1. The girls and I just watched a creepy movie, Conjurer, that we ordered from Netflix. I had each of them pick out 3 or 4 movies for us to get this summer, and Amber picked this one. We wanted some creepy movies to watch, and of course, we didn't let her get any that were rated R. Horror movies that are PG or PG-13 are hard to find, but we did find some. It was a pretty good movie, but we were disappointed in the ending.
2. We've been playing lots of games lately. We went over to Steve & Lil's on Sunday night. JJ, Allyson and Joshie came home with us, and spent the night. The next day, we went swimming down at Mom & Dad's and played lots of games. They stayed for FHE on Monday night, along with Shelli, who had come to pick them up. We taught her how to play Acquire, which I'd been wanting to show her for along time. That was really fun. Then I had my mom, Aunt Diane and Kathy over last night for games. We played a couple games of Rummikub, then Aunt Diane taught me (and reminded everyone else), how to play 63. It's a card game that my mom and aunt used to play with my grandparents when they were growing up. It was so fun. Everyone brought snacks and I had even bought some Spanish peanuts, in honor of Gram. She always had a bowl full of them when we played games.
3. I'm all set now to begin my Masters' program in the fall. The first class is September 7th. I'm excited about this new journey. I'm also excited that I won't have to travel far each week, just to Auburn every Tuesday night.
4. I'm reading a Jodi Picoult book right now, but I decided that once I finish it I am going to be more picky on the kind of books I pick out. The plot is good and everything, but she puts some language and scenes in there that are not very wholesome.
5. It's been so fun having the girls home. I knew it would be fun having Ashley here, but I didn't know if it would feel awkward to have Amber around. It's actually been much better than I thought. She's been nicer than I expected her to be. There have been a couple of incidents that we are not happy about, but overall, she has not been hostile.
6. JJ is going to be going to EFY in a few days, and when he was talking about it to Ashley, I decided to see what she would think about going next summer. I had been thinking about taking Ashley and Emily next summer to BYU for EFY, but I didn't know if Ashley would even want to. I talked to Emily about it a couple months ago and she seemed open to it, as long as Ashley went. Ashley sounded like she really wanted to go, too, as long as Emily went. So hopefully, it will happen!
7. I want so badly for all of the girls (all 6 of them: Olivia, Felicia, Amber, Emily, Ashley and Megan) to have wonderful experiences with living the gospel (EFY, youth conference, stake activities, FHE, family prayer, Young Women, Personal Progress, etc), but unfortunately, they only have a small amount of those things in their lives. It is truly so sad to me. I struggle to understand why it has to be that way, when they all have righteous fathers. I know Heavenly Father can't take away their mothers' agency, so he has to let them live their lives, but all the girls will have to pay for it. They will all suffer the spiritual consequences because of it. Mike and Dan are almost powerless when it comes to their girls' lives. We try really hard to give them those experiences when they're here (and I know Mike does, too, with his girls), so they get a few Family Home Evenings a year, go to church less than 10 times a year, and family prayer and scripture study when they're here. That's it. Oh, Ashley & Emily have gone to Girls Camp twice, Amber went to Girls' Camp 2 or 3 times, Amber went to Youth Conference once and a few stake activities. Olivia and Felicia stopped even going to church with Mike a couple of years ago. They go to Young Women's sometimes, and that's it. Megan goes to church every other week with us. I'm so sad for all of them. The saddest thing is that they don't even realize what they're missing.
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