When Did Fun Become So Important?

The other day I read this blog post that I really liked. Find it here. It was all about how life needs to be less about making fun our ultimate goal and more about teaching kids how to enjoy work. I totally agree.

I remember back when one of my oldest children was in junior high and I was complaining to the school about the movies they were watching. These were not educational movies; they were popular culture type movies and I couldn't understand why the teacher was showing them instead of actually teaching them the curriculum. So I complained and the response was something like "kids need to have fun sometimes!" My thought was, "That's not why I send my children to school!" And I didn't think my children were being overworked at school, in the first place.

The challenge in my life is to convince my children that learning how to work is vitally important! They need to know I'm doing it for them, and not just to make their lives difficult. When they see their friends not having to do very much work, it can be a tough sell. I frequently do not feel like the most popular parent.

Here are some ways I am trying to help my children learn how to work:

music lessons and practicing
Saturday house cleaning and holding them accountable to do it well
lots of garden and yard work
earning money by mowing lawns for other people
cooking dinner once a week
everyone helping with dinner dishes
extra jobs in the summer
bicycling or walking to school or other places they need to go

It is a daily challenge to encourage my children not only to work to do the job well, but I'm committed.

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Visiting Susquehanna: The Priesthood Restoration Site

On our way home from Palmyra, we decided to go a couple of hours out of our way to visit the recently opened Priesthood Restoration Site along the Susquehanna River. This is where we believe that Joseph Smith and Oliver Cowdery received the keys of the Aaronic Priesthood from John the Baptist which gave them the authority to baptize. This site also has the restored Isaac and Elizabeth Hale home where Joseph and Emma lived for a year as well as the home where Joseph and Emma lived on their own. We spent a couple of hours there and I wouldn't have minded a few more minutes but we had a long way to go that night. It's a beautiful setting, very much in rural Pennsylvania. However, on the day we were there, cars at a racetrack nearby were detracting from the peace and quiet. I'm guessing that's not as big of a problem on weekdays. The Hale Family was quite well-off for their day so their home was probably nicely decorated with wallpaper and carpet. ...

Book Review: Out of My Mind by Sharon Draper

This is a juvenile fiction book about a young girl named Melody with severe cerebral palsy. Her body doesn't allow her to feed herself, speak, or do much at all. She's very intelligent with a photographic memory but she can't really communicate. Finally, in 5th grade, she gets a "Medi-Talker" which is a computer that speaks what she types in. Finally she has a voice. This book explores what it is like to be severely physically disabled but not mentally disabled. It seems like one of the most frustrating of all scenarios. She is completely aware of all the cruelty (subtle and otherwise) that her classmates inflict on her because they don't really want to include her in their activities. One of the saddest moments in the book comes when she realizes that every one of her special ed classmates is kind, where the "normal" ones are not. Who really has the worse disability? The book was a quick read and fairly enjoyable. Wha...

Hansen Family Plot in the Provo Cemetery

On Memorial Day this year, our family went to the Provo Cemetery, as we do almost every year. We spent some time at the Hansen Family plot which contains the grave of my 2nd great-grandparents, Peter and Mary Hansen. They both emigrated from Denmark with their spouses to Utah. My grandfather lost his first wife Ane to cholera on the plains outside of St. Joseph, Missouri, along with three of his little boys within a very short time--about one month. It's a sad story but it's also one of admirable resilience. He brought his one surviving son, Jorgen, to Utah. He married his second wife Maren (Anglicized to Mary) some 9 years later in Utah She had been married before but lost her first husband at an unknown date. I wish I knew more about her but she left very few records, although I could do more research! Peter and Maren had 6 more children together. The youngest two were twins, Enoch and Ephraim. Ephraim is my great-grandfather and is buried in California. He is the father of ...

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