My Life Might Bore Most, But I Like It!

So, I'm kind of a lame-o blogger these days.  I don't feel like I have much to say, but I do.  Maybe it is because my life happenings are being emailed to my brother on a mission so I don't feel a need to blog.  So, in the spirit of lameness, I will post on my blog what I wrote to my brother.

Another day, another week.  We have tithing settlement today followed by an opportunity to go to the Nativity Display at the church.  I helped a little with set up so I'm excited to see it finished.  I can't believe how much work goes into this event.  The main lady in charge, I'm sure she's been practically living there all week.  I don't know how she does it!

The missionaries have been meeting with a lady in our neighborhood.  JDawg has accompanied them twice, I went last Friday with them.  She's a great person to talk to because she is so open and honest about her beliefs and she is willing to ask questions and listen to answers about our beliefs.  Because of these frank discussions, I felt comfortable challenging her beliefs.  She doesn't believe that God is in a church or in a building.  She believes that God is in nature and has felt His Spirit there and not in churches and she is adamant about that.  She doesn't believe in organized religion and hates the hypocrisy found therein.  I asked her, "What if you did walk into a church and you felt the same thing there that you feel in nature?"  She also pointed out that there are so many interpretations of the Bible and people claim their interpretation is right and that how are we different from anybody else?  So I told her, "That is why we want you to read the Book of Mormon and pray about it to see if there is truth in what we say we believe."  And she acknowledged that I had made a valid point.  I felt good about that!  Anyway, she said she is impressed with what she knows about our church.  We hope that she will read the Book of Mormon and pray about it, at least the parts that the missionaries challenged her to read.  I don't think our conversations will bear much fruit for her unless she does.

I have a friend who is in the hospital for at least a couple of weeks because her baby is trying to come out 10 weeks early.  I'm really hoping and praying that baby will stay put.  She is in a hospital all the way in Seattle and her three other kids and husband are still over here trying to carry on.  Thankfully his work is letting him work from home but I imagine this is a difficult time for all of them.  Even if she was able to come home in two weeks she wouldn't be able to do any sort of caring for her kids.  At present she is only allowed bathroom privileges and to get up for a short time every few hours.  I can't imagine sitting in a hospital bed for two weeks straight, feeling relatively well with no one to visit and very few things to do.  Will you keep them in your prayers?  At least one or two prayers?

I got a haircut last week at my hairstylist friend's house.  When it was time to go, Cristy's husband went upstairs to get Ginger and he found her in their girls' room, buck naked.  We've entered a nudist phase!  She was trying on princess dresses and felt it was necessary to take everything off in order to do so.  She also walked out the side church door while I was talking to a friend.  We watched her charge right out and down the sidewalk, confident as can be.  I don't know where she thinks she was going or what she was thinking at all but she obviously wasn't feeling a need to stay close to mom!  Later she also climbed on top of JDawg's car.  That was when I finally grabbed her and put her in the car to go home.  She's a funny kid.

In other news, Nelumbo is frustrating right now.  Not that his behavior is any different than it has ever been but because it is now affecting important obligations.  He is so easily distracted and really just wants to play all day.  He has his own agenda and pretty much refuses to adhere to anyone else's agenda.  Unless forced, he will take his own sweet little time doing anything of relative importance that is not play.  Like getting ready for church and school in a timely fashion.  Today, I locked him in the garage so he would finally get in the car while I got his socks, shoes, and coat.  We were on a path to being late for school already and I still had to herd him into the car.  He was crying at this point and it only escalated by the time we got to school.  He refused to get out of the car and insisted on continuing his fit.  So I started driving out of the school parking lot to take him home, making it clear that he would spend his school time in his room because the only reason he would stay home is if he were sick and if he were sick he should be in bed.  He would also not get to play video games for the week and he would go to bed at 7:00pm for the rest of the week.  He could get out of these consequences if he stopped crying and asked nicely if he could go to school by the time we got home.  He wasn't able to do that.  He just became a broken record about how he wanted to do what he wanted to do.  So here we are at home with a crying five year old in his room.  I don't know what else to do.  I have no clue how to motivate this child.  Any ideas?