Dad: Someone who stands in when mom is not there.

On Monday, Kris planned a wonderful family home evening lesson. He decided to teach a lesson on prayer and was using the FHE resource manual to tell a story. The story is about how a dad is working at home and throughout the day his various children come to him and ask him different things. One child comes with a broken doll which he says he'll fix. One child comes with a math problem, the dad kindly listens and then suggests different ways to try to work the problem but he doesn't give the solution. One child comes and asks for money and the dad says no. There were a handful of other situations. Our children have been getting progressively more rowdy during prayer time. Kris' thinking was that maybe if they could understand prayer a little bit better, they'd be more reverent. So the purpose of the story was that we really have a Father in Heaven who loves us and takes the time to listen to us about whatever we're willing to share with Him. Kris also told the story to try to stress that Heavenly Father doesn't always say "yes" to our prayers. Well, at the end of the story he asked a question from the manual in an attempt to emphasize these points. He asked "Why did these children go to their father for help?" He was hoping for an answer along the lines of "Because they know their daddy loves them and will help them". Ahhh, hope springs eternal. Kaylyn started bouncing in her seat in typical 7 year old fashion, hand raised high in the air saying "I know I know" so Kris called on her. And here is her wonderful nugget of an answer, "They went to their dad because their mommy wasn't home." Thank you Kaylyn for countering my opinions of my mothering skills.

I have discovered what I will do with my children's toys when they don't pick them up: http://cakewrecks.blogspot.com/2009/01/why-suzy-needs-therapy.html Tada! No more stepping on little toys, now we'll just eat them.