Controversial Books

So, I was interested in reading The Golden Compass series by Phillip Pullman (The Golden Compass, The Subtle Knife, The Amber Spyglass) because some parents have asked us to remove it from the shelf at the school lbrary. After hearing the allegations about the books (that they are intended to persuade children to become atheists), I was feeling like people had not given them a chance. I had already begun to read The Golden Compass before I had heard about any of the controversy, after all, and there was nothing that I could find that was questionable. So I continued to read. Even after the second book, it seemed as though he was only speaking out against corrupt religion, which I think is a good thing. Not too far into the third book, however, it was clear that he believes all religion is corrupt.

The premise of the books is essentially that there was an angel a long time ago that put himself above the other angels and called himself God and the Creator (even though he was not) and that his goal is to keep people from gaining knowledge(that's why gaining knowledge was the original sin). The rebel angels (you know, that 1/3 from the war in heaven) have been fighting against him ever since and trying to help humans learn. And they enlist the help of two children to help them destroy God and create the Republic of Heaven (rather than the Kingdom).

There's a lot more to the stories, of course, and they are well written and interesting, but they still really hurt my feelings. In his books, the only religious people are either power-hungry hypocrites or fearful and ignorant. He writes about love and accepting people even with their faults (his main characters are flawed on purpose, I think) and the power of human relationships and following your instincts and the great value of learning. I am in complete agreement with pretty much everything he writes about those things. He seems to have a good understanding of how we all interact with and need each other. But the major flaw I see is that his goal is to show that religion is the antithesis of all of those good things; it is only useful for repressing people. So, while he may know a lot about life, he is quite ignorant about religion and people's reasons for being religious. Maybe he should stick to writing about things with which he is familiar.

For the record, I still don't think it should be removed from the shelves at school. As Anna said to me, "Nothing good ever came from censorship." I agree. It would probably create more problems than it would solve. And I want to have my freedom of expression protected, so I can't take away someone else's. Still, I think parents should be making informed decisions about what their children are reading.

Past events

Here are a couple of pictures from December that I never got around to posting:

Laurel was baptized Dec. 1. We had a conflict with the scheduled Stake baptisms (Jared was going to be out of town), so she got to have her own. It was really nice to have all of Jared's family and also Mom and Dad here for the baptism. Our house was pretty packed with people, but all the cousins on the Meeker side seemed to have a good time.

Our Christmas picture. We can never get one with everyone looking at the camera.

December Things

Our big events for this month (except Christmas) were Laurel's baptism on the first and Jacob's 3rd birthday on the third. But Jared has the camera with all of the pictures from those two days with him in Germany right now. I'll post them later. We have had a lot of snow since Jared left for his trip and the kids have had fun playing in it. So here are the pictures...





We got quite a bit more snow on the ground after these pictures were taken. And so while we've been here shoveling, Jared's been running around in Germany and heads to Switzerland on Wednesday. Tough job, Jared. Last year Tahiti, this year Europe. Poor you. I'm actually not too bitter about it. I'm excited he gets to see some cool places. I just want to go with him some time.

I'm finally getting around to it!

OK, after almost 2 months of good intentions, I am finally posting something on the family blog! The past few months have been quite busy, but we've been getting a few things accomplished and having a lot of fun. Greg and I had a great couple of weeks in Vienna, Prague and Salzburg (a million thanks to Mom for taking such good care of our kids!) and we saw some amazing sights. And yes, that is a picture of me standing in front of the house where Mozart was born. If anyone wants to see the pictures from our "Sound of Music" Tour, just let me know and I'll post them separately.
Once we got back in town, Greg and I both had a lot of work to get caught up on. Then we had to make sure all of our costumes were ready for Halloween. We were all pirates, and the children took their roles very seriously. Phoebe got quite upset when other children thought she was a gypsy, Cader wore his eyepatch all day, and Topher just wandered around with his sword saying "Arrgh!" He also learned a new sign on Halloween and started using it in his first spontaneous 2 sign phrase-- "More Candy!" Halloween was quickly followed by Cader's birthday in November. He started announcing to everyone the evening before that when he saw them next, he would be five! He had a few friends over to play and had a dinosaur birthday cake of which he was very proud.
We all really enjoyed Dad and Mom's visit for Thanksgiving. Phoebe and Cader had a great time putting together their gingerbread house with Grandpa, and then eating all the candy off of it. Unfortunately, on the Monday after Mom and Dad left for Portland, I weighed myself at the gym and discovered that I had gained 7 pounds while they were here! It looks like I enjoyed myself a little TOO much.
Now that it's December, Phoebe has returned to school following her November track break. The rest of us are trying to return to our schedules as well (we'll see if going to the gym 5 days a week can help me get rid of my Thanksgiving weight gain before Christmas) and get ready for Christmas. Now that I've done this once, hopefully it will be easier to do in the future.
Love to all of you!
Bekah and family

Family Pictures

We tried to do family pictures on Monday night at the gardens at Jared's office. It got too dark to get any frame-worthy photos, but we did get a couple of good pictures.


Most of them were pretty much like this one, though.


They kind of like to goof off...

I'd love to see some Halloween pictures of other cousins...

Halloween

Here are the kids in their costumes. Jacob was a dragon, Laurel was a poor rendition of Linny the Guinea Pig from Wonder Pets (I got the cape done at least!), Ben was a Ninja, and Meg was Tinkerbell. They all had fun and got lots of candy. And we're all really tired today.

Beautiful Tuesday

We are having ideal weather! It's not as warm as it was a week ago (it was in the 70's!), but it is clear and beautiful and in the 50's. Perfect weather for working in the yard again, but I'm letting a blister heal, so didn't do too much today.

Just for fun, I'll run through the day, so you know what it's like around here. I slept in until 7, but Tom was up by 6/6:30. Matt was also up 6:30. He starts breakfast for whichever children are up. Tom and I left at 7:30 to go to the temple and were back around 10. Meredith and Garrett left for school about 8:30; Jianna walks them to school, and sometimes Haley walks along, too. But usually Haley and Bethany stay home with Dad (or Grandma, when I 'm here).

Then there's the usual routine stuff, like laundry that goes on each day. But today Matt and I went down the street to a new neighbor's to help set up our old bunkbed in their house. We found there was a need to move some furniture to make room for the bed first. It's a good thing Matt knows how to disconnect and reconnect computers and other stuff, because he needed to do that, too. We barely got back in time for Jianna to go to get Garrett from school at 12.

As beautiful as the day was, we had to convince Garrett and Haley that playing outside would be more fun than staying inside today (they wanted to watch TV). They played on the swingset and helped rake leaves and cut twigs. Meredith gets out of school at 2:50, and today had to get home quickly to get dressed in her Halloween costume and go to "activity day" with other girls her age in Primary.

The piano will finally be getting some regular use again. Meredith had her first lesson yesterday, and was able to learn the first half of "Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star" during the lesson, and figure out the rest after hearing Matt play it after the lesson. She practiced yesterday and today, and is doing very well. Now Garrett wants to take piano lessons, too.

Jianna stayed at home working on dinner while I did the pickup of the carpool for Meredith's activity day. We had duck spring rolls, some other kind of rolls (like a crepe with scallions and filled with egg), and peas. Our meals are much more varied now than ever before, thanks to Matt and Jianna.

Tonight Thomas called with a question about paying his credit card bill. Karen also called, but it was time to eat, so we didn't get to talk much. It's always nice to hear from one or more of you.

The evening routine tends to be the same most nights. After dinner, baths are administered and dinner dishes washed. Then Meredith reads from the Book of Mormon with Matt. Then Jianna reads some scriptures to the family. After that, Matt reads from something a little lighter - they finished Harry Potter, and are currently reading "Bunnicula."

I couldn't resist sitting to write this for a few minutes, though I have several other things to do before going to bed tonight.

So I hope you all have a safe and pleasant day tomorrow. And I hope all the children enjoy Halloween!! We'll be at the door handing out the large candy bars Tom always buys. Everyone enjoys coming to our house on Halloween for those big candy bars. We usually have more than 100 trick-or-treaters! But there are always leftover candy bars:)

Happy Halloween, and love,

Mom/Pam/Grandma