punchbowl

General Conference Sunday means we get to relax at home and sit in our PJ's while listening to the Prophet speak to us.  

It was an uplifting morning of listening to the Sunday morning session of Conference while the kids gathered in front of the TV to do their Conference Packets.

And then in between the morning and afternoon sessions, we decided to head out to have some peaceful family time outdoors.  Daddy decided it was a good day to give them a little history lesson as well, and so with that, we headed out to Punchbowl Memorial Park.

We walked along the path to the look out and the kids noticed all the gravesites and memorial stones.

They noticed all the different National plaques and we were able to tell them about all the different countries that the US has made peace with since the many wars.

 

At the top of the Punchbowl lookout. The view is so beautiful up here!

This was actually my very first time coming up here!  And I was so humbled to see the history of war and strife that has brought us to where we are today. 

To see all the gravestones, and to know how many people sacrificed their lives and families to help bring peace to the world is not something one can easily put into words.

But I am so very grateful for the freedoms we get to enjoy, and know that it was not achieved without great sacrifice by many.

Our family.  Well, minus Kela since she was taking the picture because there was no one else around to ask. 

These kids didn't complain once during the walk up and down to the lookout. It's not a short or easy one, and we were proud of them.  I think they felt the solemn atmosphere that permeates this Memorial Park.

  

We walked all around the murals of the many World Wars.  We read to them the history of their ancestors, and they were truly touched and saddened to hear about all the wars and bloodshed that happened so many years before they were born.  I discovered that while they knew some basic facts about the United States' war with Japan, they were a little misled as to some of the details.

Kela mentioned to me that the "United States accidentally bombed Japan."  

She and her sisters were pretty horrified when I informed them that it was not an accident, but a deliberate act of war--to combat a country that was equally bent on causing destruction to many countries around the world!  They kept asking "why?" And that really is the question, isn't it?  

From the beginning of the creation of the world, people have been in and out of war with each other for various reasons.  I had no real answers for them.  And realized that there is no easy answer.

I am so glad that war is a concept that is difficult for them to understand, that they have been saved from having to experience it first-hand. Who knows what is in store for their futures...there is currently a war going on in the Middle-East, and as they grow older, I am sure it will touch them or affect them some how or another.  I just hope that when that time comes, they will be spared any major heartbreak or tragedy.  That they may be kept safe from the harm and hatred of war.

Coming here to see the history of war in our world, makes me feel even more the need for the Savior in our lives.  When there is so much hatred and tribulation, He is the one we can always turn to for peace and comfort.