Stories from Ruth #68

 

This week we went to London, Canterbury, and Maidstone. Basically we spent only a few days in our area.

I will be honest in saying that I don't remember much of what happened this week, besides Canterbury. I was with Sister Bain again and we had a lot of fun finding, stopping by less active and part member families, helping and sweet romanian lady who was lost, teaching this sweet old guy named Josheph, and going out to an asian resturaunt for Sister Shin's 20th birthday!!!
Friday we got home late, helped an elderly lady (who just returned from the hospital) clean her house, and went to do come follow me study and game night where bishop's family kindly suprised us and brought cake for Sister Shin's birthday!

Sunday Barry came to church!!!! That night we went with Lina to the Hawkins family for a ysa activity. Sister Hawkins had made a cake for Desmond's birthday, but he was hanging with his friend's and didn't come so Sister Shin got another birthday cake!
Today we went to Noi and her husband Gordon's house for a thai dinner. We met Noi at the bus stop and a week later saw her again. She invited us over for a thai dinner and we went tonight! It was so good! We had thai green curry and this sweet rice dessert! During the whole time we talked to them, her husband Gordon struggles with christianity because of the way it was kind of forced at them as kids in school and many people in england believe it is a brainwashing thing. I cannot blame them for disbelieving the conflicting opinions of sectarianism, but it is harder for them to listen on the subject. In england ir also seems popular to identify with Buddhists. Which he fit into those categories and was open about it, so we were open as well. Finally Sister Shin asked him to read a scripture from the Book of Mormon. The spirit hit him and he paused and asked where it was from because it made sense and it was not in the bible. I shared about the backround of the Book of Mormon and apostacy and how God had sent another witness to confound false doctrines and establish peace amongst his people. It was so spiritual. And is more than likely a first of many appointments.

I love the Book of Mormon and I know that it is the word of God. He did not just leave us alone,

wanders in a strange land but he gave us his counsel and direction and wishes us to seek to know him and receive more counsel and direction. I want to share a few scriptures from the Book of Mormon

1 Nephi 13:23 "And he said: Behold it proceedeth out of the mouth of a Jew. And I, Nephi, beheld it;

and he said unto me: The book that thou beholdest is a record of the Jews, which contains the covenants of the Lord, which he hath made unto the house of Israel; and it also containeth many of the prophecies of the holy prophets; and it is a record like unto the engravings which are upon the plates of brass, save there are not so many; nevertheless, they contain the covenants of the Lord, which he hath made unto the house of Israel; wherefore, they are of great worth unto the Gentiles.
24 "And the angel of the Lord said unto me: Thou hast beheld that the book proceeded forth from the mouth of a Jew; and when it proceeded forth from the mouth of a Jew it contained the fulness of the gospel of the Lord, of whom the twelve apostles bear record; and they bear record according to the truth which is in the Lamb of God.
25 "Wherefore, these things go forth from the Jews in purity unto the Gentiles, according to the truth which is in God.
26 "And after they go forth by the hand of the twelve apostles of the Lamb, from the Jews unto the Gentiles, thou seest the formation of that great and abominable church, which is most abominable above all other churches; for behold, they have taken away from the gospel of the Lamb many parts which are plain and most precious; and also many covenants of the Lord have they taken away."
And
2 Nephi 3:12 "Wherefore, the fruit of thy loins shall write; and the fruit of the loins of Judah shall write; and that which shall be written by the fruit of thy loins, and also that which shall be written by the fruit of the loins of Judah, shall grow together, unto the confounding of false doctrines and laying down of contentions, and establishing peace among the fruit of thy loins, and bringing them to the knowledge of their fathers in the latter days, and also to the knowledge of my covenants, saith the Lord."

I know the Book of Mormon is the word of God and works with the bible to confound false doctrines and bring about peace.
I hope you all have a lovely week!
And as the english always say: see ya!

Happy Birthday, Joshua

And just like that, Josh turns 8!!! He has always been a sweet little boy and fairly easy to be entreated. He is imaginative, and talkative. Josh loves playing games with his dad, drawing, pretending he is blowing things up, and building legos and blocks. Josh has always been an impressive builder and a good artist. Josh is good at listening and learning from what we say to him. Josh straddles the middle kids and the little kids. Sometimes he is absolutely one of our little kids and other times he is all in with the middle kids. I think he will grow and learn a lot this next year and I look forward to see him develop both personally and academically. Of course, we love our little blond boy and the fun dynamic he brings to our family.

This Week at Our House #2: Back to School

Baby Gideon has not made his entrance yet, and seems to be content to stay put longer. I am extremely uncomfortable and that is all consuming. John keeps asking me what I am thinking about, and I am like, "there is only one thing on my mind." I tried to remind him that when he is sick, he thinks, "Oh, I am sick. Oh, I am so, so sick. What can I do to get better?" Well at 39 to 40 plus weeks pregnant, all I think is, "I am so uncomfortable! When will this baby come?"

On Tuesday, I had my first midwife

The second thousand piece puzzle of the new year

appointment for the week. They are having me come in on Tuesdays and Fridays for non-stress tests now. Tuesday, I brought Rachel, Anya, and Arwen because they wanted to go grocery shopping with me. We made it through the appointment, a trip to the bank to get a check endorsed from the home insurance company to get the roof repaired from the hurricane, to Hobby Lobby for a small birthday present for Anya, and a long-ish grocery trip to Sam's Club. But things got a little funky with me when we tried to make our last stop to Walmart. The baby keeps resting on some nerve or something that is making it so my left leg quits working. It kept 

happening while we tried to cross the parking lot into Walmart. All the cars were stopping for me and the girls to cross, but I could not make my leg work. I had to wave for them to go until I knew I could cross into the store. It was half funny half humiliating. Rachel and Anya were quite worried about me. Once I got a shopping cart, though, it was fine because I would use the cart as a walker. Eventually, Gideon shifted position and I could walk normally again.

Until the baby does come, we will be holding school. After a 3 week vacation, the kids weren't too happy getting back into the swing of

Susan does this 48 piece puzzle by herself

things, but they did it. The worst day was Thursday. I would usually expect it to be Monday as that is our typical worst day of the week. But on Thursday, Joseph, who couldn't sleep at all the night before woke up at 2pm and then cried and got mad at everyone for "making it so he had to do school so late." Arwen would not do her work. She just sat and stared at her papers and played with anything and everything that she could get her hands on and ended up working past 4pm to finish what she usually does between 10am and 12pm. As soon as I told Josh it was time to read to me, he started bawling and then couldn't read a word. I sent him outside to run 

around the back fence 10 times. Sam ran with him, which Josh liked. Then Josh came back in ready to read. But Thursday was definitely a long, hard day. Still the first week of second semester is complete! If we stay strong and don't take any breaks except for 2 weeks for the baby, we will finish school the first week in May.

While we ran all the errands on Tuesday, Kate was a gem and made 4 ice cream cake rolls in preparation for Anya's birthday on Wednesday.

At Hobby Lobby, Anya picked out a little paint your own bird house. She enjoyed doing that over a couple of days. I was glad that Anya happened to be with me. I would not have picked something so suited to her.

Anya is now an inch taller and 2 pounds heavier than Rachel. Rachel had always managed to stay just a little taller than Anya until now. Rachel may beat out Kate for the title of "shortest member of the family". 

On a cute note, Susan said to Anya, "I am little, but my curls are all grown up. Isn't that funny?" Then she spent the rest of the evening trying to comb out her curls to make her hair longer. It doesn't really work. All that does is bring her curls all to the bottom of her hair and makes it look like she has a big flip. Still, I think Susan adores her naturally curly hair. She is the only child who made it past babyhood with curly hair and the only child who has had a haircut and then had her curls return.

Kate has been helping me a lot since I have been so big and uncomfortable. She has made every dinner except the ones that I made using the crock pot. Anya and Rachel are supposed to help cooking, but Joseph usually ends up being the one to help cooking. Joseph has been baking since he was 6 or 7, but now he likes to cook parts of dinner too. 

Sam has discovered watching TV. Sometimes he screams to try and get us to put a show on for him, but other times he asks so sweetly, it is hard to say no to him. When I am back into regular functioning life, the tv will go off, but for now, he can usually convince me to lay down in the evening and let him watch a half hour or more.

Adam broke his new pair of glasses during a soccer game this week. I ordered him 2 new pairs from

Zenni. They will take 14 to 21 days to arrive. I am sorry that Adam has to be without glasses again.

He has a very strong prescription and really can't see well at all without his glasses. It makes it hard for him to read and do school work. 

Since Johnny never really took any vacation time, he had no trouble getting back to work. The main complaint I have been hearing about Johnny is that he works too much and does not have enough time to play anymore. 

Ruth is still doing well on her mission. Last I heard, she has not spoken to her mission president in person about extending a month. She really wants that. We have been thinking about bedrooms and such for when she returns. I want her to have a nice place to come home to. 

We will continue with school tomorrow and continue on until Gideon arrives, and I will continue to feel all sorts of discomfort. Josh has his birthday coming up on Thursday too, so if Gideon does not come tonight or tomorrow, I will want him to wait until Friday so as not to mess up Josh's birthday.

Stories from Ruth #67

I am literally so tired and I feel like I am falling apart, but so is every sister missionary at this point in their mission.

This week I felt prompted to tract a certain street and we found two families from Slovakia who want to learn more about the Book of Mormon! Yeah! We also went tracting near a part member family's house and found a guy who has a friend that is a member and actually went to church five years ago. He is now reading the Book of Mormon and is super cool.

I know that the Book of Mormon is the instrument God has given us to gather Israel. I know it is the word of God and I am so grateful for thus time I have to declare the word. It has gone by so fast but it is the best thing I could ever have done.

I want to share 2 Nephi 3:12 "Wherefore, the fruit of thy loins shall write; and the fruit of the loins of Judah shall write; and that which shall be written by the fruit of thy loins, and also that which shall be written by the fruit of the loins of Judah, shall grow together, unto the confounding of false doctrines and laying down of contentions, and establishing peace among the fruit of thy loins, and bringing them to the knowledge of their fathers in the latter days, and also to the knowledge of my covenants, saith the Lord."

I know that this is the purpose of the Book of Mormon. It is for the convincing of jew and gentile that Jesus is the Christ, the only begotten son of God in the flesh. With the bible it is for confounding false doctrines and bringing about peace, and most importantly it teaches us of the covenants we must make to live with God again and I am so grateful for this knowledge. If you don't know about it, read it, ponder it, and pray, and God will show unto you that it is his words by his holy spirit.

Happy Birthday, Anya

My little Anya has turned 11! She is one of the two children I have that are quiet. Anya's gentle and sweet and obedient. Anya quietly goes about doing good things. She generally thinks about other people before herself. Anya loves our animals and is always willing to take care of them. She loves her brothers and sisters and parents and is generally kind. She likes to read, build with legos and play pretend adventures. Anya often is in a world of her own. She calls it her mystical world, and if we want her attention and want to be sure that she is listening and learning, we have to call her back to Earth. As a result, Anya learns best through reading and studying on her own.

Anya has always been Joseph's buddy and friend and Rachel's friend and partner in our family.  Right now, Anya is particularly excited for the birth of Gideon. She loves babies and wants to hold her new brother and care for him and cuddle him. She loves to cuddle up next to Sam when he is asleep because she says that is when he is still the most like a baby.

Anya is not our girly girl and will be the first to say so. She likes to be out in nature doesn't care for fancy things, though she likes to wear plain, long cotton dresses and grow her hair long. We sure love our little Anya and could not do without her gentle spirit and influence in our home.

This Week at Our House # 1: A New Year

I was thinking this year I would like to try out a paragraph format for my weekly blog updates. I just need to be careful not to exclude any of the kids. They like to see what I have to say about them each week, and I certainly don't want to miss anything cute they've said or done. My kids love reading over past blog posts and the silly things they said when they were little.

The week seems a blur to me. We had 5 dentist appointments, though 4 were on one day and the final one was an early in the morning appointment for Arwen to get sealants in her six year old molars. None of the kids had any cavities this time around. John has been pretty firm with the kids that they need to brush their teeth both morning and night. That seems to be paying off. Johnny used to always have cavities and now he has been cavity free for several years. It's nice to know they are all taking teeth care more seriously.

I had two midwife appointments, one on Wednesday, and one on Friday. During the appointment on

Wednesday my blood pressure was high two of the three times they took it. I also found out that I am now dilated 4cm. That took the midwife off guard, but not me. That means things are normal to me.  Anyway, because of the blood pressure and because my blood sugar has been having unusual spikes, they asked me to come in for a blood pressure check on Friday.

On that Wednesday appointment, I brought Sam with me. I expect having a new baby around will be quite a shock for him, so I wanted to have a little one on one time with him at the appointment and grocery shopping afterwards. Sam quietly cuddled me or sat quietly in his stroller with his hands folded together the whole hour and half appointment. All the nurses and midwives were surprised at how quiet and still he was. I told them it was because he was surrounded by strangers and unfamiliar equipment. One mentioned maybe I gave him benedryl. The idea horrified me. Ugh, it seems you can get judged wrongfully even for the good behavior of your kids. I assured them that if Sam had a sibling around to play with, he would surely be running around. They asked me not to take him to the next appointment in case they needed to send me to the hospital for further testing.

The Friday appointment, I took Kate. She can drive, so if I had to go to the hospital, she could get home and give the van to John. Well, my blood pressure was back to normal. I have had some pain that I attribute to the presence of gal stones in my gal bladder, but may actually have something to do with hellp syndrome or preeclampsia, so they took a blood test to check my liver enzymes. Never before have I been so carefully watched during a pregnancy. But, that is all that was done and we got to go straight home afterwards.

On a happy note, Baby Gideon is still looking good, and each week my amniotic fluid has gone down. It won't be too much longer before we get to meet this precious boy. I am 39 weeks today.

Of course we held our annual New Years Eve party. Since we homeschool and John doesn't sleep

well at night, our family stays up late and gets up early. Going to bed past midnight is an everyday occurrence for most of us. Still, we had snacks and played a lot of games. I watched some shows with the youngest kids, and we nearly finished our first 1000 piece puzzle for the year. I think everyone had a nice time. Sam was the only one who did not make it until midnight. He fell asleep at about 11:30. Arwen was the second child to drop off. I think she managed until 12:30. Everyone else was sent to bed before 2am. We are a late night family. I am always hoping this will change. Maybe in the New Year, hahaha!!!

One night this week, one of our little chickens didn't make it to the shed at dark. We know that we have a fox living in our woods, and thought maybe the poor chicken strayed too far and got caught. But later that night, I needed to send Adam outside for a moment. He went out by the shed and there was our chicken waiting to be let in. She has not wandered far from the other chickens since that night.

Joseph is the biggest fan of our chickens. He cried and cried and worried and fretted. I was happy for his sake, that our chicken survived.

On the same topic, we got a farm bird catalogue in the mail on Friday. I handed it directly to Joseph as I thought he would most enjoy looking at it. Well, everyone enjoyed looking at it. In fact, Kate, Rachel, Anya, Joseph, Joshua, and Arwen all took turns looking at it and deciding what ducks, geese, or chickens they want to own. All of them decided that more ducks or chickens is what they want to spend their little bit of Christmas money on, except Kate. Kate wants a game.

Joshua decided that he would get a boy chicken and name it "Cutie Pecky 3".  Cutie Pecky 1 died. Cutie Pecky 2 has such a horrible name that we all call her "Hecky Pecky".  We made fun of Josh's horrible choice in chicken names, and then he spent several hours asking everyone in the family what good chicken names were.

Rachel plans to get a male duck that she wants to name Parley P. Pratt. Kate hates that idea, but is trying to be careful not to talk Rachel out of what she wants. Anya agreed to get a female duck the same breed as Rachel's. Kate is worried the breeds will mix. Joseph said that he wants to spend some of his money to get Johnny a female runner duck. Johnny really likes the look of the runner ducks. Arwen wants to get three chickens just like the little Brahma Bantam that we have, but they cannot guarantee what color brahmas will grow up to be. She may be changing her mind. I am giving them all a little time after the excitement of the catalogue before willingly ordering anything. I want them to be certain this is how they want to spend their money.

The catalogue looking and dreaming lasted for two days. We are still planning on moving as soon as a job comes with enough pay, so I am not convinced that this is the best way for the kids to spend their money. But, I am surprised to find out where their current love seems to really lie. We also got a lego catalogue and an American Girl catalogue the same day. I guess my kids love farm birds. I know that we all love living on a larger larger piece of land. We want to move desperately for one reason, but we all like out little home and little bit of land out in the country.

While Susan did not join in the chicken and duck catalogue  dreaming, we know she loves the chickens just as much. She catches them easier than any of the other kids and she checks for their eggs more than anyone else.

We spent a lot of time as a family discussing the gospel and the scriptures and covenants once

This is a chocolate cheesecake Rachel made to remember Christopher's 3rd anniversary of his birth and death

changes were made in the temple and made public. I think that took up almost all of our family scripture study for days and the conversation is still going.

Vacation is over now, and we start school back up tomorrow morning. We had a nice 3 week break for the holidays.

One cute kid note to end with:
I am still hanging laundry out to dry. Sam always comes out with me. Saturday morning Sam came out, rode his little scooter into my feet and said, "Beep, beep, Mom. Beep, beep." I thought that was darling, and moved out of his way.

Stories from Ruth #66

Well not much has happened since I last emailed. Let's see... Well Barry Morgan wants to be baptized he just needs to stop working on Sunday because he works in sales and honestly it's not like he's a nurse or anything. He just needs to block his Sunday schedule so they don't give him appointments on Sunday. He did come to all three hours of church this week which was awesome!
Other than that we visited Stephen and his family and we did a family activity where we taught the Plan of Salvation to them and then they fed us really good African food.
We are getting close with a lot of the members of the ward which makes me happy!
It has been a good week. We met quite a few people that were interested to learn more about the Book of Mormon. We found someone from the Philippines, from brazil, and someone who is blind and mostly deaf.

The blind and deaf guy is named David and he has read the whole Book of Mormon before in braille and wants us to teach and explain more!
Well I want you to know that I know that the church is true. I am so grateful for the knowledge I

have.

I want to share Mosiah 2:41 "And moreover, I would desire that ye should consider on the blessed and happy state of those that keep the commandments of God. For behold, they are blessed in all things, both temporal and spiritual; and if they hold out faithful to the end they are received into heaven, that thereby they may dwell with God in a state of never-ending happiness. O remember, remember that these things are true; for the Lord God hath spoken it."

I know that God truly blesses us as we keep his commandments. We must be continually striving to do all we can to learn more of him and to be more like him and that comes through obedience and having a meek and submissive will. I love this gospel and I am so grateful for this time I have to serve the people in England.