Autumn · October
The complete archive of Melissa Whitaker's essays and reflections on LDS Family Life, organized around family discipleship, honest motherhood, marriage, faith at home, and the home rhythms that shape a family over time. Showing older posts, page 17.
Practical essays on prayer, scripture study, Sabbath patterns, and building a faithful home culture in ordinary life.
First-person reflections on parenting, emotional honesty, family fatigue, closeness, and raising children without performance.
Home notes on homemaking, hospitality, steadiness, and the spiritual texture of ordinary family routines.
Essays
June 26
I called a family council for a Tuesday night and the teenager asked if she could bring her homework. The middle-schooler asked how long it would take.
June 26
The pancakes burned on a Sunday morning while I was trying to get the toddler into a dress. I let out a breath I had been holding since Saturday night.
June 26
The doorbell rang at 4:47 on a Tuesday. I was holding a toddler and a half-peeled potato. The living room looked like a craft store had exploded.
June 26
The toast was burning. I was trying to pack lunches when the second-grader appeared with a question I was not ready for.
June 25
I sat down at the kitchen table with a notebook and a plan. I had read the articles about family councils and I knew the structure.
June 25
The Sunday morning argument started before the pancakes were on the table. I thought about what rest actually means on the Sabbath.
June 25
I was wiping down the kitchen table for the third time that morning when I realized I was not cleaning for the family.
June 25
I was wiping down the kitchen table for the third time that morning when I realized I was not cleaning for the family. I was cleaning for the possibility that someone might stop by.
June 24
The doorbell rang at 5:47 on a Tuesday and I was holding a toddler who had just discovered that yogurt smears on tile. Here is what I am learning about keeping the door open anyway.
June 24
Family councils don't have to be perfect to be effective. Here's how one LDS mom learned to find unity in the messy middle.