HE (we) DID IT!!!

Last Tuesday Camden finished the WHOLE Book of Mormon!!!!! (531 pages)

I don't know how HE felt, but I sure felt like a million bucks. His grandpa challenged him (like he did Bronson) to finish the Book of Mormon before we got baptized and Camden took the challenge........w/ the cash incentives and all from RA. :)

Now this isn't just a "go in the other room and read" type of a thing, we sat down w/ him, read it outloud, discussed it and made sure he understood what was going on and took time to teach a few lessons. 

I'm not here to paint a rosey picture of it all, because not everyday he wanted to read.....

We even started later then w/ Bronson because Camden is the VERY oldest in his school class which means he was behind a whole year in school/reading then Bronson was. And considering they start learning to read in Spanish first, the English reading was slow and coming. With Brooks' schedule I pretty much read Mosiah-to the end w/ Camden and on some days pulling 10 pages per day in the summer.

Bronson even helped out some when I had to make dinner but he still needed to read more.

We had a few read-a-thons late at night w/ a ton of treats and pop that later Emerson and Bronson joined in on.

After he finished reading the last verse you should've seen the look on his face. Priceless. There's no way to describe his smile.  It was a hard thing he did. Setting a SUPER high goal and making it through feels really good (even if Mom had to put most of her life on hold for a while everyday) :)

I was shocked the whole time of his memory. He could remember every little fact and who said what and when. It was really cool to see. His favorite parts? "Helaman and the 2,000 warriors, when Coriantumr cut off Shiz's head and when Moroni defeated Zerahemnah". He clearly got into the war stories and loved them.

My favorite part? Talking to him at the end about the promise in the last chapter of the Book of Mormon. We read and talked about how since he read the book he should "ask God...if these things are not true; and if ye shall ask with a sincere heart, with real intent, having faith in Christ, he will manifest the truth of it unto you by the power of the Holy Ghost. And by the power of the Holy Ghost ye may know the truth of all things." (Moroni 10:4-5)

It was such a good reminder to me that we can take spiritual knowledge and questions into our own hands and have it personal between our Father and us. Then, armed with the knowledge that no one can take away from you, MUCH can be accomplished and you're willing to make more sacrifices and steps to live a better life.

Well, hopefully he got all that.............if he didn't, he can read this all later when the blog book gets printed out. Way to go Camden.............we did it.