Mary, Martha, and a Book of Mormon Book Club

Martha and Mary from the New Testament have been on my mind recently...I'm sure you're all familiar with the story from the Luke Chapter 10 when Christ comes to visit Mary and Martha:

38 ¶ Now it came to pass, as they went, that he entered into a certain village: and a certain woman named Martha received him into her house.
39 And she had a sister called Mary, which also sat at Jesus’ feet, and heard his word.
40 But Martha was cumbered about much serving, and came to him, and said, Lord, dost thou not care that my sister hath left me to serve alone? bid her therefore that she help me.
41 And Jesus answered and said unto her, Martha, Martha, thou art careful and troubled about many things:
42 But one thing is needful: and Mary hath chosen that good part, which shall not be taken away from her.

I have read this many times, heard many talks and discussions about it, even read a book about it (Mary, Martha and Me). It has meant different things to me at different times of my life. I often associate myself with Martha...encumbered about with many household tasks and projects that can interfere with my attention to other needful things. I find myself recently encumbered with cleaning house, raising children, teaching piano lessons, being a room mother, crafting, scrap booking, cooking, etc. All good things but they can get in the way of the attention I pay to my spiritual health and time spent studying the scriptures. I'm sure all you mothers out there can relate. Anyway, I've been trying to shape some better habits with reading my scriptures and got to thinking about a "Book of Mormon Book Club" my Relief Society did awhile back when we were reading the BOM for Pres. Hinckley's challenge. I enjoyed it so much and have decided to start my own little Book of Mormon Book Club on this blog.

Here's how it will work if anyone wants to join me:

Set a goal of how many pages you want to read each night or each week. (I'm going to try to read 5 to 8 pages a night).

Sunday or Monday, I'll blog about thoughts or interesting things learned in my reading this week. If you want to participate, leave a comment on each weekly post about your own reading and thoughts.

So that's it!

If you want to join my little Book of Mormon Book Club, just leave me a comment!

One last thought...I've often wondered how the story of Martha and Mary would have turned out differently if they would have helped each other have the best of both worlds. What if Mary would have helped Martha before Christ came, or encouraged her to sit and listen and then they would do the work together later. I hope adding this spiritual post to my blog about temporal things can help me (and maybe some others) find a better balance between my "Mary" and "Martha" endeavours.

The Family Car: Past and Present

(Disclaimer: This post has been on my mind for a few weeks so I'm finally posting it but I'm sure it will not be interesting to anyone but me...it's just for the scrapbooking/journaling point of this blog...you'll probably want to skip it!)



We recently bought a new family truckster and for some strange reason it got me thinking about family cars. Maybe I inherited it from my Dad...he loves cars and talking about old cars. He loves rattling off the the make and model of old cars he sees around town and such. Anyway, this post is dedicated to family cars, past and present.

It's intersting how far the family car has come in the past 3 or 4 generations. My grandparents didn't have cars as children, but pretty much walked everywhere or took the bus or train. My parents were kids, they did have a family car though very different from our recent purchase. My mother loves to tell about how they drove around in a panel truck that my grandfather took on flooring jobs. They sat on buckets...actual buckets...not bucket seats! When I was a kid we had several versions of the station wagon you can see in the picture below.



It looks like we were on one of our many summer vacations as evidenced by the fast food cups and bag were holding...we never went out to eat otherwise. I love the "car seat" my younger sister is in. My Dad is holding her in this white bouncer chair sort of thing. I remember my younger sibling riding in the car in it as babies. We never wore seatbelts as young kids. In fact, I wonder if the car even had them! As a pre-teen and teenager I know we had them in our vans and we did wear them but not like my kids do. We climbed all over the station wagon or van, especially on road trips. It's a wonder that we never got in an accident and had someone ejected from the car!
The price of cars past and presents also just kills me. Our recent purchase cost us just a little more than my parents paid for their first house! Can you believe that! My grandparents first car (it was used) cost them $90! Their first new car was the panel truck whick cost a couple of hundred dollars. My grandfather got in an accident in this truck shortly after buying it and totalled it. He was so proud of it when he bought it. They paid someone to fix it but it was of course never quite the same. They nicknamed it the "blue goose."

Anyway, just a few interesting things to be remembered later.

Little Pigs Have Big Ears!

You've heard the sayings about children and eavesdropping..."little pigs have big ears" or "children may not obey but they will listen." These expressions came to mind this week as I had few experiences with my children repeating things they have heard me say. Just yesterday at lunch time, I pulled out some Teddy Graham Trail Mix I'd recently bought and passed some out to Natalie. She looked over the contents: mini chocolate teddy grahams, mini graham bees, tiny pretzel twists, and yogurt covered raisins. She replied "Oh, these pretzels are kinda cute!" I smiled only to hear her brother reply, "Food cannot be cute!". I laughed and recounted the the banter to Bryan. He pointed to Ben and said "Daddy" and then at Natalie, "Mommy." We have had several such conversations where I have commented on how some snack or food I've prepared turned out cute and he's sarcastically disagreed! Funny how our kids picked that up. Ben's also been heard to repeat some silly phrases we say...especially Seinfeld quotes!

I've been also thinking about a conversation I once overheard my own mother have. She was talking to my grandmother about my aunt and her daugther. She said something along the lines of "If you want to know what kind of parent you are, just watch your children playing house." Apparently my aunt had been watching her daughter play with some friends and got a view of just what kind of mother she was. Recently I've had my own such experience. I've lately overheard Ben talking to Natalie in a sarcastic tone when he's frustrated with her. He'll respond to her questions or actions with sarcastic questions. "What does it look like I'm doing Natalie?" "What do you think?" It really started to annoy me so I sat him to down to discuss it one afternoon. I realized half way through the discussion why he was talking this way. I often respond to him with questions, sarcastic and serious...and had, in fact, used a couple when I was talking to him! What a good mother I am!

So I'm learning to be more careful about what my little pigs ears hear...whether it's funny Seinfeld quotes or words of discipline. Oh how much respect I've gained for my own parents since I've become a mother. It's a tough job!