Monday, April 21, 2014

Megan's family home evening lesson

Megan is so excited that she is now eight, and she can't wait to be baptized and receive the Gift of the Holy Ghost (less than three weeks!). She has already started working on the Faith in God requirements. On Monday she taught our Family Home Evening lesson. It was about the Holy Ghost. She had a white lunch sack and a flash light. She shined the flashlight into the bag and told us how having the Holy Ghost with us helps us feel light. She assigned scriptures to each member of the family and had them read it, then tell us what it taught us about the role of the Holy Ghost.

John 14:26 (comforts uas and teaches us)
2 Nephi 32:5 (tells us what we should do)
Mosiah 5:2 (changes our hearts)
Mornoi 8:26 (fills us with love and hope)
Doctrine and Covenants 20:27 (testifies of Christ)
Moroni 10:5 (tells us what is true)

She closed with a simple and sweet testimony. "I know the Holy Ghost is real. I know that He can comfort us when we are sad or scared. I know he can help us know what is right."

Wednesday, April 16, 2014

Timeless wisdom from my boys

I wrote these notes down to myself. These are things that Michael said in late summer or early fall of 2012.

He was working on an experience for Faith in God. He read a favorite scripture story and then had to talk aboutwhat it taught him about faith. He read about Helaman's 2000 stripling warriors. When I asked him what he learned about faith from this story he said, "When you have faith in Jesus Christ he can help you do hard things."

Then he pulled out the illustrated scripture book to read the chapter of this same story. He read the caption under each picture to himself, then we talked more about the 2000 young warriors, "mom, this is what you do." Then he read about how they did not fear because their mothers had taught them to believe in Christ. I thought to myself "Michael, This is what I try to do."

I don't remember how this next thought came about, but I think we were talking as I cooked dinner one day. We were probably talking about the song "The Wise Man and the Foolish Man. (I think he was learning to play it on the piano.) I don't remember his exact wording, but this is what he said, "Building the house on the rock reminds me of the 'rock of our Redeemer'. I think it is like repenting and keeping the commandments and having faith in Jesus."

Nathan shared the following experience in Primary in March 2013. In Primary every week they give the kids opportunities to share when they have felt Heavenly Father's love. Yesterday (March 3) Nathan shared how he had piano festival and how he was nervous about a song because he hadn't been playing it very long and how he didn't think he could do very well at all. He told the primary how he prayed and prayed and how he felt he played well and that he scored a 37 "which is a really good score." He said that he was so grateful that Heavenly Father helped him. Candy (his piano teacher) just teared up as she told me about it. (She was serving as the primary music leader at the time.)


Wednesday, April 2, 2014

April Fools

I dislike April Fools Day . . . a lot. Thekids are cute about it though, playing simple, little, harmless jokes on each other. A couple of the kids' teachers did cute things for the day as well. Megan's teacher had the school announce that the second grade field trip was canceled due to weather, then told them "April Fools!" And Mike's teacher made a few changes to their daily schedule, listing things like multi variable calculus in the place of "math". I don't mind these harmless jokes, but I am certainly not a fan of anything that hurts or embarrasses people.

Anyway, back to my story. The kids had gone to bed, and Megan had come down for a drink of water. Then she said, "Mom, I didn't April Fools anyone, not once." She was so sad. I said, "If you think of one, then do it." A few minutes later I was sitting at the computer and she comes down the stairs, trying to look frightened, but really looking excited. "There's a lion in my room!" I jump up, trying to look frightening and said, "Oh, no." I hadn't gone more than two steps when she said, "April Fools!" She was so proud of herself.

I wish I could just keep her at this age forever.

Girls and Goalball 2014

Yesterday the girls had their goalball tournament. They have both been attending practices since January and have really been looking forward to this day. Megan practiced last year, but wasn't feeling quite ready for the tournament a year ago, but she was more than ready, and very excited for yesterday. Here she is in her first game. She started off at center (for the team of the left). Here she blocks a throw, then scores a goal. She scored three goals early against this team.

Here she is playing left wing and she sneaks a goal into the very corner across the court. 
I like this video a lot because she is blocking one way, then changes direction as she hears where the ball is coming from. 

One more goal from Megan!




It has been quite a difference for Liz this year as she has gone from playing with the younger kids to playing with the older junior high and high school kids. Practices have been longer and more intense. They actually measure the speed of their throws (with a a radar gun). Liz started off this season throwing at about 18 mph, and has improved over hte last couple of months to consistently throwing 20 mph. They also play with some additional time rules, which force them to keep the game moving really fast. She did great though. We are so proud of her for working so hard! Liz got off to a great start. She was the first from her team to throw the ball in their first game, and she snuck it in the corner of the goal. Then she blocked the ball when the other team threw it and she scored again in just the same way. This video shows the first goal.

She did really well blocking, even though it is a little scary to have that ball coming at her so fast. She sure is tough!


She is getting better nad better at knowing where she is on the court, and she did great with her teammates (they have practices together with lots of other kids, but were only divided into these particular teams for the tournament yesterday). 


This is perhaps my favorite moment of the entire day for Liz. Her team had a penalty so the other team got to choose who had to defend for the shot. They chose Liz to defend the entire court for the pnealty shot. She has always been so nervous to do this even at practices, but she was awesome.





Megan's team took second out of three teams. She was so excited to get a trophy. There was a darling girl there, who, when it was announced that her team won third, cheered like she had won the Olympics. It was fun to celebrate all of these great kids. 

The matches for the older kids went longer. There were five teams, and after round robin play, they had a mini play off. Liz's team lost their first play off game, but played in the "bronze medal" match. It was a close one, but they won (by one point I think). Liz and one of the girls on her team put their hands on each others' shoulders and jumped up and down cheering. It was so fun to see their excitement.
It was a long day, and the girls were both exhausted, but it was all worth it.

There was a great article in the Deseret News from Saturday, and Megan even had her picture in the paper. Here is a link to the web version. There is the same picture of Megan that was in the paper, but also one of Liz throwing the ball. We are sure proud of the girls.