J and J

In our church we believe in personal revelation, that when you have a problem you can pray to your loving Heavenly Father and  He will answer your prayers. We also believe that the Prophet Joseph Smith was a young man who wanted to know what the course of his life should be, through prayer and personal revelation the restoration of Christ's church  was brought back to the earth. That through this process the Priesthood was returned to the earth. Each member of our church is entitled to receive a Patriarchal blessing by a priesthood leader who also can give us personal revelation through an inspired blessing meant just for us.

I was 19 when I received this special blessing of direction. A huge concern of mine was making sure my future children would be good people who could feel God's love for them in their life. In my blessing it advised me to pattern my parenting after my own parents. I thought that was great advice because I think they both  are amazing parents, as I have looked back on their parenting I have noticed many things that they "did right". These are 3 things that I want to emulate in my own parenting.

1) They were present. Every cross country race, basketball game (even when I sat the bench), drama play, choir performance, track race, you name it they were there. At least one parent was always present. Lindsey did soccer when I was on the basketball team and our games were on the same night they would rotate attending. My mom worked outside the home ever since I was little, but she was at the crossroads of our activities  Dad of course worked but always managed to get off work in time to hear the race gun for our meets. It was a sacrifice and I am sure not always convenient, but we knew we were their top priority.

2) They were active in the church. We always made it church, I honestly can't remember a time we didn't attend church on Sunday. I am sure we were occasionally sick but I cant remember.  Mom and Dad always had some sort of responsibility at church and they  went above and beyond to fulfill them. I think that their activity was the reason why in high school when we would have a sporting event in the afternoon and we would get done with them just before our youth group would meet that night, it was never a question if we would ditch, we wanted to go.

3) They allowed open communication with problems without judging. An example of this is when Lindsey and I were invited to spend the night at a friends house, when we got there we did not feel good the Dad was odd and the thought of staying was not appealing. So I turned to my friend and said hey its 8 pm my mom wanted me to call her. This is how the conversation went.

Me: Hi mom, you wanted me to call you?
Mom: What, whats going on? is everything ok?
Me: What? Why do you want us to go home? We just got here?
Mom: Honey you want to come home?
Me: Yes mom, I get it.
Mom: I am coming right now.
Me: Fine, we didn't know about that chore!We will be ready, this really sucks.

She picked us up and we were so relieved. She would tell us, I have no problem being the bad guy. She was great. I remember one time in high school I was "depressed" about something Dad took me for a ride to talk about things cause he noticed I was down, he cared enough to notice and act.

All parents worry if they did enough, I try to look back at all the great things my parents did and let go of things I wish they had done better. And as a parent now when I make mistakes I think wow this is probably how my parents felt too. When we show others mercy we receive mercy, maybe my kids will remember the positive things too :)