Tennie's birthday party

Today we finally had Tennie's birthday party, and I must say right now that she wanted to plan and carry out every detail. I helped her make some lists, and took her shopping, and begged her to let me make her cake so that she had some kind of surprise (even if she did pick the design... and she let me). She had a budget of $20 and pulled off a very fun "Explorer Party".

A magnifying glass birthday cake

Practicing catching tadpoles before the party

Geoff delivering the lunches to the other side of the pond in preparation

After the guests arrived they had "Explorer Training".

The first "piranha" was caught!

Team One made it across "Piranha Pond"

Team Two made it alive through the Crocodile Territory

This little girl thought there were real worms in the bag and stewed and squirmed...until she closed her eyes, reached her hand in, pulled out a worm, and put it right in her mouth without hesitation! What courage! She was pleasantly surprised to find a gummy worm in her mouth!

Great posture and balance!

Ceci's partner was clearly doing most of the work...

Through the Spider's Nest

Good ol' dad dressed fully for the part

The group went on a Scavenger Hunt for some small toys and treats, as well as seed pods, wild flowers and real live bugs!


In our family the birthday person gets to eat as much cake as they want when we eat cake, and then we throw the rest out. While everyone shared the magnifying glass cake Tennie had her own.

She decided to give her face a little dip

The other kids thought it would be fun, too

Way to go Tennie!

Bedside table

The other day I took a look at Tennie's bedside table and had to capture a little peek into her current world: a rock collection, a small clay handmade box, a blue ribbon she found at the rodeo (almost as good as earning it yourself!), the long skinny jewelry box that holds her growing collection of earrings, a clay creation with her full name and special marbles pressed in, a magnifying glass for looking at bugs close-up, a necklace, and a piece of sticky glue that held the packaging onto a new Pyrex bread pan.

Ten is a great age...

The role of Nurturer

A few months ago I found myself being particularly hard on one of our girls. I frequently felt frustrated with her choices, and was correcting her behavior often. Subconsciously I had taken it upon myself to "straighten her out". I wasn't feeling the love for her that I wanted to feel, and it took far too long to realize I was the one that needed straightening out! One morning I sat down with my little notebook and wrote, "What is my role in mothering this child?" I pondered if it was really my responsibility to point out and correct her weaknesses, some of which are nothing more than a developmental stage! It was during this quiet morning that I had a big perspective shift.

The Family: A Proclamation to the World says, "Mothers are primarily responsible for the nurture of their children." What does it mean to nurture? It must mean more than just providing food and clothing and some occasional sunshine...a nanny, a childcare facility, even an orphanage can do that. Each of my children is so unique. My role is not to shed light on their weaknesses, or jump on every chance to correct them to make them into what I want them to become. An all-knowing Father in Heaven will do that in wisdom throughout their lives (heaven knows he is still working on me!) Instead I am to nurture their spirituality; their emotional, mental, social and physical being. What that means for each mother, and each of her unique children, will be different. As I looked at how I was generally doing in each of these areas, with each of my children, I saw that I was doing decently in some, pathetically low in others. The areas that were low needed some immediate attention, and I took some time writing down what changes I could make to improve my role as nurturer of the whole child.

To do this it was necessary for me to step back and observe each of my children: their personality and preferences, what motivates them, what caused stress for their little bodies, how they show and receive love, how they communicate and like to be communicated with, their strengths and their weaknesses, etc. And then allow for them to be who they are, accept them for who they are, and love them exactly where they are at this stage in their existence, all the while nurturing the divine that is within them. I certainly don't believe we abort any responsibility to correct our children, or set boundaries, but I felt I needed to be more gentle in my correction, and slightly looser in my boundaries.

The Proclamation also says we are the "primary" nurturer in our children's lives. Before I began teaching the girls at home I admit that I put the primary responsibility to educate my children on their teachers at school. I relied on them to tell me if my particular child was having a little trouble, and with what, exactly, and how I could help. It wasn't until I was teaching them myself that I saw some pretty large gaps in their understanding of certain things that, according to the curriculum, they should have understood. (Not that one has to homeschool to catch these aspects of their children.) These teachers were great teachers. They were doing the best they could with 20+ kids in their care, but I have since taken a closer look at the ways I have given (or subconsciously hoped to give) the responsibility of the nurturing of my whole child to others - individuals or institutions.

Once we as mothers embark on nurturing each of our children as a whole child we soon realize there isn't time for much else. We only have a relatively short time to lovingly coax the seed into a blossom! But there is so much joy in the process as we recognize the overwhelmingly sacred role of being a mother, a nurturer. God's work and glory is "to bring to pass the immortality and eternal life of man." We, as mothers, help directly in both aspects of that work, bringing glory to our Father every step of the way.

Fresh start

I feel the desire for a fresh start. Ideally it would be a new beginning after this temporary life we’re living; in our own home with a paying job. It has been just over two years since Geoff stopped working, and it has almost been one year since we returned from our year in France! So I’m ready for a fresh start, and I’m going to make it happen right here on blogspot!

Our temporary life has been one of the most challenging and exhilarating chapters in our lives. France was amazing. It turned our family inside out and changed us forever. This past nine months living with Geoff’s parents has been equally defining for us as a family. I haven’t written about it much. Mostly because I haven’t had the time, but also it isn’t easy to write what you are learning in the middle of an intensive crash course! Lately, though, I have been longing to write about what we’ve been learning here, our changing perceptions, and our attempts at putting new things in to practice. I want our girls to grow up and read why we did the things we did; what worked and didn’t work. Mostly I want them to know how deliberate their parents were in trying to give them the best chance at reaching their full potential that they could, and how they tried to go about it. Basically, in addition to our on-going photo scrapbook, I want to more deeply record our life story.

So, here is to one fresh start, today…on blogspot.

In search of wildflowers

On Friday we girls and Geoff's mom took a day trip to Bear Valley in search of, what is claimed to be, one of the most spectacular displays of wildflowers in the world. It was a good two hour drive on good roads, and then another 45 minutes on a dusty dirt road into a peaceful and lazy valley. We had missed the peak by two weeks so it wasn't as amazing as we had hoped, but Bear Valley itself was worth the trip.

Tea Party

I am far too practical to be fancy, and that is why I'm so grateful we have the tradition of a Tea Party on Geoff's mom's birthday. It gives us a reason to practice our "finer" etiquette at least once a year!

This year we were lucky enough to have the tradition with the honorary birthday girl herself! She replaced my set table with real china and silver, and taught us a thing or two about enjoying a moment of refinement in the middle of a routine day. We heard stories about how she used to love having tea with her Danish grandmother while studying at the University of Copenhagen. Her grandmother always had the most dainty tea cups, and finest little tea spoons.

Like Mesha's memories of her grandmother, our girls will always remember that their Mormor loved beautiful things. It was a special occasion...that is until we rushed off to horse lessons!

The discovery of prank calls

We had stake conference this morning, which meant a completely free afternoon. I was so excited to settle down and write in my journal. In the middle of my peaceful hours the girls came down telling me they had called a "grandma" and asked if she wanted a mud pie. She thought they were her grandchildren calling and so chatted away about all sorts of things. She told them where she lived and told them to come visit. Her name was Beverly, and could they please go visit her! (Turns out she wasn't the only one offered mud pies, and other calls were made saying their house was on fire, started by the "fire people" who "really are kind of weird these days".) It was hard to deny them their desire to do something for a little granny in the ward (They called people from the ward directory). They made some chocolate chip cookies, picked a bouquet of flowers (weeds, really), quickly finished a little craft they had started, and off we went in search of the little yellow house on Nevada street. We found it, but it had a gate with two, teeth-showing dogs on the other side. Shoot, how were we to get to the door? Tennie suggested we pray. We did, and not 30 seconds later Beverly's daughter pulled up saying she was home later than usual for lunch. We met Beverly, explained the girls were the ones that called, and the girls admired her 90-year-old "cuteness". She cut a bouquet of lilacs for us and our visit was over.

The beginning of prank calls...the end of a free afternoon!