November miscellany

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Here is a baby in some places a baby shouldn't be: inside his clothes box, atop the stool by Nutmeg's cage, and on the floor of Relief Society. Actually, that last one is okay. Better than yowling on my lap!

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We had a great time on our field trip to the Children's Museum. We hadn't been there since Abe was in first grade, but we remembered the little city being really fun—and it was!

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Seb made a projector out of a tube of paper, a lens, and a flashlight. The middle picture is what is inside the tube. The last picture is the projection on the wall. It was so pretty!

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• Teddy riding Seb's "ride." Seb makes these all the time and they seem to get more elaborate each time. You can see this one is held together with ties (!), padded on all sides with pillows, and there are speakers for surround-sound (!!). The kids have so much fun on these rides that I don't ever have the heart to put a stop to them. I just have to make sure I am not present while the rides are occurring (I'm not sure they meets OSHA standards...).  • Sequin sparkles on the wall!  • Star the Orangutan has an ice-cream party

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• Teddy on the "Bunny Level" at City Creek  • Ziggy has the cutest way of fluting out his lips when he says "ooo." I love it.  • Daisy at her piano recital

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• Floppy guy the girls made me stop for . • Goldie nest  • Boys absorbed in something-or-other

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• Daisy and me matching  • Ziggy having drink-by-squirt-bottle (this is actually really common)  • Goldie looking through a lens

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Our street in 3 different lights. So pretty.

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Tape monster! By the time I got there it was already too late. Everlastingly too late.

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We had Thanksgiving a day late (due to my mom taking a couple of the boys to St. George with some of their cousins) and it was great. Daisy did some lovely napkin folding, and the dolls played football and basketball. What could be better?

Maybe just Goldie walking Ziggy on a leash?

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It is largely learned

This post is part of the General Conference Odyssey. This week covers the Relief Society Session of the October 1981 Conference.

When Sheri Dew gave her "Are we not all mothers?" talk in 2001, I thought it was so revolutionary. I had never considered how all women, whether they physically bore children or not, had a calling of "motherhood." (And because I had just gotten married, but didn't have children yet, this doctrine felt fresh and important to me.)

But as I've been reading these old Conference talks, I've been surprised to learn that Sister Dew was teaching a doctrine that had been emphasized many times before. In this Relief Society Session, I don't think there was one talk that didn't reiterate that the calling of motherhood belongs to ALL women, no matter their age or circumstance. For example, here is Sister Shirley Thomas in her talk, "An Opportunity for Continual Learning":

We are all daughters of Eve. I think of one sister who fills a very responsible position in Relief Society. Although, being single, she has no children, she has important work in her profession. She touches the minds as well as the hearts of young people; she uses fully her excellent talents and training; she brings love and light to the lives of others. I believe that her role is directed and accepted of the Lord as is my neighbor’s, a mother of eight. Mothering roles differ and may yet take on other dimensions, but we can each learn to use the principles that relate to motherhood.

Because I DO have literal, physical children in my home right now (sooooo many of them😄), I'm not sure why this doctrine is so meaningful to me—but it is. I guess I love the idea that the skills I'm practicing in my life right now—organizing, managing, teaching, comforting, brightening—are going to be of use to me long after my children grow up and leave home. And not only that—long after I die, in the eternities too! It makes it all seem more worthwhile somehow.

Here's another thing I loved. Sister Thomas said:

Mothering is also an eternal, fundamental work. It has to do with bringing life and love, and it is largely learned.

I found that so reassuring. I know women have divine gifts and divine heritage from our Heavenly Mother. Probably even aptitudes and talents that help us do this work of mothering. But on the whole—"it is largely learned." To the extent that loving and nurturing and teaching others doesn't come naturally, we have to just learn it the way we learn anything else! And we CAN learn it! By practice. By study. By inspiration. And we can be confident that our Heavenly Parents will bless us in our efforts!


Other posts in this series:

• Transition by Jan Tolman

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Creatures, wild and tame

I am putting zoo pictures and Halloween pictures together in this post because it just seems right somehow.

So. I feel like we are always going to the zoo for some reason or another, but I looked at old pictures and the last time we went was in 2014. And all the kids look like BABIES! Well—even those of them that weren't actually babies, I mean. Anyway, this time we went because we just finished a school unit on Elephants. This was the second time Marigold has ever seen real elephants in…person…and she was VERY HAPPY about it.

I liked this elephant because he was putting his trunk in the same position as my stuffed elephant, Bendigo. (This is Bendigo.)

We were at the zoo without a baby (he was home with Sam), and thus without a stroller, which was pretty great. I feel like I am always lifting strollers up so babies can see over fences. But this time I just had to lift Teddy up sometimes, and mostly everyone could just SEE all by themselves! Amazing.

Being there without a baby also meant the kids could play on the playgrounds I'm always dragging them past, saying, "We don't have time; the baby has to get home for his nap." So that was pretty great too. And the zoo was practically deserted, it being a chilly morning in the off-season.

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