A combination of events throughout the fall led me to utter words over Thanksgiving break that I have resisted saying for 26 1/2 years of marriage.
I think our family needs to get up early to read scriptures together.
And so at the beginning of December, as a sad sort of late birthday commemoration, we did it. We started waking the family at 6:30, stumbling to the family room, collapsing onto the couch, and reading a chapter from first the end of the Book of Mormon, then from the book of Moses, and most recently from the New Testament.
November had already been overwhelming to me; filled with night-time meetings and daytime appointments I was completely exhausted by Thanksgiving. I had anticipated that December would bring some relief, but no. As the month wore on and we got closer to Christmas (and the tree still didn’t get decorated) I couldn’t figure out what my problem was. I didn’t have all of November’s meetings and I had few appointments, but I was still exhausted and overwhelmed. The biggest evidence for me was the inability to blog—a function which requires both time and mental energy. Finally a day or two before Christmas vacation it hit me. I had started getting up two hours earlier for family scriptures, but hadn’t gone to bed any earlier.
Ouch. No wonder I was exhausted.
Once Christmas break started we took a hiatus from early morning scripture reading and I got to catch up on some much needed sleep. But with all of the Christmas preparations and activities there was still never time (or brain function) available for blogging. (And seriously—when it’s between Kate and the blog, Kate wins every time!)
I’m hoping that now that we’re into the new year that I can finally hold fast to my desperate resolve to GO TO BED EARLIER!!! so that I don’t feel like a walking zombie all of the time. I’m thrilled that we’re reading the scriptures as a family consistently. I’m happy that early morning family scripture time naturally gives me time to make the family breakfast, which is certainly healthier than the alternative. I’m amazed that the kids have NEVER ONCE complained about getting up early for scriptures. I think we all knew in our hearts that we weren’t doing something that we really should be doing and it’s kind of a relief to be on the right track now.
I’d just love to be able to have family scripture study and be able to blog, too…
Posts
NOOOO! I refuse to give into the early morning scripture study! In fact, Brian and I just recently had this conversation (like three weeks ago) where he said, "At some point, don't you think we should be having scripture study in the morni---"
ReplyDeleteI held my hand up to stop him and said, "We will not be having this conversation." That was the end of it. :) Maybe it will happen sometime in our future, but I refuse to think about it today. :)