Spaghetti Sauce

Last week tomatoes were on sale so Jennie and I decided to try something new and can spaghetti sauce. I read the recipe and was a little nervous about how much work it was going to take, but we thought it would be a good experience for us. First we put the tomatoes in hot water until the skins split then into icy water. Then we peeled, cored and quartered them. Next we put the tomato pieces (and juice) into a pot and brought them to a boil for 20 minutes. While the tomatoes were cooking, we diced onions and peppers and sauteed them with oil and garlic. After the tomatoes boiled for the 20 minutes we were supposed to put them through a sieve or strainer, but we wanted our sauce a little chunky so we put them in the blender for a little bit. Then we added the sauteed veggies and some spices/herbs and put that mixture back in the pot to cook down. This took FOREVER! It probably should have taken longer, but after more than and hour we gave up with that step thinking that it would never get thick enough and poured it into jars and put them in the canner. 30 pounds of tomatoes was supposed to make 9 pints, but 25 pounds made 20 pints. Jennie's family had it for dinner last night. It was runny, but no one complained of the taste.
Here's a picture of me stirring the tomatoes hoping that they will thicken.
Here's a picture of the final product.

AFHE's Homeschool Convention

Jonathan and I attended the homeschool convention put on by Arizona Families for Home Education. It is something that I look forward to all summer. It's a chance for us to browse the vendor hall and possibly buy new curriculum, listen to speakers who usually give us good ideas to use in our homeschool, visit with other homeschool families, and feel inspired and uplifted. I'm grateful that Jonathan attends with me and that I have his total support.

This year was a great conference. I've recently picked up the Thomas Jefferson Education book again and have been feeling like I need to move more in that direction with our family's education. Many of the classes that I attended reaffirmed that feeling. It's amazing how strong and how often I felt the spirit. It helped me realized that I'm doing what's right for my family.

Jonathan and I attended several classes on our own and some together. There were a lot of fantastic presenters. I got ideas to help me progress in my own education, ideas to use for book discussions, ideas to be a better homeschool mom, and ideas to help foster the growth and learning of my own kids. There were also some classes on the history of homeschooling--can you believe that it used to be illegal to homeschool?!?!? It blows my mind and makes me grateful for the sacrifices that people made before me so that I can teach my kids at home.

Cowboy Cookies

Last week Braedi found a book on my shelf called Book Cook. It's full of recipes and activities to go a long with children's stories. She asked if we could do something out of it for our next cooking class and made a list of her favorites. I reserved some of the books at the library and picked one that I had the ingredients for.

We began by reading A Campfire for Cowboy Billy by Wendy Ulmer. It's about a little boy who rides his stick horse on an imaginary journey through the wild west (really New York City). Then we made the cookies. It was a nice recipe because it only made one cookie per person. I think the finished product was supposed to look like a haystack, but you can't make that comparison with ours.

1. Mix together 1 tablespoon peanut butter and 1 tablespoon dry mild in a small bowl.


2. Add 1 teaspoon honey.
3. Add 1 tablespoon chow mein noodles. (Dyllan took a finger-ful instead).
4. Spoon the cookie onto a piece of waxed paper. (The kids just ate it out of the bowl).
I thought they were yummy!

Another FHE

Braedi started a tradition and now all the kids want a turn giving the family home evening lesson. Corbin did one last week. He read the story of how Nephi and his brothers got the brass plates then organized a hot-cold game of finding the brass plates (a set of scriptures). Corbin is always asking for a turn to do the lesson, but it's as we sit down for family home evening. This time he asked earlier. Dyllan volunteer to do the lesson tonight. She asked for help. So I looked through my pre-made lessons and found one with a story that she could tell. It was called "Travis learns about repentance".
Then I helped her by teaching the steps of repentance and she ended with a poem. I loved watching the other kids pay attention to Dyllan as she read the story. Ephram wants to do it next week.

Pioneer Talk

I had to speak in chuch on Sunday. I never like to prepare talks (I don't so much mind the speaking) and last week was no exception. I wanted to focus on the homeschool convention that happened on Friday and Saturday, but had to split my time between my talk and the convention. I don't think I've ever avoided a talk this much. I worked on it a little each night--looking for stories and quotes and stuff--but, I never sat down on worked on an outline or finalized what I would put in it. Mostly because I didn't want to, but also because I wasn't quite sure how to. So Saturday night around 8:30 I finally sat down and wrote it out. 4 hours later I was finished. Needless to say I was tired the next day. Jonathan was worse off than I was, though. He didn't come to bed until 4:30. I am glad that it's over. Here's a copy of my talk:

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
I was asked to talk about how we can follow the example of the pioneers in our own lives. I struggled preparing my talk this week. Not because I wasn’t interested in the topic. Not because there wasn’t enough information. But, because I didn’t want to spend my time preparing for it. Friday and Saturday was the annual homeschool convention. I look forward to going every year and I wanted to spend my week getting ready and excited for it--not my talk. But, Jonathan pointed out to me that this experience would help me with my talk. I would have to manage my time so that I could do both. How could I feel what the pioneers felt, if everything was handed right to me--all the time I needed, finding the perfect story on the first search, having the works come to me. I was able for a shore, and comparatively easy time, feel the spirit of the pioneers. I hope that I will be able to help you feel that same spirit.

After Joseph Smith died, Brigham Young said that he and the apostles should lead the church until a new prophet was chosen. The saints were living in Nauvoo at the time, and the Governor told them to leave Nauvoo and go west. Brigham Young said that they would, but they needed time to prepare. The saints worked hard to get ready to leave. They built wagons, bought food and made clothes. They also worked on completing the temple. The mobs in Nauvoo made the saints leave before they could get fully prepared. The saints crossed the Mississippi river and camped there for a few days then moved and made another camp. These saints that were traveling west were called Pioneers. They continued their travels and stopped at a place called Council Bluffs. They remained there for awhile making preparations to continue their journey west. The Lord told Brigham Young what they should do as they traveled.

The Lord blessed the pioneers. They traveled a long way across the plains and met with many trials and challenges. Their actions and faith can be examples to us today as we face our own challenges. Elder Oaks said, “Many of our challenges are different from those faced by former pioneers but perhaps just as dangerous and surely as significant to our own salvation and the salvation of those who follow us.” Elder Ballard also said, “Certainly it was hard to walk across a continent to establish a new home in a dry western desert. But who can say if that was any more difficult than the task of living faithful, righteous lives in today’s confusingly sinful world, where the trail is constantly shifting and where divine markers of right and wrong are being replaced by political expediency and diminishing morality. The road we travel today is treacherous, and the scriptures tell us it will continue to be so until the very end.”

The journeys of the pioneers parallel our own journey, and we can learn to mirror their actions and apply them to what we do. Former United States president Ronald Reagan has been quoted as saying, “I do not want to go back to the past; I want to go back to the past way of facing the future.” There is something about reviewing the lessons of the past to prepare us to face the challenges of the future. I would like to take 4 out of the many notable attributes of the pioneers and show how we can use them to face the challenges of the now.

The first is obedience. Brigham Young and the pioneers were told by many people not to go to the Rocky Mountains, but to go on to California. Brigham Young had been shown by the Lord where they should go. He was going to obey the Lord. They arrived in the Salt Lake Valley on July 24, 1847 and began building houses and planting crops. After the saints had gotten settled in the valley, Brigham Young asked people to help rescue other saints who were crossing the plains. People obeyed and were able to save the stranded hand cart companies.

We can also show obedience by following the counsel of the prophets, accepting callings, serving missions and a myriad of other ways. Elder D. Todd Christofferson said, “Obedience gives us greater control over our lives, greater capacity to come and go, to work and create.” President Monson tells a story of a man who learned the power of obedience. He was a convert to the church and an immigrant to North America. He was the branch president of small branch in an unfriendly city. He set a Christlike example for his branch. He made little money, but he always paid a full tithe and donated more. He started and contributed to a missionary fund. He was hospitable to missionaries and other members who came to his city. Leaders and other men of learning felt spiritually uplifted after spending time with him. “They appreciated not so much what he said as what he did, not the substance of the sermons he preached but the strength of the life he led. . .This man had the glow of goodness and the radiance of righteousness. His strength came from obedience.” This man was able to touch so many lives because he was obedient to the Lord.”

The second attribute I want to hi-light is a willingness to sacrifice. The following story tells of a way the saints were asked to sacrifice.

Hilda’s family lived in Kirtland when the temple was being built. Many of the men sacrificed their time to labor on the building. The women spun wand wove clothes for those workers.
When it was time to make the stuccoed plaster for the outer wall, the workers discovered that broken china helped hold the plaster together and gave the walls a beautiful sparkle. Hilda’s mother had a beautiful china set that had been brought over from England. It was special to her family. Hilda cried when she watched the plates being smashed to pieces then stirred into the plaster.
“One evening after the temple was finished, Hilda walked with her father and mother up the road toward the beautiful building. The sun was setting and Hilda saw the temple walls. They sparkled and shimmered in the sunlight.
“ ‘Oh, Mother!’ she exclaimed, her heart suddenly full and happy. ‘Do you see that sort of blue brightness beside the front door? Only [our china dishes] could sparkle like that!’

A mentor and teacher, Dr. Neil Flinders said, “many of the American pioneers had left large, comfortable homes and beautiful farms to spend sometimes many years living in caves walled off at one end with a few logs--in the middle of deserts or snowy plains. Eventually they built something new, something great; but they had to be willing to go through the growth years.”

I like something else that Dr. Flinders said, “If you want to be [like] a pioneer, you’ve got to be willing to push a handcart and live in a dugout for a time.” Sacrificing isn’t meant to be easy; we need to do some hard work (like cross the plains or donate our china) before we can receive the blessings. We are asked to sacrifice and give of our time and our talents.

Another quality of the pioneers is love. Elder Oaks stated, “When the Saints were driven out of Missouri, many were so poor that they lacked teams and wagons to move. Their Church leaders were adamant that none of the poor would be left behind. The response was the same in the exodus from Nauvoo. At a conference of the Church in October 1845, the membership entered into a covenant to take all the Saints with them. Thereafter, in the initial epic struggle across Iowa, the companies that arrived first at their stopping place on the Missouri River sent rescue wagons back toward Nauvoo to gather those who had been too poor to leave earlier. The revelation that guided their next exodus on the trip west directed each company to ‘bear an equal proportion … in taking the poor, the widows, the fatherless, and the families of those who have gone into the army’ (D&C 136:8).”

A friend compared this to visiting teaching and home teaching. These programs give us a chance to show our love for God’s children. Sister Allred from the General Relief Society Presidency tells the story of a sister who had just gotten home from the hospital after giving birth to her third child. She had 2 other young children. After a short visit, the sister shared how peaceful she felt because the Relief Society sisters had signed up to come to help her every day for the next few days. She felt loved.

The last quality of the pioneers that I want to focus on is endurance. Many pioneers could have given up, but, even though the path was difficult, the finished the journey. The following story illustrates how one pioneer endured to the end.

“When twenty-two-year-old Louisa Wells crossed the plains with her family, she was given the job of driving one of her father’s teams of oxen as well as caring for her younger brother and sister.
After packing their possessions in the wagon, Louisa bravely started on her way. She had a large sunbonnet on her head and a parasol (sunshade) in one hand. In her other hand she carried an ox whip to help her control the animals. Things went well for a short time, considering Louisa had never driven a team of oxen before, but soon it began to rain. Her parasol and sunbonnet quickly became soaked and useless, and before night she was muddy and soaking wet all over.
Despite this discouraging start, Louisa faithfully kept going. When the company arrived at the Sweetwater River, Louisa’s best yoke of oxen died from drinking bad water, so she had to use two cows in their place. The cows were not accustomed to pulling wagons, so Louisa had to pull and coax them along for the rest of the journey. A woman in the company became ill, and Louisa was assigned to help care for her. For three weeks she walked at the side of her wagon all day and nursed the sick woman during the night. Fortunately Louisa was able to stay healthy and safely guide her team and wagon into the valley with the rest of the company.
After wearing out three pairs of shoes on the journey, Louisa sewed rags around her feet to protect them, but the rags would wear out in a few hours. Often Louisa’s cut feet left bloody tracks on the trail.”

Elder Ballard says it best: “Life isn’t always easy. At some point in our journey we may feel much as the pioneers did as they crossed Iowa—up to our knees in mud, forced to bury some of our dreams along the way. We all face rocky ridges, with the wind in our face and winter coming on too soon. Sometimes it seems as though there is no end to the dust that stings our eyes and clouds our vision. Sharp edges of despair and discouragement jut out of the terrain to slow our passage. Always, there is a Devil’s Gate, which will swing wide open to lure us in. Those who are wise and faithful will steer a course as far from such temptation as possible, while others—sometimes those who are nearest and dearest to us—succumb to the attraction of ease, comfort, convenience, and rest. Occasionally we reach the top of one summit in life, as the pioneers did, only to see more mountain peaks ahead, higher and more challenging than the one we have just traversed. Tapping unseen reservoirs of faith and endurance, we, as did our forebears, inch ever forward toward that day when our voices can join with those of all pioneers who have endured in faith, singing: “All is well! All is well!””

This time of year is a time for remembering our past and drawing strength to face and conquer the challenges of today from the exemplary faith and courage of those who faced and conquered the challenges of yesterday.

I want to close by reading the words to a song written by Janice Yeates Wuckert and Mary Ann Erdmann called “The Strength of a Pioneer.”
1. Some pioneers walked a thousand miles
To get to the place they called home,
Crossing rivers and streams and mountains and plains,
Blazing trails with dangers unknown.
2. Some pioneers lived so long ago,
and some live in modern day.
But each pioneer can have strength to go on
and faith that God will show the way.
3. All pioneers put their faith to the test,
Having courage to do what is right,
Standing up for the truth, being valiant each day,
And trying to walk in His light.
[Chorus:] Oh, I can be like a pioneer,
Leading others and braving my fears.
With God as my guide, I will lengthen my stride
With the strength of a pioneer!
I say these things in the name of Jesus Christ, Amen.

Mosaics

For art class this month we have been learning about mosaics. A mosaic is a picture made by setting small colored pieces onto the surface. We've been using pieces of paper. Today Ammanda took face shots of each of the kids and enlarged them and printed them. Then she gave the kids different colored paper. They ripped the paper into pieces and glued them to their pictures. The idea was to follow the outline of their faces and use similar colors. Most of the pictures turned out really neat. Try and guess who is who. The last one is easy--he gave up and just glued big pieces of odd colors to his face.

(Braedi)

(Dyllan)

(Ephram)

(Corbin)

Pudding Pops

Today, in honor of the hot weather, we made pudding pops. I found a yummy looking recipe in a fry's coupon/recipe book that I got in the mail. Here it is:

Strawberry and Cream
12 medium strawberries (almost 2 cups), washed, stemmed and quartered
2-3 Tbls. sugar, to taste
1 small box (3/4-3.9 oz) instant vanilla pudding
6 oz vanilla yogurt
1 cup milk

In a food processor or blender, combine the strawberries with the sugar. Process until smooth. Set puree aside.

In a blender, combine pudding, yogurt and milk, and blend until combined. Layer the pudding mixture with the strawberry mixture in small paper cups or popsicle molds, insert a wooden Popsicle stick in the center of each cup and freeze until solid. Remove from cups to serve. Makes 10-20 pops, depending on cup size.

We made them in the morning and they were ready to eat by the time we got home from afternoon piano lessons. I'm not a big pudding fan, but the combination of pudding a strawberries was yummy. I think the next time we make them, I'm not going to layer them--I'll just mix it all together.

Swimming With the Cousins

Our monthly Garrett family home evening was today. A friend of the family has a pool and loves to have us over so we usually do the summer FHE's over there. There were a lot of kids of different swimming abilities, so usually one adult sat out and acted as a lifeguard. Here's Jonathan taking the first turn.

The kids had fun jumping in, diving for toys, swimming around, splashing and playing.

Dyllan and a couple of her cousins held hands and jumped off the side together. I couldn't get a good picture, but they looked cute doing it.

It was a refreshing afternoon.

Canning

My sister and I finally got together to do some canning. I got a pressure canner for my birthday and have been waiting for the day I could go over to her house and use it. I've been using her canner and my mother-in-law's canner for years, but was afraid to use mine by myself. That's why I had to wait to go over there. Plus it's always more fun to can with someone else. I canned some chicken while Jennie canned some beans. Then we took advantage of the smoking deal at Sprouts for peaches. We made some peach raspberry jam and canned some peaches. I'm not sure if the jam will set-up and the peaches don't look too pretty, but they'll taste good and it was fun to hang out with her and her kids.

While the beans and chicken were canning we headed outside to use the burner on the grill. Kitchen stoves just aren't big enough for all the canning we want to do. The kids swam and I sweated. It was SOOOO hot.

The kids usually get to watch a movie for quiet time when we visit cousins. We used to be able to put one movie in and please all the kids, but now that they are older their tastes are so different. Luckily Jennie has 4 dvd players.

Here's some pictures of the stuff we canned.

And here are my sister and me--all hot and sweaty.

Happy Birthday Ephram and Jonathan

Four years ago, minus one day, Jonathan went to work and prayed that I would go into labor so that he could get out of work. This was when he was working nights. Around 2:00 AM I woke up with regular contractions and called him. He was so excited! I packed up the kids, took them to his mom's house where he met me, then we headed to the hospital. I was in "mom mode" and barely felt the contractions, but walking from the car to the hospital was tough--I had to stop several times and concentrate on my breathing. We got checked in and a few hours later Ephram was born.

When we first found out that I was pregnant and the doctor told us my due date, Jonathan was so excited--it was the same day as his birthday. The only thing he wanted that year was for the baby to be born on his birthday. He got his wish. And for the past 4 years they have celebrated together.







Ephram got a lot of cars and Jonathan got some spending money.

This year Ephram chose to go bowling for his birthday activity. Jonathan usually lets him pick. Here are some fun pics of us bowling.

And just a couple more pictures. The first is of Ephram when he was a baby and the second him with one of his new cars. They grow up so fast.

Faith

I recently read on Conference talk about working with daughters on personal progress. I don't remember which talk--it was one of the many on how I can be a better mom. Anyway this talk and a conversation I had with a friend a while back pushed me to help Braedi with her Faith in God book. This is the program the church put together for kids ages 8-11. I decided that one night a week, after the other kids are in bed, we could work on an activity from the book. The first one we chose lead us on a search to discover how the sacrament helps us renew our baptismal covenants. We looked up the scripture in Moroni where Alma sets forth covenant of baptism and compared it to the sacrament prayers. Braedi made a list and planned to focus on that during sacrament. Then she prepared a family home evening lesson teaching us what we can do to remain faithful. We found a simple lesson/activity and she spent the week preparing. Last night she gave the lesson. I love when the kids prepare the family home evening lessons. It doesn't happen very often, but they always do a good job and are confidant. Braedi had us read scriptures that shared somethings we can do to strengthen our faith--read scriptures, go to church, show love, etc. Each scripture had a piece of a puzzle that, when finished, was a seed that grew into tree and had fruit. My favorite part was when she closed and shared her testimony.

Ancient China

Today we practiced writing calligraphy--the way the people of ancient China wrote. It was hard! No wonder they had the learn and practice for several years. These lines are called the Seven Mysteries and they are the basic lines that make up the characters.

Dyllan gave up and joined Ephram and Faythe in "just" painting.


I even tried.
We also tried to recreate the Great Wall of China. The emperor, Shi Huangdi, wanted a wall built to keep out the Mongols. He found architects and builders, but they said there wasn't enough stone to build a wall. They had to come up with a solution: they built a wooden frame that was waist high and the width of a wall,
filled it with loose dirt and packed it down to about 4 inches. The dirt was as hard as concrete after the packing.


Then they took off the frame and put it on top of the hardened mound and repeated the process over and over and over and over. We just filled our frame then built two more sections next to the first one. We only did 3 and it took us awhile. I can only imagine what the process must have been like for the people who were forced to work on it back then.