All Kinds of Education

I have developed a very different attitude towards school from the one I had growing up. My sisters and I knew we were going to school every day unless we were direly ill. And dire illness was the only reason to miss school. I still mostly subscribe to that idea...kids would come up with a new Ferris Buehler method for staying home every day without us draconian parents insisting they go. In my case I drop them off and pick them up every day myself. But I am finding too that there are sometimes good reasons to take my children out of school that have nothing to do with health.

This past week my Michigan sister brought her children to stay at my parents' while she and her husband took a well-earned trip together (on the heels of a conference her husband had chaired). So Thursday morning my parents brought the cousins down to BYU while I took my three younger kids to meet them at the Bean Museum. Grandpa brought two digital cameras and his iPad for the grandkids to share and take pictures of whatever caught their eye at the museum. My dad and I had some much-needed daddy-daughter talking time while the grandkids wandered all over the Bean Museum taking pictures of each other, the exhibits, the people, and who knows whatever else. When the kids slowed down we packed them up and took them over to the Museum of Art to meet my mother and two oldest nieces, who got to see the Carl Bloch exhibit (if you are in the area and haven't seen it yet it's a GOTTA SEE. And rent the iPad to get the full experience. It's a worthy $3).

We gathered our whole group and ambled over to the Wilkinson Center to visit the bookstore (a tradition) and get some lunch at the CougarEat. It was an awesome morning. The cousins had a great time playing/laughing/talking together.

And on Friday I took Evan out of school to participate in a temple trip to perform baptisms on behalf of his deceased ancestors with his older cousins. It was especially great because the kids performed this service for their own ancestors. Children need a spiritual education as much as they need a secular one.

School is critical, don't get me wrong. Going to college is just part of what we expect our children to work towards. But a crowded classroom isn't the only place to learn.

And those pictures? We'll get to those later!