Our ward was preparing for a talent show when quarantining struck. So we decided to record some of our talents and share them via Facebook. This was my first entry. I'm thinking of recording some of my other past talent show bits and sharing them also.
Sunday, March 29, 2020
The Kids on our COVID-19 experience, week 2
John-Thomas - COVID bad. Bad bad COVID. I like staying home, but I don't like that Matthew can't come over because my birthday is coming soon.
Princess - I like General Conference, even though people might not be able to come to the place.
SCHOOL
[For our home school experience, the kids have three groups of things they need to do. 1 - They get ready for the day with the usual things they need to do anyway. 2 - They have their school subjects. 3 - They have additional school subjects that we want them to learn, like Duolingo and more advanced math for the older kids. They can choose when they do each subject within each group for the most part.]
Superstar - I have my school stuff to do and a couple hours of 8th grade algebra, which is frustrating.
Princess - I like to do more art, more preparation for [JT's] birthday
Superstar - During recess I don't get to play football with my friends.
Princess - I miss my classmates and my teacher.
JT - School is more exciting. The fun yesterday was more exciting. I almost beated the level on Wii and the movie was fun too. Movie movie movie!
Superstar - I like being able to choose what subject comes next. I sometimes get to play Wii at school once I finish everything. We get to do Zooms - it's a face to face online video chat you can have with other people. Sometimes we have zooms with the entire class and sometimes it was 3 people. In Zoom I like how you get to share anything on your ipad on your screen so that everybody can see it and you can make yourself have a virtual background. So if I'm standing at a green background it looks like I'm at the beach. [I asked him what's good about in-person classes.] There are a lot of good things about Zoom.
Princess - I like the new clothes I've been getting. Two people brought me pretty new clothes. I get more me time, quiet time, reading time. I like almost everything about homeschool, except when I'm on the Disney dance pad, I can't sit down.
JT - I like Disney dance cause I get the gold star!
Superstar - At least this happened before we got to track, cause I didn't want to do track.
Princess - I like science. I tried an experiment from my teacher. So you put some water in one cup, about half full, and put water in another cup about half full, and then you put a lot of salt in one and then you don't put any salt in the other. I dropped an egg in each and in one it floated and one it sank. Then I put the egg in the one that floated and put the water from the one that sank on top, and the egg floated in between the two waters!
Superstar - I've shared a google doc with some of my friends so I can talk to them through the google doc. But the google doc, it doesn't give you a notification when someone says something. Google classroom and share it with your class, everyone in the class can see it and there's a notification. But then you can have a small chat with someone in Zoom that gives notifications as well.
CHURCH
JT - Church is yummy. Because of the homemade bread. Feels like I'm eating the house!
Princess - One thing I like about home church is that I'm only talking to 5 people when I bear my talk so it's not as scary as usual when I bear it normal church.
Superstar - I don't really like revisiting Primary because I'm the only young man. But I kind of like that they are letting me teach, which kind of brings it back up again. I also like that I get to pass the sacrament to my family every Sunday. I'm not looking forward to that ending. It's interesting that Dad gives the sacrament tray to me, and then I hand it to him because he's the presiding person. He hands it to me and then I hand it to him, and then I pass to everyone else. It's kind of cozy. And we have rocking chairs! So I get to sit in a rocking chair the entire time. Pretty cool.
Princess - I like General Conference, even though people might not be able to come to the place.
SCHOOL
[For our home school experience, the kids have three groups of things they need to do. 1 - They get ready for the day with the usual things they need to do anyway. 2 - They have their school subjects. 3 - They have additional school subjects that we want them to learn, like Duolingo and more advanced math for the older kids. They can choose when they do each subject within each group for the most part.]
Superstar - I have my school stuff to do and a couple hours of 8th grade algebra, which is frustrating.
Princess - I like to do more art, more preparation for [JT's] birthday
Superstar - During recess I don't get to play football with my friends.
Princess - I miss my classmates and my teacher.
JT - School is more exciting. The fun yesterday was more exciting. I almost beated the level on Wii and the movie was fun too. Movie movie movie!
Superstar - I like being able to choose what subject comes next. I sometimes get to play Wii at school once I finish everything. We get to do Zooms - it's a face to face online video chat you can have with other people. Sometimes we have zooms with the entire class and sometimes it was 3 people. In Zoom I like how you get to share anything on your ipad on your screen so that everybody can see it and you can make yourself have a virtual background. So if I'm standing at a green background it looks like I'm at the beach. [I asked him what's good about in-person classes.] There are a lot of good things about Zoom.
Princess - I like the new clothes I've been getting. Two people brought me pretty new clothes. I get more me time, quiet time, reading time. I like almost everything about homeschool, except when I'm on the Disney dance pad, I can't sit down.
JT - I like Disney dance cause I get the gold star!
Superstar - At least this happened before we got to track, cause I didn't want to do track.
Princess - I like science. I tried an experiment from my teacher. So you put some water in one cup, about half full, and put water in another cup about half full, and then you put a lot of salt in one and then you don't put any salt in the other. I dropped an egg in each and in one it floated and one it sank. Then I put the egg in the one that floated and put the water from the one that sank on top, and the egg floated in between the two waters!
Superstar - I've shared a google doc with some of my friends so I can talk to them through the google doc. But the google doc, it doesn't give you a notification when someone says something. Google classroom and share it with your class, everyone in the class can see it and there's a notification. But then you can have a small chat with someone in Zoom that gives notifications as well.
CHURCH
JT - Church is yummy. Because of the homemade bread. Feels like I'm eating the house!
Princess - One thing I like about home church is that I'm only talking to 5 people when I bear my talk so it's not as scary as usual when I bear it normal church.
Superstar - I don't really like revisiting Primary because I'm the only young man. But I kind of like that they are letting me teach, which kind of brings it back up again. I also like that I get to pass the sacrament to my family every Sunday. I'm not looking forward to that ending. It's interesting that Dad gives the sacrament tray to me, and then I hand it to him because he's the presiding person. He hands it to me and then I hand it to him, and then I pass to everyone else. It's kind of cozy. And we have rocking chairs! So I get to sit in a rocking chair the entire time. Pretty cool.
Friday, March 20, 2020
Throwback Thursday: Holding church as a single person
I do have one big lesson I want to share with everyone about holding church at home, but there's a story that goes with it...
----wavy flashback----
In the summer of 2013, we were setting Joy and the kids up in Utah. We had just moved from Provo to Pleasant Grove. I had just a few weeks left before returning to Nigeria alone. One of the bishop's councilors asked me to speak in church. I happily agreed and worked on my talk for many hours until I felt some very strong stirrings from the Spirit that helped me know what I was supposed to say.
When we got to church, however, I discovered my name wasn't on the program. About 30 minutes into the meeting, I got a text from our ward in Provo, asking me where I was. OOPS! Our old ward had invited me to speak, not our new ward. We had only been there for 4-6 weeks and I didn't know either bishopric that well. We were more than a 30 minute drive away and had to cancel. Sorry!
Later that day, the new ward's bishopric asked me to speak on a different topic the next week. I happily agreed and worked on my talk for many hours until I felt some very strong stirrings from the Spirit that helped me know what I was supposed to say.
When we got to church, I was pleased to see my name on the program. I was in the right ward this time! But then the speaker before me spoke for the entire meeting. I had enough time to bear a 30 second testimony and sit down.
I got home deeply confused. Why had I felt the Spirit so strongly - TWICE - about talks that no one would ever hear? I remember weeping as I prepared both of them because of the love of God I felt while writing them. What was I supposed to learn from this? Then came the lesson:
I learned I needed to prepare my talks in Nigeria with the same faith and fervor and effort that I had used when preparing for these talks. If it took hours, that's what it took. It didn't matter that no one would hear them but me and God. That was what I needed.
--------------------
My first Sunday alone in Nigeria, I thought it was weird standing at our little podium and speaking to an empty couch. I grabbed some of the stuffed animals my kids had left behind to serve as an audience. ... That was a bad idea. It was much weirder giving a talk to them! Once the toys were back where they belonged, church went forward. I sang an opening hymn by myself, blessed and passed the sacrament to myself, and faced an empty couch to give the talk I had worked on while on the plane. I have to say, the Spirit was there in power. It was a great reassurance and testimony to me that I wasn't truly alone.
Over the weeks that followed, there were some days that I decided I could wing it. It was just for me, after all. Not long into my talks, however, I noticed that there was no power, that the influence of the Holy Ghost was decidedly missing. So I announced that church would be postponed until the evening. I would spent the rest of the day writing out the talk I should have prepared during the week. When I re-started church, it felt right again. That only happened a couple times before I learned it would just take me 3-6 hours a week to draw deeply enough from the scriptures and the words of latter-day prophets to get the help and renewal I needed from my Sabbath observance.
Though I will say, one of the nice things about church by myself is that the meeting lasts just as long as I want to. If my talk is 10-15 minutes long, church is done pretty quick. But if the good professor (windbag that he is) decides to rhapsodize a bit and enjoy a 45 minute lecture on the Atonement, well, that's all fine too!
What you get out of church depends on what you put into it. God will visit and strengthen us as we gather in our much smaller congregations, and even in a church of one! We are never truly alone.
----wavy flashback----
In the summer of 2013, we were setting Joy and the kids up in Utah. We had just moved from Provo to Pleasant Grove. I had just a few weeks left before returning to Nigeria alone. One of the bishop's councilors asked me to speak in church. I happily agreed and worked on my talk for many hours until I felt some very strong stirrings from the Spirit that helped me know what I was supposed to say.
When we got to church, however, I discovered my name wasn't on the program. About 30 minutes into the meeting, I got a text from our ward in Provo, asking me where I was. OOPS! Our old ward had invited me to speak, not our new ward. We had only been there for 4-6 weeks and I didn't know either bishopric that well. We were more than a 30 minute drive away and had to cancel. Sorry!
Later that day, the new ward's bishopric asked me to speak on a different topic the next week. I happily agreed and worked on my talk for many hours until I felt some very strong stirrings from the Spirit that helped me know what I was supposed to say.
When we got to church, I was pleased to see my name on the program. I was in the right ward this time! But then the speaker before me spoke for the entire meeting. I had enough time to bear a 30 second testimony and sit down.
I got home deeply confused. Why had I felt the Spirit so strongly - TWICE - about talks that no one would ever hear? I remember weeping as I prepared both of them because of the love of God I felt while writing them. What was I supposed to learn from this? Then came the lesson:
I learned I needed to prepare my talks in Nigeria with the same faith and fervor and effort that I had used when preparing for these talks. If it took hours, that's what it took. It didn't matter that no one would hear them but me and God. That was what I needed.
--------------------
My first Sunday alone in Nigeria, I thought it was weird standing at our little podium and speaking to an empty couch. I grabbed some of the stuffed animals my kids had left behind to serve as an audience. ... That was a bad idea. It was much weirder giving a talk to them! Once the toys were back where they belonged, church went forward. I sang an opening hymn by myself, blessed and passed the sacrament to myself, and faced an empty couch to give the talk I had worked on while on the plane. I have to say, the Spirit was there in power. It was a great reassurance and testimony to me that I wasn't truly alone.
Over the weeks that followed, there were some days that I decided I could wing it. It was just for me, after all. Not long into my talks, however, I noticed that there was no power, that the influence of the Holy Ghost was decidedly missing. So I announced that church would be postponed until the evening. I would spent the rest of the day writing out the talk I should have prepared during the week. When I re-started church, it felt right again. That only happened a couple times before I learned it would just take me 3-6 hours a week to draw deeply enough from the scriptures and the words of latter-day prophets to get the help and renewal I needed from my Sabbath observance.
Though I will say, one of the nice things about church by myself is that the meeting lasts just as long as I want to. If my talk is 10-15 minutes long, church is done pretty quick. But if the good professor (windbag that he is) decides to rhapsodize a bit and enjoy a 45 minute lecture on the Atonement, well, that's all fine too!
What you get out of church depends on what you put into it. God will visit and strengthen us as we gather in our much smaller congregations, and even in a church of one! We are never truly alone.
Throwback Thursday: Holding church as a family
As the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints announced that church would not be convening because of COVID-19, we pulled out our family chant, "Welcome to Nigeria! Have a nice day!"
Normally we only recite it when the electricity shuts off, but nothing reminds us of our Nigeria experience quite like holding church in the comfort of our own home. For 3 years we did that. At first there was a second family, but then they left and it was just us and then just me for the last year. The kids couldn't remember those days very well, but we just had to pull our old system out of mothballs.
I assigned Superstar to prepare a 5 minute talk about something from Jacob 1-4 that we had all read last week. Joy and I each prepared 10 minute talks and we had the young ones bear a brief testimony. I picked four hymns - opening, sacrament, intermediate, and closing - and accompanied the family on our piano. I blessed the sacrament and our new deacon passed it to me and the rest of the family.
This was our setup in Nigeria.
We put an end table on top of a coffee table to create our podium
while the rest of the coffee table held the sacrament. This seven year old pic sure does bring back memories and nostalgia for those tiny kids!
In TX we had a two-drawer dresser to hold the sacrament but I haven't invented our podium yet. Maybe I'll pull out our long card table and stick my music holder on top of that to hold people's notes....
I often miss blessing the sacrament. When I was a priest, I was also the ward organist, so I rarely got the opportunity to pray over the emblems of our Lord's Atonement. And that, too, after being mostly in charge of setting it up for the two years before since we lived so close. One of my favorite things about home church is the opportunity to say those sacred prayers and participate in a deeper way in the ordinance of the sacrament. I was thankful for someone's Facebook post where they shared that they used medicine measuring cups for the sacramental water. We had used some decorative glass owl cups that I was nervous about people dropping, and that's just distracting. (One of them did fall off the counter later, so now we only have 4 of them and we'd be mismatched again anyway.)
Joy also put together Primary. I reckon that's what newly-called Primary presidency counselors do. We sang some Primary songs for half an hour and had a short Come, Follow Me lesson that involved something for the younger kids (JT) and the older kids (Princess), with Superstar helping with some of the teaching. He's understandably none too thrilled about returning to Primary just after graduating from it, but he did a fine job participating.
I'm actually looking forward to more Sundays as a family. At least, I'm choosing to look forward to them - since we're going to be doing this for a while, might as well enjoy it!
Normally we only recite it when the electricity shuts off, but nothing reminds us of our Nigeria experience quite like holding church in the comfort of our own home. For 3 years we did that. At first there was a second family, but then they left and it was just us and then just me for the last year. The kids couldn't remember those days very well, but we just had to pull our old system out of mothballs.
I assigned Superstar to prepare a 5 minute talk about something from Jacob 1-4 that we had all read last week. Joy and I each prepared 10 minute talks and we had the young ones bear a brief testimony. I picked four hymns - opening, sacrament, intermediate, and closing - and accompanied the family on our piano. I blessed the sacrament and our new deacon passed it to me and the rest of the family.
This was our setup in Nigeria.
We put an end table on top of a coffee table to create our podium
while the rest of the coffee table held the sacrament. This seven year old pic sure does bring back memories and nostalgia for those tiny kids!In TX we had a two-drawer dresser to hold the sacrament but I haven't invented our podium yet. Maybe I'll pull out our long card table and stick my music holder on top of that to hold people's notes....
I often miss blessing the sacrament. When I was a priest, I was also the ward organist, so I rarely got the opportunity to pray over the emblems of our Lord's Atonement. And that, too, after being mostly in charge of setting it up for the two years before since we lived so close. One of my favorite things about home church is the opportunity to say those sacred prayers and participate in a deeper way in the ordinance of the sacrament. I was thankful for someone's Facebook post where they shared that they used medicine measuring cups for the sacramental water. We had used some decorative glass owl cups that I was nervous about people dropping, and that's just distracting. (One of them did fall off the counter later, so now we only have 4 of them and we'd be mismatched again anyway.)
Joy also put together Primary. I reckon that's what newly-called Primary presidency counselors do. We sang some Primary songs for half an hour and had a short Come, Follow Me lesson that involved something for the younger kids (JT) and the older kids (Princess), with Superstar helping with some of the teaching. He's understandably none too thrilled about returning to Primary just after graduating from it, but he did a fine job participating.
I'm actually looking forward to more Sundays as a family. At least, I'm choosing to look forward to them - since we're going to be doing this for a while, might as well enjoy it!
Saturday, March 14, 2020
Superstar turned 12
One of the nice coincidences of each year is that spring break coincides with our eldest's birthday, so we all get plenty of time off to enjoy it.
This was a birthday even I had been looking forward to for a long time. 12 was a pretty major milestone in our church because it's when a young man graduates from the children's primary organization and receives the Aaronic priesthood. They begin their first steps in a life of covenant service to God and others.
Except that changed last year with the announcement that 'graduation' would happen in January of the year young men and women turn 12, rather than on their birthday. Superstar received the priesthood at the beginning of January and we went to the temple with his grandparents two days later. It was wonderful! For my part, though, that left this week feeling a little less dramatic.
Still, a good time was had by all. Superstar's theme this year was the Olympics. We had Olympic rings out on the front lawn, I hung up these Olympic streamers, and in his two birthday parties (one with two school friends on Tuesday and one with two church friends on Wednesday) they played a bunch of sports and sports-related video games. A lot of the presents were sports-related as well: a tennis racket, two different kinds of basketball hoops that hang from door frames, an automatic pitching machine, a chocolate football.... He also got some board/card games, a Tacocat shirt, and a book of card tricks for some variety.
He was very eager for the big event, planned everything himself, and even made the decorative bronze and silver medals. He, representing Japan, won the Olympics overall with 2 gold and 2 silver medals.
Superstar was entertained by the fact that most of the presents were in gold wrapping paper, while some were in silver. And by silver, I mean aluminum foil. I actually really liked wrapping things in foil and may have to that more often - it holds its shape without tape. Plus, it's highly reusable, assuming the opener doesn't tear it into tiny pieces on the way in.
We had cheesy noodles for dinner one night, grilled two-cheese sandwiches with clam chowder another, and all you can eat pizza on the main night - our primary excursion outside of social distancing. Superstar also asked if we could please go one day without mentioning the word Caronavirus. So now the dread topic on everyone's lips is called "that which shall not be named" or "Voldemort" for short.
This was a birthday even I had been looking forward to for a long time. 12 was a pretty major milestone in our church because it's when a young man graduates from the children's primary organization and receives the Aaronic priesthood. They begin their first steps in a life of covenant service to God and others.Except that changed last year with the announcement that 'graduation' would happen in January of the year young men and women turn 12, rather than on their birthday. Superstar received the priesthood at the beginning of January and we went to the temple with his grandparents two days later. It was wonderful! For my part, though, that left this week feeling a little less dramatic.
Still, a good time was had by all. Superstar's theme this year was the Olympics. We had Olympic rings out on the front lawn, I hung up these Olympic streamers, and in his two birthday parties (one with two school friends on Tuesday and one with two church friends on Wednesday) they played a bunch of sports and sports-related video games. A lot of the presents were sports-related as well: a tennis racket, two different kinds of basketball hoops that hang from door frames, an automatic pitching machine, a chocolate football.... He also got some board/card games, a Tacocat shirt, and a book of card tricks for some variety.
He was very eager for the big event, planned everything himself, and even made the decorative bronze and silver medals. He, representing Japan, won the Olympics overall with 2 gold and 2 silver medals.Superstar was entertained by the fact that most of the presents were in gold wrapping paper, while some were in silver. And by silver, I mean aluminum foil. I actually really liked wrapping things in foil and may have to that more often - it holds its shape without tape. Plus, it's highly reusable, assuming the opener doesn't tear it into tiny pieces on the way in.
We had cheesy noodles for dinner one night, grilled two-cheese sandwiches with clam chowder another, and all you can eat pizza on the main night - our primary excursion outside of social distancing. Superstar also asked if we could please go one day without mentioning the word Caronavirus. So now the dread topic on everyone's lips is called "that which shall not be named" or "Voldemort" for short.
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