I absolutely loved the class that we talked about counseling. I loved it so much. I learned a lot from that class that I had never known about counsels before. I think that the way that the church has set up the counsels is a testimony to the truthfulness of the gospel because only the true church could have come up with such a perfect setup. I love learning about the way that the apostles and prophets have their counsels and how they communicate with each other. I think that I might have a little obsession with communication. for one, I really like to communicate and for two I really like good communication. I like people to be direct with me and let me know what they are thinking. I like to speak my mind (maybe a little too much, but I'm working on it) and I like to chat with people and communicate with friends. So, when I learned about the process that the counsel of twelve used in their meetings I was very excited. The only thing I have to do now is learn how to let go of my own wants and desires and listen to the Lord. I love having family counsels and talking things over a s a family too. My husband and I have just recently talked about how we want our family home evening and family counsels to go. I think that planning stuff like that out in advance is a really great idea because you can think about the things that you really want to do in your family before you start doing different things. It was good to talk about it and get everything worked out. I think that with everything that we are learning we are going to be well prepared to have children and raise them up unto the Lord. I think that everyone should be required to take this class before they have a family. It is just that great.

In class we learned about crises in the family. Something that I learn/ relearn/ thought more about was how much our trials really strengthen us if we let them. There are some kinds of crisis that don't really have that much of a deep and lasting effect on us but there are those that we keep with us and continue to learn from. Something that I can to realize even more when thinking/ talking with others about was that it is our attitude that changes a situation from bad to good. We have control over how we feel about something and we can change our attitudes for the better. I think that this can be really hard and sometimes takes a while. I do not think that we should try to never feel or try to push away being upset of hurt or frustrated, but we can learn to overcome those feelings  and learn to see them in more of a positive light. I know that if I try to hid or cover up my negative feelings I will end up feeling worse int he end and it never helps. I think that we all can morn at times and feel sorry for ourselves and others but if we dwell on those feeling we can cause some emotional damage. I'm not sure what I was going for here but I think that learning to deal more effectively with trials and hardships is something that we all can improve on.

I'm really looking forward to being a mother. sometimes it actually drives me crazy because I want to just be a mother right now (I'm not good with waiting). It is especially hard because of my Major with is Child Development. I am always learning new and interesting things about children and I just can't wait to try them out. When we learn about teenagers I sometimes wish that I had a teenager right now so that I can use what I'm learning before I forget it. I know that this seems silly but I really am afraid that I will forget about what I am learning before I have kids.
Anyways, one of the things that we talked about in class that I will have to wait until I have kids for is talking/ teaching about their bodies and God plan for the creation of children. Something that I think is great and that I can't wait for is starting to teach my children to respect and appreciate theirs and other people's bodies right from the beginning. I think that the idea of the "big talk" is so silly and that there shouldn't be one big time that you lay it all on your kids. I think that that could be seriously overwhelming  and confusing. I class we talked about what to say at what age and it gave me a really great opportunity to think about what I would want to tell my kids and how to teach them about their bodies. I thought that it would be good to start out  teaching them to respect their bodies when they are young and move on to the differences between men and women and then go on to why we are different and how babies are born and why babies need to be born and that we were all babies and that you were once a baby and that you are going to grow up and be a mommy and that you are going to have babies too. I think that with such a delicate subject it is important to always keep it in a gospel light. It is really easy to get things wrong, especially in the world we live in today. I know that Satan is trying his best to twist things around and ruin our perceptions but Sexual intercourse will always be a deeply beautiful thing when between man and wife. I can only imagine how bad it will get in the future, that is why it is so important that we stand strong and teach truth.

Out of all the stuff that we have learned so far, I think that stuff that I like the most is the stuff about building and maintaining healthy and awesome relationships. I think that people need to know more about relationships and how to nurture them; the world would be a much better place with a little bit of relationship training. Something that we have learned about that I wish more people would understand is the importance of thinking outside of yourself and giving you all to your spouse. I'm not saying that we should be a servant to them or put our own basic wellbeing at risk. but just live and interact in a way that demonstrates your love for your husband or wife and let them know that you are always there for them and are willing to work through problems and compromise with them. I think that a lot of the time people think that they shouldn't have to change for the people they love, and this is partly true, but I think what it really important to remember is that we should be willing to change with them. We should be willing to improve ourselves for them and help them to improve. Isn't that the purpose of this life? Isn’t that the goal we are all trying to achieve within our families, improvement? I think that we need to be willing to give a little for the people we love, even if we have to give a little of ourselves for them.

Here I am again, ready to rant. I know I've said this before, but I really do find it hard to organize my thoughts about what we have learned and spit it out on a page like this. I think its because our classes are very... all over the place. Don't get me wrong, it's a great thing and I love to have the conversation directed by the students, it’s just a little difficult to relate back and organize everything we have talked about. But I'll try.
Something that we talked about a while back was marital intimacy. I thought it was really good to talk about how important it is to have quality intimate relationships between married couples. I think that something that everyone can work on is their intimate relationship. We talked about the differences between men and women and how they are intimately different from each other. Something cool that we discussed about this was that men and women were made different like that for a good reason and that it helps us have to work together more and trust and rely on each other more. I think that this is very true. We talked about how we should use intimate moments together and how men and women think about them differently. It was just a really great class that helped us think more deeply about some things that we might not have considered before.

okay, I know this was short, but I'll write more soon.

I always have a hard time trying to organize the things that I write on here. I feel like I have all of this great information but I just can't figure out how to spit it out in a way that is coherent. To solve the problem I have decided to give up on trying to be coherent and just work on saying what I want to say. I hope it works out. So in our class we've moved from weddings to marriage to married without kids to married with kids to trying to stay married to affairs and what to do to avoid having problems in marriage to marital intimacy to teaching your children about marital intimacy. And that is where we are. There are a lot of things that we have learned about that I really like. I have been inspired about so much awesome in this class that I think my brain might explode. I think that the best way to do this is to take specific concept and talk about them individually and in no particular order. I know I wouldn't be able to articulate how they all interconnect at all, so I'm just going to explain about them (or at least what I know) one at a time:

Roles, rules, and expectations: In every married relationship, the couple should talk about the roles, rules, and the expectations that they are thinking will go with the marriage. The families that they each came from probably had different family cultures and unspoken rules that they adhered to. As a couple it is important to talk about what you want to carry over into your new family. Another important thing is to talk about what each expects of the others. If you have a husband whose mother always had dinner ready before his dad got home from work, he might be expecting that of you. Not because he is mean and wants to be bossy, but just because it is sometimes hard for us to understand that not all families are the same and that you husband might think that a wife is supposed to do one thing and you might think that a husband is supposed to do another. It just gets messy. It is really important to figure out what each of you is thinking and how you are going to structure your new family.

Build a picket fence relationship: It is way important for married couples to have the kind of relationship that has clear boundaries and attempts to keep unwanted intruders out. A husband and wife should learn to depend on each other and build their relationship together. Clear boundaries should be set that let everyone know that you two are in it together and that you are not to be split apart.

Don't question the character: It is so important that we don't start letting our interactions with our spouse become blaming and labeling. If we are thinking or talking about a specific issue, stay focused on that issue and don't start bringing things back to the character of your spouse. If your husband has forgotten to put his socks in the hamper ...again don't make the issue about his nature. Don't say “My husband is so sloppy; he never puts his socks in the hamper. He doesn't even care enough about me to try to keep the room clean. He doesn't appreciate anything that I do. He is and awful husband." I know that this is a pretty extreme example but I hope I've made the point. When the issue is about sock, keep it about socks. This isn't about your husband’s huge character flaws; it’s about a pair of sock. A couple can work through a problem about socks, but it would be a lot harder to deal with a problem about a wife who thinks her husband is sloppy, unappreciative and doesn't love her enough to keep the room tidy. Keep it with the issue at hand and don't let it be about the character.

I've run out of time but I'll be back and keep ranting soon.

Isn't it weird that the concept of weddings has drastically changed over that past few years? It used to be that a wedding was a community with family and friends coming together to celebrate a new couple going off into the world and making their own family. Now a wedding is about throwing a huge party for all your friends and family and, is a lot of cases, going into huge debt to do it. Weddings used to be simple and intimate, a celebration of life. Weddings are now increasingly become things that cause more problems than they are worth. These days, the drama of a wedding can create more relationship problems for the couple than the union itself will solve. This is a call for a return to simplicity! Where are the beautiful weddings from the past? What happened to the easy union of two people in love?



This rant will be continued later...