March and Spring are around the corner. I am launching my new website in March.
Today, I was asked to speak in California at a conference two weeks after Julia’s wedding about the mother daughter journey I call the Hope Chest Journey.
I will also be speaking at a Conference in April.
Wow, has it already been a year? So much has happened. Now you are a circle with a new daughter. Such wonderful blessings have come your way.
“Mother’s who know” are out of this world! They think beyond the veil, are comely but have not bought the world’s focus of appearance over substance.
While so many have been beguiled into the world of appearances, “mothers who know” have chosen otherwise. They know if they buy into appearances they put themselves and their children in bondage. Bondage to the world and what the world thinks, which often comes with debt to support that lifestyle.
Am I saying looks do not matter? No. The outward appearance should reflect the inner commitment. Like the well kept grounds of the temple, where the dying blooms are replaced and the weeds prevented. Are temples all about the grounds? No, indeed. However, the grounds serve as a quiet invitation to enter. The real beauty and peace are inside the temple.
“Mothers who know” have endured the disdain of the women around them. Accused of being mindless and being doormats, because “mothers who know” choose home and family.
Now as we enter the economic instability brought on by the crisis of the 21st century the realities of choices are upon us. Our neglect of children is covered up by the appearance of care, through outsourcing the tending of children from birth to 18. 25% of babies conceived in America are aborted. Often children grow up detached with little ability to develop attached and long lasting relationships, and the divorce rate soars. 50% of women can look forward to being divorced sometime in their life. This is not a good comentary on our “advanced society.”
Can we save our society? Maybe. Probably not collectively. However, we can have impact for good, one family at a time, as mothers who know, help other mothers to know.
The inconvenient truth? Is that so many mothers do not know and we are blessed to have a few who do. Mothers who know, really do know, and we are blessed to have them in our midst.
Wow, this is the 1000th post. I hope that somewhere along the line, I have said something worthy of people reading and the space on the internet.
Today is my husband’s older brother, Cedric’s 61st birthday. It is bitter sweet. I am glad he is still with us that we can love him. I know he suffers greatly, but all we feel is his love.
Cedric lives in a around the clock, full time, care facility in Salt Lake City. When he was a young father, with two toddler daughters, he had three stokes. He had been exposed to toxic chemicals while working for a company in Salt Lake. The company collected money from the employees for workers comp but never paid into it. So when Cedric became sick, there was no money to cover his medical problems. The company was fined, had their hands slapped, closed their doors, filed bankruptcy and reopened as another entity. For decades my brother-in-law’s little family has struggled both because of the lack of workers comp. and also, because the company did not have proper safety precautions for employees. Had they been responsible Cedric may never have had his strokes, and his family would not have had to endure so much. Over a decade ago he had deteriorated to the point of needing around the clock care, and has been in a care facility ever since.
We are grateful that he has been able to spend the time here that he has. Like I said, “bitter sweet.”
This last fall, his oldest daughter, Amanda, died in her sleep. He knew it was coming, he had a dream. He has a wife and a special needs daughter living near in Salt Lake. I sense it will not be long before Cedric joins Amanda. I sense the same for my mother-in-law, as well.
Life moves on. Births, weddings, and goodbyes.
We will go up to be with him today. To sing to him. To give him hugs. To celebrate his influence in our lives.
Oh, darn, I started to cry. Better get to Salt Lake!
Busy.
Over-scheduled.
Stretched thin.
No time to wonder, explore, and discover.
Stuck in an activity trap.
Shuffled from class to class
Shuffled club to club
Shuffled from activity to activity.
Spiritual, emotional, intellectual, and social development arrested.
Benchmarks delayed.
I read a letter on a yahoo group, a mother was struggling to understand the foundations that can be put in place in early childhood through the core and love of learning phases. This was my response:
Stephanie,
I read your post and felt your angst. You are a wonderful mother and it is good that you ask questions. You sense that things are not working as you envisioned and you are trying to understand and find the best ways to work with and nurture your children. Some moms never ask. Know that there is no way to be a perfect mom, but millions of ways to be a great one.
Let me start with sharing a little about myself. I am almost 54, a baby boomer. I have seven children, the youngest three are at home and are 10 yodd, 14 yods, and 17 yods. By April I will have seven grandchildren (all less than five, six boys and one girl). We have home educated since the early 1980s and came across TJEd in 1994.
Please be patient as I share my whys and wherefores, and talk about solutions. I have been doing TJEd for about 15 years and through having babies, youth, weddings, grandchildren, even through a husband out of work and other major life changing events. I have worked with TJEd moms from the beginning, running support groups, speaking at conferences, and hosting online groups. I have seen some patterns and see the struggles these moms face. Perhaps I can add some insight.
I find that part of the problem of parents getting what “core phase” and “love of learning phase” looks like is that most young parents were born after 1964 and before 1984, and did not experience either, themselves. They are part of the generation known as Generation 13, Nomads, or Generation X. Though there were some that were raised by stay-at-home mothers, most were raised in day care centers, private babysitters, or as latch key children. Even most of those who had moms at home were raised with the TV and in public schools where their generational consciousness and messages were part of the molding of their views and understanding.
The Baby boom generation was the transition generation where for the first time in history all children were pushed toward careers. We threw the baby out with the wash, really. As we moved toward a gender neutral society, we also moved away from home and toward a guardian society. Kind of Platonesque. Plato thought the ideal society would be raised by guardians. I feel God placed children in families for a reason, and the parents of my generation checked out. We have lost the lessons of the past and embraced “Change” any change as preferable to that which might be considered old fashioned or old school.
Anciently, the Hebrews followed Deuteronomy 6. In order to teach their children the things God wanted them to learn, they did not have any schools in Israel for children prior to Babylon. It was in Babylon that the Hebrews’ children were placed into mandatory mass schools. Prior to that children did everything with their parents so their parents could teach them what God had commanded them to teach their children. They did this as they ate, as they walked, as they worked, as they played together. An entire culture was passed from one generation to the next in a way that was more incidental (through the incidents of everyday life)rather than direct (as in lock step textbook incremental learning). Family businesses, with all the math entailed, were passed from generation to generation, as well as, how to run a home, how to parent, all of it.
Flash forward a few millennia… Generation X was, for the most part, raised as a detached society. Whether these children were raised in daycare or as latch key, the world revolved around them. Education’s form switched from inspiring to entertain, many youth mentally checked out. When I talk to Boomer Managers, they see their Gen x employees as irresponsible and social. Not all Generation Xers were this way, mind you, but this was the case, more often than not. When they are at work, they are less likely to be actually working than socializing. When they cannot get a day off, they are more likely to quit. They tend to marry later, and divorce more, and suffer from arrested development. What went wrong, wasn’t education a good thing?
In talking to other Boomers, they have felt that part of the problem lies in that these children were institutionalized or left alone too early. Prior to the baby boomer generation, young children were rarely in day care, pre school, or tended by non family. They were more likely in the home, working with mom to take care of daily tasks of running a home. They saw what went into creating a home, what sacrifice was, and children and parents were intensely bonded. This was punctuated by walks to the park, being read to and naps. There was no worry about socialization. There were no worries of academics. They learned their core values and work ethic in their preschool years working along the side of parents and siblings. In the baby boom, kindergartens were in transition from a place of social adjustment and being with a different child / adult ratio and being able to take direction from another adult, to a space that was highly competitive. Kindergartens were generally non academic, until the 1960s.
Many mothers I have worked with were born in the years after 1964. They struggle to know what to do with a child or how it can look if academics are not the focus. Social, entertainment, and academics are all they know and they cannot begin to imagine a different world.
I believe that a huge part of the drive to turn pre-schools to academics was the competitiveness and to entice parents to not feel guilty about leaving their small children, as they went into the work force, some because of need, but many more to seek fulfillment. It was not long before stay-at-home moms were lining their children up for pre-school, so they would not be behind their peers. As more moms could afford dance, music, sports, etc. for their children because of their extra paycheck, childhood and the joys it brought began to disappear. More moms went to work to provide the never-ending litany of enrichment activities. Until we saw a bumper sticker on a car the other day, it read, “If I am a housewife, how come I spend 90% of my time in a car?” All of this because they were afraid their children would be behind. But were they really behind? What happens when the important lessons of those early years are displaced with material that was once taught in 1st grade? Has life been squeezed out because of extra curricular activities? It is not a matter of what they can learn, or even what you can give them access to, it is what should they learn and what they should be doing.
I guess another problem brought on by the out-sourcing of the education and raising of our children, is that skills were not passed on along with the lack of good attitudes about work and service within the family. So many women just do not know how to run a home and so how can they do it with the children and teach them how? They often have poor home management skills and as a result, they struggle with whether to home school or clean their house. This lack of skills is the main reason Fly Lady and Martha Stewart and the like have such a following. Women sense they missed something and try to fill it.
What did Julie Beck say about Mothers who Know? Mothers who know do less, so they can do more! What does the Family Proclamation say about what children should be learning? What do the scriptures say they should be learning?
Deuteronomy 6 (especially 6:6-7) and Doctrine and Covenants 68:25-31 help me see an order in things. Why eight? Those are the protected years before accountability. It is time to…Work together. Garden. Take walks. Read to them. Go to museums. Visit the sick. Serve together. Learn family resource management skills together, or share them if you have them. Study the scriptures. Learn the hymns. There is so much, so rich that can be done. Learning is the byproduct, not the focus.
I had a mother who mentored me. She wanted to take an oil painting class, she invited me along with her. I became an artist. I invited my daughter to take cake decorating with me, do stained glass with me, go to writers workshops with me. My daughter has catered weddings for her friends, learned a how to run a business, developed marketable skills, is a writer, and so forth.
A key is for mom to have a vital and alive interests and love of learning, with breadth and depth. Not just sitting there with a book in hand. It is a home culture of personal self-discipline, vitality and interest, coupled with opportunity to explore and learn, howbeit simple that engenders a love of learning in children that eventually will blossom and transition into a scholar phase. That self discipline is learned in the core phase, working with and playing with parents and siblings. Those tools of work ethic and self discipline gained in the core phase help children build their love of learning into a breadth and depth that can carry them into scholar phase.
At Christmas time Julia saw a book called: When the Sky Fell by Rand and Rose Flem-ath. She bought it for my son-in-law, Alan, for Christmas. Today, Julia and Alan were discussing the book, which led to the Flem-ath website. this has led to very deep discussions. This discusses the theory of “Earth Crust Displacement Theory. Quite fascinating truly!
This led my mind to ponder the idea that I believe in the Bible so far as it is translated correctly. I have to realize that I read the bible in translation and not in original Biblical Hebrew. Translation also takes place consistent with the worldview of the translator.
Science is only as good as the tools we use to gather information and our ability to interpret, understand, and utilize information collected, to create an accurate picture of we are seeking to understand. Modern science is still young and we are as yet as seven blind men and the elephant.
Though theories are reverenced as if they were cast in concrete, it is still possible to discover new information that may completely upend and change how we look at previous understandings. With further discoveries what we hold dear today may be dismissed as we embrace a much clearer picture.
God works with natural law. Only our definitions of natural law is only a portion thereof. Mankind is constantly trying to limit God because of their prideful but limiting understanding. I look to the day that more understanding builds us a truer picture.
Welcome to our world, Elizabeth Anne Walton born at 7:45pm on Friday 6 February 2009 at the home of her grandparents (my house). She is 7lbs 4 oz and 20 inches long. She has a head of thick blond hair.
Mother and child are healthy and happy.
My daughter received this in an email from one of her friends where my daughter served her mission. This was found in the local paper:
Quit the Church
In a local newspaper there had been an ongoing series of articles written by individuals who wanted to persuade LDS Church members to leave the Church. In response to the highly critical and spirited remarks, a local member wrote this rebuttal:
Editor:
I have been thinking of quitting the Mormon Church. Yes, if I can, I am going to get even with that church. As soon as I can find another Church that teaches about the Gathering of the House of Israel; the return of the Ten Tribes and their mission; the return of the Jews to Palestine and why, and how they are going to build the temple; the building of temples and what to do with them; the mission of Elias, the prophet, as predicted by Malachi; the method for the salvation of the people that died at the time of Noah in the flood; the origin of the American Indian; the complete explanation of why Jesus of Nazareth had to have a mortal mother but not a mortal father; the explanation of the three degrees of glory (three heavens) as mentioned by Paul; the complete explanation of why Elias and Moses did not die but had to be translated (since they both lived before the resurrection was introduced by Christ); the restoration of the gospel by modern revelation as promised by Peter and Paul and Jesus himself; the belief in eternal marriage and the family, and the Knowledge and the place to seal for eternity; that teaches abstinence from all harmful drugs and foods; and that sells the best fire insurance policy on earth, for the last days, for only a 10th of my income. Yes sir, as soon as I can find another church that teaches all that, or even half as much, I will say good-bye to this Mormon Church. The church that I am looking for must also be able to motivate 50,000+ youth, and adults, for the first, second or third time, to leave their homes for two years at their own expense and go to far-away places to teach and preach without salary. It must be able to call, on a frosty day, some 5 or 6 thousand professors, students, lawyers, doctors, judges, policemen, businessmen, housewives and children to go and pick apples at 6 a.m. It must be able to call meetings and get the attention for two
hours of more than 150,000 men. Yes, it must also teach and show why salvation is assured for children who die before eight years of age. Mr. Editor, could you help me find a church that teaches all that and more than hundreds of other doctrines and principles, which I have no room to mention here, and which brings solace and comfort to the soul; peace, hope, and salvation to mankind, and above all, that answers the key questions that all the great philosophers have asked; questions and answers that explain the meaning of life, the purpose of death, suffering and pain; the absolute need for a Redeemer and the marvelous plan conceived and executed by Jesus Christ the Savior? Yes, as soon as I find another church that teaches that, and also that has the organization and the powers to make that teaching effective, I am going to quit the Mormon Church. For I should not tolerate that “they” should change a few words in the Book of Mormon-even if those changes simply improve the grammar and the syntax of the verses-for, after all, don’t you think the Divine Church should employ angels as bookmakers, and clerks, to do all the chores on earth? Don’t you think, Mr. Editor, that the Divine Church should also have prophets that don’t get sick and don’t get old and die, and certainly, that don’t make a goof here and there. No, sir! A Divine Church should be so divine that only perfect people should belong to it, and only perfect people should run it. As a matter of fact, the Church should be so perfect that it should not even be here on earth! So, I repeat, if any one of the kind readers of this imperfect letter
Knows about another church that teaches and does as much for mankind as the Mormon Church, please let me know. And please do it soon, because my turn to go to the cannery is coming up. Also, “they” want my last son (the fifth one) to go away for two years and again, I have to pay for all that. And I also know that they expect me to go to the farm to prune trees, and I have heard that our ward is going to be divided again, and it is our side that must build the new chapel. And also, someone the other day had the gall of suggesting that my wife and I get ready to go on a second mission, and when you come back, they said, you can Volunteer as a temple worker. Boy, these Mormons don’t leave you alone for a minute. And what do I get for all that, I asked? “Well,” they said, “for one, you can look forward to a funeral service at no charge!”… Do you think you can help me to find another church?
Thomas D. Clark