Tree of Life Mothering

To my surprise, the one night I flipped on the TV to BYUTV because all my kids were gone playing with cousins and I was giving my baby a bath in my master suite, I came across
The Food Nanny. This is something else I’ve always wanted to do, is
watch the Food Nanny. The Food Nanny is Liz Edmunds, LDS mother of
seven and a renowned Internet celebrity and cookbook author. If you
haven’t read The Food Nanny rescues dinner, go get it. Even if you
can’t buy it you can call your public library up and request it
through interlibrary loan for a buck or two. She has some great
recipes! This is Mormon comfort food at its best. The show involved
teaching a mom how to roast a whole chicken. This mom was terrified
of touching the raw chicken to prepare it for cooking. I can relate!
I have only touched a whole raw chicken once myself. The Food Nanny
gave her plastic gloves to use and coached her through the whole
process, even though the mom was crying. Her whole family thanked her
for cooking the yummy meal in the end. They had been used to eating
microwaved food off paper plates in front of the TV.

If you want more inspiration for cooking a real dinner every night, I encourage you to watch the show on BYUTV thourgh internet streaming . See thefoodnanny.com. Julie
Beck says LDS moms should be the best homemakers in the world. With
people like the Food Nanny helping us, we can do it! I have a
document called Making Dinner a Winner that I felt inspired to write
after reading The Food nanny cookbook. I had it available for free on
the treeoflifemothering.com site. Then the tabs changed because my
host changed the template and I lost the tab. When we get a chance,
we will put it back up for you all.

Anyway, I left my vacation feeling very refreshed and inspired. I connected with my mom and sisters. My kids had fun and didn’t mind not connecting with me, they were there for
connecting to their cousins. I played some and I also had some
scholar phase time studying Democracy in America for the online
colloquium I am hosting on September 21. (you’re all invited to join,
it’s free) I am wondering though, wouldn’t it be nice to live life in
such a way as to not need a vacation? To live your life in balance of
work, play, and rest with freedom so that you feel like every day you
are choosing what you want to do, living deliberately. This is
getting off the conveyor belt at its best!

Every year we face the same conflict: some people feel that relaxation means being as immobile as possible (watching movies, sleeping, and eating) and others want to be outside,
doing something. Whenever we do group activities like a museum some of the family zip through as if on a conveyor belt and others of us like me want to take our time digesting the information. So I have given up on going to museums in a huge family group. This year I think we struck a balance. We planned
things for Monday, Tuesday morning, and Wednesday and the rest were free
days. On Monday we went to Jordanelle Reservoir. If you haven’t been,
go! It is like a beach in the mountains. My kids loved it. You can rent
jet skis or just plain swim. It sure was windy though. If you have long
hair, pull it back.

Before I went I heard on facebook that my sister-in-law Sally was hosting a girls night of watching Pride and Prejudice, all five hours. As she lives in St. George and I live in
Layton, I couldn’t go. I started wondering when I was ever going to
watch the movie. (I have to admit I am probably the last Mormon female,
homeschooling mom in Utah to do so, until last week I hadn’t watched the
movie.) The A&E version is on the TJED for Teens 100 Classics to
study so I was feeling not only pleasure-bound but duty-bound to watch
it. Ahhh, that’s what vacations are for, to do what you ‘ve always
wanted to do! I was excited to figure out that I could watch it on
vacation. I located a copy of the movie from my visiting teacher. She
was happy to loan me her whole set of A&E romance classics on DVD:
Jane Eyre, Emma, Horatio Hornblower, Victoria and Albert, Tom
Jones….ohhh, so many classics, so little time!

So I spread out watching the movie on Tuesday and Thursday with my sister Emily. (This is the sister who is writing a romance novel that will make Jane Austen jealous.) We watched
the movie amidst tending to two toddlers and more comings and goings
from our older children than Grand Central Station. She acted as
navigator to help me understand the complexities of what Glenn Beck
calls a
“bonnet movie.” He jokes how his wife loves to watch these movies
but they put him to sleep because he can’t keep track of all the
relations: “Lord Highbottom is in love with Lady Noble, but she
really likes Mr. Pennywhistle, and meanwhile so-and-so is after
so-and-so.” It turns out my sister had brought a copy of the movie
with her as well. You can be assured that I had called her to borrow
a copy but she was gone the week before, unbeknownst to me, to
another family reunion in Washington.

I loved the movie! Oh, how the cast has mastered, the look! Jennifer Ehle and Colin Firth have it down pat. I read the story in high school but I am finally understanding it. It occurred to me that
Mr. Darcy is a Christ figure because he did what no one else could do
when he saved the Bennett family after Lydia’s poor judgment, and
that is what Christ does. We can follow him by looking around our own
homes, families, and communities and seeing what connections and
resources we have that allow us to do what no one else can do. Then
we serve anonymously, like Mr. Darcy did, feeling that it is an
honor, not a drag.

Last week I finally got around to putting the podcasts of the Old Testament scripture discussions by BYU religion professors onto my iPod.(See byub.org/scriptures) Rather, I got around to having my son putting them on. These are so cool! Imagine having three of four LDS people who study the scriptures for a living sharing their insights for 30 minutes. This is the best colloquium to listen to Now I have 30 podcasts to catch up on to get to the place in the Bible that we are studying in Gospel Doctrine. That’s OK. So I listened to the first two while I exercised Tuesday and Wednesday. I was feeling so enlightened and eager to hear the next morning’s round of two podcasts while I exercised. But that night, I lost my iPod. Somehow it seemed to have floated away.

That made the next day of running/walking not as fun. I was missing my epiphanies that come while listening. I missed hearing the great insights about the OT from my former next-door neighbor in Provo Brother Kelly Ogden. Where could it be? I racked my brain and I prayed that night, asking God to bring it back to me. I imagined myself cradling this astounding tool for learning in my hands once again. The next morning while I was walking I wondered how that iPod could have just disappeared into thin air. I reviewed the events surrounding the last memory I had of it. I had had it downstairs while listening to Democracy in America and then I went upstairs to go to bed and somewhere in between it went POOF! Lo and behold, I got an idea. Or rather, God spoke to my mind clearly with the thought that I should check the clothes I was wearing the night before that I had put in the dirty laundry. The iPod was probably caught in my clothes since I had had the iPod tucked down my front while I was listening to what my four-year-old daughter calls de Tofu (de Tocqueville).

I called my scholar phase daughter then and there to ask her to carefully check all the dirty laundry as she put in the wash that day (Her scholar phase stewardship is to was all the laundry in the house). Later that day she said she did but no iPod. What do you know, but two days later, my son heard a clunking in the dryer. Sure enough, that was it. It had been through the washer and was now getting fried in the dryer! AAAAAACKKK! The image of my dear iPod floating in my washer, with water seeping completely through it, made me feel sick. At least it wasn’t one of my children drowning or something that is alive, I kept reminding myself.

I wasn’t so much mad at my daughter for not finding it as I was mad at myself for not following through on that revelation I got and checking myself. My daughter apologized for not finding it. The amazing thing was that I was at peace. I knew that it was replaceable. Any time I have a problem, I just remind myself that if time and/or money can fix it it is not a problem.

My son however, the techno-geek son, took a different approach. His reaction was as if it was one of his children, as he raised his voice to ask if it was OK. He immediately Googled “how to fix an iPod that goes through the wash.” Can you believe what answers are on the Internet, just a google away? The answer was to stick it in a bowl of dry uncooked rice, to draw the water out. Bless my brilliant son, he gave me hope. I never would have thought to google that one.

That was Saturday. On Sunday I bore my testimony in fast and testimony meeting that God spoke to my mind and answered my prayer. But I was in mourning the next day when I exercised sans iPod. Then the next day another son reminded me that I had an mp3 player on my cell phone that I could use until my phone got resurrected. That’s right! Last fall when it was time to get a new phone, I had a distinct impression that I should get one with an mp3 player. That was God speaking to me again. So I was blissful again with my OT podcasts the next time I exercised.

By Wednesday, my iPod was completely resuscitated. it was amazing to witness. A complete miracle! Hooray! I feel so blessed!

HI everybody! I want to tell you about my friend Amy Ihrig. She is a doula and childbrith educator. I am passionate about women having joyful births and so is she. Check out her web site, http://myjoyfulbirth.com.

Last week we went to the beautiful Colorado Rockies for a family reunion. Oh, so many beautiful things happened. After we left Wyoming and entered Colorado my 12-y-o son serenaded us with “Colorado Rocky Mountain High” by John Denver as we drove. It touched my heart deeply. Some say it’s a song about doing drugs but I prefer to see a nobler purpose in it.

I took along a copy of the new book Women of the Old Testament by Camille Fronk Olson. It was overdue at the library but I felt like I had not drawn enough from its deep well of living water. This book is so cool! The typical world’s way of looking at these women is to marginalize them and overlook them or even say they were not good. But thanks to courageous scholars like Beverly Campbell, who wrote Eve and the Choice Made in Eden, and Camille, we know the truth about Eve. She was the first women’s libber.

I love what Camille’s book says about Eve and Rebekah, Isaac’s wife. I have long wanted to understand better her story with Isaac and switching Esau and Jacob. I had a personal experience to deepen my understanding this past winter. She did something that was needed and righteous, within her bounds. This book confirmed my hunches. I had a great discussion with my mother-in-law and sister-in-law about this.

This book also discusses the same story that James Ferrell’s The Peacegiver does, that of Abigail and David from the Bible. As I read the account in Camille’s book, I was reminded of how women are types of Christ. Then I thought of how men are as well, when they serve others, especially when they bear the priesthood righteously. As I discussed this with my mil and sil I learned of something vitally important someone in our family did to help someone else. Then it occurred to me that families are types of Christ as well. Each of us are in roles where we can do something for somebody else that no one else can. I thought of one of my other sister-in-laws who has lightened my load and helped me when no one else did. I am thinking of all the possibilities for each of us to do good for someone in our extended family.

Well, I could go on but I need to go shopping and make dinner. And I still want to blog more about my trip to St. George. The trouble with life is it goes faster than I can blog about it. Here’s an endearing video our nephew did of the bonding family reunion we had. Everyone had loads of fun and I found out that one of my online TJED friends in Colorado actually knows my sister-in-law. These connections are so much fun.

It was 13 years ago this July that I got my sixth edition copy of the Womanly Art of Breastfeeding signed by all seven founders of La Leche League International, with my daughter, Virtue in tow (in a sling of course). That was a moment that can’t ever happen again because not all seven founders are alive today. I got to chat with each one during the book signing and they each exuded peace and motherliness which is rare in today’s world. Even though the organizers of the autographing event kept kindly telling those of us standing in line to be done standing in line and go away, these kind old ladies obliged us autograph seekers as if they were queenly rock stars (which they are, to those of us in the LLL world) and stayed till the very last groupie was satisfied.

The eighth edition of the Womanly Art is coming out this July! It’s been completely rewritten to be more “hip” and “girlfriendy.” I am curious to see how this read. One of the authors is Diane Weissinger. I like everything she’s written that I’ve read so far. You can see her site at normalfed.com. I appreciate that the WAB was written by some of the founders because that gives it a patient, grandmotherly perspective from women who grew up in the prefeminist age. I know I gave the breastfeeding book So That’s What They’re For! five stars but I’ve been thinking I should change that to four.

It’s because that book is written from the postfeminist age perspective that having a baby and breastfeeding is something that you do alongside a career. It’s written from the perspective that mothering, fertility, and breastfeeding is something you turn on and off, according to the needs of your other nonmotherly career. The WAB has more of an old-fashioned perspective of yes, you can breastfeed and mother, it’s the natural thing for women to do from time immemorial.

When I asked one of the founders of La Leche League to sign my older edition of the WAB that I had brought to the conference, she refused. She said it had some stuff in there on birth control that she didn’t agree with. But the newer edition that was just being released that month of July 1997 was kosher to her. The newer edition mentioned LAM (lactational amenorrhea, which is breastfeeding in a way that causes your fertility to stop) as an effective form of birth control.

LAM, as well as breastfeeding, is one of the things that women of the past knew about. One of those “grandmother” things that young women of the day get pressured by commercial interests to downplay and not believe. Young women of today are persuaded to believe that science and technology are better than the wisdom of their bodies and nature.

Well, I hope the new WAB still contains the promotion of LAM. I think it will. Can you imagine how cool it would be to have the upcoming 8th edition of The Womanly Art of Breastfeeding (WAB) on the New York Times Best Seller list? Check out this page on the LLLI Web site to pre-order your copy from your favorite bookseller. http://www.llli.org/thewomanlyartofbreastfeeding Your order makes a difference and can help make the WAB be on that Best Seller list.

Only books pre-ordered & or purchased before July 18, 2010 will count towards our goal to make it on the New York Times Best Seller list. (Preorder by July 13th, purchase directly between July 13th and July 18th, Books purchased on or after July 19th will not be counted.)

So order your copy today. You may be past the time of breastfeeding but I bet you know someone, a neighbor, a ward member, someone you visit teach, a niece, a daughter, daughter-in-law or granddaughter or cousin who is expecting a baby or nursing. Each of these sisters would greatly benefit from the gift of the Womanly Art of Breastfeeding book. Let’s show the world that women of today are highly interested in preserving the womanly art of breastfeeding!

Join me for a summer cooking class! Learn how to follow the principles taught in “Nourishing Traditions,” by Sally Fallon. Visit my blog for more information!

http://happyinthekitchen-withtara.blogspot.com/2010/06/summer-cooking-class.html

Hope to see you there!

Tara

Yesterday, I read an article in Redbook magazine in the reception room of an oral surgeon while my son got his wisdom teeth pulled. You can
find the article here
http://redbookmag.com/kids-family/advice/stop-breastfeeding“

The author claims that breastfeeding is the norm now, unlike 50 years ago when LLL started, and that the pendulum has swung too far in the
direction of breastfeeding, so that moms who don’t breastfeed are made
to feel that they are bad mothers.

This is so sad. Moms who don’t breastfeed should feel regretful, not guilty. This whole debate is just
evidence of a larger problem…(Please go to the Ecological Breastfeeding
group to read the rest of my post and add your comments.)

I have a blog called “Happy In The Kitchen” that I would love your imput on! It is filled with recipies and ideas on how to prepare REAL, nourishing food. Please take a look and tell me what you think!

http://happyinthekitchen-withtara.blogspot.com/2010/06/this-is-place.html

Thank you!!!

Tara

The fireside with Dan Ralphs was spectacular! I feel so inspired to read classic literature and do hard things and get a great education. Dan basically said that if you get a great education you will become Christlike. Therefore you will have virtue in education, because Christ is virtuous. The best education leads one not to just know stuff, and not to just understand, but to actually become Christlike. The best education changes or transforms you. You “become,” instead of just knowing and understanding. That makes sense because Christ is the only source of power that changes us, or helps us become, for the better. He gives us a new life through a new birth.
Dan quoted from Les Mis and said that someone said it was the best work about the atonement outside of the standard works. I read it for my Face to Face with Greatness class (see but that was just a skim, rushed, conveyor-belt reading. Maybe I will actually go back and read it and allow it to help me “become.” Dan also quoted Elder Neal Maxwell about what real education is, and then he had to translate the Maxwellian talk for us. I am hoping that one of my friends who was at the fireside will type up her notes and then I can share them on my treeoflifemothering.com site. It was at Michele Smith’s home. She is so on the ball and organized and her youngest is 4 (meaning she actually has free time not dictated by naps) so I think she will do this for me.

Photos
I planned to post pictures of the fireside but since the computer wouldn’t read my SD card I put pictures of my kids playing at my sister’s house.