What is the activity that you do when you don't have anything else to do or when you are putting off that thing you're supposed to do?  My husband calls those "default activities". Camille's is playing with Duplo blocks.  She loves to build structures with these.  I don't think any of my children have loved these as much as she does. Mindy's is reading.  We got to the library just about every week during the summer and Mindy gets a pile of books and makes her way through them.  She recently read all the Harry Potter books and has recently discovered the Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle books.  She also likes the books by E.D. Baker, the Mother-Daughter Book Club series, the Wings of Fire series, and more. Talmage has different default activities.  He will read but frequently he will work on magic tricks, especially with playing cards.  He also likes the Rubik's Cube. Susanna is a huge reader.  We have to go to the library frequently just for ...

Recently I found a blog that I enjoyed reading and will go back to again.  It's called "Reality FHE".  Here is the link: http://realityfhe.blogspot.com/. Apparently one Sunday, she asked the Relief Society class she was teaching what was the hardest commandment for them to keep.  It was Family Home Evening.  So she started her blog with the goal of making family home evening less overwhelming and more doable.  Her blog includes lesson ideas and activity ideas.  She has six kids 12 and under so she doesn't sugarcoat the challenges.  It's truly "Reality FHE". Maybe I'll do a few posts about our own Family Home Evenings one of these days. 

I have a new motto.  I heard it the other day when I was listening to Conversations on the Mormon Channel.  This is a program that features one or two people being interviewed by someone else.  The people being interviewed have an interesting story or perspective and are always admirable in some way. Back to my new motto.  I was listening to this conversation.   It was Sheri Dew interviewing Elaine Dalton and her husband.  Elaine Dalton used to be the General Young Women's president and I always enjoyed listening to her talks.  Apparently the Daltons became runners after they had been married a while and now they run together a lot.  (My husband and I have started running together recently so this speaks to me on a personal level.) One day, they were running up a hill together.  Elaine was having trouble keeping up and she was feeling discouraged since her husband was getting ahead of her.  She called out to him that she was...

  Summers are reunion time in our family.  This year our Kansas cousins arranged for us to all meet up at the Heber Valley Camp on July 3rd and 4th.  We enjoyed a challenge course with a zip line, a nice fire pit with plenty of firewood, great bathrooms, cabins to sleep in, places to hike and some time on the lake in canoes.  And good meals with lots of watermelon!   This is where we got our instructions for the zip line.   Mindy screamed her way down the zip line.  I'm glad she did it. Susanna's a pro from doing it at girls' camp the previous year. Camille wanted to do the zip line and she got up the pole a few feet but she wasn't quite strong enough. Doing this took a little more strength than I thought it would, but I made it!   I was in charge of Friday night dinner and I served pork burritos and watermelon.  I think we had watermelon at almost every meal. The older kids and teens enjoyed non-sto...