My husband's thoughts on Romney and the Election

I expect that after the dust settles someone will write an op\ed that says what I think, but until then I'd like to give my thoughts.

The Romney candidacy has been a bigger deal for members of the church than most people think, and that's why there's so much lamenting about his loss. Mitt Romney was one of our best examples. He represented what we members hold up as a good member: he was Bishop and Stake President, he's got five boys and is a family man, he served a mission, he's proud of his faith, he's successful in business and politics. He's even good looking.

A lot of hope was wrapped up in him and excitement for this guy (not Harry Reid or some right-wing crackpot) to be the guy we wanted to present on the world stage as being a model of us. We'd have an opportunity to explain our religion finally and when people would see the Romney's and their good example they would be curious to learn more. Missionary work may even pick up. There was an article in the Deseret News that basically said all this a couple of days ago.

So when the country got to take a look at Romney and the church it didn't really go as hoped. People and reporters asked hard questions about us. It wasn't misunderstanding. On the contrary, they understood and asked up to clarify. The church, Public Affairs especially, responded quite often like they would to members asking questions, with half answers and "don't worry about that" type responses that might work on members who feel the social and spiritual pressure to not push it anymore, but that don't work on others. Like when the church said that no one who says disparaging remarks about people because of their skin color is a true disciple of Christ, and then CBS brings up Brigham Young quotes from the Journal of Discourses that does just that and Public Affairs responds "it is what is it." that's not convincing.

So Mitt Romney became each member of the church in spotlight by proxy. We wanted to succeed, to impress, because it represents us. While a lot of other people see in Romney so little concern for others, arrogance and condescension, lies and misrepresentations, weird religious beliefs, we didn't. Because that's us up there.

Criticism of Mitt Romney from the right will probably come out soon because "how could anyone lose to Obama and this economy?" Then the protection of being the front runner of the Republicans will be gone and Republicans won't give Romney a pass on his mormonism any more. We'll see who his true friends are.

The country took a proxy for us as members and did not like what they saw. The nation said no, and now we're all distraught because we were rejected. Now we ought to look more clearly about how we really are and if we are admirable, likable, and nice to people.

Rather than predicting the end of the nation and a rejection of God's favor because the nation rejected a "righteous priesthood holder" maybe to ought to do some introspection into what things we should improve on, and how we can more clearly see ourselves as we really are. To me Romney losing was a relief that other people could see what I saw, and what I see in other people in the church that have caused me quite a lot of grief. I'm glad it's over.

For FHE the other day we talked about how without charity or love you are nothing. I asked the kids if they'd like to be in heaven with a bunch of people that read their scriptures, went to church, said their prayers but were mean. The disgusted look on their faces gave the answer. Or would you rather be with nice, inclusive, and loving people even if they didn't come to church all the time or even were members. I think that's what we should work on instead of righteous indignation.

My Thoughts on the Election

As an independent-- I am glad that Obama won over Romney. I didn't like either candidate, but I think we will have less wars with Obama than we would have had with Romney-- that was the main difference for me. I think Romney lost because he offended a lot of groups of people-- Ron Paul supporters, the London Olympic committee, Nascar racers, 47% of Americans who would never vote Republican, and the list goes on. He got 14 million less votes than McCain because of lower voter turnout.  The Republican base never really liked him, they just hated Obama more.  That was especially true for the South.  It is amazing that that was the best the Republican party could do.  The Primary race was full of lousy candidates-- and they thought Ron Paul was crazy!  He was the best chance against Obama.   I'm glad we have a Republican house to keep President Obama at bay. Although I disagree with Obama's ideology-- he seems like a "nice" guy and says nice things and acted with class throughout the election as far as I could see.

my little girl is 12!

My second little girl turned 12 today!  I can't believe it.  I'm kinda sad to see the little girl era end.  I loved the little dresses and hair bows and cute shoes and dollies and ponies and ribbons and princesses and pink, etc.   She is way excited to be going into Young Women's and I am sad to see her leave primary and all the little girl stuff behind.  The older girl stuff will be fun too I'm sure.  Life always changes and I will miss those little girl times.  There are a lot of little boys in this house.  I took 6 of them shopping today without their sisters and it was quite different.  They were good, but they have no interest in frilly clothes or dolls.  It's cars, trucks and sports time at our house now and for years to come!

Halloween

We had an awesome Halloween.  My kids said tit was the best one ever.  It srated last Friday with our co-op-- we went to a nice pumkin patch for a field trip-- then we drove to Layton and closed on our house-- yay!  Then we had an extended family Halloween party on Sat.  I sewed a monkey costume that morning and sewed on the ears on the way over-- it only took me about an hour to sew and I used another costume for the pattern and I didn't have to unpick anything-- I was very proud of myself.  Anyway, we had a colonial girl, a cat, a monkey, a ninja, iron man, batman, Po from teletubbies and a little lion.  They werre cute, but I don't think we even got a picture of them all together we were so busy just trying to gather up all the pieces and kids we needed for each activity.  Then Monday night we picked out our pumpkins and the kids carved them the next day during school hours.  They really did a nice job and I think we got pictures of those.  Then Wed. was Halloween-- we took the afternoon to decorate the entryway.  I told the kids we weren't going to buy anything new but they could use anything in the house.  We had a bunch of white row cover material that worked perfectly to look like a drop cloth on the stairs banister, and we covered the stairs with white sheets and had some white tulle for the holding rail on the other side.  Then we strung pictures of bats and a scary face the kids made across the ceiling and one of the kids made silhouttes we put in the windows, adn we scattered straw all over the floor, and had a fan going and a black light and a little table with the candy and some cardboard tombstones, and my husband set up speakers all over the entryway with really scary music and some speakers hidden above the candy bowl that he would play some more creepy screams and sounds right when the kids would reach for the candy.  It was a lot of fun.  We had way more tricker treaters here in this new neighborhood than we ever did in the old neighborhood-- I think we had 5 last year and maybe 10 the year before.  So the kids loved it.  We closed shop around 9 and watched The Nightmare Before Christmas.  I forgot about the soup so we had candy for dinner instead.  The kids traded most of it in for screen time minutes.  They played a ton on Friday.  A most successful Halloween!  The best part was the next day when everyone helped clean it all up and the house looked pretty good!  We are going to have to do that again!

twins

the twins today each had a jumprope and said let's go fishing-- yeah, Danel- yet's go fishing-- yeah-- let's go fishing!
 we took all the kids to the psrk and played b-ball-- it was pretty fun, the twins walked around the court and played with the v- ball while the others of us played-- eventually they took off walking together toward the playground-- I just love being around them-- but watch out when they are tired andyou try to turn off thetv that you turned on togive yourself a little extra time making dinner!

wow!

We are actually under contract with our house which is a HUGE blessing-- I think the Lord has been watching out for us all along, but it has been a tough couple of years.

Anyway, we are set to close tomorrow!!  We are taking a pretty big hit because of all the damage that happened to the house this past year, but we are out of time and money to fix it up, and we figure that pretty much everybody lost money on their houses so it's our turn now too.  We will still have a pretty good chunk of change from when we were rich and put a lot of money on that house, so we'll be able to put in a fence and yard in our new house and have a really good financial cushion.  Hopefully we'll be able to save most of it and live within our means on the salary of my husband's new job which is also a huge blessing!  He's still working for the LDS church, but no longer as an employee-  he is vendor status and gets to work from home.  It has been so nice.  He also got a bit of a raise which helps too.  We are very thankful to finally have a break and to be close to the end of a very difficult period in our lives.  Yay!!

We are so dang busy though.  We had the Pinewood Derby tonight in which the boys did just fine-- not dead last like last year. We have a fun family Halloween party Sat. and I have to make a warm furry costume for a certain boy.  We have a pumkin land field trip scheduled tomorrow-- the girls are supposed to start b-ball on Sat.  I really want them to play, but it just may be pushing it too far because they have quite a few choir concerts coming up.  We had a doctor appt. this  week too and vision therapy for #5,  And lots of good schooling goin on-- I'm just not sure when to get to my deep cleaning and when to get my shopping done-- there are so many good things to do-- it's hard to prioritize and balance everything just right.  These are really good problems to have and I'm really glad that these are the problems I'm dealing with right now.  Life is good!

Hubris

Hubris is a word I never had even an idea tht it existed until about 7 years ago when I finally learned some Greek history.  Merriam- Webster describes it as exaggerated pride or self- confidence.  I like to think of it as arrogance and ignorance mixed together.  One example I think of is aperson who has just learned to play a song on the piano telling a concert pianist how their song was pretty good, but they might want to pay closer attention to how they sit on the bench or use the pedal.  Another example of hubris would be a sub contractor such as an electrician, plumber or mason telling the general contractor how to manage the whole project or how they need to be sure to include " such and such" in the general plans.  There sure seem to be a lot of people who know how and what other people should be and do in their lives.  I think these people are very hubristic-- they speak without knowing all the details, they judge others based on their own limited experience.  I think hubristic people are very dangerous.  They think they know how things should be.  They think they are good people who would never do anything wrong.  They are unteachable and stuck, and they don't even know it.  They are not nice to be around.  They are usually mostly interested in themselves or in how others can validate their long held views and opinions, and they will do just about anything to make it appear that their idea is right regardless of how it may make others feel.  I hope I am not that way.  I'm glad I know the meaning of the word, and I'm glad I can recognize this charactoeristic in others so tht I can stay away from those people and know how to manage being around them when I have to be.  I hope I will recognize it in myself.  Extreme arrogance often brought on by extreme ignorance.  Education is a good thing usually-- some people are so stuck that even with an education they can't or won't see it.  This is definitely something I will teach my kids-- be teachable, learn from others, listen, postpone judgement until you have all the details,  don't be afraid to be wrong and admit it, love people, show compassion and mercy, it's OK to not understand things and it's OK to say I don't know, give others the benefit of the doubt, don't let others bring you down or tell you how things are and try to put you in a place so that they can run you over, stand up for yourself without being overbearing and be willing to change your mind and admit your mistakes.  Don't be hubristic!!!!