Cheaper by the Dozen! Our 12th Grandchild!

Welcome to Amelia, daughter of Christopher and Marilyn Valentine, sister of Giselle, Zane and Imogen.

We're so happy you're here! We are grateful and happy that mother and daughter are doing well.

There is nothing more precious to us than our family. Adding each of you to our family was wonderful, and now, having grandchildren is another experience with different emotions that are really hard to explain. I sometimes think my heart will explode with happiness. What a precious gift you all are.

Thoughts on the family:

Prophet Spencer W. Kimball

The family is the basic unit of the kingdom of God on earth. The Church can be no healthier than its families.

Family life is the best method for achieving happiness in this world, and it is a clear pattern given to us from the Lord about what is to be in the next world. Our political institutions . . . cannot rescue us if our basic institution, the family, is not intact.

A true Latter-day Saint home is a haven against the storms and struggles of life. The home should be a place where reliance on the Lord is a matter of common experience, not reserved for special occasions.

Families can be forever! Do not let the lures of the moment draw you away from them! Divinity, eternity, and family--they go together, hand in hand, and so must we.

Prophet Joseph F. Smith

God instituted marriage in the beginning. He made man in his own image and likeness, male and female, and in their creation it was designed that they should be united together in sacred bonds of marriage, and one is not perfect without the other.

Teach your children the love of God. Teach them to love the principles of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Teach them to love their fellowmen, and especially to love their fellow members in the Church, that they may be true to their fellowship with the people of God. Teach them to honor the priesthood, to honor the authority that God has bestowed upon His Church.

Love each other, take care of each other.

All our love,
Mom and Dad,
Shauna and Robert Valentine
oxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo

Edwina Froehlich, 93, La Leche League Pioneer

Copied word-for-word from an obituary by Roni Caryn Rabin in The New York Times, today.

Edwina Froehlich, who was inspired to help found La Leche League to support breast-feeding after being told at the age of 35 that she was too old to make breast milk for her baby, died Sunday in Arlington Heights, Ill. She was 93 and lived in Inverness, Ill.

A pioneer on several fronts of motherhood, she worked for Young Christian Workers, a Roman Catholic lay organization, before marrying John Froehlich when she was in her early 30s. She had her first child a couple of years later, making her comparatively old to have a first child at the time, and she made the controversial decision to forgo giving birth in a hospital in favor of a more natural delivery in her Franklin Park, Ill., home, with an obstetrician attending.

At a time when most pediatricians encouraged formula and bottle-feeding and when there were few scientific studies demonstrating the health benefits of breast milk, Mrs. Froehlich chose to breast-feed all of her babies, said another La Leche founder, Mary White.

“We used to tell the mothers the three main obstacles to successful breast-feeding were doctors, hospitals and social pressure,” Mrs. White said.

In 1956, when Mrs. White and a friend, Marian Tompson, decided to start a community organization to support and educate local breast-feeding mothers, Mrs. Froehlich was one of the first women they approached. Soon, monthly meetings were being held in Mrs. Froehlich’s home, and a new phone line was installed so she could answer questions coming in from mothers across the country, Mrs. White said.

“We didn’t have any information,” said Mrs. Tompson, another of the original group of seven La Leche League founders. “There weren’t any books out there, and women just didn’t talk about these things. Only 18 percent of women in the U.S. left the hospital breast-feeding at that time.”

As La Leche League of Franklin Park grew, becoming La Leche League International in 1964, Mrs. Froehlich took on additional roles, including serving as assistant executive director for many years and, more recently, as a board member and a member of the Founders’ Advisory Council.

She was one of the authors of “The Womanly Art of Breast-feeding,” the league’s manifesto, which was first put together in loose-leaf form in 1958 and later published as a bound book in 1963. More than two million copies are in print.

End of Ms. Rabin's excellent obituary.

Comments by Robert Young Valentine:

Shauna Burgon Valentine, Thursday, June 12, 2008.

My wife Shauna Burgon Valentine joined the La Leche League in 1969 in Durham, N.C. and attended meetings faithfully for three years until our first child (Christopher Burgon Valentine, MD) was born. Shauna breast-fed all five of the Valentine children for as long as each was interested. She taught many women the "womanly art of breast-feeding" over decades. Our daughters breast-feed our grandchildren. No doubt one of the major reasons our children have become effective and efficient adults is the feeling of security and maternal bond established between each child and their devoted mother Shauna during the precious times that she breast-fed them while gently stroking their foreheads, gazing into their eyes and singing softly to them.

Kudos to Edwina Froehlich and to Shauna Burgon Valentine.

How about a movie and a Happy Meal?

Kung Fu Panda, a great flick, was later re-enacted at the Lehi McDonald's as the kids swarmed the play thing while Lisa, Topher, Grampa and Grandma ate leftover chicken nuggets.

Beauty and the Beast: The Dance Recital

Zane, the doggy-cook, to the right of the ballerina in the third act!
Mesmerized, Imogen watches the final act from stage right!
The Valentine stars, the children of Christopher and Marilyn Valentine.
Gigi the trouper performed twice during the performance!
Costumes are not cheap!
Caught up in the enthusiasm of the moment, Imogen (Immy) decided to join another troupe on stage for a few pirouettes.
The yellow tea-cups danced AND sang!

Giselle, Zane and Imogen all performed in the dance recital in Draper Tuesday night.

Family Home Evening, Monday, June 9, 2008

The vines and grasses in our rock garden are wonderful! This dugout is our private retreat!
A mile from our home, the entrance to American Fork Canyon is beautiful. If patient, one can see big horn mountain goats in the hills, too many deer and not a few cougars, who have been seen a couple of times this winter near our home.
An interesting detail in this view of Lone Peak is the secondary irrigation reservoir, which allows us to keep our lawns green at a very low cost.
Happy Family Home Evening to Everyone!

We love green. It really lifts our spirits and serves as a great background to brilliant spring colors. Green has popped out on the Wasatch mountains, and lawns have never looked better. For those of us in Utah today was an incredibly beautiful day! We hope the days in Tennessee (Amanda) and Dijon, France (James and Maroon 5) are just as beautiful. Send us pictures.

Here is our message:

In my life's chain of events nothing was accidental. Everything happened according to an inner need.

Hannah Senesh

"It is inevitable when one has a great need of something, one finds it," Gertrude Stein reminds us.

Taking care of all our needs is important whether they be emotional, physical, social, or spiritual. Each need to be worked on, nurtured, and not treated casually. Concerning the attitude of spirituality and understanding sacred things, consider the teachings of Elder Todd Christopherson, (the most recently-called LDS Apostle and dear friend from our years at Duke University):

"The importance of having a sense of the sacred is simply this: if people do not appreciate holy things, they will lose them.

Absent a feeling of reverence, they will grow increasingly casual in attitude and lax in conduct. They will drift from the moorings that the covenants with God could provide. Their feeling of accountability to God will diminish and then be forgotten. Thereafter, they will care only about their own comfort and satisfying uncontrolled appetites. Finally, they will come to despise
sacred things, even God, and then they will despise themselves.

On the other hand, with a sense of the sacred, one grows in understanding and truth. The Holy Spirit becomes a frequent and then constant companion. More and more a person will stand in holy places and be entrusted with holy things. Just the opposite of cynicism and despair, their end is eternal life."

Good night, and love from Mom and Dad,
Robert and Shauna Valentine,
Highland, Utah

Sunday Night in Highland!

Amy Melvina Young Valentine (92) took a stroll (one quarter mile) around the park with her great grandchildren.
Margaret Valentine Clark took a nap on her grandparent's California King bed!
Shauna Valentine finishes another book after the kids went home.
Gina Valentine James sorts through Zane Elijah Valentine's clothes in anticipation of the birth of Porter Robert James in July. Marilyn Ashby Valentine is expecting a girl on June 22! No name selected yet! Lisa Valentine Clark, mother of five and most recently the cutie Margaret (sleeping on the bed) will share girl's clothes with Marilyn although Imogen Elsa Valentine will pass on some of her clothes to the new baby sister, too.
Most of the grandchildren fit in grampa's hammock on the lower deck!
After the meal (lasagna and all kinds of good stuff) it is delightful to just talk and talk!
A walk around the park next to our home is mandatory!
The kids came over for dinner and we just hung out!

Kite flying for the little kids and the BIG kids, too.

The wind blew and the kites flew at the Valentine home.

Ariel and Jim, Our Movie Pals!

Saturday night, we saw "The Fall" at The Broadway on 3rd South in Salt Lake City with Jim Ford and Ariel Bybee, who are moving to Utah this summer. Jim will be teaching English at BYU. Ariel, a mezzo soprano for 18 years at the Metropolitan Opera in NYC will teach private voice lessons. We were friends back in Nebraska! Jim's kids and ours grew up together. After the movie, Robert pigged out on California Pizza in Gateway while Shauna and Ariel ate salads. Jim ate an obscene chocolate dessert. Salt Lake City, just 30 minutes from our home in Highland, is a delightful place full of theaters, restaurants, museums and the beautiful LDS Temple Square. The LDS Church has committed one billion dollars to downtown redevelopment from funds generated from LDS controlled businesses.