Richardson Report

July has been a tad bit crazy.  But oh-so-fun. First, I never introduced you all to Jaime from Spain.  He left yesterday.  He was awesome.  I don't know if we just got lucky or what, but his personality fit our family's personality so well.  With Jaime we had lots of teasing, lots of card games, and lots of rounds of golf.  It was pretty fun.  We will miss that kid.  Some of my favorite memories of him:  when I was dropping him off for a camping trip that he wasn't sure he wanted to go on I said, "well, at least it's a beautiful river to look at" and he looked at me with this incredulous face and said, "I'm fifteen!  I don't care how pretty a river is!" Or the time I found out he wasn't buckled up and slammed my brakes so I could scold him (we were just pulling into our neighborhood).  Couldn't have made a better object lesson if I had tried.  He flew into the seat in front of him and his face squished up hard against the h...

I think when I read or hear those familiar verses in Alma 32 I somehow always correlated them with Moroni 3:4-5 where we are invited to find out for ourselves if the Gospel is true. This morning I read Alma 32:27 ..."awake and arouse your faculties, even to an experiment upon my words, and exercise even a particle of faith, yea even if ye can no more than desire to believe , let this desire work in you, even until ye believe in a manner that ye can give place for a portion of my words." I was thinking about the word experiment and what that means.  It doesn't mean solely praying to know if the Gospel is true, although that could certainly be a part of it.  I think it means our actions. Our choices of behavior.   Because Faith is a choice .  And so when we choose to go to church every Sunday, when we choose to dress modestly, when we choose to read our scriptures and listen to General Conference and try to be better - we are choosing to experiment, we are choosi...

I was so excited for summer to come (if you remember my last post).  Those last three weeks of school seemed to last FOREVER.  I may have overbooked my life.  It was like a marathon and a sprint in one.  Tennis, kid craft camp, school activities, piano recital.  It was so busy.  Joyful, but busy.  And now it's over.  And I'm so glad. I've been busy thinking about things too.  I need to call a new counselor.  In fact, last week I submitted a name.  And then promptly spent this past week feeling very unsettled and anxious about it.  On Sunday I happened to spend 5 minutes with the Bishop and asked if he had made progress on that.  He kind of made a face and said he totally forgot - in fact couldn't even remember who's name I had submitted.  I reminded him and he asked me how I felt about it still - something he doesn't usually ask (also he doesn't usually forget when I submit a name).  I told him about my unsettl...

Guys!  Does anyone else feel like life kicked up the pace a notch and a half?  Or a million?  I'm realizing more and more than my decade in Fort Bragg may have been an answer to some prayers to have PEACE and quiet and rest to raise my children.  Funny to think that the one thing I complained about the most might have been just what the doctor ordered.  Sigh.  Another reason to stop complaining to Heavenly Father.  He really does know what is best for us. The girls had their last day of co-op today.  It has been a busy but fun experience for us.  The last two months I worked with my class preparing a Shakespeare reader's theater to present (which we did today).  Those girls are seriously so cute - I love the 10-13 year old age bracket of sweet LDS girls.  Anyway, we finished co-op.  Homeschool is just about done.  I'm done, the girls are just finishing up some work that they fell behind on.  But otherwise, summer go...

Can you believe the cousins' clothes all coordinated?  How fun is that! I left a spot to photoshop Hannah into the picture.  ;-) So the baptism went great.  We were happy to have some family drive down to be with us.  And there were some wonderful ward friends who showed up as well, which made it very special for Natalie.  She was so excited, but we were worried she was coming down with a cold.   Luckily she pulled it together for the big day. Obviously we are not used to grouping together for a family picture without Hannah.  There are gaps in all of them! Congrats, Natalie!  We are so pleased with your decision to be baptized and your excitement about it. 

Yep.  At 12:21am Miss Natalie turned 8.  Since she was 8 for so long before breakfast, we figured she was practically 8 1/2 now.  She's pretty excited about this birthday of hers! This little girl was born 8 years ago.  She was the second and only child other than Hannah where I started labor at home (that is weird when you think about it).  Great story from her birth - I had to have antibiotics and an IV because of the strep B that sometimes is present.  We decided to do an epidural to help the wait along (antibiotics have to be spread out in two doses).  So I was feeling pretty good during labor.  My doctor came over after work and I remember him sitting on the side of the bed telling me that he was going to rupture the amniotic sac so that labor would start progressing. He did the tiniest of tears because I WARNED HIM.... and a huge fire hydrant's worth of fluid came gushing out all over him, the bed, the floor.  It was a mess.  He...

This is the last post from Education Week.  I think.  I went to a bunch of classes by Stephanie Sorensen.  One was on the Beauty Paradox - it was a great talk about Righteousness, Self-Image, and Power.  If you want those notes, email me.  Great stuff to teach teenage girls (and their moms!) But I really loved the class she gave entitled "Women as Gospel Scholars".  If you've paid attention lately at conference, there have been several talks about the need for the women of the church to have a "bedrock understanding of Gospel principles".  So this class is pretty timely as far as I'm concerned.  She shared talk after talk after talk.  I wrote down the reference so that I could go back and study them.  So what you have here are my brief notes jotted down during the flood of information, and lists of talks.  But I think they would make a great basis for improving Gospel study for anyone who's feeling a little at loose ends as to the...