Artwork by Dallin

Dallin drew this to give to one of his friends.
I really like it and I'm glad he would let me take a picture of it before he gave it away.

Great Grandpa's Ties

I've been helping out with some cleaning and stuff at my Grandma's house and my uncles house in Ogden. I was happy to have the chance to get some of my Grandpa Elmer's ties. My boys each wore one to church yesterday. They never got the chance to know him because he died when I was about 14. I always felt a closeness to him though because I was born on his birthday. He was such a great man.

My maternal grandpa George Wilford Elmer.

Dallin, Isaac and Noah wearing the ties.

I think they look great!

Ward Activity

We had a lot of "lasts" before we left Maryland.
Our last ward activity was fun,

but also sad to realize that it was our last with our White Plains 1 family.

Dodgeball fun

 stick-pull

I know you are wondering, no, she didn't win :)

 water relay and bean bag toss

 We are sure going to miss our church family in Maryland!

Trip to St. Lucia Day 4, Easter Sunday

We went to church early to help get everything set up.

My Dad is serving as the Branch President (President Bush, he he.)

It was nice to meet the saints there and to worship with them.

Here I am with one of the young woman in the branch named Brittany
She was so sweet.

Mom and I sang a duet and then I also sang a solo. It was a different experience for me because we had to sing a capella.....yikes! It went well though and I enjoyed doing it, I really do love to sing and I feel blessed to have opportunities to share my talent (if I may be so bold as to call it that)

After sacrament meeting, Mom and I went to help in the Primary. 

I loved doing that! The Primary President does everything on her own, there aren't any counselors or teachers really. She was thankful for the help.

Mike went to Sunday school and Priesthood and enjoyed those meetings.

Here I am with a few of the primary kids. The one leaning on my lap is Krisshona, she and I have the same birthday :)

It was a wonderful experience to go to church there.

Right after church we went to visit Brother and Sister Joe. That was such a humbling spiritual experience. The purpose of our visit was to bring the sacrament to Sister Joe, and to bring her a picture of the Savior to hang on her wall in front of her bed. Brother and Sister Joe had joined the church and then they had saved up their money to go to the temple to be sealed. They went and right after they got back Sister Joe had a stroke and now she is bedridden and can only move her mouth, her head a little bit and her left arm and hand. The Spirit was so strong in their small humble home, and Brother Joe would not let us leave without having some ice cream and giving my Mom a bag of guavas from his tree.

When we got back to our apartment we had dinner and we were able to Skype the kids and hear all about their day.

They made it to church on time and were good...so they said :)

Noah took on the role of Easter Bunny after church and set up an egg hunt for the other kids.

Lu "wow"

We had a luau last Saturday for our ward activity.

I was exhausted after a week of day camp, but still needed to dig in and help since the Primary was in charge. Our wonderful secretary, Ana, was overseeing pretty much everything and she did a fabulous job.


Me with the other members of the Primary presidency, Jacque, Dela and Ana.

I think it was a successful activity, everyone seemed to have a good time. The food was delicious and the achievement girls did a hula that Ana taught them.

My hula girl

I helped do some face painting 

here's what my kids ended up with

I'm pretty sure you'll be able to tell what most of them are. The only ones you might not get are the Poké Balls, and the black puffle with fire behind it from Club Penguin.

Anyway, none of them wanted to take baths and wash their faces (except for Dallin) but I told them they needed to be clean for church tomorrow. Grace said, "ok, so will you repaint it after I take a shower?"

Umm...no sorry I'm not taking my kids to church with face paint on... :)

Mike's New Calling

On Sunday July 11th Mike was sustained as the 2nd counselor in the Bishopric. There were many wonderful and spiritual things that happened leading up to this call, and we feel honored for him to have the chance to serve in this capacity. 

Anyone who knows Mike, knows what a dedicated hard working man he is. He also has a great capacity to care about and love others and I know that this is where the Lord wants him to be.


Our new Bishop, Farrel Martin, and the first counselor, Brother Ron Franklin, are exceptional men and Mike is looking forward to working with them.

As this Sunday rolled around, he found out that he would be conducting. He did a good job, though I could tell that he was nervous. At least his suit coat and pants matched :)

I am fortunate to be married to such a wonderful man who honors his priesthood and sets such a great example for me and for our children. I know that he will settle into this new calling just like he has with many others he has held and that our whole family will be blessed by his service.

What a Sunday

We had a wonderful Stake Conference on the 6th of June. Elder Jeffrey R. Holland of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles came to our Stake to reorganize our Stake presidency.

When we found out he was coming, we were excited. We started learning about him in family home evening and reading some of his talks and just trying to prepare ourselves and our kids to meet this special witness of Christ.

We decided that we wanted to sit in the chapel so our kids could see him in person and not just on a t.v. monitor. I made all the preparations the night before and Mike got home about 2 in the morning from his trip to Utah (that's another blog post!) Then we woke up early and arrived at the Stake center a little after 7:15 a.m. We were able to get a bench and shared it with our good friends the Vance's. The meeting didn't start until 10, so we kept the kids busy with snacks, books, paper, etc. Isaac even had a conversation with Elder Holland in the bathroom.

When it was getting closer to 10, I took my place on the stand to sing with the choir and left Mike with the kids. The meeting was wonderful, even though there were some issues with the sound. The Spirit was very strong.

The new Stake Presidency was announced and our Bishop was called as the 2nd counselor. So we will be getting a new Bishop in the next few weeks.

After the meeting I waited on the stand as Mike brought the kids up to shake Elder Holland's hand. What a wonderful feeling, to watch your children shake hands with an apostle of the Lord and to feel of his spirit and love. I have to say that I loved meeting him too.

It was such a wonderful day. I felt so spiritually fed. I hope that my children will always remember what they felt. I recorded my personal feelings in my journal, some were just to personal to share on a blog. I know the church is true and I feel so blessed by the opportunities we have to continue to learn and grow and to listen to apostles and prophets speak.

We ended our day by going up to the Temple visitor center and listening to the Mormon Orchestra of D.C. perform their annual children's concert. The music was wonderful, I think the hit of the night was the Star Wars music.

My favorite moment though, was at the end of the concert when they started playing I am a Child of God. I was video taping it and Anna started singing along with the music. (I have tried repeatedly to upload the video and it's just not working, so I'm moving on!)

What a wonderful day!

BYU Management Society Annual Gala Dinner

Ok, last night Mike and I had a neat opportunity. We attended the BYU Management Society's Annual Gala Dinner. Mike sits on the Executive Board as a representative of the J. Reuben Clark Law Society. In one of the planning meetings for this event Mike volunteered me to photograph the event for them. I accepted, even though I was very nervous. I ended up getting some good shots, so I thought I would share some of them with you. The president of the Society told me that he mostly wanted candid shots, not posed, so I got some of both. It was a wonderful night, and the guest of honor was M. Russell Ballard of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles. In the photos below, you will see some (not all by any means) of the many notable people who were in attendance.

M. Russell Ballard with Senate Majority Leader Harry ReidElder Quentin L. Cook having a laugh with Senator Robert F. Bennett.
Elder Ballard talking with Chinese Ambassador Zhou Wenzhong.
Elder Ballard with Senator Orrin Hatch.
Richard and Nancy Marriott with Ned Hill, Dean of the Marriott School of Management.Elder David L. Cook of the Seventy chatting with Mike at dinner.
He was very nice and fun to talk with.
Ok, here is a picture of me with Elder Cook.

And me with Elder Ballard.We had a good time, great dinner, delicious dessert and fabulous company. Elder Ballard gave a wonderful talk and coincidentally he talked about blogging. He encouraged us to make our voices heard and take part in discussions about the church wherever they may be.