult to manage, because I do homeschool, I would never trade for anything. The things they are learning right now are priceless.

Homeschooling While Recovering

Last night I had two dear homeschooling friends bring me dinner and stay to visit.  I asked them "please tell me it's ok if I don't get any schooling in right now!" They both looked at me like I was nuts to even think about doing it and told me about their days so I could feel better. I physically can't do much, and don't last very long before I'm completely exhausted, burned out and needing a long long nap.  I just can't do what I was doing. In fact, I'm lucky to be getting anything done that requires lots of physical energy. I know that is part of the reason we homeschool - the flexibility. But I also knew that if we did something for school the kids would not be making messes, getting into trouble, or making it harder on me.

So I've tried to change my thinking, knowing that we wouldn't get normal school in, but looking for opportunities to get any learning in, or recognizing those learning moments when they did happen. So here is how school looked the last couple of days at our house.

Picking rocks outside with dad while mom slept - practicing counting, earning a penny for every rock picked, practicing adding their money, using tally marks, paying tithing, and spending money on a treat later. Plus learning hard physical work.

Reading books

Practiced Piano - Piano Lessons

Played a vowel game - identifying the vowel sounds in words. (Isaac's learning to read and everyone is helping)

Watched some educational movie clips and filled out a graph on the various types of weather and natural disasters, so mom could get some sleep after having a physical and emotional break down. Which lead to Isaac not wanting to sleep tonight because he was scared. "What if something bad happens like a flood, tornado or earthquake?"  We tried to address why he didn't need to worry about each of these issues. "What about poisonous gasses?" Caitlyn asked.  Obviously they all retained the information from the movies a little too well.

Did Math using one of the I Love Math books from Time life books. (My kids LOVE these books and love doing the Math inside of them.) Mirian and I sat on the couch for a good hour while I rocked Belen to sleep and went through almost the whole book.

The skills we practiced: Counting by 10's, counting, adding, and subtracting money, acute, obtuse and right angles, time, mapping skills and spatial sense, logical thinking, multiplication and division readiness, grouping.  She didn't want to stop. We might have done 1/2 of the book and practiced all of that. (At the bottom of each little section they tell you what skills your practicing, and give you additional activities you could do as well to expand it.) We first found them at my local library. I then picked them up really cheap through amazon for my kids to read and do anytime. They are ALWAYS taking these books to their rooms to read.

Photography - Mirian taking pictures for her online photography class assignment

Legos and Programming - building her Lego duck assignment and then programming it on the computer so it could move around. Savannah loves these sets.  They're the Lego WeDo sets that are made for the elementary age kid. Simple robotics for really young kids.  Isaac can even do it.  You build it with the instructions then you plug it into the computer, use a simple programming program to make it do what you would like.

Learning really can happen, even if you are unable to teach.