A Great Example

I don't remember exactly when or how it started. All of a sudden, maybe a year ago, whenever we said prayers our little Noah (age 5) would pray for President Hinckley. It must have been after he had the cancer surgery that we suggested to our children that we should pray for the prophet. Not a prayer was said by that little boy that he did not pray for President Hinckley's health. He was also quick to remind us if we forgot President Hinckley in our prayers. Pretty soon we were all praying for the prophet with great regularity. Noah's love for him increased through seeing him on General Conference (our hard and fast rule for the kids: when the prophet speaks, you must come and listen).

When President Faust passed away last year, we realized that we better explain to Noah that even though we pray for his health, President Hinckley would eventually pass on as well. We knew that it would be upsetting for Noah, and we hoped we could prepare him a little.

His reaction on Sunday night was heartbreaking. He asked if he could pray after family prayer was over, and all he could say was, "Thank you for everything President Hinckley did for us" before breaking down in tears. We all cried for Noah, for he had lost his hero.

I never had the opportunity to be in his presence (although Joey did in Honduras), but I always felt a special connection with him. I know he was a prophet of God. What's amazing is how much my love for him grew as I saw him through the eyes of a child.

As children do, Noah has already started to forget his sadness. But what will not be forgotten is the example that my little boy showed me of following the prophet.

Our Little Akeelah

Dr Larabee: Where do you think big words come from?
Akeelah: People with big brains?

In case you hadn't heard, Hannah won the spelling bee at her school back in December, and then won the district spelling bee this month. She goes to the regional spelling bee next week. So she's had her 15 minutes of fame twice now, with her name up on the marquee. And no, someone didn't spray paint over her last name; I'm just a little freaked out about internet safety so I blurred it out (I'm loving my new Photoshop Elements). And I promise not to make every post a movie reference.

By the way, I paid her $5 to try and make it to the school spelling bee, because she told me she didn't want to do it. Great parenting skills, all that intrinsic motivation I'm trying to teach my children.

Hooray, Hannah! You rock!

Beuller? Bueller?

So we created this blog, and then were strangely absent and didn't post anything. Apparently we've been too busy doing other things. (Unfortunately, not calling in sick while synthesizing alien barfing sounds, stealing our dad's car, and going to a baseball game, but still, we've been busy, people.) So here it is, our first blog post. Momentous.

As you can probably tell, we don't exactly have it set up the way we want it yet. And in case you're wondering, "the way we want it" is perfect, and better than everyone else's. Just kidding. But I would like to figure out how to get the post title font smaller, it makes me feel like Ben Stein is actually shouting. And I'd like to change a few random other things, about which I'm sure you could really not care any less.

Thanks for stopping by. And come back often. And leave comments.