Spotted on Pinterest...

Yes. I am aware.  And it's good to know that Amos is already above average at something.

I'm a sandwich.

Today we took the kids to see the Chipmunk movie, you know, "Chipwrecked."  Afterwards Amos said,

"I didn't like how he (Alvin) wasn't listening to his Dad."

YAHOO!

Tonight I went in to take a picture of him to accompany this post.  When I asked him if I could take his picture he said,

"Sure, I'm a sandwich."

Then, Maggie, without missing a beat, jumped on him and said,

"I'm the peanut butter!"

It was awesome.  Amos got pretty ticked because apparently he was the peanut butter, but I liked it.

Butty Butty/Monkey See, Monkey Do

A while back, out of nowhere, Maggie started doing a little "butty butty" dance.  It's as technically difficult as it sounds.  Basically, it's a butt wiggle.  She used to do it ALL the time, but then Amos yelled at her and told her "butt" was a bad word, and she quit doing it all together.  We bribed her for a video, so it's a bit of a lackluster performance, but you get the idea...



This brings us to Audrey.  We were teasing Maggie the other day about doing a butty butty and I looked over to see Audrey doing her very own butty butty!  It was shocking that she'd managed to pick that up just from watching Maggie do it (a million times).



In spite of Amos yelling at her every time she does it, we can usually count on Audrey for a "butty butty" these days.

Conference Applied-Packer's "Counsel to Youth"

I gave a lesson to the combined YW just after the first of the year, and I used this talk in preparation.  It felt like the perfect talk.  There was so much good stuff in this talk, it's hard to condense.  Packer is a little scary to me, but he sure knows his stuff.  So, on to the quoting and commenting...

You are much better than we were when young. You know more about the gospel. You are more mature and more faithful.

 Uh, yeah.  I have never been more certain of something.  I swear the YW should be teaching me.

The old crow is getting slow.

The young crow is not.

Of what the young crow does not know

The old crow knows a lot. 

At knowing things the old crow

Is still the young crow’s master.

What does the slow old crow not know?

—How to go faster. 

The young crow flies above, below,

And rings around the slow old crow.

What does the fast young crow not know?

—Where to go.

John Ciardi, “Fast and Slow,” 

I liked this poem because it "cutely" said how I feel.  Sometimes I want to shake the girls and say, "Listen to me so you don't have to be a dumb dumb like I was!"  It also made me think, who is looking at me and thinking, "I wish I could shake her and help her along?"  There is tremendous help in learning from those who have gone before us, no matter our age.

Many of the temptations you face, certainly the most serious ones, relate to your body. You not only have power to create bodies for a new generation, but you also have agency.

The Prophet Joseph Smith taught, “All beings who have bodies have power over those who have not.”⁷ So every living soul who has a physical body ultimately has power over the adversary. You suffer temptations because of your physical nature, but you also have power over him and his angels.

One of the best talks I've ever read about our bodies: Bednar's "Things As They Really Are."  It's worth a read regardless of your beliefs.  Seriously.  It's good.

You may in time of trouble think that you are not worth saving because you have made mistakes, big or little, and you think you are now lost. That is never true! Only repentance can heal what hurts. But repentance can heal what hurts, no matter what it is.

So very true.  And so very easy to forget.

Also, I showed these two videos during my lesson. They're short and sweet.

**Update: Ok, I couldn't get the second video to embed, so check it out here.  It's Elder Russel M. Nelson's "Face the Future with Faith."

Family party

Tonight is our first night home together in like three weeks so we had a little family party in our bed. We ate pizza and watched Parks and Rec. Amos liked the bowling in the episode, but he was really upset by the "punching" plot line. At the end of the episode they joked about punching someone again, and Amos said, "no! We need to go into the tv and tell them not to do that."

It was really sweet. When we moved onto 30 Rock he said, "but how will we teach them?"

Then we gave him another piece of pizza and he let it go. Good night with the family. Thank heavens for no other commitments tonight.

Conference Applied-Utchdorf's "You Matter to Him"

Full text here.

January has been rough.  I think it's a combination of coming down from the holiday highs and a winter slump.  I have been dragging at best =)  Today the kids were watching Netflix on the iPad, and I could hear the little squeaky voices of the veggietales telling them they're children of God.  Amen.  It reminded me that I am getting behind on my conference reading (and applying) so I sat down with them and picked a conference talk at random.  What I came up with was Elder Uchtdorf's "You Matter to Him" ('Him' being God).  Not too shabby.  I think even the veggietales would agree.

I don't really have anything to add, but these were my three favorite quotes (emphasis added):

Disciples of Jesus Christ understand that compared to eternity, our existence in this mortal sphere is only “a small moment” in space and time. They know that a person’s true value has little to do with what the world holds in high esteem. They know you could pile up the accumulated currency of the entire world and it could not buy a loaf of bread in the economy of heaven.

The Lord doesn’t care at all if we spend our days working in marble halls or stable stalls. 

May we ever believe, trust, and align our lives so that we will understand our true eternal worth and potential.

Girls and their eggs

Maggie and I have started a super secret girls only tradition, and I love it.

It started over Thanksgiving when Amos and Eric went to PA without us.  We put Audrey down for her nap, and Maggie and I made eggs.  Mags loves to crack the eggs, and then mix them.  She hates the cooking part and ALWAYS says, "be careful mom, it's hot."

On Thanksgiving, we curled up in bed with our eggs and watched the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade.  I knew it felt special that day.  Our tradition really started to stick a few weeks ago though.  Amos was at preschool and we'd just put Audrey for her nap.  Maggie and I made eggs, and then she said, "let's watch the parade!"  I couldn't believed she remembered that.  It must have felt special to her too.

So, now when Amos goes to preschool, and Audrey is sleeping, Mags and I make eggs.  Just the two of us.