Wednesday, April 29, 2009

The Swine Flu and How It Has Affected Us Here in Mexico

About a week and a half ago, as John, the kids and I were returning home to Mexico after a over-nighter to the states, we saw two people along the way wearing protective masks on their faces. I thought it was to keep dust out of their lungs as it seems the wind never ceases here, but after I learned of something called the Swine Flu at one of our girl lunches, I realized that they were probably wearing them as a protective measure again this new epidemic.

They say that nearly 150 people have died of this flu in Mexico City and that the numbers are bound to go up. They say that all citizens of Mexico must stop using the customary greetings of kissing cheeks and shaking hands and keep their body parts to themselves. They say that the citizens should wash their hands thoroughly every chance they get and that if possible, when in large crowds, should wear masks.

Things came to a point of critical mass yesterday when the Mexican government decided that ALL schools in Mexico should be closed until May 6th, including our American Mormon elementary and high schools. As an added precautionary measure, our church area authorities asked that ALL church meetings be cancelled, including scouts, youth activities and Sunday worship services.

For those of you who aren't Mormon, you must understand that this is unheard of. I never in my life have been told that no church services would be held on a Sunday morning. It feels so completely strange and unnatural to think that on Sunday, we will forego the mad rush to find white shirts, black socks and shoes and ties for six boys (the girls, ages 7 and 14, dress themselves with no problem whatsoever, so I don't factor them into the diffculty level of the equation), we will avoid the stress of trying to keep the twins clean until church begins, and perhaps we will have time to eat something other than Cheerios for breakfast. We will still keep the sabbath holy, but without attending three hours of church meetings, I truly do not know how we will spend our Sunday. Perhaps we will invite family over for a simple meal in the afternoon and good conversation.

And so, until May 6th, I don't have to get up and get the kids ready for school, entertain the 3 under 3 by myself all day, have a lunch ready for the school kids at exactly noon (as there are no school cafeterias), run the kids to youth activities, scouts, and the like. It's going to be wonderful! While my heart aches for those who have been adversely affected by the swine flu, my personal life has taken a definite, unexpected upturn for the next several days. Today I assigned chores to the kids until noon (yes, I ruined their lives), including babysitting the twins (the 12- and 9-year-old boys), planting trees in the courtyard (the 12-year-old boy), mowing Grandpa's lawn and driving the van to the big town to see why the radio and the brakes don't work (the 17-year-old boy), cleaning bathrooms (the 14-year-old girl) and organizing closets (the 7-year-old girl). Once noon rolled around, it was time for the babies to go to bed, which was much easier than normal with the kids' help, then the kids and I got ready for the swim party across town to which we were invited (2.5 minutes away). The 14-year-old girl opted to stay home to keep an eye out for the sleeping twins while the 12-, 9-, and 2-year-old boys and the 7-year-old girl swam in the cold swimming pool until their teeth chattered, then warmed up by playing Star Wars with light sabers, only to re-enter the pool once they'd stopped shivering. I had real, live adult, intelligent conversation with some of my dearest friends, ate hummus, pretzels and watermelon by the side of the pool and looked forward to the coming days until May 6th.

We've agreed that we'll do chores each day until noon, then visit friends or invite them over, then, once dinner time rolls around, we'll work together to make a healthy meal, then we'll watch one episode of Star Wars each night after the babies go to bed until we've watched all six of them in a row. Tonight we watched Episode One while slurping homemade strawberry smoothies. Can't wait until tomorrow!

So now you know how the swine flu has affected our family here in Mexico. May the epidemic be contained and may I ENJOY this time with my kids until then.

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Tuesday, April 28, 2009

Wordless Wednesday: Go This Way, Brother!


I am pleased to list this post on Wordless Wednesday at 5 Minutes For Mom dot com.

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Sunday, April 26, 2009

Homemaker Monday: How I Unload a Dishwasher With 3 Under 3...

Welcome to...


Thank you for joining us! If you're new to this carnival and would like to enter your post, please check HERE for the rules and regs. (By the way, if you have been featured on Homemaker Monday in the past, your name is on my left sidebar. Check it out!)

YOURS: This weeks "YOURS" goes to The Blossoming Skillet for her post on chewy granola bars! I love making granola bars and the chewy kind are the best. Her recipe also happens to be vegan, so I'm definitely going to be trying this recipe this week and reporting on it next Homemaker Monday. The Blossoming Skillet has been featured here before, so let me just say thank you, AGAIN, Blossoming Skillet, for your excellent link to Homemaker Monday and I can't wait to try this recipe! For The Blossoming Skillet's entire post, click HERE.

Now for the report on last week's featured link. Jerri over at Simply Sweet Home posted a blog about foil potatoes. This sounded like a really fun meal for the kids so I decided to try it. For Jerri's recipe, click HERE.

First the 14-year-old girl diced up eight potatoes. Since we were going to be serving this as a meal rather than a side dish, she also cut up zuchinni, yellow bell peppers, mushrooms and onions...


We placed a handful of potatoes, a pinch of each vegetable and a little bit of salt and pepper onto a piece of foil, folded them up like this...


...then baked them as per Jerri's instructions. I have to tell you that these were delicious! For some reason I didn't think the potatoes would get tender enough in the half hour they were in the oven, but they turned out perfect, along with their vegetable counterparts. We added some vegan butter spread, sour cream, the 14-year-old girl prepared a fruit salad as the side dish and we enjoyed a simple, delicious meal...


One foil pack wasn't enough for the 17-year-old boy, so fortunately, the 14-year-old girl had thought ahead and sauted all the leftover potatoes and vegetables in oil while the foil packs were cooking. That filled him up and we will definitely be making these again! Thank you, Jerri, for your inspiration. You've changed my life for the better!

MINE: One of the hardest things to do with twins and a toddler around is to load or unload a dishwasher. I usually make sure to focus on this task while the twins are in their high chairs, but sometimes that just doesn't work out. If they are freely roaming around the house, when I open the dishwasher, it is like a beacon of hope for them, a large cave of shiny, colorful objects to explore and destroy learn from. Here's Hyrum as he begins the process...


...and Joseph joining in...


Of course, the toddler can't be left out, so he is going to show them how it's done...


Here is how one can deal with a problem like this:

Step 1: Remove the silverware tray. This is a potentially dangerous part of the dishwasher, as it often contains sharp knives. Put it directly on the counter as fast as you can.

Step 2: Quickly gather all of the breakable objects from the bottom rack and place them on the counter as well.

Step 3: Gather all of the breakables from the top rack and place them on the counter. Your counter will soon look like you never cleaned the kitchen in the first place, but remember that these are clean dishes that will only remain here for a couple of minutes...


Step 4: Do your best ot unload the rest of the dishwasher's contents, gently prying away various objects from the explorer's hands and putting them in their proper locations.

Step 5: Take the explorers off of the dishwasher door and carefully close it, making sure not to pinch fingers in the process.

Step 6: Shake the explorer's hands off your pants and grab the dishes you've placed on the counter and put them in their proper places.

Step 7: If you have one dishwasher, you are finished. If you have two, do this all over again.

Best of luck!

OURS: Okay, I can't wait to read YOUR homemaking posts today! Even though I'm not able to comment on all the posts I read because I'm usually breastfeeding, please know that I truly enjoy learning from you and applying your ideas to my life here in Mexico. Thank you for joining us and make sure to check out all of the other links below. Have a great Homemaker Monday!



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Tackling Shortening-Free Pie Crust!

Hello. My name is Jen and I eat partially (and sometimes fully) hydrogenated oil. I try not to, but there are the crackers, the cookies, the brownie mix and most especially.... the pie crust. Who doesn't love a good, flaky, Crisco pie crust? As of recent months however, I have been trying to banish the foul substance from our family's household. We all know how bad for us this modified fat is, and life is hard enough as it is. Why should I complicate things by blocking my arteries with a substance that was meant to have an eternal shelf life, whether it resides on our favorite grocery store shelves or in our life-sustaining arteries?

Something I have been meaning to tackle for quite some time has been to come up with a recipe for pie crust that does NOT contain shortening (A.K.A. - hydrogenated oil). Now let me mention here that almost everything I am able to accomplish in my day-to-day living is a "tackle". I have nine children, two of whom are seven-month-old breastfeeders and one of whom likes to lay on, press on, pinch, knock over and "luv" on the two breastfeeders. Referee-ing this circus takes 99.9 percent of my time each and every day. I even consider taking a shower a "tackle", but that would not be appropriate to blog. Add to this zoo the fact that we've chosen to raise our children on a farm in a rural village in Mexico, and you will be able to see why I hadn't gotten around to perfecting my pie crust recipe. One of the reasons I LOVE 5 Minutes For Mom dot com is that I am motivated to tackle something meaningful (yes, I know breastfeeding is meaningful, too) every week and blog about it. Whoever thought this up was a genius!

I digress. Back to the pie dough. I've tried to make it without this poison, I mean shortening, in the past, but the dough was hard to work with and the crust was tough, not flaky, like grandma's always was.

I know you all are sitting on the edge of your rolling ergonomic computer chairs wondering if I was able to tackle such an ambitious feat. I am here to tell you that you will NOT be disappointed! Here is my version of a pie crust I can live with...literally.

Let's start from the bottom up...


These are wheat berries, wheat in it's purest, most natural form. It has to be ground up before we can use it, though, and here's how I'll do it...


I love my Golden Grain Grinder. Unfortunately, these particular types of grinders are no longer manufactured, but if you would like to see about getting a grain grinder, try the K-tec kitchen mill or the Nutrimill. I've had experience with both and love 'em.

All righty then, now that I have the whole wheat ground down to a fine flour, I am ready to gather my ingredients for the pie crust. Here's what I'll be using...


(P.S. If you aren't able to grind your own wheat, you can purchase whole wheat flour at any grocery store.)

6 cups whole wheat flour
4 cups white flour
4 teaspoons salt
4 cups butter, softened, but not melted
2 cups very cold water
(This is a quadruple recipe for use as a make-and-store dough for a large family. If this amount is too overwhelming for you, then just cut it into a quarter.)

In a large bowl, I will whisk the flours and salt together, like so...


I'll then cut in the butter with a pastry cutter (or two butter knives) until the mixture resembles course crumbs, like this...


Next, I'll add the cold water and stir it in carefully with a fork, making sure not to overmix it or the dough will be chewy, not flaky. When it comes to pie crust, flaky is always the best!

Now I will get out my handy-dandy pillow case. This is a trick my mother taught me when I was but a lass and it has been one of the most valuable homemaking tips to which I've been privy in my career as a homemaker. On this pillow case I will generously sprinkle large amounts of white flour, then I will gently ball about a cup and a half to two cups of the dough on top of it and sprinkle lots of flour on top of that, too. Finally, I'll get out my rolling pin and sprinkle lots of flour all over that! We're going to have a flour festival!


(See? That's a lot of flour!)

Now we come to one of the tricky parts. I will carefully roll out the dough, taking great care to make sure the dough doesn't stick to the rolling pin. Even the least bit of stickyness will cause the fragile crust to attach itself to the pin and all will be lost. Okay, not really, but it will be a pain in the neck to try to mend the crust once it's torn. Remember, we're having a flour festival, so don't be shy. Rub the rolling pin repeatedly with the the white flour to make sure the pie dough keeps to itself. And don't be afraid to add more flour to the dough ball during mid-roll, like so...


I'll keep rolling from the inside out until my pie crust is about 14 x 14 inches and about 1/4 of an inch thick...


Here's where the pillow case comes in. I swear my mom was a genius. I mean she is a genius...she's still alive. Hi mom! I will take the pillow case from the side closest to me, lift it up, pie dough and all, and fold it over itself so that the pie dough will end up like this...


I'll then place the pie plate close to the dough to make sure it only has a short distance to travel...,


...carefully lift the dough up onto the pie plate, then unfold it to cover the plate completely. Some of the dough will hang over the edges, so I'll take a butter knife and neatly trim off the excess.


Now, I could just leave it like this, but how I long to be like my grandma, so I am going to flute the edges. I'll dip the pointer and middle finger of my right hand and the pointer finger of my left hand into the flour crock, then poke the edges of the dough like this...


Lovely, isn't it? Next, I will poke fork holes into the dough, so large, obnoxious bubbles won't form, like this...


Now, we can go one of two directions. We can either bake the pie dough right now if we're making something like pecan pie, or, if we're going to bake an apple pie, now would be the time to pour in the filling. I am going to bake my crust right now to use for blueberry pie with a cream cheese base. UMMMM! (But just so you know, that recipe will be linked up here next week on Tackle-it Tuesday. This is a pie CRUST tackle, not a PIE tackle.)

I will bake it at 400 degrees for about 15 minutes, or until the edges are golden brown and here's what it will look like when it's done!


Nice!

In this recipe we used over 10 cups of flour and four cups of butter, but we only made one pie crust. What, you may ask, will we do with all that leftover dough? We can do one of two things. We can tenderly (remember, working with the dough too much will cause it to become chewy) ball up about 1 1/2 to 2 cups of the dough and freeze it in Ziploc bags, like so...


...or we can roll the same amount out on our handy-dandy pillow case again and place it on wax paper, using the fold-and-lift technique as described above.


Once the dough has been safely transferred onto the wax paper, we can cover the top with wax paper, roll it up like so...


...and wrap the whole thing in foil to avoid freezer burn. This dough should keep in the freezer for several months.


When it's time to use it, just let it sit on the counter for a couple of hours to thaw, then remove the wax paper and place your crust in a pie plate.

Ahhhhh....how good it feels to tackle something I have put off for so long. Gone are the guilt-ridden days of using shortening for my pies. I can now knock on Grandma's door for Thanksgiving with confidence knowing I am offering the most healthy pie crust options available!

Thanks for joining me and my chaos this Tuesday. For more of my tackles, click HERE...and have a GREAT Tackle-it Tuesday! See ya next week!



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Thursday, April 23, 2009

To speak of my faith during the greatest difficulty of my life...

Today I feel compelled to post this talk I gave over four years ago during a church conference for the adult members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (The Mormons) in our area. I was asked to speak on faith and the conference was to take place only seven and a half weeks after my first husband passed away. Some details, such as my place of birth and my full name, have been omitted.

January 2005....

"Good evening, Brothers and Sisters. My name is Jennifer ___ and I feel very humble and grateful to have been asked to speak to you tonight. The theme of tonight’s conference is Building Faith and Spiritual Reliance. Now I have to tell you that I have been preparing for this talk for about four weeks now, and last night I decided to practice saying it out loud after my children went to bed. I share a room with my two-year-old daughter, and since she hadn’t fallen asleep yet, I thought that my soothing voice would lull her to sleep. Instead, she sat up in her bed and said, “Mama, be quiet please.” I finally was able to practice in my car before I came here, so, believe me, I did try! Before I get to tonight’s theme, I need to give you a brief summary of my life up until this point so that you will know where I’m coming from.

I was born here in ______ in 19--. I had a loving, fun-filled childhood with three younger sisters and one younger brother. When I was 18 years old, I met and fell in love with a soldier in the United States Army. We married and a few months later welcomed our first child, Bethany, into the world. We were then stationed in Germany, where Rob got his first call to overseas duty during the aftermath of Desert Storm. After a long deployment, Rob returned and several months later, our second child, Conor, was born. We were then sent to Fort Polk, Louisiana, where Rob was, again, sent overseas for a period of five months. Several months after his return, we welcomed our third child, Kyla, into our world. We were then stationed back here in ________. Our fourth child, Reid, was born seven months later. When Reid was nine months old, however, Rob was again sent to Southwest Asia for five months. Upon his return, we had about two years of uninterrupted time together, but it wasn’t to last long, as he was again asked to serve another tour of duty in Southwest Asia. Several months after his return, we gave birth to a son, our fifth child, Landon. When Landon was three weeks old, Rob left on an unaccompanied tour to South Korea for a year. Again, several months after his return, we welcomed our sixth child, Claire, into the world.

As you can imagine, Rob and I and our little military family have had many adventures. We’ve had the trials that a marriage and children can often bring coupled with long separations from each other, but we’ve also had huge growth opportunities that I wouldn’t trade for anything. Our love and appreciation for each other was always intensified by separation, and looking back on the sixteen years that we’ve had together, we’ve had a full life, with definitely more good times than not.

It’s with a heavy heart, but also a feeling of deep gratitude to Heavenly Father for the time Rob and I had together, that I share with you that seven weeks and six days ago, due to a series of unforeseeable, unusual, and tragic events, my husband, best friend and father of our six beautiful children committed suicide.

I know that it is shocking to hear those two words uttered, especially from this pulpit, but because we are in the adult session of conference, I felt comfortable speaking freely with you so that you can have a clear picture of how the Lord has worked in my life through the faith I have in him.

Many of us have read Alma 32 in the Book of Mormon. This chapter is a wonderful lesson on faith and how to build and grow faith. During my preparation for this talk, although I had read this chapter many, many times, I felt compelled to pore over it many more times and I would like to share with you some of the things that stood out to me as I’ve begun to try to rebuild my world.

First of all, I need to remind you what faith is not: Alma teaches us in his 32nd chapter of the Book of Mormon that, “-faith is not to have a perfect knowledge of things.” That struck me as so important because there are many times when we may have doubts about spiritual matters, but we can still have faith because our knowledge does not have to be perfect.
Alma teaches us that this it the definition of faith: “Therefore, if ye have faith, ye hope for things which are not seen, which are true.” In a world where God is sometimes feared, we can have assurance that He is a loving, compassionate God who only requires the very simple act of HOPE on our part, in order to work in our lives.

In the New Testament, there is a beautiful story of a father who brought his son to Jesus to heal. This son had had many ailments since he was a young child and his father was greatly tormented by this. He said to Jesus, “-if Thou canst do anything, have compassion on us, and help us.” Just his request alone was obviously an act of faith. This was the Lord’s response: ”If thou canst believe, all things are possible to him that believeth.” Listen now, to the desperate father’s response as he cried out with tears, saying, “Lord, I believe. Help Thou mine unbelief.” And because of his faith, his son was healed in front of the multitude. What I love about this example is that all we need to have the Lord work in our lives is a desire to believe. This father humbly admitted that while he believed Jesus could heal his son, there was a portion of him that didn’t believe and he asked the Lord to help his “unbelief”. The Lord has said in many writings, “Ask, and ye shall receive. Knock, and it shall be opened unto you.” I can’t imagine a more noble request than to ask Heavenly Father to help our unbelief. I KNOW He will answer us every single time we ask this of Him.

I would like to count some of the ways my faith in the Lord, Jesus Christ and the Atonement has helped me and my children to get through this very difficult time in our lives. I do this in the hopes that, if you haven’t done so already, that you might begin to spiritually prepare yourselves for things to come in your lives.

There are so many things that I wanted to say to you this evening and when I first wrote out my talk, it was twice as long as the time I was allowed, so I had to chop out so many things I wanted to tell you about what The Lord has done in my life. I think one of the most important things I can speak about is the comfort I feel having faith that the Lord has known all the days of my life that I would experience this and that He has been by my side in so many ways preparing me. When I first shared the summary of my life with you, you might have thought that I was given a difficult lot having to go through so many military deployments with so many children. At the time I went through them, I felt the same way and I often wondered why my life seemed so much harder than the average wife’s. I now know what a blessing it was that I learned how to take care of such a large family on my own and I learned many years ago what loneliness felt like and how to deal with it. We sometimes don’t know how our daily hardships can prepare us for future events in our lives of which only God is aware.

Heavenly Father also gave me a very special gift only two months before Rob died. I would like to share this experience with you. In March of last year, my mother had given me a book about a Christian missionary husband and wife couple that was abducted by Al Qaeda terrorists in the Philippines. For various reasons, I wasn’t able to pick it up right then, and actually didn't start reading it until the end of September, some six months after my mother had given it to me. Once I started, I couldn’t put it down. This missionary wife was much like myself. She home schooled her children like I do, went on many adventures with her husband and was very independent. When she and her husband were vacationing in a Philippine resort, they were kidnapped by terrorists and forced to spend a year in the jungles of the Philippines as their captors tried to evade capture by the government. Their story was truly inspiring as the wife, Gracia, wrote how they had befriended their captors and had tried to share the gospel of Jesus Christ with them. Theirs was an amazing story of love, forgiveness and the power that faith in the Lord can have in one’s life. Tragically, however, after a year of being forced to follow their captors through the jungle, in a rescue attempt by the Philippine government, Gracia’s husband, Martin, was shot and killed. She was rescued, but had to face the prospect of a life without the one she loved most in the world. As I read her account of how she told her children what had happened to their father, how she helped her children say good-bye and how strong she was, I sobbed like I never have before during the reading of any other book. I cried for many days afterwards every time I thought about it and cried when I shared the story with my husband. I was puzzled that I would have such a connection to this family and feel such emotion, because I have read many books that were much more tragic than this. I now know why. I now know that I was to follow Gracia’s example of how to honestly tell our children what happened to their father and how to help them deal with the funeral and say goodbye to their dad. It was like God gave me an instruction manual on how to deal with a crushing event like this. Perhaps nothing, besides prayer and scripture study, prepared me more for the initial few days after Rob’s death than did this book. My faith in the Lord has helped me to realize that this was not a random coincidence in the time-space continuum, but that the Lord placed the book in my hands when he did as a specific road map on how to help my children deal with the death of their father. I will never forget this Heavenly gift and I will always cherish it in my heart.

Now that I’ve shared with you how my Faith in The Lord has helped me, let me share with you the steps that one might take to build faith.

The first step that I would like to discuss with you is the way that our thoughts roam around in our heads. We all know that the best way for the Lord to communicate with us and to act in our lives is through a pure heart. When we carry around feelings of bitterness, anger, pessimism, distrust and resentment, we cannot be an effective conduit through which the Spirit of the Lord can flow. I would like to share with you a parable, the parable of the shopvac. Some of you in Hondo Pass Ward have heard this parable, so please bear with me. As you already know, I have six children. In turn, my floors are often in need of serious attention. I have discovered that a using a shopvac is the best way to clean Cheerios, dog hair, dirt, and cheese all at the same time. This is something I use every day. One day, I noticed that my shopvac wasn’t picking up as well as it used to. There was a very gradual, almost imperceptible decline in the performance level that had finally gotten to be so bad that the vacuum was practically useless. I realized that the filter was clogged with months of grime that I would need to remove. This was during the time that Rob was in Korea and I had five small children and I just didn’t feel like loading them all up and going to the store for a new filter. So, I decided to simply remove the filter and bang it as hard as I could on the side of my house. After some pretty brutal banging and an asthma attack because the exertion and the dust, I found that I could replace the filter in the vacuum and it would function just like new. May I compare this to what can happen when we let negativity into our heads? Sometimes, our negative thoughts have come in and piled up so gradually into our minds, that we don’t even realize the fact that they are blocking inspiration and guidance by the Holy Spirit. We truly cannot be effective Latter-Day Saints if we continue to allow these waste products to cloud our minds. Sometimes, we become so dysfunctional, that it takes a good banging against a wall to rid us our of negativity. That is never any fun, and we can avoid it by willingly forgiving those who we might have thought have trespassed against us. I wouldn’t stand up here and ask you to do something that I haven’t done and I want you to know, that during the last four weeks as I have prepared this talk, as I have been able to forgive those whom I had thought had transgressed against me, I have experienced a peace and a clarity of mind that is unbelievable. I know that as I have done this, my mind has had room to dwell on the more beautiful things of life and it is wonderful.

The second step to building faith is the next standard primary answer: Scripture study:
Something occurred to me a few years ago about scripture study as I was doing some woodworking. I was using a circular saw and it slipped and hit my wedding ring. Fortunately, it made only a very small nick in it and can hardly be seen. Later, as I was reading my Book of Mormon, I recalled that that very book was written on gold plates. When I thought about the power it took to put the little tiny nick in my ring, and then when I thought about all of the physical and mental effort it must have taken to compile these writings, it was completely overwhelming. It gave me such a sincere appreciation for how important it was for us to have these writings. It made me wonder how I could have ever gone a day with doing scripture study. Our Heavenly Father, in all of his wisdom, went to great lengths to provide us with a blueprint of how we should live our lives to be able to receive happiness in this life and the next. If we cannot find the time to take advantage of this wonderful gift, then we will truly be missing out on so many sweet blessings in life. I can truly testify that reading our scriptures daily WILL improve our lives. More time in the day will appear, more patience in our voices will sound as we raise our children, more love will show in our countenance as we interact with our fellow human beings, and a more desire will develop in our hearts to be obedient to our Heavenly Father. I have a strong testimony of how scripture study benefits our lives.

The last step is the standard primary answer to almost any question asked of our children: Prayer. I would like to suggest to you one very simple act of faith that you can go home tonight and perform. Get down on your knees and pray to Heavenly Father in the name of Jesus Christ. The act of getting on your knees is a true act of faith. Most people wouldn’t willing forego the comfort of their bed to kneel on the hard, cold floor unless they had some hope that there was someone listening to them. You will be rewarded for this simple act of faith. Let’s talk about how we pray. As I’ve reflected on what some of my prayers may have sounded like to our Heavenly Father, I realized that many of my daily prayers have had this repeated kind of blanket thanks for everything, and then quite a few requests for blessings. As I’ve become more acquainted with prayer, I’ve realized that there is so much more to it than that. I would like to read a quote by Gordon B. Hinckley that definitely enlightened me as I read it.

He says, ”We need to build ourselves spiritually. We live in a world of rush and go, of running here and there and in every direction. We are very busy people. We have so much to do. We need to get off by ourselves spiritually. Get by yourself and think of things of the Lord, of things of the Spirit. Think of the things of God. Just meditate and reflect for an hour about yourself and your relationship to your Heavenly Father and your Redeemer. It will do something for you.”

That is so beautiful. How different is this idea of communion with the Lord than perhaps our daily, routine interactions? Our prophet spoke of reflecting for an hour on the things of the Lord. I truly believe that all of us can find the time to do this on a regular basis. If we do, we can know that everything else will fall into place in our lives just as the Lord would have it.

Something else I’ve recently been enjoying very much when I pray is to just start listing, very specifically, all of the ways that God has blessed me and to thank him for it. During this very difficult time for our family, as I’ve reflected on the hundreds of kind gestures and sacrifices that have been made for us, I am able to spend many hours in prayer on my knees listing all of the people and events that I am grateful for. Sometimes I don’t even feel the need to ask for anything from Heavenly Father after doing this because I don’t fell like I even need anything. He has given me such an abundance of blessings that I have cried many, many more tears of gratitude and joy than I have of sorrow. The Lord is such a loving Father.

I want to leave you with my simple testimony. I know that Jesus Christ lives. I know that he is the Redeemer of the world and can save all mankind from their sins. I know that we can live with God again with our families, our families being the most important unit in the universe. I am so grateful that I have been given the opportunity to speak to all of you today and my only wish is that I have inspired or helped someone to make an effort to build their faith in Jesus Christ. I say these things in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen."

I am pleased to list this post @ Cielo's "Hopeful Friday."


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Wednesday, April 22, 2009

Long overdue thankful list with photos...

I am thankful...

...that I recently came across a recipe for, seriously, what could be the best chocolate cake ever...which just happens to be vegan...(I will be posting the recipe this coming Tuesday)...


...that a young man in our town fixed up a go-cart, with his father's help, and now rents it to my son for 50 pesos a day, (roughly $3.50). My son can earn this money by being my servant for one hour. See? We all win...


...that the door of my dishwasher hasn't broken off yet...


...that my babies are THIS happy in the morning...


...for this woman, who regularly offers to babysit the twins...just because she loves them...


...that vegans can have chocolate ice cream, too...(Pictured below: a frozen dessert I made with almond milk, agave nectar, cocoa powder, coconut oil and vanilla)...


...for a husband who has the patience it takes to organize a family gardening project...


...for the men who work with us on our landscaping, and who encourage Johnny to help...


...for surprises!


...that the nine-year-old boy can get hours of pleasure from layering one phone book's pages over another. Apparently, once layered and closed this way, it is impossible to get the phone books apart, impossible even for two very strong men...


...that the 14-year-old girl thinks it's cool to saute...


...that my husband can buzz a one-year-old without making him cry...


...for peanut butter and honey sandwiches, my favorite food in all the world...



I am pleased to list this post @...

Grace Alone's...



Thursday Thirteen dot com,
Rose-Colored Glasses' "Thankful Thursday",
Cielo's "Hopeful Friday",
Jayelee's "Thursday Thirteen"
and...




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