Living Through It: Veteran's Day, Home Study, and Evening in Excellence

November 2016

Being married to a veteran makes Veteran's Day much more exciting! The first year Brandon worked at William McKinley, he mentioned that it was lame that we didn't have a Veteran's Day program. So year 2, I made sure we did!

For it being the first year, it turned out pretty well. Students made the decorations, the Boy Scouts brought in the colors, and we invited all students and staff to send in photos and information about veterans in their families, which we put into a slideshow. My heart swelled with pride when Brandon's photo came up. I'm so proud to be his wife! We had several other veterans at the program, too, including a World War II vet! We had a small reception for them afterwards and it was fun to get to know them and hear their stories.

I took the rest of the day off so I could accompany Brandon to the program at his cousin Nevaeh's school. Then we took advantage of the free meals offered to vets!

The sky was so cool that day!

One of the things I love most about Brandon is how involved he is with Jackson. We have him half the time, and he's so good at taking advantage of that time by spending focused, one-on-one time with him. He's also very studious and spends a lot of his time studying - mostly schoolwork, but also spiritual things. He's no stranger to the floor. :)

As Thanksgiving approached, we had a gratitude-themed Family Home Evening and made a tree full of leaves describing things we are thankful for.

Our Young Women in Excellence was also in November and we had a beauty pageant theme. We had each of the girls present about a specific value and then demonstrate a talent or skill they had developed that year. They also had artifacts demonstrating their interests, activities, talents, and accomplishments on display. They're sharp, talented, faithful young women.