Just A Fun Day

Tuesday was just a fun day. I did at lot with the kids and it all went well and we all had fun. In general conference a few weeks ago Elder Ballard told mothers to enjoy more of the doing rather then looking toward the finish. At first I did not see how that would work. How can I enjoy putting my kids into their pajamas when they are running away from me yelling no? Well, I just thought I would try, and when I remember to enjoy my kids the days are good and relaxed and fun. I feel a lot happier too. So anyway, Tuesday, we did a lot of fun stuff. Tuesday was earth day and so the zoo was free. Adam and Rachel do not remember ever going to the zoo. I think Rachel was 2 months and Adam was 19 months the last time we went. I have never seen Rachel so excited. She ran ahead of me pretty much the whole time and squealed, and even screamed, every time she saw a new animal. She would run up to get as close as she could squealing and screaming and saying, "I see a...". I did not know that Rachel knew so many names of animals. Although she did make some cute mistakes. She called goats dogs, and cows pigs. I think Rachel liked the sheep the best and she liked the giraffes second best. She stayed looking at the giraffes while Adam and I looked at the rhinos. Adam said he liked the gorillas the best. The gorillas were wrestling and banging on the glass. That made them pretty exciting. I stopped to nurse Anya while we watched the mere cats. Rachel wet her pants at this point. And this is when Elder Ballards advice came in handy. I just looked at Rachel's wet pants and the puddle on the
ground, asked Rachel if she wet her pants (She said, "yep, wet." )and we just let her air dry and continued having fun.

When we got home we were pretty tired and it was time for Ruth, Kate, and Johnny to get home from school. I had them do their homework right away as usual while I folded laundry that I had not gotten to earlier and we chatted and had fun. Then I went outside and played wiffle ball with them. I did not feel like making dinner so we got John and headed into the car. We bought a bucket of KFC and ice cream cones for all. Then we headed to a park. Again I used Elder Ballard's advice. The kids wanted to just go and play so I did not make them stay and eat. Some of them grabbed chicken
and ran and others said they were starving just before bed. But there were no confrontations and that made our
family time better. I held Anya the whole time and even went down the slide with Anya and Rachel a few times. I walked around the water with the kids and smelled the pretty lilacs that Kate picked. I did not get upset with Kate for picking park flowers or Rachel for walking into the water. I just enjoyed watching them. John played freeze tag with Ruth, Kate, Johnny, and Adam (as seen in the pictures). The kids just loved that and John got his exercise. It was late when we got home, but Ruth and Kate had cleaned the house to earn bigger ice cream cones before we left, so even bedtime was easy. It was just a fun, good day.