Hi all - I have a favor to ask of you.

I am looking for music for our Youth Christmas presentation (it's a stake thing and each unit is doing a presentation). According to the skit that the girls have already written, we need a song to play while they wrap presents 'a la chaine' (assembly line) and prepare them for Pere Noel. The girls will choreograph their dance to the music. Ideally it would be a Christmas song but it could also be any song that talks about charity, service, helping others, helping children. If we can't find anything like that, the girls will end up using any song that has a good beat and I would prefer to help them find something more appropriate that fits with the theme.
Do you have any ideas?
Jocelyn

I just sent this to Jeff to use with his soccer kids, but I think the article is good for anyone with kids. Sorry it's long but it's good for all of us.



A Nation of Wimps
By: Hara Estroff Marano, Psychology Today
Summary: Parents are going to ludicrous lengths to take the bumps out of life for
their children. However, parental hyperconcern has the net effect of making kids
more fragile; that may be why they're breaking down in record numbers.
Maybe it's the cyclist in the park, trim under his sleek metallic blue helmet, cruising
along the dirt path... at three miles an hour. On his tricycle.
Or perhaps it's today's playground, all-rubber-cushioned surface where kids used to
skin their knees. And... wait a minute... those aren't little kids playing. Their
mommies—and especially their daddies—are in there with them, coplaying or playby-
play coaching. Few take it half-easy on the perimeter benches, as parents used to
do, letting the kids figure things out for themselves.
Then there are the sanitizing gels, with which over a third of parents now send their
kids to school, according to a recent survey. Presumably, parents now worry that
school bathrooms are not good enough for their children.
Consider the teacher new to an upscale suburban town. Shuffling through the sheaf
of reports certifying the educational "accommodations" he was required to make for
many of his history students, he was struck by the exhaustive, well-written—and
obviously costly—one on behalf of a girl who was already proving among the most
competent of his ninth-graders. "She's somewhat neurotic," he confides, "but she is
bright, organized and conscientious—the type who'd get to school to turn in a paper
on time, even if she were dying of stomach flu." He finally found the disability he was
to make allowances for: difficulty with Gestalt thinking. The 13-year-old "couldn't see
the big picture." That cleverly devised defect (what 13-year-old can construct the big
picture?) would allow her to take all her tests untimed, especially the big one at the
end of the rainbow, the college-worthy SAT.
Behold the wholly sanitized childhood, without skinned knees or the occasional C in
history. "Kids need to feel badly sometimes," says child psychologist David Elkind,
professor at Tufts University. "We learn through experience and we learn through
bad experiences. Through failure we learn how to cope."
Messing up, however, even in the playground, is wildly out of style. Although error
and experimentation are the true mothers of success, parents are taking pains to
remove failure from the equation.
"Life is planned out for us," says Elise Kramer, a Cornell University junior. "But we
don't know what to want." As Elkind puts it, "Parents and schools are no longer
geared toward child development, they're geared to academic achievement."
No one doubts that there are significant economic forces pushing parents to invest so
heavily in their children's outcome from an early age. But taking all the discomfort,
disappointment and even the play out of development, especially while increasing
pressure for success, turns out to be misguided by just about 180 degrees. With few
challenges all their own, kids are unable to forge their creative adaptations to the
normal vicissitudes of life. That not only makes them risk-averse, it makes them
psychologically fragile, riddled with anxiety. In the process they're robbed of identity,
meaning and a sense of accomplishment, to say nothing of a shot at real happiness.
Forget, too, about perseverance, not simply a moral virtue but a necessary life skill.
These turn out to be the spreading psychic fault lines of 21st-century youth. Whether
we want to or not, we're on our way to creating a nation of wimps.
The Fragility Factor
College, it seems, is where the fragility factor is now making its greatest mark. It's
where intellectual and developmental tracks converge as the emotional training
wheels come off. By all accounts, psychological distress is rampant on college
campuses. It takes a variety of forms, including anxiety and depression—which are
increasingly regarded as two faces of the same coin—binge drinking and substance
abuse, self-mutilation and other forms of disconnection. The mental state of students
is now so precarious for so many that, says Steven Hyman, provost of Harvard
University and former director of the National Institute of Mental Health, "it is
interfering with the core mission of the university."
The severity of student mental health problems has been rising since 1988,
according to an annual survey of counseling center directors. Through 1996, the
most common problems raised by students were relationship issues. That is
developmentally appropriate, reports Sherry Benton, assistant director of counseling
at Kansas State University. But in 1996, anxiety overtook relationship concerns and
has remained the major problem. The University of Michigan Depression Center, the
nation's first, estimates that 15 percent of college students nationwide are suffering
from that disorder alone.
Relationship problems haven't gone away; their nature has dramatically shifted and
the severity escalated. Colleges report ever more cases of obsessive pursuit,
otherwise known as stalking, leading to violence, even death. Anorexia or bulimia in
florid or subclinical form now afflicts 40 percent of women at some time in their
college career. Eleven weeks into a semester, reports psychologist Russ Federman,
head of counseling at the University of Virginia, "all appointment slots are filled. But
the students don't stop coming."
Drinking, too, has changed. Once a means of social lubrication, it has acquired a
darker, more desperate nature. Campuses nationwide are reporting record increases
in binge drinking over the past decade, with students often stuporous in class, if they
get there at all. Psychologist Paul E. Joffe, chair of the suicide prevention team at the
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, contends that at bottom binge-drinking is
a quest for authenticity and intensity of experience. It gives young people something
all their own to talk about, and sharing stories about the path to passing out is a
primary purpose. It's an inverted world in which drinking to oblivion is the way to
feel connected and alive.
"There is a ritual every university administrator has come to fear," reports John
Portmann, professor of religious studies at the University of Virginia. "Every fall,
parents drop off their well-groomed freshmen and within two or three days many
have consumed a dangerous amount of alcohol and placed themselves in harm's
way. These kids have been controlled for so long, they just go crazy."
Heavy drinking has also become the quickest and easiest way to gain acceptance,
says psychologist Bernardo J. Carducci, professor at Indiana University Southeast
and founder of its Shyness Research Institute. "Much of collegiate social activity is
centered on alcohol consumption because it's an anxiety reducer and demands no
social skills," he says. "Plus it provides an instant identity; it lets people know that
you are willing to belong."
Welcome to the Hothouse
Talk to a college president or administrator and you're almost certainly bound to
hear tales of the parents who call at 2 a.m. to protest Branden's C in economics
because it's going to damage his shot at grad school.
Shortly after psychologist Robert Epstein announced to his university students that
he expected them to work hard and would hold them to high standards, he heard
from a parent—on official judicial stationery—asking how he could dare mistreat the
young. Epstein, former editor in chief of Psychology Today, eventually filed a
complaint with the California commission on judicial misconduct, and the judge was
censured for abusing his office—but not before he created havoc in the psychology
department at the University of California San Diego.
Enter: grade inflation. When he took over as president of Harvard in July 2001,
Lawrence Summers publicly ridiculed the value of honors after discovering that 94
percent of the college's seniors were graduating with them. Safer to lower the bar
than raise the discomfort level. Grade inflation is the institutional response to
parental anxiety about school demands on children, contends social historian Peter
Stearns of George Mason University. As such, it is a pure index of emotional
overinvestment in a child's success. And it rests on a notion of juvenile frailty—the
assumption that children are easily bruised and need explicit uplift," Stearns argues
in his book, Anxious Parenting: A History of Modern Childrearing in America.
Parental protectionism may reach its most comic excesses in college, but it doesn't
begin there. Primary schools and high schools are arguably just as guilty of grade
inflation. But if you're searching for someone to blame, consider Dr. Seuss. "Parents
have told their kids from day one that there's no end to what they are capable of
doing," says Virginia's Portmann. "They read them the Dr. Seuss book Oh, the Places
You'll Go! and create bumper stickers telling the world their child is an honor
student. American parents today expect their children to be perfect—the smartest,
fastest, most charming people in the universe. And if they can't get the children to
prove it on their own, they'll turn to doctors to make their kids into the people that
parents want to believe their kids are."
What they're really doing, he stresses, is "showing kids how to work the system for
their own benefit."
And subjecting them to intense scrutiny. "I wish my parents had some hobby other
than me," one young patient told David Anderegg, a child psychologist in Lenox,
Massachusetts, and professor of psychology at Bennington College. Anderegg finds
that anxious parents are hyperattentive to their kids, reactive to every blip of their
child's day, eager to solve every problem for their child—and believe that's good
parenting. "If you have an infant and the baby has gas, burping the baby is being a
good parent. But when you have a 10-year-old who has metaphoric gas, you don't
have to burp him. You have to let him sit with it, try to figure out what to do about
it. He then learns to tolerate moderate amounts of difficulty, and it's not the end of
the world."
Arrivederci, Playtime
In the hothouse that child raising has become, play is all but dead. Over 40,000 U.S.
schools no longer have recess. And what play there is has been corrupted. The
organized sports many kids participate in are managed by adults; difficulties that
arise are not worked out by kids but adjudicated by adult referees.
"So many toys now are designed by and for adults," says Tufts' Elkind. When kids do
engage in their own kind of play, parents become alarmed. Anderegg points to kids
exercising time-honored curiosity by playing doctor. "It's normal for children to have
curiosity about other children's genitals," he says. "But when they do, most parents I
know are totally freaked out. They wonder what's wrong."
Kids are having a hard time even playing neighborhood pick-up games because
they've never done it, observes Barbara Carlson, president and cofounder of Putting
Families First. "They've been told by their coaches where on the field to stand, told
by their parents what color socks to wear, told by the referees who's won and what's
fair. Kids are losing leadership skills."
A lot has been written about the commercialization of children's play, but not the
side effects, says Elkind. "Children aren't getting any benefits out of play as they
once did." From the beginning play helps children learn how to control themselves,
how to interact with others. Contrary to the widely held belief that only intellectual
activities build a sharp brain, it's in play that cognitive agility really develops. Studies
of children and adults around the world demonstrate that social engagement actually
improves intellectual skills. It fosters decision-making, memory and thinking, speed
of mental processing. This shouldn't come as a surprise. After all, the human mind is
believed to have evolved to deal with social problems.
The Eternal Umbilicus
It's bad enough that today's children are raised in a psychological hothouse where
they are overmonitored and oversheltered. But that hothouse no longer has
geographical or temporal boundaries. For that you can thank the cell phone. Even in
college—or perhaps especially at college—students are typically in contact with their
parents several times a day, reporting every flicker of experience. One long-distance
call overheard on a recent cross-campus walk: "Hi, Mom. I just got an ice-cream
cone; can you believe they put sprinkles on the bottom as well as on top?"
"Kids are constantly talking to parents," laments Cornell student Kramer, which
makes them perpetually homesick. Of course, they're not telling the folks everything,
notes Portmann. "They're not calling their parents to say, 'I really went wild last
Friday at the frat house and now I might have chlamydia. Should I go to the student
health center?'"
The perpetual access to parents infantilizes the young, keeping them in a permanent
state of dependency. Whenever the slightest difficulty arises, "they're constantly
referring to their parents for guidance," reports Kramer. They're not learning how to
manage for themselves.
Think of the cell phone as the eternal umbilicus. One of the ways we grow up is by
internalizing an image of Mom and Dad and the values and advice they imparted
over the early years. Then, whenever we find ourselves faced with uncertainty or
difficulty, we call on that internalized image. We become, in a way, all the wise
adults we've had the privilege to know. "But cell phones keep kids from figuring out
what to do," says Anderegg. "They've never internalized any images; all they've
internalized is 'call Mom or Dad.'"
Some psychologists think we have yet to recognize the full impact of the cell phone
on child development, because its use is so new. Although there are far too many
variables to establish clear causes and effects, Indiana's Carducci believes that
reliance on cell phones undermines the young by destroying the ability to plan
ahead. "The first thing students do when they walk out the door of my classroom is
flip open the cell phone. Ninety-five percent of the conversations go like this: 'I just
got out of class; I'll see you in the library in five minutes.' Absent the phone, you'd
have to make arrangements ahead of time; you'd have to think ahead."
Herein lies another possible pathway to depression. The ability to plan resides in the
prefrontal cortex (PFC), the executive branch of the brain. The PFC is a critical part
of the self-regulation system, and it's deeply implicated in depression, a disorder
increasingly seen as caused or maintained by unregulated thought patterns—lack of
intellectual rigor, if you will. Cognitive therapy owes its very effectiveness to the
systematic application of critical thinking to emotional reactions. Further, it's in the
setting of goals and progress in working toward them, however mundane they are,
that positive feelings are generated. From such everyday activity, resistance to
depression is born.
What's more, cell phones—along with the instant availability of cash and almost any
consumer good your heart desires—promote fragility by weakening self-regulation.
"You get used to things happening right away," says Carducci. You not only want the
pizza now, you generalize that expectation to other domains, like friendship and
intimate relationships. You become frustrated and impatient easily. You become
unwilling to work out problems. And so relationships fail—perhaps the single most
powerful experience leading to depression.
From Scrutiny to Anxiety... and Beyond
The 1990s witnessed a landmark reversal in the traditional patterns of
psychopathology. While rates of depression rise with advancing age among people
over 40, they're now increasing fastest among children, striking more children at
younger and younger ages.
In his now-famous studies of how children's temperaments play out, Harvard
psychologist Jerome Kagan has shown unequivocally that what creates anxious
children is parents hovering and protecting them from stressful experiences. About
20 percent of babies are born with a high-strung temperament. They can be spotted
even in the womb; they have fast heartbeats. Their nervous systems are innately
programmed to be overexcitable in response to stimulation, constantly sending out
false alarms about what is dangerous.
As infants and children this group experiences stress in situations most kids find
unthreatening, and they may go through childhood and even adulthood fearful of
unfamiliar people and events, withdrawn and shy. At school age they become
cautious, quiet and introverted. Left to their own devices they grow up shrinking
from social encounters. They lack confidence around others. They're easily influenced
by others. They are sitting ducks for bullies. And they are on the path to depression.
While their innate reactivity seems to destine all these children for later anxiety
disorders, things didn't turn out that way. Between a touchy temperament in infancy
and persistence of anxiety stand two highly significant things: parents. Kagan found
to his surprise that the development of anxiety was scarcely inevitable despite
apparent genetic programming. At age 2, none of the overexcitable infants wound up
fearful if their parents backed off from hovering and allowed the children to find
some comfortable level of accommodation to the world on their own. Those parents
who overprotected their children—directly observed by conducting interviews in the
home—brought out the worst in them.
A small percentage of children seem almost invulnerable to anxiety from the start.
But the overwhelming majority of kids are somewhere in between. For them,
overparenting can program the nervous system to create lifelong vulnerability to
anxiety and depression.
There is in these studies a lesson for all parents. Those who allow their kids to find a
way to deal with life's day-to-day stresses by themselves are helping them develop
resilience and coping strategies. "Children need to be gently encouraged to take risks
and learn that nothing terrible happens," says Michael Liebowitz, clinical professor of
psychiatry at Columbia University and head of the Anxiety Disorders Clinic at New
York State Psychiatric Institute. "They need gradual exposure to find that the world
is not dangerous. Having overprotective parents is a risk factor for anxiety disorders
because children do not have opportunities to master their innate shyness and
become more comfortable in the world." They never learn to dampen the pathways
from perception to alarm reaction.
Hothouse parenting undermines children in other ways, too, says Anderegg. Being
examined all the time makes children extremely self-conscious. As a result they get
less communicative; scrutiny teaches them to bury their real feelings deeply. And
most of all, self-consciousness removes the safety to be experimental and playful. "If
every drawing is going to end up on your parents' refrigerator, you're not free to fool
around, to goof up or make mistakes," says Anderegg.
Parental hovering is why so many teenagers are so ironic, he notes. It's a kind of
detachment, "a way of hiding in plain sight. They just don't want to be exposed to
any more scrutiny."
Parents are always so concerned about children having high self-esteem, he adds.
"But when you cheat on their behalf to get them ahead of other children"—by
pursuing accommodations and recommendations—you just completely corrode their
sense of self. They feel 'I couldn't do this on my own.' It robs them of their own
sense of efficacy." A child comes to think, "if I need every advantage I can get, then
perhaps there is really something wrong with me." A slam-dunk for depression.
Virginia's Portmann feels the effects are even more pernicious; they weaken the
whole fabric of society. He sees young people becoming weaker right before his
eyes, more responsive to the herd, too eager to fit in—less assertive in the
classroom, unwilling to disagree with their peers, afraid to question authority, more
willing to conform to the expectations of those on the next rung of power above
them.
Endless Adolescence
The end result of cheating childhood is to extend it forever. Despite all the parental
pressure, and probably because of it, kids are pushing back—in their own way.
They're taking longer to grow up.
Adulthood no longer begins when adolescence ends, according to a recent report by
University of Pennsylvania sociologist Frank F. Furstenberg and colleagues. There is,
instead, a growing no-man's-land of postadolescence from 20 to 30, which they dub
"early adulthood." Those in it look like adults but "haven't become fully adult yet—
traditionally defined as finishing school, landing a job with benefits, marrying and
parenting—because they are not ready or perhaps not permitted to do so."
Using the classic benchmarks of adulthood, 65 percent of males had reached
adulthood by the age of 30 in 1960. By contrast, in 2000, only 31 percent had.
Among women, 77 percent met the benchmarks of adulthood by age 30 in 1960. By
2000, the number had fallen to 46 percent.
Boom Boom Boomerang
Take away play from the front end of development and it finds a way onto the back
end. A steady march of success through regimented childhood arranged and
monitored by parents creates young adults who need time to explore themselves.
"They often need a period in college or afterward to legitimately experiment—to be
children," says historian Stearns. "There's decent historical evidence to suggest that
societies that allow kids a few years of latitude and even moderate [rebellion] end up
with healthier kids than societies that pretend such impulses don't exist."
Marriage is one benchmark of adulthood, but its antecedents extend well into
childhood. "The precursor to marriage is dating, and the precursor to dating is
playing," says Carducci. The less time children spend in free play, the less socially
competent they'll be as adults. It's in play that we learn give and take, the
fundamental rhythm of all relationships. We learn how to read the feelings of others
and how to negotiate conflicts. Taking the play out of childhood, he says, is bound to
create a developmental lag, and he sees it clearly in the social patterns of today's
adolescents and young adults, who hang around in groups that are more typical of
childhood. Not to be forgotten: The backdrop of continued high levels of divorce
confuses kids already too fragile to take the huge risk of commitment.
Just Whose Shark Tank Is It Anyway?
The stressful world of cutthroat competition that parents see their kids facing may
not even exist. Or it exists, but more in their mind than in reality—not quite a fiction,
more like a distorting mirror. "Parents perceive the world as a terribly competitive
place," observes Anderegg. "And many of them project that onto their children when
they're the ones who live or work in a competitive environment. They then imagine
that their children must be swimming in a big shark tank, too."
"It's hard to know what the world is going to look like 10 years from now," says
Elkind. "How best do you prepare kids for that? Parents think that earlier is better.
That's a natural intuition, but it happens to be wrong."
What if parents have micromanaged their kids' lives because they've hitched their
measurement of success to a single event whose value to life and paycheck they
have frantically overestimated? No one denies the Ivy League offers excellent
learning experiences, but most educators know that some of the best programs exist
at schools that don't top the U.S. News and World Report list, and that with the right
attitude—a willingness to be engaged by new ideas—it's possible to get a meaningful
education almost anywhere. Further, argues historian Stearns, there are ample
openings for students at an array of colleges. "We have a competitive frenzy that
frankly involves parents more than it involves kids themselves," he observes, both as
a father of eight and teacher of many. "Kids are more ambivalent about the college
race than are parents."
Yet the very process of application to select colleges undermines both the goal of
education and the inherent strengths of young people. "It makes kids sneaky," says
Anderegg. Bending rules and calling in favors to give one's kid a competitive edge is
morally corrosive.
Like Stearns, he is alarmed that parents, pursuing disability diagnoses so that
children can take untimed SATs, actually encourage kids to think of themselves as
sickly and fragile. Colleges no longer know when SATs are untimed—but the kids
know. "The kids know when you're cheating on their behalf," says Anderegg, "and it
makes them feel terribly guilty. Sometimes they arrange to fail to right the scales.
And when you cheat on their behalf, you completely undermine their sense of selfesteem.
They feel they didn't earn it on their own."
In buying their children accommodations to assuage their own anxiety, parents are
actually locking their kids into fragility. Says the suburban teacher: "Exams are a
fact of life. They are anxiety-producing. The kids never learn how to cope with
anxiety."
Putting Worry in its Place
Children, however, are not the only ones who are harmed by hyperconcern. Vigilance
is enormously taxing—and it's taken all the fun out of parenting. "Parenting has in
some measurable ways become less enjoyable than it used to be," says Stearns. "I
find parents less willing to indulge their children's sense of time. So they either
force-feed them or do things for them."
Parents need to abandon the idea of perfection and give up some of the invasive
control they've maintained over their children. The goal of parenting, Portmann
reminds, is to raise an independent human being. Sooner or later, he says, most kids
will be forced to confront their own mediocrity. Parents may find it easier to give up
some control if they recognize they have exaggerated many of the dangers of
childhood—although they have steadfastly ignored others, namely the removal of
recess from schools and the ubiquity of video games that encourage aggression.
The childhood we've introduced to our children is very different from that in past
eras, Epstein stresses. Children no longer work at young ages. They stay in school
for longer periods of time and spend more time exclusively in the company of peers.
Children are far less integrated into adult society than they used to be at every step
of the way. We've introduced laws that give children many rights and protections—
although we have allowed media and marketers to have free access.
In changing the nature of childhood, Stearns argues, we've introduced a tendency to
assume that children can't handle difficult situations. "Middle-class parents especially
assume that if kids start getting into difficulty they need to rush in and do it for
them, rather than let them flounder a bit and learn from it. I don't mean we should
abandon them," he says, "but give them more credit for figuring things out." And
recognize that parents themselves have created many of the stresses and anxieties
children are suffering from, without giving them tools to manage them.
While the adults are at it, they need to remember that one of the goals of higher
education is to help young people develop the capacity to think for themselves.
Although we're well on our way to making kids more fragile, no one thinks that kids
and young adults are fundamentally more flawed than in previous generations.
Maybe many will "recover" from diagnoses too liberally slapped on to them. In his
own studies of 14 skills he has identified as essential for adulthood in American
culture, from love to leadership, Epstein has found that "although teens don't
necessarily behave in a competent way, they have the potential to be every bit as
competent and as incompetent as adults."
Parental anxiety has its place. But the way things now stand, it's not being applied
wisely. We're paying too much attention to too few kids—and in the end, the wrong
kids. As with the girl whose parents bought her the Gestalt-defect diagnosis,
resources are being expended for kids who don't need them.
There are kids who are worth worrying about—kids in poverty, stresses Anderegg.
"We focus so much on our own children," says Elkind, "It's time to begin caring
about all children."

Our bishop is a math professor and sent this out today. I especially liked the math part of it and thought I'd share it.
Jocelyn

Interesting Facts...Read all the way through!!!

Beauty of Math!

1 x 8 + 1 = 9

12 x 8 + 2 = 98

123 x 8 + 3 = 987

1234 x 8 + 4 = 9876

12345 x 8 + 5 = 98765

123456 x 8 + 6 = 987654

1234567 x 8 + 7 = 9876543

12345678 x 8 + 8 = 98765432

123456789 x 8 + 9 = 987654321


1 x 9 + 2 = 11

12 x 9 + 3 = 111

123 x 9 + 4 = 1111

1234 x 9 + 5 = 11111

12345 x 9 + 6 = 111111

123456 x 9 + 7 = 1111111

1234567 x 9 + 8 = 11111111

12345678 x 9 + 9 = 111111111

123456789 x 9 +10= 1111111111


9 x 9 + 7 = 88

98 x 9 + 6 = 888

987 x 9 + 5 = 8888

9876 x 9 + 4 = 88888

98765 x 9 + 3 = 888888

987654 x 9 + 2 = 8888888

9876543 x 9 + 1 = 88888888

98765432 x 9 + 0 = 888888888

Brilliant, isn't it?

And look at this symmetry:

1 x 1 = 1

11 x 11 = 121

111 x 111 = 12321

1111 x 1111 = 1234321

11111 x 11111 = 123454321

111111 x 111111 = 12345654321

1111111 x 1111111 = 1234567654321

11111111 x 11111111 = 123456787654321

111111111 x 111111111=12345678987654321

Now, take a look at this...

101%

From a strictly mathematical viewpoint:

What Equals 100%? What does it mean to give MORE than 100%?

Ever wonder about those people who say they are giving more than 100%?

We have all been in situations where someone wants you to GIVE OVER 100%.

How about ACHIEVING 101%?

What equals 100% in life?

Here's a little mathematical formula that might help answer these questions:

If:
A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z
Is represented as:
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26.

If:

H-A-R-D-W-O-R- K

8+1+18+4+23+15+18+11 = 98%

And:

K-N-O-W-L-E-D-G-E

11+14+15+23+12+5+4+7+5 = 96%

But:

A-T-T-I-T-U-D-E

1+20+20+9+20+21+4+5 = 100%

THEN, look how far the love of God will take you:

L-O-V-E-O-F-G-O-D

12+15+22+5+15+6+7+15+4 = 101%

Therefore, one can conclude with mathematical certainty that:

While Hard Work and Knowledge will get you close,

and Attitude will get you there,

It's the Love of God that will put you over the top!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY! FELIZ ANIVERSARIO! JOYEUX ANNIVERSAIRE! FELIZ COMPLEANOS! BUONO COMPLEANNO

ANDY AND TIA JOCELYN
WE LOVE YOU VERY MUCH .
HOPE YOU ENJOY YOUR DAY!
WITH OUR LOVE
DREW IV, NINHA AND SHAWNNA

Hello Everyone,
Here are some news from our side.
We have being little busy with school work and doctors visits.

Now about my health situation:
I was in the hospital for a few hours I guess a month ago. They did blood work , a CAT scan, endoscopy, colonoscopy, ultrasound, They did find cancer cells in blood that time, then, I stayed into the hospital for 3 days. During this visit, they gave me lots of fluids because I was so dehydrated and I do have a cancer bacteria in her stomach that could turn into cancer, and also my biopsy came back showing that I had cancer, but, some how all the holes in my stomach was gone and now I just have the cancer bacteria and cancer cells in my blood . now I am taking strong medication for it and return to have another biopsy taken in a week or so to see if it’s getting better. And I also had a brain scan to check for my epilepsy– it looked good, so no problems there. I just have to take my medications for the seizures and I will be fine .I am still having lot pain ,but I am taking strong pain killers and some time I rather not taking them at all. This just me. I am eating much better now and it stays down, I have to eat boring food for while even baby food. YUK. But now I am starting to eat little better. Oh and I gained some more pounds which makes me really happy. I am able to do my things around the house and all the good cleaning that I love doing and taking care of the kids.
And Now the better part.
Went back to the doctor and she said I was doing great and ready to have normal life again. But slowly.
Now I have a job. I can't stop I can't just sit and do nothing I need to keep myself busy and going on with my life.

Life is wonderful to just let it go by without enjoying and learning from it every day.
I work in a preschool. AGAIN. And I am loving it. Drew goes to the same place. So I can see him and it makes me feel good that my kid is around.

Shawnna is in first grade and she is loving it. She is in a special program for gifted children. They said they will keep her in first grade for the 3 moths or so and test her and maybe she will to 3rd grade in the middle of the school year. That's little crazy! But will see how it goes.
She already was tested this week with a reading specialist and a Psycologist.

Life is pretty good around here so far.

Andy is working hard and of course he loves what he does.
His boss likes him a lot and they treat him really good around there. He is one of the best mechanics in the shop. And that makes us proud. Of course.

I have learn so much from all this situation. My testemony grows every single day.
I know that miracles happens big or small they do happens.
Heavenly Father loves and cares for each of us.
We have our difficulties in life and there's where we need to take the advantage to learn and think about the wonderful blessings that we can get from it.
It is amazing how He is always watching over us doesn't matter what we do good or bad He is there for us just waiting for us to come to Him with our humble hearts and with our faith.
My testemony grew and I learned so much this last year.
I think I have being better person and have another way to look at life and people.
I think we are in this earth to learn from our own trials and from others too. And I have tried to respect others and love them the way they are and learn from them. Beacause Heavenly Father gave me one more chance in my life. We come here tolearn and grow.
And I will take advantage in the best way to live and do my best to show Him that I will follow the gospel just like I was tought more than 10 years ago by the missionaries.
I have a great testemony how true and wonderful the Gospel is. I have no douts about it.
I am so Thankful for those missionaries to knock at my door and tought me the Gospel and I will pass to my children and hope they will pass it to their children too.
We love all of you and miss you .
This what I have to say for now.

Sorry for my english. I am not very good writting.But I am trying at least.
Love,
Ninha, Shawnna, Drew IV and Andy.
Here is our Home phone number if anyone would like to say hello.
(703) 436-2663

Im always griping about no one posting so I think it is the right time to compliment
Jocey, Cindi, Nathan, Bobby and Jeff on their latest posts. WAY TO GO GUYS AND GALS.
I hear all the time --- my life is boring------ I have nothing to post ------etc. I love it all even the mundane and ho hum! You might think it is DRAB but I think it is all very interesting and will let future generations know about our daily lives. the good times and the bad it all works out as our families history------So Keep Posting
Love to all Dad

HERE IS AN EMAIL FROM CINDI.
I think it is important so I am posting it:

well at least for me it´s morning, you´re probably just going to bed now.

Not much to say, just wanted to send a little note. Seminary was great this morning. I hate waking up, but LOVE teaching the Gospel. I get so excited about things that I´m learning and want to share that excitement with the kids. Most days I get through to them, some days they´re a bit sleepy! But in each class my testimony grows. Today we talked again about the fall of Adam and the consequence of the fall. That of course lead to the Atonement of Christ. It dosen´t matter in what setting you´re in, when you talk about the Atonement the Spirit fills the room and bares testimony of the truthfulness of the Atonement and how much God and Jesus love us. Anyway, like I always say, it´s a wonderful way to start the day.

I hope you are worrying less...unlikely, but I hope. I love you and hope you have a happy happy day!
keep smiling
me

A little about what we've been doing lately....


We had a great stake conference 10 days ago. One thing I realized was that in France, stake conference is always very well attended. People seem to come to stake conference even when they don't attend church regularly. I asked Patrice and his parents about it. I guess it's because the people get to see everyone and don't have to participate! That's SO French and it's driving me crazy lately - the lack of willingness to commit to participating. I said I thought that in the US it was the other way around, (at least it was in our family growing up - sorry mom!) that it was stake conference that you could skip because you didn't have any responsibility that particular Sunday. What is your impression of stake conference attendance in the US? I need to base my comparison on something besides my own experience.



We had a record-breaking ward activity at our house this past Saturday. It was our second annual dry pack canning (mylar bags actually) ward activity held at the Duffort home/garage/backyard. We start canning by 10, we have a Primary activity in the backyard from 10-12, then a BBQ for everyone, then back to canning until it's done. Last year we canned about half a ton of wheat in about 3 hours. This year we canned 1.5 tons of a variety of grains in about 8 hours (including clean-up). All that and WE didn't even can any of our own food. We plan on finishing ours this weekend. The stake has two dry pack sealers and Patrice's parents are in charge of one of them. It's convenient. So they left it with us for us to be able to finish what we didn't do.


Here are some pictures....

We had three pallets of grain delivered to our house the week prior to the activity. It was cool to see the paper with the name of the church on it.

In the foreground is what I call our carport (it's not an add-on, it's actually under our living room), fully covered just missing a garage door, with our front door on the left which you can't see. It's where we usually park our car. Here we have boxes of sealed mylar bags.

This was in the beginning of the canning, so a lot fewer people. Later there were twice as many helping (or trying to).

Aphy at the sealer.

My father in law took this one. I promise the camera added 15 pounds here! I am not that round! But notice the apron Mom - that's my favorite one. That's one thing I inherited from my mom - I'm an apron wearer.

It doesn't look like much but there were a lot of bags. We had people load their car to help clear space. Here's Bishop Jean-Luc Marichal loading his car with help from Ronny Wies, one of our 3 Luxembourgers.

This was the NUMBER ONE improvement over last year - labels. Berenice, who was RS pres last year and started this tradition, helped with the planning of this year's activity even though she's no longer pres. She printed these up and they were a life saver. Last year they used Sharpie markers and it was long and after awhile they didn't work on the bags anymore.

So given my description of the activity, you might assume that I actually participated. Not really! I helped with the Primary activity for the first hour. We had about 20 kids and we divided the group in half and I took one group on a walk in the back of our backyard looking for food the way the pioneers would have had to do. We have fruit trees, apples, pears, plums, walnuts and hazelnuts, plus raspberries and blackberries. They really liked finding the food and even helped me pick apples and find walnuts and hazelnuts on the ground. My main purpose was gopher, before and after helping with the primary. Everyone needed something, or had forgotten something, or wanted something. I just kept running around 'hostessing'.

But overall it was a total success and each year we (or I) learn something that we will change next year. Last year the kids ended up getting out all our toys, bikes, etc after the Primary activity. I didn't have the nerve to say no. This year I had decided beforehand no toys so I didn't let anyone take out anything and I was constantly policing it because the little kids kept dragging stuff out. Next year I will announce that people need to bring their own toys for their kids to play with! The problem with the set up is that our house is very long, and our garage runs (front to back) through the right side of it. We do the canning activity in the front of the garage and the rest out back in the backyard/patio. Although we could go around the side of the house, it's much more convenient just to walk through the garage and out back. But then the kids do the same and they see all the stuff on the shelves, in boxes etc and they want to get everything out. NO, NO, NO!! Like I said, I was toy police. Live and learn. We look forward to next year's activity, but are glad it's a year away!!

I´m sorry. I´m sure these pictures are terribly boring, but dad insisted I put some pictures up of the store I work at.

I wrote a blog...a message from the Director of Coaching (thats me) for our Council Bluffs Futbol Club Web Site. I did not want to take up too much space so I decided that if you are interested in reading it you can click here to read it.

O.K. So I understand that the picture is not of me, but it is a picture of our leading goal scorer (Daniel Blevins from Topeka, kansas)on the women's team. I thought a picture...any picture would be better than no picture.

Anyway, the polen count and other allergy stuff is very high and both teams are finishing up thier illness times. It did not help that in a span of 8 days both teams traveled on a bus for just under 70 hours and played 5 matches each. The teams headed to idaho...Coeur d’Alene to be exact. We went there for some great competition and to see a gorgeaous part of the county. Genrally, we take the western kids somwhere they might not get to see (like the mall of america in Minnesotta). This year we decided we would talk the Iowa (midwest) kids to see a part of the country they normally would not get to see. If you go to the link that i put up a few lines ago, you will see the gorgeous surroundings of the institution there and recognize that dead center is a green field where the soccer field is located.

Anyway,

The ladies are 5-1-1 and the men are 3-2. We are pleased with both teams and feel strongly that the women are the deepest team in the nation and that the men are the scrappiest (opposite of the same word without the s) team in the nation. Both teams are a joy to coach and be involved with as they are all good people, students and hard workers.

O.K. So I have had a number of you ask what the girls name is. Her name is Jessica. She goes by Jessie, and she hates calling me GINN, so she calls me Jeff. I allow it, because we make each other laugh tons! Last night i got off work around 9pm, she came over to the school around 8 and we putboth our legs in the ice cold whirlpool (my calves still hurt and she just started working out again so we were both sore.) So she came over and put our feet in 55 degrees water and shivered together as we made fun of one another. She had already eaten, and I had not, so I suggested we go buy some soup...and again she laughed at me and them later agreed to go with me to the store to get some soup and oyster crackers. Anyway, she is delightful and keeps me on my toes...we are going camping in two weeks. The camping at lake arrowhead will involve kyacking and fun stuff like that so pray that it stays somewhat warm the next few weeks. Jessies mom has worked for the wildlife of Iowa for the last ???? years and knows everyone in the outdoors in the midwest. She is sort of like our Dave Webb that we all miss so much. So it looks like I have to start eating granola and purchase some trail boots to keep up with Jessie and her family.

Life is decent and I am enjoying the great weather we are having in the midwest. I miss and love you all dearly. Keep smiling and be happy!

Great job Nathan!
For the record would you please identify the
people in the pictures. I know your family but
I am not sure about Brett and Carries kids.
Again Thank you for taking the time to post the pics and the
days journey!!!!
Love Dad

Nathan - LOVED IT!!!

I believe it has come to my attention that dad (ed) is slowing down at work and has more time to stare at the computer. Meanwhile all of us young families are freakin' out with the beginning of a new school year. Likely, the reason why the blog has nearly come to a halt. Today is Sunday and I am home with Alexa who is sick with a Temp near 102. Yesterday with Alexa being under the weather and unable to participate in the many activities usually involved on a Saturday, I was tasked with managing Brinley and finding time to shop for some new clothes. I have been on the Atkins diet since May. I took a blood test and well, sometimes heredity stinks and I am creeping toward diabetes. The good side affect is that I have lost about 20 lbs. Therfore, the need for new clothes. So, to entertain and enlighten my father of the typical school year Saturday... In the AM took brinley to her soccer game, which ended around 11:15 (brinleys team walloped the opponent 8-2, but we really don't keep score...do we?), then off to get the haircut, and finally another 20 minute drive to Nordstrom rack for some pants that hopefully will fit for a while. Just for Cindi I bought a new pair of shoes. However, they hurt my feet so they may go back? I still had Brinley with me and she needed some shoes for PE class at school, so we headed next door to Famous Footwear, while I was waitng for the cuffs to be sewn on my new pants. Brinley picked out some dark brown Sketchers with baby blue stripes and hearts. By the time we finished shopping, it was 2 o'clock and we had one hour to stop at Mc Donald's (the caesar with grilled chicken is an Atkins friendly choice). Ran to the Mecca of all stores Wal-Mart to purchase the Birthday gift for the party we would be late for. Yes, it was at 3 and 20 minutes away. Of course as we are making our way through the weekend crowds and B-lining it for the Toy section, I run into an old friend and his family from the last ward we lived in. My personal desire was to have a seat and catch up on life, but alas Barbi and her assortment of accessories was waiting. Brandi had given me a $10 limit so we looked hard. Knowing that the little girl (Georgia) probably sleeps on the floor because of all the toys and dolls in her room, I convinced Brinley that the appropriate gift was the Barbi beach cruiser car which would allow Barbi to be transported somewhere so that Georgia would have a place to sleep at night. B said "ok" and we ran to the gift wrap aisle for a big pink bag for the big pink car and then ran to the 1000 item or less check out stand only to discover that I had left my wallet in the car. The nice old lady at WM said she would watch B while I RAN! to my car. Transaction complete and off we go to another mall and the Colorado Bear (similiar to the Build-a Bear) for just over an hour. Now I was very anxious at this point because BYU was playing UCLA and I had forgot to set the TIVO. Brandi was actually able to do that for me after a frantic call. I returned home at 5pm with a quick confirmation that TIVO was doing his job on the game, I went outside to use the last 2 hours of daylight to do a little work on the playhouse. I had just enough time to trim the ends off of the asphalt shingles. Then microwave some left over chicken, put the girls to bed and then sit down to watch BYU get handed a nice loss by the referees whom surely must have been paid handsomely to let UCLA steal the game. The Coug's put up a valiant fight in the 2nd half, but alas, the referrees called a blown forward pass a fumble giving the ball back to UCLA when BYU, down only 3 points, was well within Field Goal range and would likely have tied if not taken the lead. Now, the day was over. I will throw in some pictures for the old folks to oogle at, just to complete this lengthy, mundane and ho-hum chronicle of a day in the life at the Colorado Ginn home. Which I am sure has left some thinking..."well, now I can live another day..." and the rest thinking "please someone give me back the last 5 - 1o minutes of my life to pursue more worthy objectives." Have a wonderful day! Lots of love, nathan

Looks like all my encouragement to post your family labor day fun went no where!
But I am guilty also. I left my camera at home (forgot it) so no pictures. We did have a very relaxing time with Ron and Shan. We read books played games and cards and I ventured into the pool every day and got a nice red glow that is turning brown. Ron and I went to the races on Saturday. Ron won and I lost. I would have made a good deal of money in the seventh if I had bet on Sweet Robert to win but I didn't. sorry bobby.
Still hope to see some photos and rhetoric.