The Disappointment of the Bonehead Brothers

Every weekend is cause for celebration, but the Bonehead Brothers decided to start the celebration early!

They decided to start their weekend THURSDAY evening! It was a trifecta calling for a bacchanal celebration of epic proportions.

1) Tyler was turning 18 today – enough of a cause for celebration but…..
2) He finished his Eagle Scout Application at about 5 pm with 7 hours to spare until his the 18th birthday deadline AND
3) The weather forecast called for 10-20 inches of snow. The potential for a snow day or at least seminary getting cancelled was high!

Let the weekend begin!
Immediately after Tyler obtained the necessary signatures on his Eagle application and Garrett finished lacrosse, they went to the Girls’ Soccer Game.
By 7, they were back home because it was too rainy and it was obvious the girls were going to win.
By 8, they were in the hot tub relaxing after the stress of a long week.
By 9, they were kicking back with a fresh bag of Cheetos, facebook, texting and TV watching.

That’s where they lost me. I drifted into my never, never land of 6 hours of sleep.
I assume Tyler left sometime after 10.

Upon arising this morning, I looked out the window. It was wet, but it hadn’t even started snowing. I got in the shower and got ready for seminary.

Every morning, around 5:15, I go upstairs and open Parker’s door and tell him goodbye. Then I go downstairs and open Garrett’s door and say goodbye. All of this is done in pitch black. No lights are ever turned on. There is never an actual conversation.

EXCEPT for today –
Me: “Bye G! I’ll see you later.”
Garrett: “Bye. See ya.”
Strange Male Voice from the corner of the room, “What? Wait! We have seminary?”
Me: “(recognition dawning) “Yeah Tyler. It’s not even snowing yet. See ya at seminary. Oh and Happy Birthday!”

My Husband Rocks!

It's Friday! It's time to recognize Brian for the almost 25 years he has put up with me! It's time for My Husband Rocks!

So here ya go...............

MIDDLE OF WEEK, MIDDLE OF THE DAY DATES !

When I get home from seminary, Brian is at his desk or showering or sometimes still in the bed. But a few times a week he greets me with “Where are we going?”
“Where are we going?????? We’re going somewhere at 7 am?”
Yep! We’re going on A DATE!

And he tells me to pick a place. Sometimes we go out to a place called Sams No. 3 for a full fledged breakfast….or Johnny’s Diner or Village Inn. Sometimes we take a little drive for the famous cinnamon crumb donuts at The Donut or maple cake at Lamars. We’ll go to Einsteins or My Favorite Muffin. And some days, we just run to McDonalds for the large Coke and come right back to our desks to get to work.

Sometimes it's an hour and half and sometimes it's only 15 minutes, but it’s time together.
And it shows he’s thinking of me, wants to be with me and –
He likes me! He really likes me!
And guess what? I like him too!

No! Nien! Ne! Nu! Nej! Negatory!

Give me a treat, a prize, a certificate……..something!
I SAID NO!
I know! It’s hard to believe.
My friend and I were whining, crying and tearing our hair out because we are in charge of the food for After Prom and we’ve put it off and put it off until we could put it off no more!
Luckily, neither of us have ANYTHING to do this week (ha ha, hee hee…wooo that was funny) so we got together to plan.
After 15 minutes of plotting how to throw ourselves down stairs and land on swords, arranging to drive into bridge abutments, and deciding that arranging our own deaths was harder than feeding 1,000, we got to work and planned the whole darn thing in a couple of hours.
Yep – we have the menu, the decorations, room layout, lists of supplies we need to purchase, lists of vendors to solicit, lists of items we need parents to donate. We’re armed with lists!
It’s going to be fun and it’s going to be yummy. I would tell you all about it, but it is TOP SECRET. No one knows what the theme for Prom or After Prom is yet (except for the leadership class, the Prom committee, the administration, the PTO, etc. etc.)
Before placing our order for our TOP SECRET decorations, we decided to run to the school. Never go to the school during the day.
It’s not the students who scare me……..it’s the other adults. The students totally ignored us as we wondered the cafeteria pointing to where we could string TOP SECRET decorations and planning our table arrangement. But those pesky adults are the ones who get in the way. We made the mistake of talking to a few of them. They wanted to know what we were doing tomorrow, next week, next year.
“They” thought it would be wonderful if WE were on the PTO Board. And without thinking and in perfect unison, we exclaimed, “NO!”
Congratulate me! Pat me on the back! Take me to dinner! But DON'T ask me to do anything!

Seminary Teacher - BEST CALLING EVER!

I was starting to prepare my seminary lesson and I started to cry.
Wow! What is this all about?

Maybe I am crying because we are starting Revelations.
Having to teach Revelations would make anyone cry!

Maybe I am crying because I am preparing my LAST TWO WEEKS of seminary lessons EVER!

Maybe I’m crying because I just read Elder Holland’s talk AGAIN.

Seminary, seminary, seminary. Where do I begin?

First let me just get this out there – I am NOT a morning person.
And NO you don’t EVER get used to getting up that early.
So don’t say that about me!

I love seminary!
While I have HATED getting up at 4:15 every day,
I have LOVED –
Every single student – they uplift me, they build my faith, they entertain me and each and every day, they made me laugh. Their enthusiasm is contagious. They give me hope. I see them like Heavenly Father sees them and he must be so thrilled with them. I love them.

The “forced” study of the scriptures – I’m not that diligent. If I wasn’t teaching seminary, I wouldn’t spend as much time in the scriptures. This has been a selfish blessing to me. I’m the one who benefits from the daily peace the scriptures have brought into my life. And let me just dispel any myth that might be out there – I don’t know ANYTHING about the scriptures. My brain is a sieve. I read, I study, I learn, I prepare, I teach and I FORGET.

Here are the other blessings of teaching seminary. I shouldn’t reveal all this. You’ll see how selfish I have been by hoarding this calling.
Starting the day with the Spirit
Learning from the students
Daily inspiration and personal revelation
Becoming more teachable by the Spirit (I’m still not that teachable by people – oops!)
Recognizing miracles in daily life
Increased testimony in the Savior
Increased testimony of the scriptures as a guide for us
Increased testimony in our modern day Prophet and other Church leaders

Okay – I can’t list all the ways my testimony has increased.
But this calling has been way more of a blessing than a sacrifice.

Many, many times, people have said, “I could NEVER teach seminary!”
Oh yes you could!
I am no one special.
I am no different than you.

All you need is a love of the Lord, a love of the scriptures and a love of teenagers.

Actually you don’t. I don’t think I have always loved the scriptures. You will gain a love of the scriptures as you study them. So don’t worry about that.
And actually, you don’t have to love, like or understand teenagers. As you serve them and as you get to know them, you will realize that teenagers ROCK! They are the best people on the planet. They will surprise you with their dedication, diligence, knowledge, openness, thoughtfulness, desire to do right and most of all their acceptance and forgiveness of your weaknesses as a teacher. NOW I know why Heavenly Father selected a young 14 year old boy to restore the gospel.

So really, all you need is a love of the Lord. That’s it!
So, it’s not that I am some great teacher…….it’s that I had good material and good students.

Seminary Teacher = BEST CALLING EVER.

BAD IDEA TUESDAY

Some ideas are just bad..........and not just on Tuesday

#1
VeLouR SWeaTSuiTS
Even in chocolate brown.
The only thing worse than a velour sweatsuit is a velour sweatsuit with “Juicy” or “Cheer” or “Pink” across the butt.

Really?
What are these little words supposed to tell us? Your butt is juicy? Your butt is pink? We should cheer when we see your butt?
Yeah, I don’t get it.

#2
EXeRCiSe
You know how I feel about this one.
You have to buy cute shoes. You have to buy a whole new exercise wardrobe (not including velour sweats.)
Then you sweat. You get injured. You use up your knees, your shoulder, even your heart. You have surgery, go to rehab and while you are doing all of that, you can’t exercise, so you put all the weight back on.
It’s really just not worth it.

#3

SaYiNG "YeS"

Speaking at a fireside, hosting a dinner, being in charge of food for a large event, having a big party at your house always sounds good a month or two out. But as the day gets closer, you never fail to say, "What was I thinking?"

And have you ever noticed that when you initially say yes,

your calendar is totally open....no commitments (except for th ONE you just made)....all the time in the world. But then somehow as the event approaches, your calendar is packed, everyone wants a piece of you, the kids get sick, your husband has to travel, the house burns down and it's just bad, bad timing.

You swear you will never say "yes" again.

but you do

Got any good ideas that went awry????

The Bonehead Brothers vs The IRS

NEVER encourage your progeny to work!

It will cost you - gas to get there, clothing to be worn at work, food purchased while working or while on the way to work from school because they can't just swing by the house for a free meal.

Whatever Garrett made, it probably cost me double!

And now the TAX MAN COMETH! The IRS wants a piece of him too! I just spent 2 ½ hours on Garrett’s taxes –

1 ½ hours crying,

45 minutes actual tax preparation

and 15 minutes redoing my makeup.

I thought I would take on this little project as a favor to Brian. How hard can it be?

Usually the kid’s taxes get thrown in with our taxes and the accountant does everything. But this year, it just didn’t occur to us.

So here we are with the deadline looming and I thought I would fill in the blanks and get Garrett’s money back.

WHAT WAS I THINKING?

First of all, he was eliminated from the lucky pool of people who can fill out the 1040EZ form because he has 1099s from modeling.

I wish that was as impressive as it sounds.

It sounds like he has a gazillion dollars and SHOULD be paying taxes.

But don't believe it for a second!

So not only did I have to fill out the 1040 REGULAR form,

I had to fill out a Schedule C because of his thriving self employment status AND a Schedule SE to determine how much self employment tax he might owe.

The child is 17! Please!

And after all that multiplying and adding and subtracting , he owes just what we thought he would - ZERO!

He owes NOTHING! And they owe him whatever miniscule amount line 61 subtracted from line 71 is.

YAY! Bonehead Brothers 1 vs IRS 0 Actually, he will get NOTHING because I’m going to invoice him for tax preparation. (He can deduct it next year! ;) )

Happy Easter Friends!

Last week was General Conference and I never blogged about it.
I was busy digesting it.

When I heard Elder Jeffrey R. Holland’s talk about the Savior, I knew it would be a conference classic for me.

We are studying the New Testament in seminary this year.
In December, we spent THREE weeks covering the last week of the Savior’s life. It was wonderful, spiritual, awesome, glorious and painful.

When Elder Holland started speaking, it seemed like we had just studied this yesterday. I LOVE this talk because it is true.

I was THRILLED the other day when I saw that the talks from General Conference are already available in print.

Here's is Jeffrey R. Holland's -

None Were with Him
Elder Jeffrey R. Holland Of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles
Trumpeted from the summit of Calvary is the truth that we will never be left alone nor unaided, even if sometimes we may feel that we are.
Thank you, Sister Thompson, and thanks to the remarkable women of this Church. Brothers and sisters, my Easter-season message today is intended for everyone, but it is directed in a special way to those who are alone or feel alone or, worse yet, feel abandoned. These might include those longing to be married, those who have lost a spouse, and those who have lost—or have never been blessed with—children. Our empathy embraces wives forsaken by their husbands, husbands whose wives have walked away, and children bereft of one or the other of their parents—or both. This group can find within its broad circumference a soldier far from home, a missionary in those first weeks of homesickness, or a father out of work, afraid the fear in his eyes will be visible to his family. In short it can include all of us at various times in our lives.
To all such, I speak of the loneliest journey ever made and the unending blessings it brought to all in the human family. I speak of the Savior’s solitary task of shouldering alone the burden of our salvation. Rightly He would say: “I have trodden the winepress alone; and of the people there was none with me. . . . I looked, and there was none to help; and I wondered that there was none to uphold [me].”1
As President Uchtdorf so beautifully noted earlier, we know from scripture that Jesus’s messianic arrival in Jerusalem on the Sunday preceding Passover, a day directly analogous to this very morning, was a great public moment. But eagerness to continue walking with Him would quickly begin to wane.
Soon enough He was arraigned before the Israelite leaders of the day—first Annas, the former high priest, then Caiaphas, the current high priest. In their rush to judgment these men and their councils declared their verdict quickly and angrily. “What further need have we of witnesses?” they cried. “He is [worthy] of death.”2
With that He was brought before the gentile rulers in the land. Herod Antipas, the tetrarch of Galilee, interrogated Him once, and Pontius Pilate, the Roman governor in Judea, did so twice, the second time declaring to the crowd, “I, having examined him before you, have found no fault in this man.”3 Then, in an act as unconscionable as it was illogical, Pilate “scourged Jesus, [and] delivered him to be crucified.”4 Pilate’s freshly washed hands could not have been more stained or more unclean.
Such ecclesiastical and political rejection became more personal when the citizenry in the street turned against Jesus as well. It is one of the ironies of history that sitting with Jesus in prison was a real blasphemer, a murderer and revolutionary known as Barabbas, a name or title in Aramaic meaning “son of the father.”5 Free to release one prisoner in the spirit of the Passover tradition, Pilate asked the people, “Whether of the twain will ye that I release unto you?” They said, “Barabbas.”6 So one godless “son of the father” was set free while a truly divine Son of His Heavenly Father moved on to crucifixion.
This was also a telling time among those who knew Jesus more personally. The most difficult to understand in this group is Judas Iscariot. We know the divine plan required Jesus to be crucified, but it is wrenching to think that one of His special witnesses who sat at His feet, heard Him pray, watched Him heal, and felt His touch could betray Him and all that He was for 30 pieces of silver. Never in the history of this world has so little money purchased so much infamy. We are not the ones to judge Judas’s fate, but Jesus said of His betrayer, “Good [were it] for that man if he had not been born.”7
Of course others among the believers had their difficult moments as well. Following the Last Supper, Jesus left Peter, James, and John to wait while He ventured into the Garden of Gethsemane alone. Falling on His face in prayer, “sorrowful . . . unto death,”8 the record says, His sweat came as great drops of blood9 as He pled with the Father to let this crushing, brutal cup pass from Him. But, of course, it could not pass. Returning from such anguished prayer He found His three chief disciples asleep, prompting Him to ask, “Could ye not watch with me one hour?”10 So it happens two more times until on His third return He says compassionately, “Sleep on now, and take your rest,”11 though there would be no rest for Him.
Later, after Jesus’s arrest and appearance at trial, Peter, accused of knowing Jesus and being one of His confidants, denies that accusation not once but three times. We don’t know all that was going on here, nor do we know of protective counsel which the Savior may have given to His Apostles privately,12 but we do know Jesus was aware that even these precious ones would not stand with Him in the end, and He had warned Peter accordingly.13 Then, with the crowing of the cock, “the Lord turned, and looked upon Peter. And Peter remembered the word of the Lord. . . . And [he] went out, and wept bitterly.”14
Thus, of divine necessity, the supporting circle around Jesus gets smaller and smaller and smaller, giving significance to Matthew’s words: “All the disciples [left] him, and fled.”15 Peter stayed near enough to be recognized and confronted. John stood at the foot of the cross with Jesus’s mother. Especially and always the blessed women in the Savior’s life stayed as close to Him as they could. But essentially His lonely journey back to His Father continued without comfort or companionship.
Now I speak very carefully, even reverently, of what may have been the most difficult moment in all of this solitary journey to Atonement. I speak of those final moments for which Jesus must have been prepared intellectually and physically but which He may not have fully anticipated emotionally and spiritually—that concluding descent into the paralyzing despair of divine withdrawal when He cries in ultimate loneliness, “My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?”16
The loss of mortal support He had anticipated, but apparently He had not comprehended this. Had He not said to His disciples, “Behold, the hour . . . is now come, that ye shall be scattered, every man to his own, and shall leave me alone: and yet I am not alone, because the Father is with me” and “The Father hath not left me alone; for I do always those things that please him”?17
With all the conviction of my soul I testify that He did please His Father perfectly and that a perfect Father did not forsake His Son in that hour. Indeed, it is my personal belief that in all of Christ’s mortal ministry the Father may never have been closer to His Son than in these agonizing final moments of suffering. Nevertheless, that the supreme sacrifice of His Son might be as complete as it was voluntary and solitary, the Father briefly withdrew from Jesus the comfort of His Spirit, the support of His personal presence. It was required; indeed it was central to the significance of the Atonement, that this perfect Son who had never spoken ill nor done wrong nor touched an unclean thing had to know how the rest of humankind—us, all of us—would feel when we did commit such sins. For His Atonement to be infinite and eternal, He had to feel what it was like to die not only physically but spiritually, to sense what it was like to have the divine Spirit withdraw, leaving one feeling totally, abjectly, hopelessly alone.
But Jesus held on. He pressed on. The goodness in Him allowed faith to triumph even in a state of complete anguish. The trust He lived by told Him in spite of His feelings that divine compassion is never absent, that God is always faithful, that He never flees nor fails us. When the uttermost farthing had then been paid, when Christ’s determination to be faithful was as obvious as it was utterly invincible, finally and mercifully, it was “finished.”18 Against all odds and with none to help or uphold Him, Jesus of Nazareth, the living Son of the living God, restored physical life where death had held sway and brought joyful, spiritual redemption out of sin, hellish darkness and despair. With faith in the God He knew was there, He could say in triumph, “Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit.”19
Brothers and sisters, one of the great consolations of this Easter season is that because Jesus walked such a long, lonely path utterly alone, we do not have to do so. His solitary journey brought great company for our little version of that path—the merciful care of our Father in Heaven, the unfailing companionship of this Beloved Son, the consummate gift of the Holy Ghost, angels in heaven, family members on both sides of the veil, prophets and apostles, teachers, leaders, friends. All of these and more have been given as companions for our mortal journey because of the Atonement of Jesus Christ and the Restoration of His gospel. Trumpeted from the summit of Calvary is the truth that we will never be left alone nor unaided, even if sometimes we may feel that we are. Truly the Redeemer of us all said, “I will not leave you comfortless. [My Father and] I will come to you [and abide with you].”20
My other plea at Easter time is that these scenes of Christ’s lonely sacrifice, laced with moments of denial and abandonment and, at least once, outright betrayal, must never be reenacted by us. He has walked alone once. Now, may I ask that never again will He have to confront sin without our aid and assistance, that never again will He find only unresponsive onlookers when He sees you and me along His Via Dolorosa in our present day. As we approach this holy week—Passover Thursday with its Paschal Lamb, atoning Friday with its cross, Resurrection Sunday with its empty tomb—may we declare ourselves to be more fully disciples of the Lord Jesus Christ, not in word only and not only in the flush of comfortable times but in deed and in courage and in faith, including when the path is lonely and when our cross is difficult to bear. This Easter week and always, may we stand by Jesus Christ “at all times and in all things, and in all places that [we] may be in, even until death,”21 for surely that is how He stood by us when it was unto death and when He had to stand entirely and utterly alone. In the name of Jesus Christ, amen.