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Sunday, February 7, 2016

Letter - Earning Playing Time, Those Who Resiste Temptation Know How Strong It Is

Sunday, February 07, 2016

This week has been great.  On Monday I had to go to the Post Office and the MVD, back to back.  Those are two places I don’t usually like to go, but it wasn’t too bad because Chad worked from home so Tilly stayed with him and I caught up on Facebook and relaxed while I waited.  Chad finished working as the kids came home from school so he got to hear all their news from the day and help with reading and homework and listened to me give Bryant a piano lesson.  It felt like an idyllic afternoon being all together on a workday afternoon. 

Tuesday was Ground Hog’s day.  Since I’m a Snowflake traditionalist of course we had biscuits and gravy for dinner.  It totally blew my healthy eating for that day, but I’ve been good every other day since deciding to lose twenty pounds so it didn’t put me off my goal to badly.  Marlee had soccer practice that evening, Bryant had scouts, Spencer had a basketball game, Karalee had activity days, I had mutual and Chad had a late work event.  Luckily I have several people I carpool with so everyone was able to get to all their activities, but I was a little late to mutual so I could get the kids ready for bed before I left.  I played volleyball with my friends from 9:00-10:30pm.  It was a good way to work out all the stress from such a busy evening.  It was really good, competitive volleyball that night so it was fun, but I tweaked my knee and it has been hurting a bit since then.

Wednesday Tilly had her music class.  I don’t remember anything else from that day.

Thursday morning I donated blood and then Tilly and I went grocery shopping at Walmart.  Bryant had basketball practice at 5:00 and Karalee had soccer practice at 6:30.

Friday I went to Zumba.  My knee didn’t hurt too much while I exercised, but it was really sore the rest of the day.  Tilly got to play at her friend Elsie’s house and I got to go help with an art project in Marlee’s first grade class.  Chad and I attended the temple for Ward temple night and then we went out to dinner.

Saturday was full of good basketball games.  Bryant had a game at 10:00.  His team barely lost in overtime.  Spencer had his first 8th grade basketball playoff game at 1:30.  They beat that team pretty easily so they advanced to the next round.  His next game was at 5:00pm.  That was such a fun game to watch.  The teams were both pretty evenly matched.  Spencer started the game.  He and the other starters played the whole game except for about 2 minutes in the 2nd quarter when the coach gave a couple of other boys a chance to play and the starters a chance to rest.  Spencer scored 7 points and had some great assists and rebounds.  The game was pretty close the whole way.  Spencer’s team ended up winning by 8 points when it was all over.  Chad and I had so much fun watching Spencer play.  We’re excited for the many years of watching our kids play sports that are ahead of us.  It is great entertainment. 

I felt Spencer earned so much playing time because he has worked so hard this season and has put in a lot of time in our back yard improving his game.  However, I felt badly for the boys who didn’t get any playing time, I’ve been in that situation before.  I also felt badly for the parents of the boys who didn’t get to play at all.  However, I think in school sports it is important to coach to win, not to play everybody equally … especially in the playoffs.  I think that lights a fire under the kids who don’t get much playing time and helps them improve their game so they can have more playing time and it builds everyone’s talent level.  That’s just my opinion.  I’m pretty competitive though.  I’m sure other people feel differently and that’s ok.  

Today has been a nice Sabbath Day.  It is super bowl Sunday, but we don’t watch TV on Sunday and we don’t follow football any other day of the week either so we didn’t watch the big game.  We periodically asked Siri on our phone what the score was though.  Chad recorded the game for Bryant who is interested in it so they can watch it tomorrow.  Chad rarely watches sports on TV, but when he does he likes to fast forward through most of the game only watching the highlights.  I’m sure they’ll check out the commercials too since they are always funny for the super bowl. 

Spencer and three of his friends decided to sing a quartet in our ward talent show on Feb. 20th.  They are going to sing “Barbara Ann.”  They practiced this evening in our home.  I’m glad Spencer took my suggestion to sing with his friends and is developing into a well-rounded young adult. 

My quote for today is from C.S. Lewis, “No man knows how bad he is till he has tried very hard to be good. A silly idea is current that good people do not know what temptation means. This is an obvious lie. Only those who try to resist temptation know how strong it is. After all, you find out the strength of the German army by fighting against it, not by giving in. You find out the strength of a wind by trying to walk against it, not by lying down. A man who gives in to temptation after five minutes simply does not know what it would have been like an hour later. That is why bad people, in one sense, know very little about badness — they have lived a sheltered life by always giving in. We never find out the strength of the evil impulse inside us until we try to fight it: and Christ, because He was the only man who never yielded to temptation, is also the only man who knows to the full what temptation means — the only complete realist.”

Love,

Mindy

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