Memorial Day 2011

This weekend was absolutely busy but a complete blast! Friday after work I went home, packed and headed to Salt Lake to pick up Mike so we could go camping with my family for Memorial Day. We went up to Coalville, by Park City and had so much fun with everyone! I did feel bad for Mike, Austin and Jordan because they slept out in a tent, and although the weather was nice for part of the weekend - it did snow on Friday night. Poor guys.

Friday we had yummy food, ate s'mores, played with the girls and just got settled in by talking and catch up.

Saturday morning we had a yummy breakfast. Everything seems better when it's made with a dutch oven or outside at all for that reason.


Afterwards Jordan insisted we play Topple like 20 times (or until he won). Which was fun, we all hadn't played that game forever! Then we went fishing (nobody caught anything), and then while the boys played basketball, us girls got all the swim gear together. We went swimming and enjoyed the warm weather while it lasted.








After changing Annika and I went to watch a game of horse shoes.




We took a break from watching to play "Pooh Sticks." We would both find a stick, or something that we could throw on one side of the bridge and then we would wait to watch it come out the other side. If was fun and she really got into it.



Alisha and Ady

Adalyn grabbed her blanket and snuggled up down on the ground while we watched the horse shoe game. It was cute!

Ady fell on her face the middle of last week and was a little scratched up. Then on Monday she got a runny nose. Poor girl. She looked sad but was completely happy, just her normal little cute self.



It started raining shortly after that and so we ate more amazing dutch oven food under the RV canopy and watched movies inside. It was a still a nice night despite the rain. (Annika watching a movie while lounging on Mike.)

Mike and I left camping a little early so that we could go to a big Memorial Day Breakfast with his family. The breakfast was HUGE! One family sponsors the breakfast and has been doing so for 40 years now. (It was their 40th anniversary this year!) They make sourdough pancakes, fried eggs and ham served with juice and milk. I thought it was incredible that one family does this for whoever wants to come. This year there was approximately 1,000 people who joined in and ate the yummy food. It was a pretty huge event. I must say the pancakes were as delicious as I was told they would be.



After we visited a lot of Mike's family and went to the cemetery so he could visit his Grandma's grave. We went 4-wheeling to an Elk Farm, up into the mountains and by Lover's Lane. Oak City is a very cute little town and it was fun spending the day there.








The bottom of a rainbow - looked a little more like the Northern Lights than a rainbow :0)

Mr. & Mrs. Christopher Rowland

The wedding reception that I went to in Provo was for Brianna Harris and Christopher Rowland. Brianna and I served in a Relief Society presidency together about five years ago, right after I got home from my mission.

I have been SO EXCITED about their wedding. They met when they were approximately 14 years ago, at EFY! They liked each other and they kept in touch. They started dating when they were old enough and when Brianna and I served together she was waiting for him to come home from his mission. Then she decided that she wanted to go on a mission, so he waited for her.

They have done so much in so many areas of their lives. They have touched so many people and the spirit just radiates from them. Hands down, they are one of my top ten favorite couples along with my parents, grandparents and others (yes Boozer, you & K-lub are too). When I went through the line Brianna introduced me to her parents as "Utah's Mother Theresa." Why wouldn't she be my favorite after that comment. LoL. She is super sweet and although her comment is far from the truth, it made me feel really good. I am really really happy for her & Christopher and so happy that after some ten years they are finally married in the Alberta Canada LDS temple.

Congratulations Bree & Christopher!

Missionary-ism's

Saturday I got to go down to Provo for a wedding reception. I decided to go to the Provo Temple while I was down there since I hadn't gone through that temple since I was a missionary in the MTC. It brought back a LOT of memories.

THEN:





NOW (the fountain changed!):





And no trip to the Provo temple is complete without a walk to the MTC.

Remember the Picture Perfect "Missionary Training Center" Sign?
THEN:

NOW:

It's gone! I guess they did away with it when they started having familes 'drop off' the missionaries instead of walk inside with them. I never knew! And nobody ever told me! What a sad reunion I had with the MTC. ;0)

How sad to see how things change sometimes. Some days my mission feels like it was yesterday. Sometimes it feels like I have been working so long that my mission was ages ago. But not a day goes by where I don't think about the lessons I learned, the people I taught and the area I grew to love so much. I know it sounds funny, and a lot of people don't understand but the gospel really does give me a giddy feeling. I love it so much. I love learning and I love growing and I love thinking about how true it is. I have had the truth of it reiterated in my life so many times. At times when I want to doubt because it would be easier - I think about those experiences and I remember what I know and I know that it's not worth giving up that knowledge or those experiences for anything.

When I drive - I like to listen to general conference. In fact - look what came in the mail today!!!!!


When I wash my hands - I like to repeat the recitations from my mission:

D&C 4
"Now behold, a marvelous work is about to come forth among the children of men. Therefore, O ye that embark in the service of God, see that you serve Him with all your heart, might, mind & strength, that ye may stand blameless before God at the last day. Therefore, if ye have desires to serve God ye are called to the work; For behold the field is white already to harvest and lo, he that thrusteth in his sickle with his might, the same layeth up in store that he perisheth not, but bringeth salvation to his soul. And faith, hope, charity, and love with an eye single to the glory of God qualify him for the work. Remember faith, virtue, knowledge, patience, brotherly kindness, godliness, charity, humility, dilligence. Ask, and ye shall recieve, knock and it shall be opened unto you. Amen."

Standard of Truth
"...the Standard of Truth has been erected, no unhallowed hand can stop the work from progressing; persecutions may rage, mobs may combine, armies may assemble, calumny may defame, but the truth of God will go forth boldy, nobly, and independent, till it has penetrated every continenet, visited every climb, swept every country, and sounded in every ear, till the pirposes of God shall be accomplished, and the Great Jehovah shall say the work is done..." - Josepth Smith

My Missionary Commission
Bruce R. McConkie

"I am called of God. My authority is above that of the kings of the Earth. By revelation I have been selected as a personal representative of the Lord Jesus Christ. He is my master and He has chosen me to represent Him, to stand in His place, to say and do what He Himself would say and do if He were personally ministering unto the very people to whom He has sent me. My voice is His voice, my acts are His acts, my words are His words, my doctrine is His doctrine. My commission is to do what He wants done, to say what He wants said, to be a living modern witness in word and deed of the divinity of this Great and Marvelous Latter-Day work. How great is my calling!"

1 Nephi 3:7
"I will go and do the things which the Lord commanded, for I know that the Lord giveth no commandments unto the children of men, save he shall prepare a way for them that they may accomplish the thing which he commandeth them."


And when I have time to day dream, I wish that I was on another mission. Not because I am bored with my life, because if I was I would take a couple years to just backpack the world - but I dream of a mission because I loved my time serving the Lord. I wouldn't take it back and do anything differently because I strengthened my relationship with our Father in Heaven and Savior during this time. I know that they live and I know that they are real. I don't understand how missionaries can come home and act like their lives haven't changed. I love being a member missionary and love the things I learn in every day life - but nothing can replace the time you spend focusing on nothing but the gospel 24/7.

I do think about this every day. I guess being at the MTC gave me a chance to share it. I know not everyone feels the same way I do - and that's what life is all about. But I know that I am blessed to have the knowledge of a Heavenly Father who is aware of every aspect of my life. I am blessed to know that families can be together for all eternity through His plan and I am so grateful for that. I am thankful that we live forever and that we can continue learning and growing for the rest of eternity because what would would life be if we couldn't progress and move forward and if family ended at the grave?

This is why the gospel of Jesus Christ is the good news of Jesus Christ. Because He made the plan possible!