Some more good quotes...

I had the chance to read some BYU-Idaho Devotionals today, and was really struck by two quotes, so here is another post with uplifting quotes. I love beautiful words and how they speak peace to my soul and bring me the comfort of the Spirit!

"When I come to the Savior with my burdens, my problems, my challenges, He doesn't hand me an off-the-shelf, one size-fits-all yoke. He knows me intimately. He loves me infinitely. Therefore, the help that He offers me will be perfectly fitted to my needs, my abilities, and my circumstances. How profound are those words. “Take my yoke upon you.” …There is no burden, no sorrow, no suffering that He doesn't fully understand. And because of that, there is nothing we can take to Him that brings a response of, “I'm sorry. I don't understand.” …

Why would He willingly offer Himself as such an infinite sacrifice? It was because He was meek and lowly of heart. He was submissive to the Father. Even in the hour of His darkest need, pleading to escape from the bitter cup that lay ahead, He immediately added these words to His prayer. “Nevertheless, not as I will, but as thou wilt” (Matthew 26:39). Thus, as Abinadi taught, His will was swallowed up in the will of the Father (see Mosiah 15:7). …

If we who labor and are heavy laden come unto Him, and if we do so because we understand that His meekness and lowliness of heart brought about the Atonement; and if we take His yoke upon us and learn of Him, then the promise is very clear: And you shall find rest unto your souls.

Here again is the promise of rest, but here we learn that this rest is not just for the body, not just for the mind, but for the soul. The soul is the whole man, the body and the spirit knit together. It is our physical, emotional, mental and spiritual dimensions all wrapped together. What a promise. “Ye shall find rest unto you souls.”

Brothers and Sisters, I testify that in the Savior Jesus Christ we can find rest to our souls. We can have our burdens lifted. (Elder Lund, BYU-I Devotional, "Come Unto Me," September 23, 2008).

"He is there for you and for me. He knows our needs, our desires, our circumstances, and our challenges. He stands ready to succor us, to strengthen us. His promise is sure and is extended to each of us—individually, personally:

. . . for I will go before your face. I will be on your right hand and on your left, and my Spirit shall be in your [heart], and mine angels round about you, to bear you up. (D&C 84:88)

It takes faith and effort and a bit of practice to see the hand of the Lord in our individual lives. We can begin cultivating that ability by taking time each day to ponder the following questions suggested by President Eyring last October in general conference: “Have I seen the hand of God reaching out to touch [me] or [my] children or [my] family today? . . . Did God send a message that was just for me? Did I see His hand in my life . . .?”

I promise that as you consistently reflect upon these questions, evidence will come that the Lord loves you—individually, personally—and that He is involved in the very details of your life."

(Betty Oldham, BYU-I devotional, July 1, 2008)

When times are tough...

There are some people in my family who are going through some hard times right now, so I thought I would do a quick blog post of what I've been thinking about today. I've been thinking about how Christ is able to heal even very difficult situations. He can bring good out of things that seem incredibly hard. He is over all, and as President Hinckley used to say: "Things have a way of working out." We never know when Heavenly Father might be ready to work a miracle in our behalf.

I've been thinking about how important it is to trust in in Heavenly Father, who is always there for us, and to remember that Christ suffered all things, and including my pain and sorrow, and the pain and sorrow of every person on the earth. He knows through personal experience what we are suffering.

I've also been thinking about how many loved ones we have on the other side of the veil that care about us and are still watching us, and who are doing all they can to help us. I was in the temple yesterday, and wishing that I could feel the presence of those who have passed on and still love me. But just knowing they are there gives me strength to keep going.

Here are a few quotes that I found today that go along with what I have been thinking about:

"In the gospel of Jesus Christ you have help, and you have it from both sides of the veil. You must never forget that. When disappointment and discouragement strike, and they will, you must never forget that if our eyes could be opened we would see horses and chariots of fire as far as the eye could see riding at reckless speed to come to our protection (see 2nd Kings 6:16-17). They will always be there, these armies of heaven, in defense of Abraham's seed." (Elder Jeffrey R. Holland, "For Times of Trouble," BYU Devotional, March 18, 1980)

"...we knew our Elder Brother and our Father in heaven well. We rejoiced at the upcoming opportunity for earthly life that could make it possible for us to have a fullness of joy as they had. We could hardly wait to demonstrate to our Father and our Brother, the Lord, how much we loved them and how we would be obedient to them in spite of the earthly opposition of the evil one. And now we're here--our memories are veiled--and we're showing God and ourselves what we can do. Nothing is going to startle us more when we pass through the veil to the other side than to realize how well we know our Father and how familiar his face is to us.

God loves us, he's watching us, he wants us to succeed, and we'll know someday that he has not left one thing undone for the eternal welfare of each of us. If we only knew that there are heavenly hosts pulling for us--friends in heaven, whom we can't remember now, who yearn for our victory. This is our day to show what we can do--what life and sacrifice we can daily, hourly, instantly bring to God. If we give our all, we will get his all from the greatest of all." (Jesus Christ--Gifts and Expectations, Ezra Taft Benson, BYU Devotional, 1974: The whole talk is amazing, and can be found here: http://speeches.byu.edu/reader/reader.php?id=6019)

I'm grateful for the comfort of the gospel, and the knowledge I have that we are never alone in our struggles. God truly will help us if we will turn to him!

Oquirrh Mountain Temple Dedication

I have been so incredibly busy the last few weeks that I haven't hardly had time to do anything--so that's why I've been silent on my blog. My job has been so busy ever since August started, plus I was called into the Stake Primary Presidency, and have been having two hour meetings every week to try to get things organized. So tonight I thought I would take time to do just a quick post about Sunday, because it was such an amazing day.

I had the incredible blessing of being able to attend the Oquirrh Mountian Temple dedication in the Celestial Room for the 9:00 session on Sunday. It was just such an amazing experience--it's hard to put into words. But just some highlights--Jan and I got there really early, and I'm so glad we did, because we were sitting in the row right behind the reserved seats, (so 6 rows back), and it was so neat to be so close to the brethren. In our session, we had President Monson, President Uchtdorf, Elder Bednar, Elder William Walker, Elder Paul Johnson, Elder Spencer Jones, and Sister Margaret Lifferth (from the Primary General Presidency).


The talks were all so wonderful, the spirit was so strong, and hearing the choir in person was unforgetable. There were only about 25 people in the choir, but Jan and I both commented that it sounded like a much larger choir. We can only guess that there were others singing that we couldn't see. I just felt so grateful to be there.

One of the neatest things for me was being so close to President Monson, our prophet. It was a cloudy day, but as he stood up to begin the dedication, the sun broke from behind the clouds, shone through the window in the Celestial Room, and right onto President Monson. Jan and I just looked at each other and were amazed--it seemed such a symbol--that he truly is God's annointed and holds the keys in our day.

I love the temple! It is such a place of light, love and goodness, and I just felt so grateful to get to be there in person as another temple was dedicated.

I'll end with a quote that President Uchtdorf quoted in his talk, by President George Q. Cannon:

“Every foundation stone that is laid for a temple, and every temple completed according to the order the Lord has revealed for his holy Priesthood, lessens the power of Satan on the earth, and increases the power of God and Godliness, moves the heavens in mighty power in our behalf, invokes and calls down upon us the blessings of the Eternal Gods, and those who reside in their presence" (George Q. Cannon, Millennial Star, 12 November 1877, 743)

Happy Birthday to Karla and Mike!

I don't usually do birthday posts for grown-ups, but I thought it might be good to do a quick post to say Happy Birthday to Karla, my sister-in-law, and Mike, my brother. Karla's birthday is tomorrow, the 29th, and Mike's birthday is Thursday the 30th. Here are pictures (you know I can't ever do a post without pictures!)

Here is Karla at April Conference, with Ethan and Seth

Here is Mike with Janelle and the girls at the Oquirrh Mtn. Temple Open House.

I'm grateful for Karla and Mike, and for all they have done for me. I have the best family in the world! Happy Birthday to both of you!

Some cute pictures from last night

I just had to do a quick post of some pictures that we took last night. We had FHE with Dan and Ems and Dave and Melissa. Afterward we were talking, and Jan was playing in the kitchen with the kids. She put all four of them in a little tower thing the kids can stand in next to the counter, and then took my camera, and got the cutest picture. I can't believe they are all smiling! Here it is:

Then a few minutes later Jan said, "Quick. I need your camera again!" She looked over, and Mieka was "riding" Matthew like a horse. They are so cute!

As I said, just a quick post. I'll post again soon!

Happy Birthday, Truboy!

Once again, it's late at night, and I am doing a birthday post. I don't know why it takes me so long to do these. I even had most of the pictures of Truman picked out the other day. But I always just want to find the right combination of pictures, and so end up searching and searching until I find ones I like. I want these birthday posts to be something the kids can look back on. So, it is worth all the time it takes. I just love my little kiddies, and I'm so glad I have so many of them. Here is my birthday post dedicated to Truman, who turns five years old tomorrow!

Truby has always been such a cute little guy, and I just feel so grateful that we still have him with us. When he was only 9 weeks old, he almost died. Karla had laid him down for a nap, and then had a feeling to go check on him. They found that he wasn't breathing, and couldn't call 911 because their phone was disconnected, so they ran outside and pounded on Adam and Stacey's door (who, thank goodness, lived right across the street). By the time the ambulance came, he had started breathing again, and thankfully was okay once they got him to the hospital. I'll never forget going to the hospital to see him that night, and just feeling so grateful that he was okay. He had a blessing that night telling him that he would live a long life and would be a great teacher. I remember the next day at work I was near tears all day, just feeling so grateful that he had been spared. We've had many miracles like that in our family, and I'm so grateful that one of them was for darling Truman! So, here is my picture tribute to Truman:

I don't have pictures of the day he was born (because I somehow left my camera home that day), but here is Truman about a week after he was born. I teased Karla after I took this picture that he looked like a little Truman burrito.

Here he is, almost a month old, with Karla.

And here he is on his blessing day with Aunt Jan. He was already starting to get a little bit chubby.

Here he is on Halloween. This was a month after he almost died. If you look closely, you can see wires hanging down by his legs. He had to stay on a monitor for awhile afterward to make sure he was okay.

Here he is on Christmas, 2004 with two of the three other babies we had in 2004--Lizzie and Briana.

This is early 2005, with Uncle Dave.

I love this one of him. This was on the 4th of July in 2005, when he was almost one year old. We had laid a bunch of the kids down together to get a picture. He is in the top middle, and his eyes look so blue!

Here he is with cousin Briana, dressed up as a pirate for Halloween. We used to have trick-or-treat every year when I worked at BYU, and I loved having the kids come to visit me at work.

This is one of my favorite pictures of him. This is in December of 2005, one night when we watched him and his brothers at our house. I love his red cheeks and blue eyes. So cute!

Here he is on the 4th of July 2006 with brother Logan and cousin Kate. (I seem to have a Halloween and 4th of July theme in this post--but that's where I found the cute pictures!)

I had to put this one in--this was Thanksgiving, 2005. I was taking a picture of a bunch of the kids, and this was Truman saying, "cheese!" I think it is so cute.

Here he is on Daddy's lap, with his brothers. I love that they are all laughing. They were watching the video that our family made for Jan and I on our 32nd birthday. As I said in my nephew's post, they love the part where their daddy is pretending to be a burgler in our house.

This is late 2007, standing on our balcony holding a kite he made. We have a tradition that when they come to visit, I print out a kite with whatever picture they want, and they color it, we put string on it, and then they "fly" it off our balcony. We have so much fun doing it.

This is actually our 24th of July celebration last year (so, not quite 4th of July, but close), with his brothers and cousin Joshy.

I love the way the light is shining on him in this picture. This was January of this year, when Karla and the kids came to visit me at work. We were up looking at the Christus statue, and I snapped this picture of him. What a sweet boy! I sure love him!

And finally, here he is last week with cousin Emma before her party started. I love his big smile!

I'm so grateful for my little Truman. He has such a sweet personality, and I love hearing him speak in his high voice. I'm so excited that he will be going to kindergarten this year. Happy Birthday, Truman! I love you!

Nephew's sleepover--finally!

It's 7:20 and I am on the bus. I've tried doing this post three times in the last few days, and Blogger keeps timing out when I try to download pictures. Each time I've only had limited time to work on it, so haven't had time to finish it. Finally this morning I just kept loading pictures while I got ready. I found that the only way to get it to work was to load the pictures four at a time, so I barely got it all done before I had to run out the door (and I'm sure Jan heard me running around at the last minute). I also forgot my gym clothes for Zumba, so will have to run home before I go to Mom and Dad's house. But, at least this post is getting done!!! So, here is, finally, my post about our nephews sleepover last week.

We had so much fun--five cute boys from ages 8-5. We had pizza when we first got there, and then I told the boys about the Army of Helaman and Captain Moroni, and talked to them about how they were living in a wicked world, and needed to be righteous warriors in standing up for truth. I made each of them name tags with pictures of the Army of Helaman and Captain Moroni. Here is Logan holding his (since his picture was the one where you can see the nametag best). Then we had each of them show how strong they were. I got a picture of it, but couldn't get it to load on time--but it was really cute!

Then we did a fun craft--we talked about how hot it has been, and so got them sun visors that they got to decorate. They loved it so much that they each had to decorate both sides. Thank goodness we had tons of stickers! Here are our five boys from oldest to youngest, wearing their sun visors:

Ethan, 8

Joshy, 7

Brendan, 7

Logan, 6

Truman, 5

Bummer! I somehow just deleted the picture of all the boys together on the porch wearing their visors. I tried to undo it, but I can't get it back. That's the problem with doing a post on the bus. Well, at least I'm getting this post done.

After the visors, we blew up the air mattresses and got the beds all ready. I never got a picture of all of them sleeping, but here is a picture of their sleeping bags/blankets.

Then the boys made cookies with Janice. Brendan isn't in this picture because he was using Logan's stick as a crutch, walking all around the living room pretending like he coudln't walk...

Then each of them got to add whatever goodies to their cookies that they wanted--although it looks like Logan was eating the goodies before he put them on. :)

After the cookies, we watched Tron then put the kids to bed. Jan and I told them stories and sang them songs, and they all fell asleep. Both times our boys have been so much easier to get to sleep than our girls! I don't know what it is--probably that there is so much less giggling and talking.

The next morning we made waffles for the boys, and then they watched the video that their daddy's made for our 32nd birthday. They love the part where Jon is chasing Seth. They kept chasing each other around the room--thank goodness we still don't have any downstairs neighbors. We may have had problems with the noise ordinance! Here is a picture of them all running around.

We had so much fun at our boys sleepover! I'm so grateful for my cute nephews!

Just a few more pictures to add to this post. On Saturday after the sleepover, we took Truman over to Emma's house, and the other cousins her age came and we had a birthday party. Dan just got a really cool blow up toy for his rental center--a blow up water slide with a pool. It was so fun to ride on--for both adults and kids. We all had so much fun. Ems, in her usual form, stayed up late to make an amazing cake--one that looked like the slide. So the last three pictures are from that party.

I'm so grateful that I am able to live so close to my family and that we do so much together. They really do bring so much joy into my life!