The Family is Central: A Sacred Institution {Guest Post}

THIS POST IS THE SECOND IN A SERIES. SAMUEL HILL IS THE FIRST OF A COUPLE OF GUEST BLOGGERS, ALL OF THEM COMMENTING ON THE FAMILY PROCLAMATION, AROUND THE THEME: FAMILY IS CENTRAL. OTHER TITLES IN THIS SERIES INCLUDE: 

~THE FAMILY IS CENTRAL: CENTRAL TO HAPPINESS 

~THE FAMILY IS CENTRAL: CENTRAL TO FULFILLMENT

Many today wonder why people of faith hold the family in such high regard despite all the imperfections that seem to infect the institution. When we defend the sanctity of the family in the many debates over gay marriage, religious rights, etc., we are frequently criticized for the high rates of abuse, infidelity, and divorce even in marriages of faith.

One answer that we do not often hear from the defenders of the traditional family is this, which I consider to be the most important: the family is a sacred institution to God. Of all the answers that people of faith can offer, this ought to be the most prominent. In the plan of God, the “family is central.” and cannot be done without.

Why this emphasis, not just from people of the Abrahamic faiths, but also from God himself? The simple reality is that the family is THE bedrock of every good teaching, both in a religious sense, and in a worldly sense.

One of the finest accounts of this quality of the family comes from the Book of Mormon tale of the Army of Helaman. Having converted to the faith of Christ from an idolatrous and murderous life, the people of Ammon were threatened with extinction by their former brethren, the Lamanites, because of their faith. “Now there was not one soul among all the people who had been converted unto the Lord that would take up arms against their brethren; nay, they would not even make any preparations for war...” When these people came to “believe and to know the truth, they were firm, and would suffer even unto death rather than commit sin...” And indeed, when their former brethren came to battle against them, the people of Ammon “went out to meet them, and prostrated themselves before them to the earth, and began to call on the name of the Lord...” Although 1005 of them were slain that day, their example swayed an even greater number of Lamanites to repent and follow their example. (Alma 24, approx. 77 B.C.)

Although they found brief periods of peace in the decade that followed, within 15 years they were at war with the Lamanites again. No longer a small skirmish aimed at only a single small population, the full massed army of the Lamanite nation had gathered to conquer or destroy the people of Ammon and their protectors, the Nephites. Seeing the destruction and suffering, the people of Ammon thought to break their word to God, and take up arms against the Lamanites in defense of their freedoms. Instead, 2000 their sons who were too young to join their parents’ covenant forswearing violence, volunteered to go to war in their stead. These “very young” boys are referred to repeatedly as “stripling,” an archaic word that means in essence, a young adolescent. In my mind I liken them to myself as a scrawny 14 year old whose chest was about as well defined as a piece of plywood (apologies to Mr. Friberg).

Despite their youth, and their inexperience in war, these striplings were described as “exceedingly valiant for courage,” and “true at all times in whatsoever thing they were entrusted” (53:20). Their response, when asked by their commander whether they ought to join in a terrible battle against a mighty army, a battle that had already taken the lives of thousands of seasoned soldiers, was thus:

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46 For as I had ever called them my sons (for they were all of them very young) even so they said unto me: Father, behold our God is with us, and he will not suffer that we should fall; then let us go forth; we would not slay our brethren if they would let us alone; therefore let us go, lest they should overpower the army of Antipus.

47 Now they never had fought, yet they did not fear death; and they did think more upon the liberty of their fathers than they did upon their lives; yea, they had been taught by their mothers, that if they did not doubt, God would deliver them.

48 And they rehearsed unto me the words of their mothers, saying: We do not doubt our mothers knew it. (emphasis added)(Alma 53, approx. 64 B.C.)

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Imagine the example these young men were raised with: Their parents had the conviction to surrender their own lives without a fight out of devotion to their faith; mothers and fathers willing to make the ultimate sacrifice to keep their word to God. I do not wonder that they became paragons of faith, integrity, and courage. Luckily for us, our parents don’t have to be willing to die to show us a good example. Any parent that tries to be a good parent, will learn “to love and serve one another, observe the commandments of God, and be law-abiding citizens wherever they live.”

These are just a few ways that the family teaches us:

• Pacing the hallway and singing to a child with stomach flue all night while they scream and cry? They learn to understand unconditional love.
• Admitting to your kid that something you did was wrong and apologizing to them? You’ve just taught them to be honest and humble.
• Getting up at an absurd hour because someone in your neighborhood needs help? You’ve just taught your kid to sacrifice for others.
• Explaining to you kid who just dropped an air conditioner out the window that even though you’re upset, you still love them no matter what? You’ve just given them a glimpse of how God loves them.
• Lovingly working alongside your child to clean the crayon marks off the walls? You’ve taught them both patience and responsibility.
• Making your kid do chores for money to replace the neighbors window that just met the business end of a baseball? That’s a lesson in accountability.
• The alcoholic father dragging himself to an AA meeting week after week despite frequent relapses? That’s teaching his kids about repentance.
• Praying together when you’ve lost your job and you don’t know how to eat next week? You’re teaching the kids to rely on God.
• Showing up at their baseball game even when you are dog-tired and the weather sucks? You’ve taught them that they matter to you.

This list could go on forever, and I’ve no doubt that most of you are thinking back to things your parents did that left an impression. I think you get the point: There is no other organization or structure on the face of the earth that can impart the many lessons needed to build strong societies, good governments, and a wholesome human race.



Samuel Hill is a husband, father, historian, gardener, disciple, gamer, teacher, political scientist and swordsmen without enough time to do them all. When he's not playing with his kids, he is often found neck deep in some old book that causes his wife to weep with boredom. Thereafter he is frequently found baking something to pay her back.

#PrinceofPeace: Prayer

One afternoon several years ago, I helped my son, then about 3, to plant some strawberries in a section of our garden that we had designated as his very own. He buried the strawberry roots we'd bought, he carried his little watering can over to the hose and then back to the garden to give them their first drink. And every day he checked to see if they were up above the ground yet.

As happens sometimes in the spring in our area, a few days later there was a huge storm. High winds, hail, possibly tornadoes... this storm meant business. As I tucked my little son into his bed on the second floor of our house, I mentioned to him that the storm was very bad, and that it might damage his little baby strawberries, and I reassured him that, if it did, we'd replant. Then I listened to him say his prayers.

"Heavenly Father, please protect my baby strawberries."

I gave him a kiss, and when he was asleep, I headed downstairs to my computer to keep an eye on the storm: there are some days where our second-story bedrooms are not my favorite thing, and I don't sleep through bad storms very well. Fortunately, this one wasn't far away, and I wouldn't need to stay up ridiculously late to watch the storm and be able to grab my boy and head to the basement if things got too exciting.

The storm was everything that the forecast had promised. I watched it dye the map red as it passed my parents' town, sixty miles to the west of us, and began to approach our home. As it pushed past their place, the whole storm began to rotate, so that, rather than being hit by the center of the storm, as it originally looked like would happen -- and would have been the usual pattern for weather coming from that direction -- the storm began to shift a little south, and the northern edge moved closer to our home. As the shifting storm arrived in our area, I was amazed. Zooming in on the radar map, I realized that, in all that violent red and orange storm, there was a small green square, where it was only gentle rain, about two blocks by two blocks. And that square stayed centered over my house as the storm rotated on that spot - almost like an eye. Looking out the window, there was nothing to tell me that the storm was a problem: if I had not seen the forecast and watched the map, I would not have known that it was a bad storm. I sat and watched that storm for several hours, first because I was worried about needing to take shelter in the basement, then later because I knew that I was seeing a miracle that had come in response to my son's prayer.

"Heavenly Father, please protect my baby strawberries."

I have pondered the lessons of that evening many times since then. The forces that arranged that miracle were sent in motion long before my son actually said his prayers at bedtime: God knew what he was going to ask before he asked it, and had set in motion the answer long before. There have been times where I wanted to pray for something to happen, but thought that it was too close, too late for anything to affect the situation before the critical moment. But God isn't limited by time the way that we are: He knows the end from the beginning.

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And all things, whatsoever ye shall ask in prayer, believing, ye shall receive.
-Matthew 21:22

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Little things matter to God: a preschooler's baby strawberries are important enough for Him to move a huge storm. Even though the strawberries were easily replaceable. I've become aware of His help in a many little things: when we were potty training He warned me many times daily to take my daughter to the bathroom before she had an accident. I realized, after I broke my pizza stone, that I'd missed a prompting that would have saved it. He'd sent that prompting three different times, and three times I'd meant to act on it, but got distracted and forgot. Still, my pizza stone was important enough for Him to worry about, even knowing that I was going to miss the message until it was too late.

One of the lessons I've learned from bad guys in the scriptures is the importance of asking. Laman and Lemuel didn't understand the things their father was teaching them, but when Nephi asked them if they'd prayed about it, they gave a familiar excuse:

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We have not; for the Lord maketh no such thing known unto us.
-1 Nephi 15:9

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The willingness to ask -it's even a commandment that we ask- is one of the significant differences between Nephi and his brothers. One of the big lessons for me in the strawberries that the Lord saved for my son is that God not only cares about small and simple things in the abstract, as they affect His grand designs, but that He cares about my small matters. The minutia of my life is something that He is aware of -- and He works with it to both teach me to trust Him, and also to make my life run more smoothly. We can take even our small concerns to Him; He cares.

20 Principles: Justice (part 2)

This post is part of a series. Please to visit the series index for more thoughts on the writings of Charlotte Mason.

Go here to read Justice (Part One), which covers Truth and Integrity, the first half of Miss Mason's four aspects of Justice:


Truth: justice in word
Integrity: justice in action
Sound Opinions: justice in thought
Sound Principles: justice in motive

Now we're moving away from that external behavior which is seen and on to that internal motivation which is unseen:

Sound Opinions: Justice in Thought

On our journey toward Justice in our actions, I think that, to get the details right, we are going to have to come to a place where we require justice of ourselves in our thoughts -- which will greatly impact the opinions that we allow ourselves to form and to hold. Miss Mason explained it this way:

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There is another form in which the magnanimous citizen of the future must be taught the sense of justice. Our opinions show our integrity of thought. Every person has many opinions whether his own honestly thought out, or notions picked up from his pet newspaper or his companions. The person who thinks out his opinions modestly and carefully is doing his duty as truly as if he saved a life because there is no more or less about duty.
-Charlotte Mason, 6:61-62

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At first, I was more than a little startled by the assertion that sound opinions could be as weighty as a life saved. Then I thought of the current political debacle with Mr. Trump and Mrs. Clinton as our candidates, and how unsound opinions are endangering our Liberties -- and how Agency is God's most priceless gift to man, next to life itself. And I thought how the careless opinion, repeated, become gossip and can ruin the reputation of a good man undeservedly, and the pain and heartache that causes. All the sudden, opinions seem much more important.

I have no idea if this is a legitimate Einstein quote, memes from the internet being what they are, but whoever said it, I think there is a great deal of wisdom in it:

In recent years, I have become more inclined to say, "I haven't researched that topic enough to have a well-formed opinion on the matter," and when I think about this idea of sound opinion reflecting justice in thought, it makes me want to be all the more cautious about forming and especially sharing hasty opinions.


Sound Principles: Justice in Motive

It was the marital arts that really taught me to see what a principle is; it's really remarkable how  techniques, when examined closely, are just so many ways of manipulating the opponents' spine this way or that way.  Once I learned to think of principles as the underlying idea that governs body movement in the martial arts, it was a concept that quickly transferred to and enriched my understanding of my faith.

Take Sabbath observance, for instance. We make "Sunday Cans" to help children think of things that they can do on the Sabbath. That's a technique. There are long lists of techniques that are all aimed at helping people think of things that are acceptable for the Sabbath. I've seen people get into some pretty intense conversations about whether this or that ought to make the cut. But once you understand the principle, it becomes a whole lot clearer: The Sabbath exists to create an opportunity for us to worship alone and in community,  and to assist us in coming to Christ. That's the point; the principle. It's the movement the technique is designed to create. It's the underlying unifying idea that causes us to include or exclude any specific activity. And the passing of the principle to our children is far more important that passing a list of techniques; the understanding and acceptance of the principle is what's going to make the teaching stick over the long run, and help them to sort out what to do with new options that they discover as potential activities for the Sabbath day.

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For what, after all, are principles but those motives of first importance which govern us, move us in thought and action? We appear to pick up these in a casual way and are seldom able to render an account of them and yet our lives are ordered by our principles, good or bad.
-Charlotte Mason, 6:62

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Christ told the lawyer that all the Law and the Prophets hung on just two principles,  which can be summed up in only six words: love God and love your neighbor. It is no accident that the principle that guides the entire Gospel of Christ deals with the things going on in the heart, and the reason that it's the principle is because love is the motive that guides and creates just actions. And educating children in sound principles - good and just motivations - is at the very heart and soul of what it means to educate a child.

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True education seeks to make men and women not only good mathematicians, proficient linguist, profound scientists, or brilliant literary lights, but also honest men with virtue, temperance, and brotherly love. It seeks to make men and women who prize truth, justice, wisdom, benevolence, and self-control as the choicest acquisitions of a successful life.
--David O. McKay, quoted by Ted E. Brewerton, "Character - The True Aim of Education"

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Miss Mason put it succinctly, both outlining the duty of the parent and educator, and also pointing out the predictable result of failure to properly instruct:

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If a schoolboy is to be guided into the justice of thought from which sound opinions emanate, how much more does he need guidance in arriving at that justice in motive which we call sound principles. ... Small wonder that juvenile crime increases; the intellectually starved boy must needs find food for his imagination, scope for his intellectual power; and crime, like the cinema, offers it must be admitted, brave adventures.
-Charlotte Masons 6:62-63

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It's easier, I think, to consider what we justly owe to our fellow men in our behavior and attitudes and motivations. But Justice is a double-edged sword that cuts both ways:

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"You ask: Have we then no rights ourselves, and have other people no duties towards us? We have indeed rights, precisely the same rights as other people, and when we learn to think of ourselves as one of the rest, with just the same rights as other people and no more, to whom others owe just such duties as we owe to them and no more, we shall, as it were, get our lives in focus and see things as they are."
-Charlotte Mason, 4:139

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Here, of course, we see the problem of trying to separate religion and education. For, if you banish faith from education, on what grounds will you lay your principles? And without a solid principled foundation, how can you build the sort of education that will encourage children to become adults who are honest men of virtue, temperance, and brotherly love who prize Truth, Goodness, and Beauty? These principles are at the heart of religion, which is why Miss Mason said that education is, rightly, religion's handmaid. Others have said it in other words:

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Alma discovered this same principle, that “the preaching of the word had a great tendency to lead the people to do that which was just--yea, it had had more powerful effect upon the minds of the people than the sword” (Alma 31:5). Why? Because the sword focused only on punishing behavior--or do--while preaching the word changed people’s very nature--who they were or could become.
-Lynn G Robins, Apr. 2011

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And that's what we're after - not just a change in behavior, but a mighty change in the very nature of our students. We want Justice not only in the behavior that is seen, but in the unseen, quiet parts of the soul. We want Justice, in all its facets, to be written in the fleshy tables of their hearts.

Took a Walk

The kids got invited to a birthday party, and I got to take a nature walk all by myself.  That hasn't happened in a loooong old time.

It's really different, doing nature all by myself. I liked it. And I missed the kids.  Before I had kids, I never used to have that problem. I went places and did things by myself, and it was fine. Now, even when I'm enjoying it, I'm thinking, "Oh, Hero would like that. It would be fun to show this to Peanut. That's where Dragon would be jumping." Funny how things change.

I never used to even see the little wildflowers. 

They're all over the place. Little gifts from Heaven.

The trail I was on is a little bit different habitat from where I'm usually birding. 

It's only a little different, but it sure made a difference in the birds I was hearing. 

But quite a few of the ones I know were there. I like that. It's a good feeling, knowing the critters that are around. My bird-friends were singing all over the place. And there was a bunch of little bitty frogs that I kept startling. They were too quick to hop into the underbrush, though, for me to get a picture of them. I ought to learn more about the frogs. They're cool.

  

Chickadees have been kind of scarce in my yard lately, but there were tons of them in the woods. I enjoyed watching them. They were behaving differently than they do in my yard, too. That's always interesting, watching old friends do new things in new places. Nature always has plenty to teach.

I heard some of the Clay-colored Sparrows that I recently figured out. They're cool; they sound a bit like bugs. Now that I know them, I smile whenever I hear them. They're shy, though; I've only seen them a handful of the times that I've heard them.

The flowers are still blooming, but this one shrub was already yellow, and the cicada song has switched from their early song to the late song. I'm seeing signs of Fall all over, and I'm having a hard time deciding how I feel about that. I feel much the same kind of ambivalence about my kids growing up. They're getting big enough to leave places, without a parent. Even Peanut. I'm slowly getting more "me time". Peanut has a long way to go, still; she's only 3. But Dragon is starting to prepare for his baptism in another 2 years. It'll be done and over so fast, he'll be baptized and preparing for the priesthood, like Hero is now, and I won't hardly know what hit me. Hero is already more than halfway to adulthood - he'll be 10 in September, and when he's doubled his age, he'll probably be nearly finished with his mission. Maybe have a sweet young thing on his mind.

It's a long way off, yet, but I'm realizing that this season of my life, like summer, isn't going to last forever. I suppose that's a good thing. To everything there is a season.

But I'm glad that it's summer now.

Busy Day

Some days are busier than others. 

Today Dragon is very busy. He's building a library. 

It's serious business. They are happy to loan books. Or sell them, so you can keep then forever. I'm not at all sure which my librarian would prefer. But I did borrow one, and his sister promptly demanded that I read it. Dragon doesn't seem to have time for stories today; he has Things To Do.

Next, the library installed sleeping space. Looks a mite cramped to me, but Dragon is pleased. 

Our "Teddy Bear" joined the game (she says she's Daddy's Teddy Bear), and the library had another nice expansion, courtesy of the kitchen chairs.

I suppose I could have interrupted their play for the book learning I had planned this morning, but play is important. So I didn't. They kept at their game for several hours. We'll actually read a few of those books tomorrow; today they are props.

Childbearing in the Old Testament

Reading about childbearing and the importance placed on childbearing and the continuance of the family in the Old Testament is fascinating stuff. I first spent time studying some of the Old Testament women when I was struggling to deal with my own infertility problems. There's tons of stories where you see this idea.

Hannah grieved until it affected her marriage, and eventually the priest thought she was drunk.

 Rachel's anguish was such that she thought it would kill her.

Sarah, seeing that she had no children, gave her maid to her husband as another wife to secure the continuance of his line.

In each of these stories, the women not only deal with the grief of childlessness, but they also must cope with the taunting of the women around them who are able to bear, and mock them for their barrenness. The grief of their empty arms is compounded by cruel jibes about their inability to perform in the sacred role of mother.

But there's some other, less familiar, less comfortable stories, and these almost tell us more about the importance placed on childbearing and the continuity of the family line.

Lot's daughters get him drunk and conceive - in our day, drugging someone like this is criminalized as rape. The Bible tells us that they were trying to preserve the seed of their father. It's an extreme that I can't picture in our day. Quite aside from the criminal nature of the act, I don't see our world putting that kind of importance on the matter. Family lines die out regularly, with no fanfare.

That's not the only story of what seems to me like an extreme position to take in order to preserve the family line. There's also the one I was reading tonight, from 2 Samuel 14, with the Widow of Tekoah.

Basically, it goes like this: two of David's sons have a disagreement, and the one kills the other (he's not without a certain amount of justification) and then runs away, fearing that King David will be angry with him. 3 years pass, and David misses his son, so one of the son's buddies gets a Widow of Tekoah to go see the king. She spins this tale about how she had 2 sons, and one killed the other, and now the family wants to kill the survivor, and can't the king do something so that her husband's line isn't ended forever? And the king listens to her! Tells her he'll handle it, and her surviving (murdering) son will be safe. At that point she says, "Uh, king, sir, don't be mad, but I was actually talking about YOUR son that's in exile," the son comes home, and life goes on.

It's amazing to me to see how far the cultural shift has gone in the other direction. This widow asked the king to excuse her son's murder, so that her family line could continue. And he was prepared to do it. No way that would fly now. Now, it's wait to have kids, if you have them at all. I've heard that stuff from folks in the church, even, though it's contrary to what the prophet says. But that's the fashionable thing, waiting. But then, then it was different.

From April Conference 1979: Fortify Your Homes Against Evil

 The importance placed upon children in the Old Testament is amazing. Women now often peg their value to education or other things, but you can see in the stories of Hannah and Rachel and Sarah how they pegged their value on the ability to bear children. (Neither is correct, in my opinion; a woman's value is intrinsic.) The lengths that some of the people went to just boggles my mind. I don't think that the extremes are good, but that's what brought this particular theme to my attention. Maybe that's why some of those stories are in there: to draw our attention to the importance of children. Because it's not just the crazies. Those women we love to hear about, Hannah, Rachel, Sarah, Elizabeth, they knew something about how important children are, too. Interestingly, in every case, those feminine heroes of the scriptures' infertility was resolved, and they bore at least one child. I'm still pondering that; obviously not every story ends so well in this life. But I'm certain that if I ponder it long enough, the Lord will teach me what it is His message is in their stories. I'm looking forward to that.

This post is part of a series.

Click the button below to go to the series index.

Praise Ye the Lord

He maketh the barren woman to keep house, and to be a joyful mother of children. Praise ye the LORD.
-Psalms 113:9

This is one of my very favorite verses. I used to hold it as a promise, now, I look at it there on the side of my blog, right above the pictures of my children, and I am filled with amazement and gratitude. Through the long years of waiting, I cried over the stories of Hannah and Elizabeth and Sariah, and yearned for children. Now I have three little angles to hold. What a blessing. Praise seems like such a tame word for what I'm feeling.

Memorial Day

Weekly Wrap-up: A Person Place or Thing

We started doing First Language Lessons this week. I suspect that we'll breeze right through this pretty quickly; it's relatively straight-forward and Monkey's good at language stuff. The first lesson introduces nouns, so of course I had to go find the applicable Schoolhouse Rock clip! Music makes everything better.



I felt the need to buy books this week. This happens sometimes. Fortunately, I hadn't been to my favorite thrift store in a bit, so we headed there while we were out grocery shopping. What a great call! The books were $.25 each; we spent $5.50.



And, as is the norm for our house, we had a steady diet of lego creations. This one is a Batplane. We also had a dragon, some tanks, a starfighter, a missile (several of those), a couple buildings, a pyramid-shaped staircase... yeah. Lots of legos around here. We even used them for math.





The Math Expressions book uses "bodies in motion" regularly to help cement the number concepts we work with. This time Monkey chose to do jumps. He jumped 10 times, then 9 times, then 7 times, as we worked with the numbers. He always loves that sort of thing!



Monkey's been enjoying a steady diet of "Super Friends," and as a result I am often corrected if we call him the wrong thing: "Wonder Woman, I'm Superman today!" Oops. Guess I'd better get that right! He's got two Superman shirts and a Batman, and for the days that those are dirty, he talked me into making a bat-symbol to pin to his chest. And of course the cape. Always the cape.



And then there was the balloon creations. Note that he was Batman that day. :])



We had a look at the super moon. That was chilly - and a bit frustrating because I was struggling with my camera at a time when I cared how the pictures turn out. I need to go take some more moon pictures sometime just to figure out the new camera some more.



Let's see. I made biscotti. Monkey helped me eat them. Especially the half covered in chocolate. He wasn't all that impressed with them once the dipped part was gone, but he sure liked to have the chocolate part!



In addition to that we had a visit from several of my family members, which I completely failed to photograph. BAD me! And we did a bunch of school, though we did take Thursday off while the family was here. I guess maybe there's a reason why I felt like this was a busy week, even more so than usual.

1000th Post Celebration: Giveaway #1! (Closed)

I've reached 1000 posts! To celebrate, I've partnered with some Etsy shops to give some wonderful gifts to some lucky people! My first guest is Syrendell. Start out by going an having a look at her beautiful yarns and handmade wooden items. I'll wait. If you happen to be in California, you might think about taking a seminar on what to do with all those beautiful yarns. Then come on back and I'll tell you what she's sharing with one lucky blog reader!



Up For Grabs:


Syrendell is sharing an ebook, Dying Fun With Children! A wealth of information on dyeing with natural ingredients, powdered drinks mixes, gelatin desserts and more! Looks like great material for handicrafts or just a bunch of fun afternoons with the kids. The ebook includes resources for families who want to get started with dyeing yarns, silks, eggs, fabrics at home. Written by master dyer Bjo Trimble of Griffin Dyeworks and published by Syrendell. This eBook will be emailed to you in .pdf format, and is for personal use only.

How to Enter:

Step 1: Go to Syrendell's store and choose a favorite item.
Step 2: Post a link to this giveaway on your blog.
Step 3: Leave a comment on this post telling us what's your favorite & a link to your blog.

If you want, you can use this code to copy for a short post:

<center><a href="http://ritsumeithoughts.blogspot.com/2010/12/1000th-post-celebration-giveaway-1.html"><img border="0" alt="Visit Baby Steps" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj-beZNMWcCmmyUXp_jSLDOPnqhWp9jg7-uXhLZKe7ZltKYu0DYu608clpausU2xPs12ZG7LQi64rwwR43DLB6SCcSt82POZaRXkOQvsCGqyuNsk5Hw_mIgTLvY5fWYA0konPOUYw/s144/badge.jpg"/></a><br>Baby Steps Blog is giving away a Syrendell ebook: <br>Dying Fun With Children!!<br>Click to Enter.</center>

It will look like this:

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Baby Steps Blog is giving away a Syrendell ebook:
Dying Fun With Children!!
Click to Enter.

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Up to Two Extra Entries:

1. Add Syrendell to your favorite Etsy shops. Leave a separate comment, including your Etsy login name, on this post.

2. People who follow this blog, whether you jumped on the bandwagon to day or last year, can also leave a comment on this post indicating that you follow Baby Steps.

Entries must be received by 11:59PM CST the 10th of December.

That's it! Good luck!

Spoon

We took Monkey to Applebee's a while back. They had some beautiful light coming in the window that afternoon, so I pulled out my camera. Fortunately, Monkey's pretty used to me.


We got him one of those "shooters" they have. A little ice cream; a whole lot of whipped cream. He was a happy guy. Plus, it came with a spoon. Doesn't that face just say, "What is this thing, and what am I to do with it?"


He got it figured out. I guess it's not really that different from the ones at home.

(I'm trying out the "visions of sugarplums" action from It's Times Like These on these pictures. I like it.)