Our Family History

In Our Family This Week...Besides the "usual" of football, football, and more football - we watched the VP debates together, had another photoshoot, did lots of editing of photos, Youth Culture Celebration practice for the older boys, Scouts for Ben, LOTS of cleaning/organization going on this week, visit from Grandma Great along with Janice and Dixon, Birthday party for Ben, went and helped out a sick sister in the ward, 2 days of "prepping" for the tailgate at the BSU game for John, John and Seth attending the BSU vs UNLV "Black Out" Game, Stake Dance for the older boys, library visit, and the highly anticipated TOURING OF THE TEMPLE! <-- of which I will go into more about in just a minute...
Saturday was Ben's last game of Optimist Football!  Seth and I went and watched it.  While they didn't win, they did have fun and ended the season with a decent record.  The head coach of our team, Darrin Ball, was awarded Coach of the Year for Optimist which is really an impressive thing! His goal was more to teach the boys good principles, good sportsmanship and to have fun! I attended practice on Tuesday and took pictures of the team so we could give to our sponsor - Sports Clips. Here is the storyboard I designed that will be presented to them. It'll be printed as a 15x30 and hang in their salon.
and here are some photos from Ben's last game...

Coach John and Head Coach, Darrin, talking to the boys after the game.

one last rally!

Seth, Ben and Coach Dad

Mom, Ben and Dad

 In Our Homeschool This Week... Things are just going quite well! We did do a little "shake up" of things this week regarding the older boys and their Chemistry.  I had mentioned in last weeks post how I felt inspired during General Conference that the 3 of us should do Chemistry together and so we started that this week!  I talked with both boys separately afterwards and they both said that they were excited for the change.  I learned so much this past week and we had fun working out the equations on measuring heat! I'm looking forward to going through this course with them (plus, this way I can really assess if they're "getting" the information :)  A couple of pics from our homeschool this week:

The kids played with magnetix this week... Lexi decided to spell out her name with them!

I printed laminated and cut these little "wipe off" cards for the 3 little ones to practice writing their numbers

I'm going to combine What I'm Grateful For and My Favorite Thing This Week since they are both the same event.... We had the privileged of touring the Temple as a family on Thursday morning. I am so grateful for this opportunity! I'm grateful that the Temple is so close to us (literally less than 10 minutes from our house) and I'm grateful for the possibility it provides for our family to be sealed together for eternity! For FHE this week, we talked about how we would be going to the Temple and what we could/should do to prepare for it (and then carry out those ideas so we'd be ready on Thursday). On Thursday morning, we all got ready in our best church clothes (and I had the girls wear their Christmas dresses from 2 years ago (yes, they still fit! LOL) since they were all cream and so beautiful and pure looking... on a side note: I can't even remember how many of the ushers there commented on how beautiful the girls and their dresses were!). We started out in the Meetinghouse located right next door to the Temple and watched a video about the history of the church in Boise. We then went with our group (that consisted of about 20 or so people - we purposefully planned to attend at a time that wouldn't be too busy ;) and we walked across the street and proceeded with our tour through the Temple. I was SO AMAZED at how beautiful everything was!  They had literally redone the ENTIRE interior and even went so far as to change the layout of things. The Baptistry was gorgeous and now has it's own entrance and recommend desk for the youth attending. Lots of dark African Mahogany wood made up a lot of the decor and lots of stained glass as well. It literally was breathtaking! We were able to see the Brides room and sit a bit in the Sealing Room.  I told the girls that this is where they'd be getting married and they were so excited! As we entered the Celestial Room, it was requested that no one say a word (I was worried that the kids wouldn't be able to that quiet) but as we entered, I think they were all able to feel of the sacredness of the room and showed their utmost reverence to Heavenly Father and Jesus.  I was so proud of them.  I remember looking at my entire family all sitting there peacefully in the Celestial Room and wanted to cement that image into my mind forever knowing that we truly CAN be a family throughout the eternities and it made my heart swell. After the tour, we headed back over to the meetinghouse to the reception area and sat together on the couches and asked each of the kids their favorite part.  Ben shared about he felt so happy in his heart and especially liked the Celestial Room and how he could feel the Holy Ghost.  Nathan said he liked the part "with the cows and the water" because it was cool.  He also said that when he "walked into the 'Quiet Room' he felt a big BOOM in his heart" so we discussed how that's how the Holy Ghost feels. Lexi was just so thrilled to be there!  All week she had kept talking about how we were going to the Temple and she was so excited.  The day before we went, she had made a comment at dinner how she was so excited to go to the Temple the next day because she was going to see Jesus. Ben sadly crushed her spirits and made fun of her because she thought she would see him. I told her that it was natural to think that since the Temple is Jesus and Heavenly Father's house that we would see him but that we would most likely just FEEL him in our hearts and that we'd see lots of beautiful pictures of him as well.  After the tour she said her favorite part was seeing how beautiful the Temple was and how she saw Jesus there and felt him in her heart and she was so happy!  She really is a sweet little girl and always trying to obey Jesus. Earlier this week after John had gotten upset with one of the boys and raised his voice, she had gone to him and told him that he needed to  be more Gentle and that yelling is not what Jesus would have him do and that he needed to obey Jesus and not yell anymore.  Having her around definitely keeps a sweet spirit in the home :)  Aubrie's favorite part was the Celestial Room and seeing "the Beautiful Temple!".  She also spoke about her heart feeling happy and being filled with Love. Ben's favorite part was being in the Celestial Room as well.  He said that the whole Temple was just so beautiful but he especially liked how peaceful he felt inside of the Celestial Room. August said that he didn't necessarily have a favorite part of the Temple and that he liked it all!  He said he thought is was "good" and after prodding about what "good" meant, he said it meant that he thought everything was beautiful, he felt really peaceful inside and he liked being with the family. Seth shared about he thought EVERYTHING was so beautiful and even though he'd never been able to see the Temple before, he thought now it was the most beautiful ever!  He shared how he was really able to feel the Spirit and felt really peaceful inside. He also liked the new exterior that was put on and his favorite part was being with the whole family inside the Temple. (Following is John's thoughts that he wrote about his experience)...I am just so grateful to have a Temple so close to us.  I have missed it so much this last year.  As we entered within it's sacred walls, I felt peace and just a feeling of being home again.  The renovation has been extensive and you can hardly even recognize some of the areas but it is that same sweet feeling of peace and stillness - a knowledge that you are on hallowed ground.  I can't wait for it to be dedicated and for us to be able to attend once more.  It was so nice to be able to show the kids around and share with them our feelings and for them to finally have a bit of knowledge of what it's like when Mom and Dad are at the temple.  When we entered the instructional rooms, I was nearly overwhelmed and I found myself getting choked up as I imagined what it would be like to be able to go through a session with our children when they are of age.  I am grateful for the restored gospel and I am grateful that we once again have Holy Temples upon the face of the earth.

Of course we couldn't experience this wonderful even without some photos to commemorate the occasion! So here are some that I took (and I had one of the ushers take the family photo of us after I had got it all set up :)  I just love ALL.OF.THESE!