The Clarkson Family: April 2011

We rented a van and even though the kids and I were just getting over strep we headed to DC. Our first stop was the DC temple. Isn't is beautiful? The kids enjoyed the visitors center and chatting with the sister missionaries.

We were so lucky to have a warm weekend! There is snow on the ground, but the weather was great!

Valentines day morning, we visited the Washington Monument. Andrew and Tim with the White House in the background.

The best place was the Smithsonian Museum of Natural History. The kids LOVED it! And did you know ALL the museums in DC are free????

To Matthew, our 7 year old, this real giant squid was the coolest thing ever!
Levi had this look on his face the entire time! He loved seeing the animals! Here he just discovered a giraffe.
We had a great little trip. Something I didn't plan on: sooooooooooooooooooo much walking. Also, we took the METRO and that was an extremely new experience for Tim and I, being from the West. But the kids were really obedient, didn't get lost, and it was actually fun (looking back on it!)

Current Favorite Quotes From My Current Favorite Books

"Only a virtuous people are capable of freedom. As nations become corrupt and vicious, they have more need of masters." Benjamin Franklin

"Life is not about finding yourself. Life is about creating yourself." George Bernard Shaw

"Rather than turning inward to 'find' herself, she has 'created' herself throughout her life by serving others, building her character, and rising to the challenges life has presented her." Maria Covey Cole

"Contentment should be the hallmark of the man or woman who has put his or her affairs in the hands of God." Phillip Keller

"If a woman wants to become a finer mother, she must first become a finer person." Maria Covey Cole

"Wise and good men are in my opinion, the strength of the state; more so than riches or arms... I think also, that general virtue is more probably to be expected and obtained from the education of youth, than from the exhortations of adult persons; bad habits and vices of the mind being, like diseases of the body, more easily prevented [in youth] than cured [in adults.] I think, moreover, that talents for the education of youth are the gift of God; and that he on whom they are bestowed, whenever a way is opened for the use of them, is as strongly called as if he heard a voice from heaven...." Benjamin Franklin

"I thank God that I have lived to see my country independent and free. She may long enjoy her independence and freedom if she will. It depends on her virtue." Samuel Adams

"Life is a mission and not a career, and the purpose of all our education and knowledge is so that we can better represent Him and serve that mission of life in His name and toward His purposes." David O. McKay

"Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other." John Adams

"I have been quoted as saying, 'Do the best you can.' But I want to emphasize that it be the very best. We are too prone to be satisfied with mediocre performance. We are capable of doing so much better." Gordon B. Hinckley

The 5 Metastasizing Cancers:
Comparing
Competing
Criticizing
Complaining
Complacency
These lead to feelings of discontentment and can get us caught in the "thick of thin things." Stephen R. Covey

"Lasting contentment comes from pursuing the true reasons for our existence: looking for, finding, loving, and serving God and His children. All other pursuits are mere distractions." Maria Covey Cole

"The science of government is my duty to study, more than all other sciences; the arts of legislation and administration and negotiation ought to take place of, indeed to exclude, in a manner, all other arts. I must study politics and war, that my sons may have liberty to study mathematics and philosophy. My sons ought to study mathematics and philosophy, geography, natural history and naval architecture, navigation, commerce and agriculture, in order to give their children a right to study painting, poetry, music, architecture, statuary, tapestry, and porcelain." John Adams

"We frequently speak of the strength of the priesthood and properly so. But we must never lose sight of the strength of the women. It is mothers who set the tone of the home. It is mothers who most directly affect the lives of their children. It is mothers who teach infants to pray, who read to them choice and beautiful literature from the scriptures and other sources. It is mothers who nurture them and bring them up in the ways of the Lord. Their influence is paramount." Gordon B. Hinckley

"I have noticed that daily we meet moments that steal our self-esteem. They are inevitable. Pick up any magazine; you see people who look healthier, skinnier, or better dressed than you are. Look around. There is always someone who seems smarter, another more self-assured, and still another more talented. In fact, each day we are reminded that we lack certain talents, that we make mistakes, that we do not excel in all things. And amidst all this, it is easy to believe that we do not quite measure up in the great scheme of things, but are inferior in some secret way....
"If you base your self-esteem, your feeling of self-worth, on anything outside the quality of your heart, your mind, or your soul, you have based it on a very shaky footing. So you and I are not perfect in form or physical figure? So you and I are not the richest, the wisest, the wittiest? So what?" Paul H. Dunn

"To teach, encourage, cheer up, console, amuse, stimulate or advise a husband or children or friends, you have to be something yourself. And how to be something yourself? Only by working hard and with gumption at something you love and care for and think is important.
"So if you want your children to be musicians, then work at music yourself, seriously and with all your intelligence. If you want them to be scholars, study hard yourself. If you want them to be honest, be honest yourself. And so it goes.
"And that is why I would say to the worn and hectored mothers who longed to write and could find not a minute for it: If you would shut your door for an hour a day and say: "Mother is working on her five-act tragedy in blank verse!" you would be surprised how they would respect you. They would probably all become playwrights." Brenda Ueland (1938)

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