Camian Academy

There’s been a lot of controversy on the internet concerning the talk given by Sister Julie Beck, general president of the Relief Society, at General Conference in October. I’m not really sure why. Her talk was amazing and, truly, nothing new or surprising. While I found her talk to be lovely, there are clearly things in it I need to work on. There’s always stuff we can work on. If there weren’t, there’d be no reason for the talk.

Mothers Who Know Bear Children
As women, we are the ones with the parts to bear children. Some women do not have a chance to have children of their own either because they do not marry or they suffer from infertility. Simply having children is not what is important. Desiring to bear children is. This principle is not an issue for me at all, particularly considering I am pregnant with baby number four.

Mothers Who Know Honor Sacred Ordinances and Covenants
Guiding children toward the temple starts with being a good example. Sister Beck mentions Sacrament Meeting being where we renew those covenants and having the children looking nice. Looking the part of a perfect family with nothing under the surface supporting that is not the goal. The goal is to look nice because we are going to church where we are worshipping the Lord. I could work on this. For some reason it doesn’t matter what time church starts, 9, 11:30, or 2, we always get ready a half hour before we leave. We rush around at the last minute and often arrive at church without having touched the kids’ hair with brushes. This really isn’t right. Ani went on a tour of the White House Friday and we took the time to make sure she was dressed nicely and her hair was up with a bow in it. Shouldn’t church, the Lord’s house where we worship Him, be WAY more important than the President’s house? I’ve got something to work on here.

Mothers Who Know Are Nurturers
Men and women have different purposes. That is clear from The Family: A Proclamation to the World. Sister Beck discusses keeping an orderly home and, yes, homemaking. This doesn’t mean women should do all the work, but the fact is if we are home all day as we should be the bulk of the work can and should fall to us. Homemaking and child-rearing is our career. As we work around the house, we are teaching our children how to work as well. How often do we push kids away as we cook, clean, or do laundry because it’ll take ten times as long with their “help.” We shouldn’t do that. One day these children, particularly girls, will have their own homes to care for. Sister Beck reminds us that God’s house is a house of order and we should pattern our own homes after His. I know I feel better and calmer and am a better mother when our house is clean. Do I keep it clean? Nope, not too well. Another thing I need to work on.

Mothers Who Know Are Leaders
Sister Beck urges women to plan for their own future and the futures of their children. We are to be an example for our children. We are not to listen to the world and what society says is the way to mother. We must stick to what we know to be right. We are to be selective about what we do to be sure our focus remains where it should. How well I am doing with this principle is iffy. I would like to scrapbook more. It’s definitely an activity worthy of my time. It even relates to family history. But it is not something easy to do with small children. So my time is limited for that. And that’s okay. One day I’ll be able to scrapbook as much as I want. One day my children will not be small. On the other hand, I spend way too much time on-line. I only go to two message boards, one for moms and one for the homeschooling curriculum we use. But, somehow, I can spend hours on them. That’s not a worthy activity, nor a good use of my time or focus. I have work to do there, too.

Mothers Who Know Are Teachers
Sister Beck reminds us to remember family scripture study, prayer, and family home evening, as well as other times such as mealtimes as times to teach our children. I am a double teacher for my kids. Not only must I teach them gospel principles, but I am also their educational teacher since we homeschool. Since we started using Sonlight, it has actually become easier to apply this principle. God and Jesus Christ is woven into the Sonlight cores and we get to discuss the gospel right along with school stuff sometimes. We try very hard to have family scripture study and prayer daily and family home evening weekly, but we are not always successful. We have to try harder there.

Mothers Who Know Do Less
The world runs at a very fast pace. People talk about simplifying. They talk about going slower. According to some our children must be in preschool at 2 and all sorts of sports and other activities by 5. The result is well-rounded, tired children who spend less and less time with their family. I was actually struggling a bit with this prior to conference and hearing Sister Beck’s talk as well as Elder Oaks’s talk. We pulled the kids out of gymnastics after 9 months of weekly lessons. Ani quit Irish dancing lessons for a few reasons. Cameron wanted to take golf lessons but then decided he’d rather just play golf for fun, no lessons needed. Ani is in Brownies and has activities just 2 or 3 times a month. In February she will start Achievement Days activities at church twice a month. Is it enough? Don’t they need more? The answer is yes, it’s enough. No, they don’t need more outside activities. What they need more of is time with their family. I blinked and Ani went from a toddler to about to be baptized. I’ll blink again and she’ll be in young women. Another blink and she’ll be getting married. This time is short and very precious. Instead of paying for these activities, we are putting that money toward going on family vacations at least once a year. I’m mostly doing just fine with this principle. And I am thankful for Sister Beck’s and Elder Oaks’s words and the confirmation that what we are doing is right for our family.

Mothers Who Know Stand Strong and Immovable
In the last couple years I have seen something happening to many of my friends who are LDS mothers that is upsetting to me and reminds me that I am not immune from the influence of Satan. If I let my guard down I could be the next to question my faith and waiver on what I know to be right. I must stick to my beliefs and in the process be an example to my children and teach them the important gospel truths, too, so they will one day also be strong and immovable. So far I think I’m doing a pretty good job with this one, but having seen other women fall, I know I must work to remain this way.

So there you have it. The main points in Sister Beck’s talk and my feelings on each of them. I’m far from perfect. I have work to do with most of these principles. I could choose to be offended and feel like she has accused me of being a poor housekeeper or choosing the computer over my kids sometimes and do nothing different. Or I could choose to be thankful for her words and work on the things I need to and make myself better and in the process make my children better. I choose the latter.

Every year I make a cross stitched ornament for each of the kids. This year Ani’s getting another angel (third in a series), Cameron’s getting another snowman (also third in a series), and Fritz is getting another snowbaby (second in a series).

Over the weekend Ani found the missing Daniel Boone book. Apparently Fritz had hidden it (along with the missing phone) in his cabinet in the kitchen. Sometimes we clear stuff out of there and it’s pretty funny what Fritz has chosen as his treasures. So yesterday we finished reading it and now we are totally done with the Great Illustrated Classics and the American Heroes biography series. Cameron enjoyed the book so much he asked if I’d read it all over again to him.

We finished Day 120 (out of 180) of Core C yesterday. It was a very strange school day. I have odd pregnancy insomnia where most nights I sleep just fine. Other night I wake up and cannot go back to sleep. Yesterday I woke up at 3:30 and was up for the day. The big kids woke up at 6:45 and we decided to go ahead and do school. So by 8:10 we were completely done and the kids were enjoying their fizzy science experiment (baking soda, sugar, and citric acid - it makes a sweet yet pleasantly tart fizziness in your mouth). We finished reading In Grandma’s Attic and will be moving on to The Wonderful Wizard of Oz (Ani’s excited about that one, Cameron’s not).

I took advantage of the buy $100 gift certificate and get a $5 coupon thing at Sonlight. I’d been chomping at the bit for over a month anyway wanting to order Core 1. We won’t need it until March, but I can’t wait to get it anyway. The money for it was in the school budget just sitting and waiting, so I jumped at the chance to get the extra coupons. They mailed them a week ago Monday and I’ve been very hopeful that they’d arrive every day since. They finally got here yesterday. I was so excited. Over pieces of paper. There’s something wrong with me (nah, we just love Sonlight!). I promptly cashed in those gift certificated and ordered Core 1. So in a few weeks we get to have another box day. Yay!

For my parents and my mother-in-law I made 6×6 mini scrapbooks. I selected two or three pictures per month (mostly of the kids) December 2006 through November 2007 and made a two page spread per month.

I first read a post by Denise on a homeschooling message board that I occasionally lurk on a couple weeks ago just a few days after her initial court hearing. At that time she was told by the very anti-homeschooling judge that her kids had to be put into school and she couldn’t move out of the jurisdiction of the court without permission for two years, among other things.

Her crime? After nearly a decade of homeschooling either she forgot to turn in the affidavit for the 2006-2007 school year or the school system lost the piece of paper. They let her know this in October 2006 and gave her 5 school days to turn it in. She got a copy of the form that Utah requires, had it notarized, and faxed it to the school on the 5th school day.

The end right? Nope. Nearly a year later in October 2007, after that school year was long over, she was contacted by the school people and told they never received it. Much more likely, they lost it. But no matter, she had to have a hearing about it because Utah is targeting underground homeschoolers right now. The problem is Denise is far from an underground homeschooler. She’s always turned in the paperwork (including for the current school year). But I suppose they decided perhaps she was an easy target.

She thought she’d be fine because she has the copy of last year’s affidavit, signed and notarized. That was not enough for the judge. Not only has he demanded she place her children in public school and public school only (private is NOT an option for her according to the judge), he threw a fit and said she didn’t show “good faith” after she enrolled the two older kids in the on-line virtual public school option (her younger two were put into regular face-to-face public school). That wasn’t enough according to the judge. Never mind that according to the state of Utah that is considered public school and is under the direction of public school teachers. The older two have now been enrolled in face-to-face public school.

She has another hearing in January. The judge has clearly already convicted her in his mind. There is a possibility this mom will be sent to jail over a misplaced piece of paper. One that was, more than likely, misplaced by the school system.

The only article I could find about this was at WorldNetDaily. Far from what I consider a good news source, but at least they are helping get the word out. Media pressure may be the only thing that knocks sense into this judge (aren’t they elected positions?). Denise lives in Carbon County, UT. This is a county that has long-standing issues with homeschoolers. Those in charge are against homeschooling (perhaps they spell it home-schooling). Harassment has happened for years, but this goes WAY too far!

Cameron likes sleeping on the floor. He refuses to have his own bed. He won’t sleep in it and it would just take up space in his room. He says all beds are too hard which really makes no sense since he chooses to sleep on the floor which is definitely harder than any bed we have.

He isn’t picky about the location of the floor. For a while he was sleeping on the floor of our bedroom. Sometimes he sleeps on the floor of his own bedroom. Sometimes he sleeps on the floor of Ani’s bedroom. Once in a great while he sleeps in Ani’s bed with her. Occasionally he sleeps on the couch downstairs.

Lately he has been choosing the stairs landing. We have stairs that go halfway up, turn, and go the rest of the way up. The landing is pretty big so it’s a perfectly safe place to sleep. Last night Ani slept on the landing with him. Usually she sleeps in her bed. She likes to sleep in a bed.

When Ani was tiny a wise lactation consultant said that it doesn’t matter where everyone is sleeping as long as everyone is sleeping. Very true.

So I’ve hit 15 weeks and I’m still nauseas, still throwing up. Once again the goal must be revised. This time the target to end morning sickness is by 18 weeks. I was hopeful this pregnancy would be like Cameron’s. I stopped throwing up at 14 weeks with him. Clearly that was a fluke.

And now my morning sickness has thrown me a total curveball. For a while I had a perfect pattern of getting sick about noon and being sick the rest of the day and throwing up most evenings after dinner. I had lots of energy in the mornings and got lots done. All that changed this week. Now my nausea starts in the morning and goes until evening and I throw up most mornings after breakfast.

So here’s to three weeks or less to go. I can always hope, can’t I?