Temple Service

I went to the temple tonight. Its been quite a while and I have been looking forward to it all week. Carving out the time to head out there has been a huge challenge and I have found myself putting the temple lower and lower on my priority list. As usual, I'm so glad I went. I went with some girlfriends and we went to dinner together before and the waiter was terrible and we were too late to go to the last session so we did initiatories. One of my friends was going for the first time since she received her endowments in 1998! It was such a privilege to go.

Mainly, I just want to say that as I was going through the ordinance I imagined myself in the initiatory with Mom. Having her share those blessings with me. It was a sweet thought. One that reminds me of eternity, of the blessings we have in our family because of the temple. I feel so at peace there, as though I can tackle any problem, meet any challenge. I feel the purpose of my life so much clearer and feel Christ's love so much stronger. I hope you all are enjoying that kind of meditation time and that you feel that peace in your lives.

Loves!

New Blog

So, I'm embarking on a new project. I decided I wanted to create a blog (kind of like this one) that had a focus on the gospel and testified of Christ. I am increasingly frustrated by the material that I find on the internet (like on facebook) and wanted to create my own place of hope and positivity. One thing I will do each week is a guest post for this blog. I'm thinking of calling it Monday Musings. I'm looking forward to having your participation and comments so you better come and visit me.

The address is: brightnessofhope.blogspot.com

9-11

I got to speak at church on 9-11. It was a humbling experience to research and go back through all of the stories, and to remember how I felt that day. One of the things that struck me the most was not the many stories of the firefighters and policeman. They are heros no doubt, but they were doing their jobs. They were trained to do what they did and they went in knowing full well the danger to their lives. What struck me the most was the stories of ordinary men and women who put their lives at risk to help others.

Todd Beamer is one of my personal heros. On flight 93 he knew that he was going to die. He knew that the hijackers had a plan that did not include him getting off of that plane alive. He made a concious decision to die in a way that would save other people. He and the other passengers on that flight decided that they would rush the cabin, and make sure that the plane didn't make it to it's intended target. They saved an unknown amount of lives that day.

Last night after talking about it all day, watching the tributes and seeing the videos of that day replayed, Katherine was very sad. She is old enough to realize that people aren't always good. There is evil out there and needless, terrible things happen. We had a good cry together and we were able to talk about why it's important that we remember. She just didn't understand why all of those people had to die for no reason. We talked about how bad things happen to good people and it's our responsibility as Americans to try to use those bad things to make positive changes in our own lives and to affect our small little corner of the world for good. My favorite quote from my talk was "Duty does not require perfection, but it does require dilligence." We have to be like Todd Beamer. Even if our lives are not in grave danger, we still have to make a concious choice to actively pursue things that will make a difference. We have to choose to turn the plane around sometimes and make something bad into something that is good.

I love you all- hope you had a sweet day of remembrance and forgiveness yesterday.

"Believe that you are enough, and the Savior will make up the difference."

Erin

Education Week

So fabulous to be in beautiful Utah, learning beautiful things and being with my beautiful kids!  Check out the first installment of posts beginning with the first class of the first day on the Tender Mercies page.  I hope to get better at posting and make them shorter and sweeter.
I also learned lots of great ways to stay better connected so be watching for implementation!  Technology is grand but takes this old bird some time to figure out.
I've enjoyed so much everyone's posts!  Keep them coming!
Remember, you are lovable and capable and valuable beyond measure.

Galland Update

We're back from FL and had an amazing trip doin a whole lot of NOTHING. It was great. BUT it's back to the grind for us. Cole started day care today and went to his teacher Ms. Anita just fine. He'll go 2 days a week while I work. I'm a little nervous about it, but know he will do fine. He is growing more every day. Love that little guy! Girls are doing great and excited about starting back to school.

School starts for kids in a week and I start the 29th. I want to ask all of you to pray for us as I am overwhelmed with our coming schedule. I have done it to myself I know, but am going to try to be superwoman even if it kills me. I am volunteer coordinator for the PTO, Activity Days leader, part time working and 9 hrs in school. Not to mention nursing mother to an infant and 2 busy girls. Please pray for me that this semester goes off without a hitch for all of us and that I impress us all with my mad skills.

I miss my siblings terribly and hope to not miss anymore skype dates. Especially ones that I set up! I love you all and hope things are perfect in your worlds!

no sibling rivalry here!

We spent a smiddgen of 4th of July with Todd and Kristi eating some hamburgers in true American fashion. I say smiddgen because I wish we would have had more time! I love that I get to live close to 2 of my siblings and their great spouses. Especially because one of them was my best friend at college =) I also failed to comment on the fact that I got some wonderful sister time with erin and mimi before we left for tonga. We left so soon I didn't get to say anything about it!

Since Erin came a day later, I had mimi all to myself and got to know a fascinating past about her and our family I somehow was kept in the dark about. How did I not know all that went on? I must have been wearing special childhood goggles and earmuffs to not notice anything but my own life. I love getting to know my adult siblings and seeing their side of the story of our family. My how it differs! I love each and every piece of this family.

Ancestors

So, I've kinda got the family history bug. Seven hours today to be exact. I am in love with searching for people on the internet. It makes everything so much easier and sometimes totally frustrating. What's so cool is that our ancestors are really interesting people. I learned today that Phillip Edward Ward was registered for the draft in WWII but he was too old to fight. I learned that Elizabeth Eberts came to America alone, before the rest of her family when she was a young adult. I also learned that Hocking County, Ohio was formed in 1818. That's important if you are searching for ancestors in Hocking County before that year but I'm not sure its useful to anyone else. These people were real and they lived in difficult periods of history. They also went without the light of the gospel. In Bavaria, Germany in the 1800's no one had even heard of Joseph Smith. Our ancestors never even had the opportunity to decide if the church was true or not. I think all the time that I am grateful that they went without that truth so that I could have the opportunity to go to the temple again and again and again. Perhaps, we made an agreement. Perhaps, Susan Ward or Catherine Ireland said to me, "I will go to a dark time so that you can be in the twenty-first century. But you make sure you find me. Don't let me be lost." Today I felt as though Susan Ward (or Warner is her maiden name) was urging me on that she wants to be found and for her family to have their ordinances done. Technology has been such a blessing to me as I have searched for and found names of those who would have the opportunity to progress.