The Church of Jesus Christ at a glance (Mormons)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7o-ByARPf9w
This is a very sweet video.  I love how it describes our beliefs using members from around the world. My favorite part is near the end where that woman says "Ours is not a Sunday religion, it is an every day religion, it is who we are."  I know that, I feel it.  I try very hard to live my beliefs every day, to show with every word and action that I am a follower of Jesus Christ.

How to teach young kids to clean

The other day as I was planning  a play date with my friend I told her  I could come over after the kids did their chores.  She asked me how I get my young boys, age 5 and 3 1/2 to clean.  I told her a few things, but i thought I'd share a few more.

• Dishes, I have my kids help unload the dishwasher.  I make it fun by letting them stand on the counter (normally not allowed) while I hand the dishes to put away.
• I also have them rinse their dishes which is fun because they get to use the sprayer, also usually off limits.
• mopping, one of their favorite chores is to mop.  I move the table and chair out, get a bucket of water and give them rags. They call it slip and slid and have a blast getting wet.  Then I pull out towels and we dry it together.  Sometimes if they need a bit of encouragement I find the dry spots and pretend to try and keep it dry as they come at it with water.
• Laundry, if I have a lot of laundry to fold we have a laundry party.  Everything goes into one big pile and we pull clothes out and throw it at whoever it belongs to.  Then after the clothes are put away we  pick a corner and use mated socks to have a sock war.  Then we put away the socks.
• general pick up.  I make this fun by playing games like I spy.  I spy with my little eye something red, then they put away all the red toys until they find the one I was thinking of. We also have races, pick a number and pick up that number, or pull out a timer and see if they can get a personal best each time.  I also try to have them pick up a small amount often so the job doesn't get to big or intimidating.
• I also use rewards on top of the fun.  For every chore they get 10-20 minutes of a computer game or after each chore we play or read together.  Breaking it up helps a lot.

So what do you do to get your kids to help out around the house? I'm always looking for new ideas and we love making work more fun around here.

Looking at it all wrong

http://latinafatale.com/2011/07/21/how-to-talk-to-little-girls/
I cam e across this article today and something about it bothered me.  I thought about it for a while, because I have seen many articles like this in the past.  They all say basically the same thing, girls need to feel smart and know that beauty isn't important.  It's so mixed up though, it not about smart or beautiful.  I know a girl who feels beautiful, but dumb, a girl who feels smart, but ugly, and then the one that feels neither ugly, nor dumb, she just feels happy.  What's the difference?  It's not the way her parents taught her, it's not the way society spoke to her as opposed to her sister or neighbor or class mate.  It's about the way she feels about herself.  She feels beautiful whether others agree or not, she feels smart not because she gets straight A's but because she feels ok just doing her best.  My highest hope for my children is not for them to feel hansom and beautiful, it's not for them to feel smarter then everyone else, it is simply this, that they feel confident with themselves.
God created each of us just the way we are, the way we look, how smart we are, the gifts that we have, they are all what God wants us to have and with His help we can be all He wants us to be.  Confidence can take you places good looks and brains can't get you alone.
What do you think?