Valentine's Day

It's Valentine's Day. If Scout didn't have a little Cousin named Valentine who wore all of the cutest clothes with hearts on them, I'd say she was the sweetest little Valentine. But we just Face-timed with Derrick's kids and Scout will have to settle for second.

It was a great week, Abe was home sick with a fever for a few days, but I actually enjoyed it. He is so sweet and polite, even when sick. He read books to Maeser every day and Maeser preferred to read his scriptures with Abe over me. Abe also finished memorizing The Living Christ this week. The goal was to finish it by Easter, but memorizing comes so easily for him. He is still using prompts, but I think a couple more weeks will do the trick. I'm really so proud of him. Mary has been working on it too, she's just a paragraph behind.
Mary and Abe both came home from school with loads of Valentines. Mary didn't notice but one of hers had a little note saying to keep it secret. It was from Rhys! That kid. I know his parents are all for it, they would have had to take him to he store to buy the Valentine!

Dan spent several hours with Mary on Saturday, daddy-daughter date, and got her flowers. I wish she'd settle for having her dad as her Valentine for the next 10 years instead of secret admirers.

We also flew kites, made heart shaped pizzas and sugar cookies.

Moses has decided to stop taking long naps. Or any naps some days. I'm sure your days feel just as long or longer than mine. How is tracting? Are you knocking on doors yet? Any investigators?

I'm learning that the gospel is a very personal religion. Each of us progress at different speeds, understand at different levels and receive inspiration that can only be applied personally. Gospel principles that might be easy for me to understand are leaps of faith for others. It makes me think about all the different Sunday school and seminary teachers I've had. I'm so thankful they didn't try to make all of the students learn at the same pace or in the same way, and they never let me feel like I was learning the gospel any different than it should have been. That would have required a lot of guidance from the Spirit to enable them to be teachers to so many students. I need to be the same way for my children. Just the oldest three are so different from each other. That's where the Spirit really helps. The same FHE lesson will teach each of them differently if the Spirit is present. They will each learn what they need to know to strengthen their small testimonies.

Oh, and Maeser is finally 4! He tells everyone.

He started Chinese immersion preschool this week. He attends 3 mornings a week. On the first day I asked him if he learned any Chinese and he said: "They don't have any Chinese at my school." (The teachers speak ONLY in Chinese.) He loves it. His uniform is ridiculous, but he rocks it.

(Making valentines.)