April

Somewhere I fell off the blogging wagon. I don't know why. But I'm trying to climb back on again. I have some extra motivation, which should help. Jeff's parents left two weeks ago to begin their 18-month-long LDS mission to Tennessee. (Hi Mom and Dad! We're praying for you!) You can thank them if you are glad that I am trying to blog again. You can also blame them if this blog becomes somewhat grandparent-focused. Feel free to skim or skip altogether.

Back in February, Ryan took the test to qualify for placement in our school district's gifted education program. He hasn't been very excited about the idea because it's a magnet school arrangement and he would have to leave his current school to participate. I've had a few reservations as well, but I felt like he needed to take the test and keep all the options open. He's had a good experience at our neighborhood school, but he just learns things so quickly and easily that I have felt like he is not being challenged, that his potential is being limited, and that he has even been bored in school. He gets his work done and then reads--so much that he probably has double the "reading points" of any other kid in the 4th grade. So anyway, after a little confusion about the scores on his test, Ryan was offered placement in a gifted class for next year. We attended an orientation meeting last week to meet the teacher and learn more about the program. Ryan still isn't thrilled, but he liked the teacher and said he is willing to give it a try. One idea that the teacher presented at the meeting made a lot of sense to me. She introduced Bloom's Taxonomy of thinking in which there are six levels of thought processes arranged from lower order processes to higher order processes: remembering, understanding, applying, analyzing, evaluating, and creating. I can't explain this as well as she did, but basically, in a regular classroom most of the available time is spent helping students with the lower order processes--remembering and understanding, sometimes applying. There is little time left for analyzing, evaluating, and creating. Gifted students need less time to remember and understand, so putting them in the accelerated environment of a gifted classroom allows them time to move quickly through the lower levels so they can have time for the challenge of the higher level processes. I doubt Ryan is the smartest kid in the school district, but he is bright, and I am excited for him to have this opportunity. I hope it will be a good experience for him.

Last Saturday was the opening day ceremonies for Adam's baseball league. Special guest of honor was Dale Murphy, retired Atlanta Braves star and my hero when I was a Little Leaguer myself. I was looking forward to seeing him and hearing him speak to the kids. He gave them all high fives as they filed onto the field, then after some encouraging words to the kids and the parents, he and and the mayor and the Salt Lake Bees mascot threw out the first pitch(es). Afterwards, Adam and I stood in line to talk to him and get him to sign a couple of my old baseball cards. I tend to get flustered and not know quite what to say to "celebrities." (I wonder if they get tired of that--fans stumbling over their words when they try to talk to them.) I did ask him if he was still in touch with Ray Knight, another former baseball player who actually had some of the missionary discussions in our home when I was a kid and my dad was the ward mission leader. I think he said he wasn't, but like I said, I get flustered, so it wasn't much of a conversation. There were people in line behind us, so I snapped a photo of him and Adam and we thanked him for coming. On the way to the ball field, Jeff had been telling me how he didn't really like Murphy and the Braves when he was a kid, because he was a Dodgers fan. It took him quite awhile to figure out why the Braves were the only team ever on TV. (Thanks to Ted Turner and WTBS, the Braves were broadcast nation-wide and became known as "America's Team." I didn't really know this as a kid. We didn't have a TV, but we lived in Georgia and attended a couple of "Mormon Night at the Braves" games, so I've always felt like I came by my Braves fanhood naturally.) As Adam and I were standing in line to get Dale's autograph, one of the coaches said to all the kids standing there, "You guys don't know how good this guy was. He was my hero when I was your age. I used to come home every day after school and turn on the TV to watch Braves games on TBS and see this guy do his magic." As we were walking off the field, another coach or parent saw my baseball cards and asked if we'd had him sign them. When I said yes, he said, "I hated him when I was a kid. I was a Dodgers fan." I said, "And the only team you could see on TV was the Braves, right?" He said, "Yes, exactly!" It was funny. Seems all the 40-somethings at the ball field that day were either Dale Murphy groupies who could hardly contain their excitement, or they hated him--not much in between. And the kids hardly knew who he was.


We had a nice but quiet Easter at home this year. It was a little chilly, so the Easter bunny hid the plastic eggs in the house. The Easter bunny needs to remember, however, not to hide one in the oven, then turn it on to preheat for Easter dinner baking. Oops. The melted egg had to be scraped off the bottom of the oven. The Tootsie Roll inside of it was still intact on the oven rack, which I thought was interesting in a 350 degree oven. Reminds me of my kids new favorite--roasting Starbursts over the campfire. I didn't quite dare eat the Tootsie Roll though, as I think it was contaminated with the melted plastic. I might have to try roasting some at our next campfire though. Jeff cooked an un-traditional but very delicious Easter dinner of German food for us--rouladen, red cabbage, spaetzle, and klöse. We finished off the day by watching the new "Voyage of the Dawn Treader" movie which the Easter bunny had brought along with too much candy.




My favorite part of Easter though, was a wonderful sacrament meeting program at church. The speakers gave great talks about our Savior, Jesus Christ, and the love He gives to each of us personally, individually. And I was able to sing "When I Survey the Wondrous Cross," and my new favorite Easter hymn, "The Resurrection and the Life," by Sally DeFord, with our ward choir. (I haven't yet sung a song by her that I didn't really like.) It was an uplifting worship service for me. I've been reflecting on my testimony of Jesus Christ lately. I remember as a teen and young adult wanting to have a strong testimony, but just not feeling it like I thought I was supposed to. I imagine there are people for whom a testimony comes as a gift in a sudden way. But I think maybe the Lord knew that I would appreciate my testimony more if it came to me gradually, line upon line, here a little and there a little (2 Nephi 28:30), through people and experiences and scriptures that have also become dear to me. I still struggle to express my faith in words, but I feel it, and I am so grateful for it.