Here’s a fun game that involves word association, logic, clues, and deductive thinking. I picked this up for $2 at the thrift store. It was definitely worth the 2 bucks. It is like Charades with words.
You get a ton of tiles, each with a word printed on it. One is in English and the other side has the same word in French. Then you take the top card of the stack of cards. The goal is to get the other people to guess as many words listed on the card as you can get them to guess before the sand timer runs out by giving them clues. To do this, you put the word tiles on the easel. The easel has three sections: “Definitely,” “Kind Of,” and “Not.” So you use the word tiles as clues in each category to fit the word you are describing.
For example, say you have the word “cement.” This is the word my daughter had when we played this morning. So she put “manmade,” “tough,” “strong,” “hard,” and “smooth.” in the top row of what that word is. Then in the middle she put “black,” “white,” “stone,” and “straight,” for the “kind of” category. That’s for the in-between category. The time ran out before she could get any clues up for the “not” category. But she could have put words that show what cement isn’t, like: “soft,” “edible,” “yummy,” and “colorful.”
This is a great game to expand vocabulary, especially for children and people whose first language is not english. Or if you are studying French, since like I mentioned above, the reverse of each tile has the word in French.
It’s not as exciting as Dungeons or Dragons, or Dune, or as loooong, but it’s still wonderful. I personally think it is more fun than Scrabble, because it goes a lot faster. It’s quick like Bananagrams because you are racing. In Bananagrams you are racing each other and in this game you are racing against the timer. So, if you are a word lover, if you like word games like Charades, Scrabble or Boggle, you will probably love this game. If you want a fun game to review basic adjectives with your children who can read, this is a great game. (It does require the players to know how to read English or French.) One tip I have for playing it is that if a guess is correct, the clue giver gets to pause the sandtimer by flipping it over horizontally while he or she clears the old clues off the easel.
Keep your eye out for it at the thrift store, I bet you can pick it up there if you look for it. I’ve seen it there often. Here’s a video below that shows how to play it. This is a wonderful game to add to your gameschooling collection.
If you’d like a free PDF guide to gameschooling, please go here.
This is one of the most beautiful sights I’ve seen in a long time! Our new-to-us used car! After two months of being a one-car family, we are back to having two cars! Yay!!!!! Happy dance all around!!!!
Last December, the night before the funeral of my mother-in-law, I was minding my own business, driving to the grocery store. A random stranger rear-ended me at a stoplight. Wham!!! Just like that, my car was totaled. Fortunately, nobody was majorly hurt, similar to the accident I had back here in 2017. Because this collision happened close to Christmas, I didn’t jump on replacing it. I had Christmas to take care of. I do have my priorities, after all. For one month, I got to drive rental cars paid for by the stranger’s insurance. (A fun story involving the monster rental truck I had for my New Year’s Eve vacation is here, skip down to where it says, “I had my own little post-Christmas miracle just this past Monday..”)
After that, I shared our remaining car with my husband. On days I needed the car to run errands I took him to the commuter train station. Then our washer broke down, and I was feeling soooo low. It was cold, it was winter (still is), it was gray, we only had one car, and the washer was broken. Ugh. Long story short, after months of wrangling with the insurance company, we finally got the insurance money to replace the car. Last Saturday, we finally got to go shopping and found another iteration of my absolute favorite family car, the Toyota Sienna. See photo above. This is my fourth. I’ve had one white one, two blue, and now a gray one. Yes, we have owned three Siennas that have been totaled! One was my fault, the other two times it was my teen driver’s fault (who shall remain anonymous) or another driver’s fault (the random stranger mentioned above).
I just love Siennas because they last a loooong time (if not involved in car collisions), have amazing engines, and feel so rugged yet smooth when I drive them. The Sienna model is a beautiful car, yet so comfortable and functional. It’s the ultimate mom car. It has over a dozen cupholders, a little table between the front two seats, where I park my purse, a compartment to store sunglasses over the driver’s seat, and a little mirror that comes down so I can see what’s going on in the backseat. I love that I can take out all the seats behind the driver’s and front passenger seat if I ever want to haul cargo instead of kiddos. Like when we picked grapefruit in Phoenix to sell at a Farmer’s Market.
I am feeling so blessed because this one we found is better than the one that was totaled, overall. It is older, but it’s in better shape. Both sliding doors are automatic, whereas in my previous one just one was automatic and it was broken. Same thing with the liftgate. It was broken in the previous one, works in the new one. I’m so grateful we could pay cash for the replacement. We are continuing with our Dave Ramsey commitment of paying all cash for cars for the total price with no monthly car payments.
I see this new-to-me yet used car as a complete blessing and tender mercy from the Lord. He knew that I wanted my old car replaced. It had all the problems listed above, plus more I don’t want to mention. (Like maybe something involving an Instant Pot of tomato lentil soup by one of my children acting carelessly, spilling it in the back storage area.) This is the way the Lord provided for me to replace my old car with a nicer one.
So, I have this car to add to my ever-growing list of tender mercies of the Lord. In the Book of Mormon: Another Testament of Jesus Christ, Nephi testifies that, “I, Nephi, will show unto you that the tender mercies of the Lord are over all those whom he hath chosen, because of their faith, to make them mighty even unto the power of deliverance” (1 Nephi 1:20, italics added). I have been delivered so many times by the Lord from first world problem bondages of frustration and inconveniences, with the tender mercies of the Lord.
Today in my church meeting a woman in my congregation shared that scripture I just quoted. She served a mission for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in Finland. She shared that in Finnish, the word for word translation of “tender mercies of the Lord” is “tender graces of God.” She then shared that many years ago she took upon herself the challenge to read the Book of Mormon with spiritual eyes looking for tender mercies. The challenge was to then find a tender mercy of the Lord in each and every chapter and mark it for future reference. Continuing with the second part of the challenge, she then wrote in the back of the Book of Mormon every day about a tender mercy from the Lord Jesus Christ that she had seen that day.
She testified that she has seen at least one tender mercy every day, and she has continued with this challenge. She has been overwhelmed with the love she feels from our Savior Jesus Christ. She feels so blessed. She has been teaching in the public school system for 32 years now, and these tender mercies have kept her going through the “third toughest year” she’s ever had. She shared several examples which I won’t share but they were really sweet.
Instead, I’ll share a few of mine:
-For years, I really wanted to give birth to a baby on a Sabbath Day. I can’t even remember if I ever voiced this request in prayer. God knew I wanted it and blessed me with the tender mercy of giving birth to my last three babies on a Sabbath Day. The last one was even born within a few hours of me attending a temple dedication, so that was extra special.
-I really wanted to move to AZ in 2015, and God arranged for that to happen by blessing me with the tender mercy of inspiring a person my husband respects to suggest to my husband that he look for a job in AZ, when dear husband wasn’t listening to that suggestion from me.
-I really wanted to move back to UT in 2020, when I could see that my older children weren’t staying in AZ with us to go for college, but going to college in ID and UT and would most likely marry someone with UT roots. They would never live close to us, if we stayed in AZ, I could just see it. So, I prayed deeply that God would work it out for us to move back to UT, and He blessed us with that tender mercy.
-After we moved back to UT, I realized God blessed me with three little tender mercies. These were things I’d never voiced in prayer but desired. Here they are: 1. That I would someday live in the neighborhood I ended up in. 2. That I would have a kitchen with white cabinets. 3. That I would have a living room with yellow walls. I had tucked away these three desires in my heart long ago, and God blessed me with them when we moved back to UT.
I know God desires to bless us with tender mercies when we show that we love to honor Him with obedience and service. I’d love to hear yours!
Happy Day after Valentine’s Day! Valentine’s Day isn’t a big deal around here, although someday I’d like it to be. I wish I had done more to celebrate it when all the kiddos lived at home. Back then, I felt like I was doing good to do something for Christmas, Easter and Independence Day. The other holidays just fell by the wayside. My sister goes all out with Valentine stockings that she made from sweaters she picked up at thrift stores. Each family member has a stocking, just like at Christmas. The family members put sweet notes and treats in each other’s stockings. Maybe I can inspire my married children to do that. I really love that the Bates family of the former reality show Bringing Up Bates does a big “I Love You Party” where they dress up in costumes, have a big dinner, and play games.
To celebrate Valentine’s with my friends, I hosted an online game night using the Newlywed Game format. I used the questions from the games above. Three other couples attended in addition to my husband and me. I asked such questions as:
“Who out of the people you know would make the best stand-up comedian?”
“Who out of the people in this room would the wife want to switch music libraries with?”
“My wife has too many of _______________.”
“My husband has too many of ______________.”
“My wife doesn’t have enough of ________.”
“My husband doesn’t have enough of _______.”
“My wife’s Church crush is _____________.”
It was loads of fun with lots of laughter and smiles. (I hoped to do one with my two married children with each one’s spouse. We had some obstacles pop up so that game night has yet to materialize.)
These friends who attended are some of my dearest friends, with some of them having been my girlfriends for decades. I just feel so grateful to have such longtime friends.
Here’s a story about a woman and a friend from her girlhood. It shows that when people die, they don’t go away. Their spirits live on in the spirit world and sometimes they are allowed to visit us. It’s called “From Beyond the Veil” by Carla Sansom. Go here to read it and enjoy.
The above photo shows my current Morning Basket. This is a place to contain all the books I want to read a little bit from for every morning as we homeschool. For years I haven’t had an official “basket,” and you don’t need one either. For years (ahem, decades), I just had a pile of books I liked to read from every day. Just last month, I found a basket for only $1 at a thrift store. Score! You can start doing Morning Basket without a basket, and if you do want a basket, just keep your eyes open for one that fits your budget.
Here’s a great video from homeschooling mom Pam Barnhill about what it is and then how to do a Morning Basket:
Here’s what is in my current morning basket:
-two picture books that relate to seasonal or holiday themes, like the ones shown above. Yes, I am still enjoying Christmas books in January and February. Nothing wrong with that! It keeps my mood up during winter. I start out with one and then end with one. So they are like the bookends to my Morning Basket time. I use the monthly picture book lists from here and then get the books from my local public library.
-a chapter from the Action Bible, with narration provided by the Audible version. I already had the Audible version from years ago, then I discovered a hard copy at the thrift store last summer. Yess!!!
-a Founding Father story a day, from this book below (another great thrifting find, after years of checking this book out from the public library whenever Independence Day rolled around)
-a two-page spread in this book: (We don’t actually do the experiments, just read about them. I’m hoping it helps my children see that science is exciting.)
-about 4 pages from the Tuttle Twins American History book by Connor Boyack.
My 13-year-old son is taking a class at our homeschool co-op about the Founding Era of the United States, for this whole school year. So I am reading this book to give him historical context to the Revolutionary War. I am learning as much as my son is. This Tuttle Twins book has a ton of stuff that I never heard in public school from any history teacher or read in any history textbook. I finally feel like I am filling in the gaps. We haven’t finished it yet but so far I love everything about it.
-a chapter Christmas book I bought at the used library book sale about a poor family living in a coal-mining town. It’s a book I wanted to read before Christmas but we didn’t get to it, what with all the other Christmas books I read. I do 2-4 pages a day. When we finish it I think we’ll then do a story a day from Marlene Peterson’s Libraries of Hope.
Sometimes we do something easy, like Kingdomino, which only takes about 15 minutes. This is good on days when we need to get out the door in the afternoon or have other pressing appointments.
Sometimes we play something complicated, like Where in the World is Carmen San Diego USA?
Or sometimes we do something even more complicated, like, Genotype, which is recommended for ages 12 and up. That works for us since my children are 13 and 16.
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I feel blessed that last month I happened upon a game made by Genius Games, the same company that makes Genotype. It was this science-y game called Periodic about the periodic table and chemistry, for only $5! Another thrifting score!
Image Credit: kickstarter.com
What I still want to add to Morning Basket time:
-poetry. I used to be fairly consistent about reading aloud poetry and memorizing a poem every week or so with my children. This was back in AZ when I had four children still in the nest. For every line memorized I’d give them a little treat I’d pick up from the bulk foods section of the grocery store. Ever since I moved (2 1/2 years ago) we haven’t done any memorizing. Time to get back at it, and dust off LaDawn Jacob’s poetry book here on my site. I’m thinking of continuing to memorize from that because it has so many “character building” poems. I also want to just read aloud the “poem of the day” from this book. I just love the idea of having a “thing” a day for each day of the year. I also love the poems in this book compiled by Julie Andrews and her daughter but it doesn’t have a poem for every day. Maybe 4-6 for each month.
-drawing. I’ve been on and off on teaching my children how to draw. We’ve been “off” since the move. I want to get back “on.” I like to think that because I exposed my 16-year-old daughter to drawing during our Morning Basket times years ago, that that consistent practice planted the seed for her to become an artist who is always drawing, sketching, doodling, etc. on her own. I have a ton of how-to-draw books I could use. I found another one while thrifting last fall. I believe what it says in “The Drawing Textbook” that people can learn to draw, just like they can learn to read. Drawing is not a special gift bestowed upon the few, just like reading isn’t.It’s available for anyone who practices it.
-singing. We used to sing songs I have curated in my Family Devotionals Ebook, again, before we moved. I have a son serving a mission for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. When he returns home, I’m going to see if he’ll join us for singing every morning, since he loves it. Before he left, he collaborated with friends on an album. He’ll be with us for just about two weeks before he takes off for a job in another town. Hopefully, his love of singing will rub off on them and we will just continue in the habit of morning singing after he leaves.
I just love doing my Morning Basket every day when we are home (all the weekdays except our homeschool co-op day). Along with our family scripture reading and prayer that we do in the AM before Dad leaves for work, along with my personal scripture reading and prayer, it is my anchor for the day. I just love it! It’s my concentrated time to share with my children what I hold dear as the good, the true, and the beautiful. It just feels so delicious and warms so heart, which is especially important on these gray wintry days.
I’d love to hear what’s in your Morning Basket! Please share below in the comments.
I enjoyed these next few videos below because they all touched upon, in different ways, on the power of fasting. They each talked about the experience Jesus had fasting 40 days and 40 nights in the wilderness. The experience of fasting reminds me of the above sign I saw in the home of one of my friends. I definitely feel that when I fast, I can feel a closeness to God and His angels. I feel them cheering me on “today, tomorrow, and forever.” Of course, God and His angels are always cheering us on, whether or not we fast, whether or not we do anything. It’s just that we are more able and likely to feel the cheering when we are fasting.
The video below is from Jared Halverson. In the video, Jared said something to the effect that fasting is like taming the beast inside you. The beast inside you is the “natural man” (or “natural woman” of course). He said as you feel the hunger rise up inside you like a beast, and your spirit tells it to quiet down, you become stronger. Jared starts talking about fasting around the 37 minute mark.
Next we have a video from Hank Smith, John Bytheway, and Dr. Jan Martin. In this video, they said that fasting is a tool to gain strength and power. Around the 16 minute mark is when they start talking about fasting. They talk about how Jesus gained inner strength by fasting in the wilderness so that His divine spirit would overcome his mortal body. We too can get spiritual strength from fasting. We can learn to do hard things as we gain this strength. Hank points out that the sons of Mosiah practiced fasting, and it gave them the spirit of prophecy and the ability to teach with power and authority. (See Alma 17:3)
I know that fasting gives so many benefits. For decades, I’ve done the monthly fasting (except when I was pregnant and nursing) on the first Sunday of each month to practice my religion as Latter-day Saint Christian. I’ve done that for spiritual reasons. I’ve received many blessings from those Fast Sundays, such as desired blessings too personal to mention here. Then off and on in my adulthood I’ve practiced intermittent fasting, sometimes fasting for three days, in order to lose weight. (See my discourse on dieting and intermittent fasting over here. Scroll way down to Point #2 to read what I say about intermittent fasting.) I agree it’s a hard thing, but there’s no question it increases mastery over the body. Fasting allows one to go on to do harder things. I firmly believe just as some evil spirits can come out in no other way, but by fasting and prayer (Matthew 17:21), some blessings can only come by fasting and prayer. Specifically health blessings. Fasting lowers insulin levels like nothing else can. High insulin is the cause of so many diseases. Dr. Benjamin Bikman calls these diseases the “plague of prosperity.” Watch his amazing speech below.
You know who recently practiced intermittent fasting in order to lose weight? Jim Bob Duggar, the father of the famous “19 Kids and Counting.” I was fascinated to read his story about it here. He had to give up his family’s tater tot casserole and treats at frequent family dinner parties, which he says is every week since his big family has 60 people in it now.
I love how he makes it sound so doable. He says he just pulls out his broth, heats it up, and sips on it when everybody else eats their stuff. He says he’s satisfied and not tempted by the treats around him. Way to go Jim Bob! He says that at first he was just going to fast for 3 days, but then after 3 days, he decided he could do more. By Day 35 of his fast, he had lost 35 lbs! I’m sure it was worth it! I wonder when he stopped and how many total pounds he lost?
The snow continues! Last week, it snowed maybe every other day, from Sunday to Sunday. It’s enough to make part of me want to just hunker down and take a long winter’s nap, saying, “Please wake me up when spring is here for good!” As some of you know, I moved to AZ seven years ago to get out of the snow. I found a job for my husband in AZ, encouraged him to apply for it, and rejoiced when he got it so we could move out of the frozen north. After 30+ years of slogging through Utah’s winters, it was just soooo nice to go to a place in AZ (not Phoenix) that still had four seasons, including snow, but milder versions of each one. Yes, AZ has places like that!
We still got snow, but it would just always melt by noon (unless you were in the mountains, which were less than a ten-minute drive from my house). I took the photo above from my front porch in AZ on a rare snowy morning. So this snow was perfect for homebodies like me who like to look at it through the window, seeing it blanket the landscape all picturesquely, but then don’t want to drive in it when I have to leave the house. Anyway, while in AZ I learned about this idea called hygge from my friend Olivia. Now that I’m back in Utah, cultivating hygge is what is helping me get through winter.
So yes! I am embracing winter now as part of my post-AZ hygge life in Utah. Let’s see…I went sledding on Christmas Eve, holed up in a mountain cabin over New Year’s Eve weekend while it snowed nonstop for 4 days, and now that we are in the post-holiday winter doldrums I’m finding lots of ways to create a cozy-looking home with cute decorations that befit the season.
I love it when the art and craft project I do for the 6-7 year-old class for my weekly homeschool co-op also turns out so cute that I want to decorate my house with it. See top photo above. For this past week I picked these 3-D snowflakes and strung them on yarn to make a garland. You can find a tutorial here. These are so simple! All you need is paper, scissors, stapler, tape, and string or yarn. (I didn’t bother with the cardboard tubes to store the garland in as suggested in the tutorial. It adds to the cuteness for sure but I didn’t have time to get those.)
I just love how this was easy enough for each kid to make at least one snowflake. I broke down the steps and showed the process to them beforehand with a sample from most of the steps. I manned the stapler and the transparent tape, and they had to wait in line for me to help them for that part. I brought the string already cut in pieces less than a yard. They strung their own snowflakes onto the string. Out of the 13 kiddos, most were done after making one snowflake and went on to our free play. We had about 5 who persisted and made 3-4 to make a garland. It was fun! After taping each one I’d hold it up high for all to see and announce who made it. I exclaimed over how beautiful each one was. I was delighted to see them each smile with their eyes lighting up after my excitement.
Image Credit above and below: goodreads.com
Before we did the activity, I read aloud the picture books shown above and below to them. Then I unveiled the snowflake garland I had made beforehand and asked them if they wanted to make one. They eagerly dove into the project. I suggested they make the garland and then take it home and then give it away, in order to “share some kindness and bring some light.”
So if you are looking for a fun simple winter art project for children combined with two picture books, look no further! Lots of other snowflake picture books would work, but I chose these to combine the idea of warming up in winter with decorations, giving, and kindness.
Photo Image Credit: Oak Norton’s Scripture Notes YouTube Channel
I just love this interview that my friend Oak Norton did just last Sunday with New York Times bestselling fantasy author Brandon Mull. See below. If you are a fan of Jesus Christ and/or Brandon Mull, you will love it!
I loved that Brandon got vulnerable and shared how heartbroken he was when his first wife divorced him. It was the power of Jesus Christ that got him through this devastating time. If you, or anyone you know, has been divorced, I encourage you to watch this.
Brandon tells his complete story, from the time he was a child using his imagination, to his time at BYU working with Divine Comedy, then serving a mission for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, in Chile, then starting his writing career. Then he shares how he worked super hard to get his books to sell, and then finally how the success came. He thought everybody was happy and then got the news that his wife wanted a divorce. He went through a super painful time.
I love that he shares about the power of making personalized covenants with God. He tells the story of how he did that. When we do such a thing, he says that the Lord gives us power to fulfill that promise we make with God. I have experienced the same thing. I know this is true! I hope you enjoy watching and learning from the video below.
I just love snowflakes! They are the one of the many things that brighten up winter after the excitement of Christmas is over. If you don’t get real ones outside, you can always make paper ones!
If I had lived near Wilson, aka “Snowflake” Bentley, we would have been friends. I just know it. I remember one time I was outside about to get in the car, years ago. I was trying to get out the door to some appointment related to homeschooling, and I was frustrated with one of my children. It was snowing and he interrupted my admonition to him by pointing out the beauty of a snowflake that had just landed on his mitten. That was enough to reach my inner Snowflake Bentley and soften my heart in the moment. I stopped feeling quite so grumpy and stopped to admire the beauty of the snowflake. For a moment, I could see its tiny, exquisite form as a perfect 6-pointed snowflake before it melted away.
If you don’t know who Snowflake Bentley is, watch this video below.
According to Familysearch.org, Mr. Bentley is my fourth cousin third times removed. Awesome! It’s doubly awesome that he was homeschooled. I just think it’s so cool that his mother was his mentor. It was his mother who recognized his genius for appreciating snowflakes and sacrificed the money to buy him the expensive camera that would take photos of snowflakes. For years, it’s been one of my personal traditions, in January, to read aloud the book Snowflake Bentley to at least one of my children, and then cut out paper snowflakes to decorate our windows. It’s been so fun for me, after moving back to Utah two years ago, to discover other people have this same tradition.
My daughter and I went to a move night to watch Pride and Prejudice with some of her scholar friends. The hostess, the mentor for her class at our homeschooling co-op (commonwealth school) had this lovely display dedicated to Wilson Bentley, aka Snowflake Bentley. See photo at the top. Isn’t it just one of the cutest things you’ve ever seen? I love it! She also had her dining room table decorated with snowflakes. They were on top of the table with a plastic see-through tablecloth over them. She said she bought them at amazon. She also had them all over her windows. As she said, it makes putting away the Christmas decorations fun because we know we can replace them all with our snowflake decorations for January. I’ve had the same thoughts for years!
I’ve thought a lot about how snow testifies of Jesus Christ. Snow has order, as Jesus does. It comes in a few different forms, such as plates, rods, and dendrites. Yet there is infinite variety within these forms to show the infinitely creative power of our Creator Jesus Christ. Snow, also, like fire, can give life, and destroy. It is a force to be admired and respected, just as fire is and just as our Creator is.
I have photos of me as a kid out in the snow, enjoying it. Then I got old and boring and didn’t like it because it’s cold. I moved to AZ to get out of it. Now I am back in Utah and am learning to love it. I’ve learned to just bundle and cover up and get out there and love it. Usually on Christmas Eve my kids always go sledding. In the past I’ve sent them on their own and stayed home to fix food. This past Christmas Eve I went out with them, covered head to toe with winter gear. I actually went sledding. It was fun!
Here are some fun videos I found of one of my favorite families, the Duggars, the Forsyths, and the Seewalds enjoying the snow. Happy snow days everyone!
Image Credit: Jared Halverson’s YouTube Channel, called Unshaken
I’ve loved learning more about Jesus these past two weeks of January as the Come, Follow Christ study has changed its focus to the New Testament with the new year of 2023. Yay! We get to study the Four Gospels as a whole church and then the rest of the New Testament.
Here are my favorite videos from last week, when we studied Matthew 2 and Luke 2. It was Christmas all over again, this time in January, as we studied the Nativity Story. I loved it!
In the above and below videos, Hank Smith and John Bytheway studied Matthew 2 and Luke 2 with Dr. Bradley Wilcox. Brad’s a perfect guest to talk about the Christmas story since he loves Jesus so much and his birthday is on Christmas Day. (You can listen to one of my favorite talks about the grace of Jesus, done by Brad, over here.)
In the Part 2 video below, John talks about the three levels of Christmas, at the 23:26 mark:
Level 1: celebrating Santa Claus, reindeer, etc.
Level 2: celebrating Jesus Christ as a baby, who doesn’t demand anything of us, because he is peacefully sleeping during His “Silent Night.”
Level 3: celebrating and worshiping Jesus Christ in all His glory as a full-grown man who grew up after being a baby in the manger. He is the Christ the Lord who is not always silent; He does ask things of us. We are to fall down on our knees to worship Him. He is an adult now who requires things of us if we are to be His disciples and to live with Him again.
Also, in Part 2, at the 31:46 mark, Brad talks about Luke 2:52. I love what Brad says about this. This is the verse that says how Jesus grew. It says that He grew in wisdom, in stature, and in favor with God and man. Those are the four ways we can each grow: intellectually (wisdom), physically (stature), spiritually (favor with God), and socially (favor with man). This is the basis for the Children and Youth program of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Brad takes a few minutes to talk about how wonderful it is that the program helps children and youth to learn to turn to God in prayer to learn what goals to set in order to grow in each area. (This program came out in 2019 to replace the old program I grew up with that had a pre-determined list of goals for every Young Woman. The boys had the Scout program.)
He also points out this wonderfully super important point. He connects Luke 2:49 to Luke 2:52. In Luke 2:49. Jesus asks His parents if they would like Him to be about his father’s business, meaning Heavenly Father’s business. This was after they found him in the temple, talking to the doctors (teachers). (Interesting side note: Joseph Smith’s Translation shows that the doctors were asking Him questions.) So Brad explains that that is the context for us and our children and youth to set their goals. It’s important that we each set goals after praying to God the Father to know what goals He wants us to do to be about His business. That way the goal program is God-centered not self-centered.
Then I also loved this commentary by Jared Halvorsen, in the two videos below, of the Unshaken YouTube Channel.
Last, but certainly not least, here are two new videos by Rhonda and Farrell Pickering, about the Nativity and the dating of Christ’s birth. The way they put pieces of the puzzle together to show historical evidence of Christ’s birth is amazing!
Image Credit: Rhonda and Farrell Pickering’s YouTube Video here, called “The Eyewitnesses of Christ: Dating the Ministry of Christ- the Case for the Word of God”
The first video is so, so sweet. They talk about how important it is to be broken in order to receive Christ. Then the second video by the Pickerings below is about the dating of the birth of Christ. I can watch all these videos over and over and truly have an Endless Christmas, like John talks about in his videos at the top. I am full of awe and gratitude for our Beloved Savior Jesus Christ, for these truths and for the people who create this content. I hope you enjoy them as much as I do!
Happy winter everyone! I love that some times, on these sometimes gloomy wintry days, the sun breaks out and makes everything look bright and white. That’s the same feeling I have about the Son, Jesus Christ, giving us light for a fresh new start. Today in church I heard the sweetest story from a young man in my congregation. He started his talk by saying that he had been asked to share a story from his life and how it relates to the gospel of Jesus Christ. I thought, wow, how simple, yet how wonderful. It would be wonderful if each of this in the congregation got asked to do this! I would love that! Every person whether they know it or not, has a story to say about Jesus touching their lives.
The story the young man shared was this. He said that he was involved in a church basketball team of 12-13 year old young men, years ago. They played against other teams of young men that same age in a league. One of the young men on his team was really, good. His name is John. For a while, every play involved John running down the court at lightning speed and shooting a basket. At some point, John decided to give the other players a turn with the ball. He gave the ball to Adam and let Adam take control. Adam dribbled a bit and shot the ball at the basket and missed. He was disappointed but he could tell that John was happy that Adam made the effort. Then when Adam did make a basket John was really happy. Then years later, the time came for Adam to play basketball with younger cousins. He was finally in John’s shoes. He was the strongest and fastest player. He could have hogged the ball the whole time and made all the points, but he didn’t. He let the younger cousins have many turns with the ball, and loved seeing them make points. So Adam likened that to Jesus Christ. He said that that is how Jesus is. He is the strongest, fastest player. He could control all of our lives and win everything for us. But he gets more joy by sharing the ball of our life with us. He hands it over us. He watches us struggle. He loves it when we shoot to make spiritual baskets. He is sad when we miss. He gets tremendous joy when he sees us make the baskets and make progress. I just thought that was so beautiful.
Tree of Life Mothering 