Can we have church at home?

In the past, we have gone to the church to watch at least one session of conference (even when we could watch at home) so the children would understand that Conference is not a break from church. This time we watched all 4 sessions from home. On Saturday, Kyle was trying to fix a system failure at work, and I was doing some work in the yard pulling weeds and preparing a flower bed. I stopped just in time to listen to conference, but that meant that the children were soon hungry, so we had to help them get lunch during conference. We didn’t require them to watch on Saturday, but they all stayed around me and listened at least some. (I felt good that they made that choice.) Sunday morning Kyle and I discussed if we should go to the Stake center. We wanted to make sure we were more focused on listening than we had been the day before. In the end, we decided to stay home, but Kyle suggested that we walk out of the house through the garage and then back in the front door to make the point that we were now “at church.” We helped all the children eat an early lunch, get dressed for church, and gathered a bag of amusements. Several times they asked why we couldn’t just stay home. When we were ready, it was about 10 to 11, so we decided to drive to “church.” Kyle drove around the neighborhood, with the children asking why he wasn’t going the right way, and then pulled into the driveway. We explained ourselves, but some were not very happy with us. Megan seemed to feel that we had done her a great injustice (“THIS IS NOT CHURCH!!!”). After some time and a discussion with Dad, she calmed down, and all the children were very well behaved. And we had the benefit of putting the little ones down for naps in their beds. We also had a discussion after conference about all the different places where church can be held.

Apparently I didn’t do a very good job of listening, though. I just looked at a friend’s blog where she commented on her General Conference experience, including notes on things that impressed her from a dozen talks. I, on the other hand, can barely remember the talks, though most of her notes jogged my memory. (Unfortunately, a few of her notes left me wondering where I was during that talk.) When Pres. Monson gave his final talk and talked about one side of his family, I was wondering why I didn’t remember him talking about the other side of his family in his previous talk. Even so, I stopped what I was doing and listened to all the sessions of conference, and hopefully I will remember what I need to when it is needed. I will definitely need to read the Ensign. I am grateful to have General Conference; the Solemn Assembly was particularly impressive. We are definitely blessed to so easily be taught by our prophet and other leaders.