Sunday

My 2yo ds woke up before 6 a.m. screaming, which seems to be his standard wake up call lately. This of course woke up the baby, so while Daddy laid down with Brennen, I went to nurse Logan who shares a room with my 5yodd, and she of course wakes up. "Mom, can we sew Bitty's (her doll) Easter dress today? She really wants a new Sunday dress." Brennen walks in, "I have dinner. You hold me." Aubrey says, "Can we watch a movie and have popcorn? And will you play Geuss Who?"

At this point I realize I am going to have to talk, and I am barely awake and would rather not for a half hour at least. "No Aubrey, you can't watch a movie, I can't play a game or sew right now. I need to finish feeding the baby and get a couple of things done then I will cook the cinnamon rolls (our traditional Sunday breakfast.)" A sits by me and talks and talks while B whines and cries. After a minute L is done and I try to put him down, nope he shreiks and so I pick him back up. I really dislike it when the kids wake up before me it makes me feel like I'm starting the day way too far behind.

The younger boys and I all have colds, so I ask my husband to stay home with the two little ones, he says that I should stay home too. But if he thinks I am going to give up my almost only period of adult interaction and no children he's crazy.

So I go and listen to high councilmen talk about families, being true to them, loving them. We have Sunday School about Abraham, and I spent part of the time trying to find out how many children he had, 8 for those who want to know. I love Abraham, I admire him, he is a hero to me. The third hour is a combined meeting, the Bishop is speaking and it is about families. We discuss the worlds view of a family and Heavenly Father's. The discussion turns to that many people in the world think that anyone can raise children and it doesn't matter much who, and we discuss the recent studies that were meant to support the new bill trying to get tax payers to pay for daycare for ever younger and younger children in CA, but instead came back showing that the longer a child stayed home with parents the better the children were in governing their behaviour, interacting with others and learning academic skills.

We discuss the parents' responsibility for guiding and directing their children. And I wonder to myself, so if it is shown that a child is best left with parents through the preschool years is that child suddenly ready for great lengths of time away from home and under an influence that the parents have no control over when they are five, they can not control the content or the method of presentation. How does one teach the gospel to the children..."when thou sittest in thine house, and when thou walkest by the way, and when thou liest down and when thou risest up" if the children rise and leave to be under the influence of others for 6 to 7 hours and then come home to homework dictated by someone who does not share the families commitments or beliefs.

And I think again of the quotes and prophecy's of Brigham Young concerning free government controlled education, I think of the peers the children will have, I think of the discussions I have with mothers who think the schools are fine, but have no idea what is being taught there. I ask myself again, "Would Abraham have sent Isaac to a government controlled school in a land that embraced evil?" "No, he would not have." We understand that evil is embraced in our society, so why do so few stand up against it. Yes, it is harder to be responsible for your own childs' education, to not go along with what everyone else is doing, but like the High Councilmen said today the straight and narrow is not on the center of the road anymore it is far, far off to the side.

I go home renewed and strengthen in my calling as a mother. I hug my two little ones, feed everyone lunch and sing silly songs with my children and ramble on to my husband about everything in my head, which he is very used to by now.

That night at our family dinner my mother-in-law calls me a Saint and says she has no idea how I do it all. I tell her I don't, my floors have not been vacuumed in a week. But honestly I do it because I believe in what I am doing, I believe in these children and that they are too precious to be turned over to anyone else, and I believe in God and He strengthens me, like today He gave me Sundays.

Brigham Young "We had to pay our own schoolteachers, raise our own bread and earn our own clothing, or go without; there was no other choice. We did it then, and we are able to do the same to-day. I want to enlist the sympathies of the ladies among the Latter-day Saints, to see what we can do for ourselves with regard to schooling our children. Do not say you cannot school them, for you can... I understand that the other night there was a school meeting in one of the wards of this city, and a part there--a poor miserable apostate--said, "We want a free school, and we want to have the name of establishing the first free school in Utah." To call a person a poor miserable apostate may seem like a harsh word; but what shall we call a man who talks about free schools and who would have all the people taxed to support them, and yet would take his rifle and threaten to shoot the man who had the collection of the ordinary light taxes levied in this Territory--taxes which are lighter than any levied in any other portion of the country? (Journal of Discourses 16:19-20) "