Darius and Kelsey

These are two of my favorite Lovebirds:

They were recently married and baptized!  They are wonderful.  I love them a lot, and though I don't get to see them to often, I sure think about them a lot.  It's so great to see these people who have become your closest friends, enter the waters of baptism and make such a sacred covenant with their Heavenly Father-and they're did it together as a family! 

Giving lots of Thanks!

Happy Thanksgiving everyone!  Here are just a few things I am grateful for...

I love my Savior.  I am so grateful for him and my Heavenly Father.  I love being a member of their church.  I love being a Christian!  I miss my family, and love them.  I love my friends out here and back home.  I am grateful for Nashville.  I'm grateful for my life! 

I'm grateful for so many things... I listed some of them on this leaf!

Looks Like Rain

In life, things seem to have a pattern.  When life is going well, we usually sense a lot of success in whatever we're doing.  We tend to be happy, grateful, and content people.

However, when things aren't going quite as well as we had hoped, we feel a sense of sadness, anger, frustration, and loneliness.

We've all heard the phrase, "when it rains, it pours."  How true is that!  When things are going great, everything falls into place and is wonderful!  When life is hard, everything seems dark and gray.

Perhaps if we changed our perspective, we would see things differently.  We can always look at the glass half full instead of half empty. 

When things are difficult, look for the good.

How? ----------------->

This scripture says "When the devil shall send forth his mighty winds,"  not "if."

The devil is cunning and wise, unfortunately.  But we can win.

If we build on Christ, then we have hope!  Not only hope, but a greater perspective.  Instead of looking at the negative, we can always see the positive blessing that are being poured down on us by our Heavenly Father.   Just remember:

Look for the good and cherish the happy memories along the way!

Family Home What?

So, what's all the hullabullu about Famly Home Evening?  What IS Family Home Evening?

Well folks, it's great. 

Once a week, usually on Monday nights, members of the LDS Church take extra time with their families.  They use resource books, such as the Family Home Evening book, websites like LDS.org and mormon.org, The Bible, Book of Mormon and other scriptures, and stories for an evening devotional. 

Usually Family Home Evening (sometimes referred to as F.H.E.) begins with a song and a prayer.  Then a lesson is taught.  After the lesson, often times an acivity is planned.  Followed by my personal favorite; dessert!

Why is this short little program so important? 

It keeps our families glued together.  As we teach each other about Jesus Christ and Heavenly Father, we grow closer to them, and closer to one another. 

I remember so many FHE nights that I did not want to be there.  But I went, and I generally left in a happier mood. 

Some of my favorite memories were listening to my parents teach us about the Plan of Salvation and how it would lead us to a better and happier life.  I remember we would sing the hymns, Called To Serve, and Put Your Shoulder to the Wheel.  Most imporantly I remember what I felt.  I remember that I felt the Spirit.  I felt safe.  I felt loved and secure.  I always knew that Mondays were a special time for our family, and they still are!  I might be 1,600 miles away from them, but every Monday night I know they are having Family Home Evening and learning about all the great things I get to teach to the people of Tennessee.

Family Home Evening makes a difference.  Can you imagine the strength that would come to the entire international family if we all had F.H.E.?

Cakity Cake

Alright folks.  It's been a few days since I posted about the wedding cake.  Are you ready for the actual cake to be revealed?

Drumroll please...

Ta-Da!!

We were able to get some edible pearls (pardon me, because I'm not sure what they're really called...) and just went to town with the frosting. 

The best part was that it tasted pretty darn delicious as well! 

Here are a couple of wedding highlights:

The Dark Lake

So, I have six younger brothers.  They are great!  They are younger, but much bigger than I am.  

The oldest is named Mason. 

Mason stands about 6'3" or 6'4".  He tends to grow a nasty beardy-mustache thing on his face during the months of November and December.   

He is a triathlon maniac, and school addict. 

Bottom line:  he is pretty awesome.

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Last night I had a dream about Mason.  As you can tell from the title it wasn't the most pleasant of dreams. 

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It all started when I was eating dinner at a members home.  My sister was my companion.  We were eating pumpkin pie (delicious stuff btw) and chatting.  But I didn't feel like talking.  Just then, the phone rang.  My mom was on the other line.  She told us that Mason was missing.  She explained that he had gone out with some friends to a lake.  They saw his phone fall into the lake off of the dock, but my brother was no where to be found. 

I panicked. 

The police would not help.  My dad, mom, brother Daniel and I prayed about what to do.  The answer came to search for his phone.  We raced out to the lake.

My dad put on some scuba gear and dove in to try to find the cell phone.  Some how we knew that Mason was safe.  We knew that if we could just find his cell phone, that we would get the answers.  It didn't make sense, but that's what we knew we needed to do. 

Daniel couldn't handle just waiting for Dad to search, so he jumped in the cold dark water and searched as well.  My mom put a flashlight into the water, and there I saw it!  His phone! 

I stuck my hand in the water, and pulled it out.  There was talking on the other line... It was Mason!  He sounded scared and alone.  We all cried.  He told us where he was stuck.  We ran to his rescue and hugged him tightly. 

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The last time I really got to hug my little but bigger brother Mason, was sometime in January.  I miss him a lot.  I found these pictures on my camera when we said goodbye.  I'm grateful that I have him in my life.  He makes me want to learn.  He is very patient.  I know that one day he's going to make an amazing Dad.  He's so great with little kids, and he loves his family more than anything.  Though that dream made me so scared and sad, I'm still grateful for it. 

Mace Face, if you read this, I love you and I miss you! 

Whether it be figurative or literal...

don't get lost in the dark lake!

 

Tune In

Last Saturday J and I had planned to hitch a ride out to Gallatin for the evening.  There, we would have dinner and a brief meeting with the Sister Missionaries there, look through their area book, and go out on exchanges with them. 

Seldom do things go as planned. 

As time came for us to leave, I kept getting this feeling in my stomach that we should not go up to Gallatin.  "This is ridiculous,"  I thought.  "The sisters are already preparing dinner, and we've already planned to go!"

Thinking that my own judgements were better than a gut feeling, we went ahead with our plans.  As we arrived, we were informed that there wouldn't be enough room in the car for us to go out with the Sisters.  We scrambled to find a ride back to Nashville, but by then it was too late.  So, there we were, stuck in Gallatin. 

As missionaries, we are suppose to be inside our homes by 9:00 every evening.  We were still up in Gallatin, and it was past 10:00.  We called our leaders and they had told us to just call them when we got home.  "No!"  I thought, "You're suppose to be angry with us!"  I felt so guilty for not listening to the spirit!  Not only were we stuck in an umfamiliar city, but we had nothing to do. 

We had wasted our entire evening...

 Finally, our phone rang.  Our ride had come!  We hopped in the car, and headed towards home.  Around 11:15 we hit traffic.  TRAFFIC!!  At 11:15 pm!

On one of the freeway off-ramps there was an accident.  J said, "Maybe if we had left and been on time, we would've been in that accident."  Maybe she's right.  Maybe, because I didn't listen to the Lord the first time, that He made us late so that we would get home safetly. 

There's no way to really tell. 
But I learned a valuable lesson about listening to the Spirit. 

"My first radio was a crystal set. It was hard to tune to the frequency of a particular radio station. I had to scratch the receiving wire whisker over the top of the rough crystal to find the right pinpoint, a little valley on the crystal where the signal was received. Just a millimeter off on either side of that point and I would lose the signal and get scratchy static.

"Over time, with patience and perseverance, good eyesight, and a steady hand, I learned to find the signal point on the crystal without too much difficulty.

"So it is with inspiration. We must attune ourselves to the inspiration

from God and tune out the scratchy static. We have to work at being tuned in.

"Most of us need a long time to become tuned in." 

-President James E. Faust

(former member of the First Presidency)

We may have only been a millimeter off on either side of listening to the spirit that night. 

But it had costs us hours of delay and a waste of precious time.

Bake Me a Cake as Fast as You Can

So... Last weekend, J and I took on the task of baking a wedding cake.  We only had a few short hours to make this cake!

Any guesses as to how it turned out?! 

You'll have to wait and see!

In the meantime, here are some of the pictures of the cake in progress...

Simon Says

Growing up in a household of 8 children was exactly what I needed in life.  However, it may have taken a toll on my mom at times.  Being the tough and loving lady she is, she found ways to teach us how to live the laws of the gospel. 

One important lesson I remember her teaching was about obedience.  Both my mother and father taught that "Obedience is the first law of Heaven." 

To illustrate this point, one day, for Family Home Evening my mother taught us a game called Simon Says. 

I'm sure most people have at least heard of this game.  Mom would say, "Simon says touch your toes."  And we would touch our toes. 

We did everything that "Simon Said" to do.  But if she didn't say, "Simon Says", then we did not do it!  If you followed any command that wasn't given by Simon, you were out of the game. 

She explained to us that this is like following Heavenly Father.  When we listen to His commands and obey them, we are blessed.  When we listen to the commands of other sources, such as addictions, temptations, and unrighteous passions, we miss out on the blessings that our Father in Heaven has available for us. 

Listening to the Spirit takes some effort on our part.  But the rewards and blessings are great!

World + Color = God's Love

 I love serving in the YSA.  There are so many people there who have become my instant friends!  A couple of Sundays ago, CA and her friend, Bud brought us a surprise lunch!  It included a mushroom quiche, juicy watermelon, Greek yogurt, and my personal favorite-Jones soda!  We had some appointments that afternoon, so we grabbed the drinks and jumped in the car.  Before we drove off I snapped a quick picture.  I like the way these delicious sodas look here in my yellow sweater.  A great color pallet in my opinion!  I spy with my little eye, a yellow pencil in the corner too!

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The other day I was thinking about colors.  Heavenly Father didn't need to make the world beautiful.  But He did anyway.   Colors are just an expression of God's love.