Where the two cents is

Hopefully you missed my post of my 1.5 cents.  I was ranting on and on and not getting my point across very well about wanting to help others and being sure others helped themselves..basically  disagreeing with the government's idea of helping others in our country.

I happened upon a talk that lays my thoughts and some Prophets of God fairly well...this is from President Romney from a while back quoting President Clark who warned us even longer ago.   Just wanting to help others is not enough. We have to want to the right way, the Lord's way....

I've edited for length and highlighted my faves:


Before doing so, however, I desire to say a word or two about agency.
Free agency means the freedom and power to choose and act. Next to life itself, it is man’s most precious inheritance.
Free agency was operative in the spirit world. The gospel plan, as there proposed and adopted, provided that men should enjoy agency in mortality. Satan, with a third of the hosts of heaven, fought it there and lost, but they did not give up their opposition to the principle.
In the Garden of Eden, God endowed Adam and his posterity with free agency. Satan and his followers have, from then until now, sought directly and in every conceivable indirect manner to substitute the principle of force for the principle of free agency.
In the book of First Samuel, we have an instructive example of the results of making wrong decisions. In the first chapter we are told that Israel objected to being governed by judges. They wanted a king. The prophet told them that a king would make them servants. But they hearkened not, and persisted in demanding a king. This grieved Samuel, and the Lord said to him, “Hearken unto the voice of the people … for they have not rejected thee, but they have rejected me.” (1 Sam. 8:7.)
Israel thus surrendered the form of free government God had given them. They got their king all right, and a few decades later they were taken captive into slavery. Slavery entered into by one’s own choice is no less slavery than that imposed upon him by external force.
Jesus, by the exercise of his agency, rose to be the second member of the Godhead. Lucifer, by the exercise of his agency, sank to Hades.
I suggest we consider what has happened to our agency with respect to contributing to the means used by the bureaucracy in administering government welfare services.
In order to obtain these means, one head of state is quoted as saying, “We’re going to take all the money we think is unnecessarily being spent and take it from the ‘haves’ and give to the ‘have nots’ that need it so much.” (Congressional Record, 1964, p. 6142—Remarks of the President to a Group of Leaders of Organizations of Senior Citizens in the Fish Room, Mar. 24, 1964.)
The difference between having the means with which to administer welfare assistance taken from us and voluntarily contributing it out of our love of God and fellowman is the difference between freedom and slavery.

Now as to the principle of love. In the operation of our Church Welfare Services, such love is to be the motivating power which moves us to give our time, money, and services.
“Let us love one another,” wrote John the Beloved, “for love is of God; and every one that loveth is born of God, and knoweth God.
“He that loveth not knoweth not God; for God is love.
“In this was manifested the love of God toward us, because that God sent his only begotten Son into the world, that we might live through him. …
“Beloved, if God so loved us, we ought also to love one another.” (1 Jn. 4:7–9, 11.)
“Whoso hath this world’s good, and seeth his brother have need, and shutteth up his bowels of compassion from him, how dwelleth the love of God in him?” (1 Jn. 3:17; italics added.)
“If thou lovest me,” said Jesus, “… thou wilt remember the poor, and consecrate of thy properties for their support. …
“And inasmuch as ye impart of your substance unto the poor, ye will do it unto me.” (D&C 42:29–31.)
When Jesus was asked, “Master, which is the great commandment in the law?” Matthew says that he answered:
“Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind.
“This is the first and great commandment.
“And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself.
“On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.” (Matt. 22:36–40.)
Matthew, Mark, and Luke all three report this incident. Luke, however, further informs us that the lawyer who put the question said further, “And who is my neighbour?” (Luke 10:29.)
And Jesus responded with his Good Samaritan parable:

Two of the three principles upon which the Church Welfare Services must function—agency and love of neighbor—are admirably taught in this parable.
When we love the Lord our God with all our hearts, might, and strength, we will love our brothers as ourselves, and we will voluntarily, in the exercise of our free agency, impart of our substance for their support.

Now about work. Work is just as important to the success of our welfare services as are the first and second great commandments and the preservation of our free agency.

We must ever keep in mind that the First Presidency, in announcing the welfare program in the October 1936 conference, said:
“Our primary purpose was to set up, in so far as it might be possible, a system under which the curse of idleness would be done away with, the evils of a dole abolished, and independence, industry, thrift and self respect be once more established amongst our people. The aim of the Church is to help the people to help themselves. Work is to be re-enthroned as the ruling principle of the lives of our Church membership.” (Conference Report, Oct. 1936, p. 3; italics added.)
A year before this statement was made, on October 7, 1935, President Clark, in a special priesthood meeting held in this tabernacle, referring to government gratuities, said:
“The dispensing of these great quantities of gratuities has produced in the minds of hundreds of thousands—if not millions—of people in the United States a love for idleness, a feeling that the world owes them a living. It has made a breeding ground for some of the most destructive political doctrines that have ever found any hold in this country of ours, and I think it may lead us into serious political trouble.
“I fear,” he continued, “we need not be surprised if some blood shall run before we of this nation finally find ourselves.”

In his conference address of April 1938, President Clark said this:
“I honor and respect old age. I would not see it suffer from want, not from disease that can be helped. It is entitled to every care, to every act of kindness, to every loving caress which a grateful community and a devoted family can give. “I have every sympathy with age. I know the difficulties which age has in fitting into modern, economic life. …
“Some plan must be devised that shall make certain that no aged person shall be cold or go hungry or unclad. But the prime responsibility for supporting an aged parent rests upon his family, not upon society. Ours is not a socialistic or communistic state, where the people are mere vassals to be driven about as animals from one corral to another. We are freemen. So still with us the family has its place and its responsibilities and duties, which are God-given. The family which refuses to keep its own is not meeting its duties. When an aged parent has no family or when the family is itself without means, then society must, as a matter of merest humanity, come to the rescue. This is perfectly clear.

“But it is a far cry from this wise principle to saying that every person reaching a fixed age shall thereafter be kept by the state in idleness. Society owes to no man a life of idleness, no matter what his age. I have never seen one line in Holy Writ that calls for, or even sanctions this. In the past no free society has been able to support great groups in idleness and live free.” (CR, Apr. 1938, pp. 106–7.)
And I’ll say to you that no society in the future will ever be able to do so.

And in a private letter five years later, President Clark wrote:
“You must remember that back and behind this whole propaganda of ‘pensions’, gratuities, and doles to which we are now being subjected, is the idea of setting up in America, a socialistic or communistic state, in which the family would disappear, religion would be prescribed and controlled by the state, and we should all become mere creatures of the state, ruled over by ambitious and designing men.”
What has happened during the third of a century since this statement was made testifies to President Clark’s prophetic insight.

Prayer in schools has been dealt a fatal blow. The integrity of the family is being undermined. Unemployment compensation, Medicaid, aid to families with dependent children (AFDC), food stamps, and hundreds of other transfer-payment programs for veterans, widows or widowers, and children are today all supported, totally or in part, by federal and state/local tax revenue.
Little is said or done in these programs about the obligation of parents to care for their own or of recipients to work for what they receive.
The Lord, in the revelations given during the Restoration, and the presidents of the Church since then, have unequivocally and repeatedly declared that our welfare services are to be founded on love and on work.
The Lord said in the revelation recorded in section 42 of the Doctrine and Covenants, specified by the Prophet Joseph as being the law of the Church:
“Thou shalt not be idle; for he that is idle shall not eat the bread nor wear the garments of the laborer.” (D&C 42:42.)
Later He said:
“And the inhabitants of Zion also shall remember their labors, inasmuch as they are appointed to labor, in all faithfulness; for the idler shall be had in remembrance before the Lord.
“Now, I, the Lord, am not well pleased,” he continued, “with the inhabitants of Zion, for there are idlers among them; and their children are also growing up in wickedness; they also seek not earnestly the riches of eternity, but their eyes are full of greediness.
“These things ought not to be, and must be done away from among them.” (D&C 68:30–32.)

“My faith does not lead me,” President Young continued, “to think the Lord will provide us with roast pigs, bread already buttered, etc.; he will give us the ability to raise the grain, to obtain the fruits of the earth, to make habitations, to procure a few boards to make a box, and when harvest comes, giving us the grain, it is for us to preserve it—to save the wheat until we have one, two, five, or seven years’ provisions on hand, until there is enough of the staff of life saved by the people to bread themselves and those who will come here seeking for safety. … [The fulfillment of that prophecy is yet in the future.]
“Ye Latter-day Saints, learn to sustain yourselves. …
“Implied faith and confidence in God is for you and me to do everything we can to sustain and preserve ourselves. …
“You have learned a good deal, it is true; but learn more; learn to sustain yourselves; lay up grain and flour, and save it against a day of scarcity. …
“Instead of searching after what the Lord is going to do for us, let us inquire what we can do for ourselves.” (Discourses of Brigham Young, Deseret Book, 1966 ed., pp. 291–93.)
“To be Latter-day Saints men and women must be thinkers and workers,” said President Joseph F. Smith. “They must be men and women who weigh matters in their minds; men and women who consider carefully their course of life and the principles that they have espoused.” (Gospel Doctrine, Deseret Book, 1939 ed., p. 114.)
President Grant declared:
“I am a firm believer that work does not kill anyone. …
“I have never seen the day when I was not willing to do the meanest work … rather than be idle. …
“Men should have a pride in doing their full share and never want to be paid for that which they have not earned. …
“I assert with confidence that the law of success, here and hereafter, is to have a humble and a prayerful heart, and to work, work, WORK. …

A statement which focuses upon and gives real meaning to what we have been talking about here is the following “Editorial on Labor,” written and published by John Taylor in Nauvoo, October 15, 1844. I just found this recently, and I think it’s a marvelous statement. This was way back there just after the Prophet had been martyred. It reads:
“Labor is the manufacturer of wealth. It was ordained of God, as the medium to be used by man to obtain his living [italics added]: hence it is the universal condition of this great bond to live. …
“God never meant to bemean his creation, especially his own image, because they had to labor:—no; never; God himself according to the good old book labored on this world, six days; and when Adam was animated from clay to life, by his spirit’s making use of him for a dwelling, we read that God put him into the garden to dress it:—Therefore, in connection with the samples of all holy men, we are bound to honor the laboring man: and despise the idler. …
“
Now, my brothers and sisters, the handwriting is on the wall; “the interpretation thereof [is] sure.” (Dan. 2:45.) 

Both history and prophecy—and I may add, common sense—bear witness to the fact that no civilization can long endure which follows the course charted by bemused manipulators and now being implemented as government welfare programs all around the world.
Babylon shall be destroyed, and great shall be the fall thereof. (See D&C 1:16.)
But do not be discouraged. Zion will not go down with her, because Zion shall be built on the principles of love of God and fellowman, work, and earnest labor, as God has directed.
Remember that Enoch’s Zion was built in a day when wickedness was as rampant as it is among us today. Among those who rejected the word of God in that day “there were wars and bloodshed”; they were ripening in that iniquity which brought the flood. “But the Lord came and dwelt with his people, and they dwelt in righteousness. … because they were of one heart and one mind, … and there was no poor among them.” (Moses 7:16, 18.)
As we prepare for the building of Zion, we must not and we shall not abandon the basic principles upon which our Church Welfare Services are founded: love—love of God and neighbor—and work, or labor.
We shall persevere by helping people to help themselves until “the curse of idleness [is] done away with, the evils of a dole abolished, and independence, industry, thrift and self respect [are] once more established amongst our people.”
This is my witness, which I bear to you in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.

And me again...Even the best of people with the best of intentions in using the welfare program call fall into the pattern of idleness. The lord's way is not to use force to have us do anything, even help our fellowman. Why? I'm thinking He knows more than us and knows it won't work.  In the end it is not helping others, it is enslaving them. 

dwtf

that's don't want to forget:

Cole read 'To Kill a Mockingbird', possibly my favorite book, for evoking a greatness of emotions and other good stuff. Anyway, he didn't want to read it because there was no fantasy and basically because I suggested and the first couple of chapters are hard to get through. I figured if he's going to be reading 24/7 and books that are above his age, he needs good ones like these tucked in with the others.  We did comtemplate the mature nature of parts of the book, but have already decided he needs 'the talk' stage 2 and possibly 3 before he's taught it at school.  So Iasked him to read the first two chapters and then if he was done, he was done.  He finished it on our trip to Orlando this weekend and we often use the 10 scale to rate experiences, books and such. So I asked, alright Cole 1-10? He replied 8-9.  This made me happy. I love that he can appreciate a good read, that doesn't include dwarfs, dragons, werewolves. :)

Laura is impressing me more and more with her confidence and unshyness.  She loves swimming soooo much. So we've decided to try her fall activity to be on the city swim team.  This meant she had to try out and swim 75 yards.  We are not naturally water people, so it's not like she's had a lot of time to improve her skills.  We did do a lesson this summer that helped her out a lot.  Anyway, she had to try out in front of other people and was ready to the be 2nd one to do it.  She did it!!!  Now we have to decide if we want to spill out the block of gold they want for fees. ugh!

Hannah was upset on the way home from Orlando we told her we knew she was tired. And while sobbing she said you don't cry because you're tired.  You cry because someone has hurt you (sob), or something is beautiful (sob), or someone died and you were there.  Sadly for her later she was upset...again and her daddy asked...is someone hurting you, no, is something beautiful, no, did someone die and you were there, she did not appreciate this.

Hannah keeps up cracking with things I'm sure she doesn't think is as humorous.  But she is also very thoughtful.  Recently a great man in our ward passed away and we were all very sad.  Hannah continually prayed for him and his family and she also came up with the idea and carried out a fast for him to be ok, she was really still concerned for him even though we told her he was just fine, so she added his family to the fast as well. Very sweet stuff.

def. stuff we don't want to forget :)

Life

  Life breezes by, a breeze that slowly creeps up on you, warm with smells of the brink of autumn, with the passing saltiness of summer and the hint of the crispness of a mild winter and then rushes by with the hope of new awakening that spring brings.  That's hokey, but I like it :).  My two girls started a new elementary school and my son started middle school this week. They have so far done the hard stuff, like actually walking into rooms without a parent with grace and some other characteristic that I can't find the name for, but  impressed me greatly.
I keep trying to buy my son socks that don't fit.  This seems trivial, but I consider it an obvious sign that I would rather my kids not grow any further.  As hard as the young years are with kids hanging at my every thread, walking my son onto a campus with 1,000 other imperfect mid-size growth spurting people, I was the one holding onto threads, and wishing we could go back.
But I'm getting better at accepting our fates.  The principle mentioned that the parents might feel that they're sending their kids to school and when they get home they won't be the same person and she said we were right.  Implying that the kids are embarking on a new stage in life. I know what she means and I try to appreciate the goodness in that. I am the parent who would like to press fast forward through the teen years and just say to the kids, see you on the otherside.  I've often expressed to Brandon my fears of heartbreak for our kids, heartbreaks for us as parents as we have to watch kids make mistakes, possibly big ones.  Brandon has always come back with, but aren't you excited that we get to help them navigate this crazy time and what an exciting time it is.  This week I was able to feel that excitement.  Cole went into the crowd nervous and came back excited about drama (even though there are only four boys) and liking his math teacher (whew!).  I could tell he was more sure and excited about this new journey and it made me happy to be able to be a part of it. 
I always worry about my foibles in parenting really messing my kids up and I realize the jury is still out, but I can't be more proud of the young man my son is turning into.  He's not perfect, but I've definitely seen a maturity in him that I'm so proud of. 

It should be noted that the child takes after the same gender parent and I realize Brandon's a big part of this.  I read this today on pinterest...
http://www.mommamadeitlookeasy.com/2012/07/raising-strong-daughters.html

I need to read it daily and implement.

My girls have been really good with the whole starting the new school thing.  My ever so shy Laura was leading the pack to go to her class.  She's sitting in her chosen front of the room seat.  She likes her teacher.  I've given her the assignment to find out the name of the a person who could potentially be a good friend.  Don't even start on sending my beautiful red head to middle school....serioulsy might do homeschool on this one.  1000 kids, my head spins. I graduated with 32 people. Whew!
 
Hannah has stayed out of trouble in the "runs a tight ship" teacher's class and I couldn't be more proud.  But she did have to walk five laps because of someone else's behavior (I hate when they do that).  She got to stir a lollipop into soda on the first day. The teacher only had to add gum into that for Hannah to be in Hannah Heaven.  And she said the teacher read a story that was so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, funny! 

Everyone's gotten up and gotten going and seem happy to be where they are.  I was lamenting last night of how sad it will be when it's not longer exciting and it's not all new, which I'm kind of expecting by Friday :(.

First day pics, all other pics of Cole are with tongue out..

Pressure

Time flies when you should be blogging. Cole asks me intermittently to blog. I like that the he likes to read, but the pressure!!! But I found one (and only) printed blog books and the guilt came crumbling...

so here's things I need to blog about
two camping trips
Christmas
Adventures in Narnia
Substitute Teaching (there could be a book)
Brandon's job
new floors
oh our cat..have I not blogged about the cat?
wanting to keep my kids young..socks, rollercoasters
Brandon's grandparents
the owl outside our window
summer
my (lack of) style-

a couple of don't want to forgets...

I walked in the girl's room the other night after "lights out", Hannah's sitting there and dryly spouts out, "This is lame". Often I want to ask her how old she thinks she is.

Laura has baby fever, bad. She's keeps asking to hold babies, see babies, take care of babies, for us to have a baby.  Some of those we help to happen as often as possible and put off the rest :). She's such a good sister to Hannah and helper to me.

Cole makes me laugh a lot.  Here's a story that will not seem as funny in type as it was in person, but I want to remember it none the less.

Back story..my mom LOVES horse racing.  A year or so ago we gathered with a good part of the family and mom asked us to watch the movie Secretariat (movie about a race horse). 
This week was the last of the triple crown for horse racing and mom told us about the horse 'I'll have another' that had a chance to make history by winning this particular race (and of course was very excited about it). On Friday we found out that the horse had an injury that would prevent it from racing.  We were disappointed for the horse and for mom, then Cole says, "Well, the good thing is, in five years I won't be forced to watch a movie about a racehorse".   It was so funny to Cole and I we couldn't stop laughing long enough to tell why we were laughing so hard. Love that kid's thought process - most of the time.

I can't say that everyday/moment/week is joyfully bloggable, but it should be documented that life is a huge lump of happy right now. 

more ponderings from the porter's point of view to come, next guilt trip, maybe tomorrow, one of our summer daily things is to write in our journals, this is that for me right now...so bad!

Conversations

Tonight I was in my room while Laura and Hannah were in their room and I overheard the following:

H: Do you believe in God?
L: Yes
H: Do you believe in the easter bunny?
L: ummmm and indiscernable answer, but appropriate
H: Do you believe in Santa Claus
L: (Pause) Yes.
H: Do you believe in the Holy Ghost?
L: Yes.

L: Do you believe in mother Earth?
H: Who is mother Earth?
L: She's our Heavenly mother?
H: Sure.
L: Do you believe in fairies?
H: Yes.
L: Do you believe in the tooth fairy?
H: Wait. I don't believe in fairies, but I believe in the tooth fairy.

H: Do you believe that my friend Shiloh lost a tooth on the playground?
L: Yes.
H: Because that really happened. It came out and there was blood.

there was something else funny...

then yesterday Hannah was all frustrated and told Laura in her best outside voice."You're ruining my life".  Thinking I'll hear that one again before they live in separate residences.  But for now, that's a first :).

Opposites

come from the same genetic makeup...so weird

exhibit....322

we were working on Faith in God with Cole and Laura

Cole listens to the options and on one of the them, maybe the service, he decides he's not fond of the recommendations. He comes up with an option of his own, which we decide is not so much an option..after a couple more we come up with a viable option. He's planning on doing it some time in the near future..plenty of time.

Laura listens to her options and chooses two from the options given for each area. She immediately begins working on three of them, has since finished one and is still fervently working on the others.

And while Hannah wasn't in this example she carries her own tune just as well.

So fun to watch them grow, be there own person with different strengths and talents. I often look at them and am amazed by who they are and worry and anticipate who they are becoming.

Tonight we went to a middle school open house...MIDDLE. SCHOOL (for added emphasis) and they talked about that in a couple of years they would take my baby to Washington D.C. for a week, only teachers to chaperone. I would like to add some expletives here...

Yesterday, I was singing Somewhere over the rainbow to an eager to laugh four month old, looking in the clear blue eyes of a one year old that knew she could swim if I'd just let her go, and making odd gurgle noises with a five month old who wanted to sing before she could talk.

Today, Cole's constanly making me laugh, Laura's found her fins and swims every chance she gets and Hannah sings like she's on Broadway.

I have times when I'd give anything to have just a day back of those early times....just a day :) ) There are pieces of memories that continue to fade. I realize I can't hold onto an 11 year old and smother him with kisses (although sometimes I do), and the kids aren't quite as easily entertained.

We often command the kids to stop growing and of course they don't listen. And of course we don't really want them to...at least half of the time.

Read this recently
"Now I can see that children are as light as air. They float past you, nudging against you like balloons as they ascend." by Simcha Fisher

I'm excited to see my kids "ascend" brillliantly in their individual ways, I would just like to put a little weight on them so as to control how quickly.

And you can bet your butter, my baby is not going to Washington DC for a week without me.

p.s. this was supposed to be a paragraph note about their differences. ??

What's for dinner?

In honor of that thought I'd like to try to revive the
Delectably Delicious Dinners, blog. See link below for past goodies and let me know if you'd like to be a contributor (so official). Tonight we're having this, (in bread bowls that Publix had on sale)...soo excited, http://delectablydeliciousdinners.blogspot.com/2008/08/creamy-chicken-and-wild-rice-soup.html

which is what made me remember the long lost blog, it is in need of design perfecting. If you're interested in decorating the place let me know, other wise I'll add it to my list...:). Ooh look for the honey bun cake, I tried that and it was yummy!

http://delectablydeliciousdinners.blogspot.com/