Conference Weekend

Conference is always a great weekend!  I love it!  

So after a super rainy month with lots of Baseball games rained out, I was actually hoping we'd have another Saturday of rain outs...and our wish came true!  Rain and General Conference all day = Awesomeness!

Sunday was gorgeous and we enjoyed the sessions, headed out for a family walk and had a yummy dinner!

Happiness!

Cade quacking at the geese...Quacking like a duck is one of his special talents!

Sooo happy...walking and freedom...

No mom!  Don't take my picture!  I don't want to wait for the brother's!

After lots more walking....and less keeping up...and more straying off the sidewalk, he was put back in the stroller.

I want to record my favorite quotes from Talks...so when I print my books I'll have some reminders of what was said what year and what I liked the best... 

Elder Holland April 2012 The laborers in the Vineyard

ay I plead with us not to be hurt—and certainly not to feel envious—when good fortune comes to another person? We are not diminished when someone else is added upon. We are not in a race against each other to see who is the wealthiest or the most talented or the most beautiful or even the most blessed. The race we are really in is the race against sin, and surely envy is one of the most universal of those.

So be kind, and be grateful that God is kind. It is a happy way to live. 

The majesty of your life, of your neighbor’s life, and of the gospel of Jesus Christ will be made manifest at the last day, even if such majesty is not always recognized by everyone in the early going. So don’t hyperventilate about something that happened at 9:00 in the morning when the grace of God is trying to reward you at 6:00 in the evening—whatever your labor arrangements have been through the day.

This is a story about God’s goodness, His patience andforgiveness, and the Atonement of the Lord Jesus Christ. It is a story about generosity and compassion. It is a story about grace. It underscores the thought I heard many years ago that surely the thing God enjoys most about being God is the thrill of being merciful, especially to those who don’t expect it and often feel they don’t deserve it.

So if you have made covenants, keep them. If you haven’t made them, make them. If you have made them and broken them, repent and repair them. It is never too late so long as the Master of the vineyard says there is time. Please listen to the prompting of the Holy Spirit telling you right now, this very moment, that you should accept the atoning gift of the Lord Jesus Christ and enjoy the fellowship of His labor. Don’t delay. It’s getting late. In the name of Jesus Christ, amen.

Elder Scott: April 2012 How to Obtain Revelation and Ispiration for your personal life

Another example of revelation is this guidance given to President Joseph F. Smith: “I believe we move and have our being in the presence of heavenly messengers and of heavenly beings. We are not separate from them. … We are closely related to our kindred, to our ancestors … who have preceded us into the spirit world. We can not forget them; we do not cease to love them; we always hold them in our hearts, in memory, and thus we are associated and united to them by ties that we can not break. … If this is the case with us in our finite condition, surrounded by our mortal weaknesses, … how much more certain it is … to believe that those who have been faithful, who have gone beyond … can see us better than we can see them; that they know us better than we know them. … We live in their presence, they see us, they are solicitous for our welfare, they love us now more than ever. For now they see the dangers that beset us; … their love for us and their desire for our well being must be greater than that which we feel for ourselves.”¹

Relationships can be strengthened through the veil with people we know and love. That is done by our determined effort to continually do what is right. We can strengthen our relationship with the departed individual we love by recognizing that the separation is temporary and that covenants made in the temple are eternal. 

One of the great lessons that each of us needs to learn is to ask. Why does the Lord want us to pray to Him and to ask? Because that is how revelation is received.

When I am faced with a very difficult matter, this is how I try to understand what to do. I fast. I pray to find and understand scriptures that will be helpful. That process is cyclical. I start reading a passage of scripture; I ponder what the verse means and pray for inspiration. I then ponder and pray to know if I have captured all the Lord wants me to do. Often more impressions come with increased understanding of doctrine. I have found that pattern to be a good way to learn from the scriptures.

When it is for the Lord’s purposes, He can bring anything to our remembrance. That should not weaken our determination to record impressions of the Spirit. Inspiration carefully recorded shows God that His communications are sacred to us. Recording will also enhance our ability to recall revelation. Such recording of direction of the Spirit should be protected from loss or intrusion by others.

Our Heavenly Father did not put us on earth to fail but to succeed gloriously. It may seem paradoxical, but that is why recognizing answers to prayer can sometimes be very difficult. Sometimes we unwisely try to face life by depending on our own experience and capacity. It is much wiser for us to seek through prayer and divine inspiration to know what to do. Our obedience assures that when required, we can qualify for divine power to accomplish an inspired objective.

Communication with our Father in Heaven is not a trivial matter. It is a sacred privilege. It is based upon eternal, unchanging principles. We receive help from our Father in Heaven in response to our faith, obedience, and the proper use of agency.

Elder Ronald Rasband: Special Lessons April 2012

I wept as I pondered the limitless love our Heavenly Father and His Beloved Son, Jesus Christ, have for each one of us, while learning in a powerful way what the worth of a soul is, both physically and spiritually, to God.

Brothers and sisters, it is my hope and prayer that we will continue to bear nobly our burdens and to reach out to those among us who are suffering and in need of being lifted and encouraged.

Julie B. Beck - just released from being RS General President...before which she was 1st counselor in the YW General Presidency.  Julie B. Beck is so fantastic...I cried when she was released!  I should gather my faves of her talks...

President Spencer W. Kimball said: “There are many sisters who are living in rags—spiritual rags. They are entitled to gorgeous robes, spiritual robes. … It is your privilege to go into homes and exchange robes for rags.”²¹ President Harold B. Lee shared this vision. He said: “Cannot you see why the Lord has put it upon the … Relief Society to visit these homes? Because, next to the Master himself, there are none in [the] Church who have a more lovely touch, a more complete understanding of the hearts and the lives of these individuals.”²²

Elder Russell M. Nelson ~ April 2012

How much better it would be if all could be more aware of God’s providence and love and express that gratitude to Him. Ammon taught, “Let us give thanks to [God], for he doth work righteousness forever.”² Our degree of gratitude is a measure of our love for Him.

hink of our physical sustenance. It is truly heaven-sent. The necessities of air, food, and water all come to us as gifts from a loving Heavenly Father. The earth was created to support our brief sojourn in mortality.⁷We were born with a capacity to grow, love, marry, and form families.

Marriage and family are ordained of God. The family is the most important social unit in time and in eternity. Under God’s great plan of happiness, families can be sealed in temples and be prepared to return to dwell in His holy presence forever. That is eternal life! It fulfills the deepest longings of the human soul—the natural yearning for endless association with beloved members of one’s family.

We are part of His divine purpose: “My work and my glory,” He said, is “to bring to pass the immortality and eternal life of man.”⁸ In order to achieve those objectives, “God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.”⁹ That act was a supernal manifestation of God’s love. “For [He] sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through him might be saved.”¹⁰

When you sing “I Am a Child of God,” think of His gift to you of your own physical body. The many amazing attributes of your body attest to your own “divine nature.”¹⁶

  

Be we reminded that a perfect body is not required to achieve one’s divine destiny. In fact, some of the sweetest spirits are housed in frail or imperfect bodies. Great spiritual strength is often developed by people with physical challenges, precisely because they are so challenged.

Anyone who studies the workings of the human body has surely “seen God moving in his majesty and power.”

Yet some people erroneously think that these marvelous physical attributes happened by chance or resulted from a big bang somewhere. Ask yourself, “Could an explosion in a printing shop produce a dictionary?” The likelihood is most remote. But if so, it could never heal its own torn pages or reproduce its own newer editions!


This year...I got clip boards for each boy...and as always Conference Bingo and a folder with lots of Conference Activities..and I gathered some treats and other things to put in baggies like this for when an apostle would speak.  It was fun...but didn't always work...such as when you just had a big conference breakfast and Elder Perry speaks in the morning session and the baggie holds jelly beans.  Not being able to plan for when the bags would come up was a bummer...but the kids loved getting bags for the Apostles.  So I sorta mixed some things around due to timing.  So it worked great for afternoon sessions because we didn't really eat lunch...but not so good in the morning.

Our bags included: {some duplicates}
Pack of sugar free but exciting Gum
Trail mix
Beef Jerky
Jelly Beans
Star Burst (only 2-3 per individual)
Stickers
Fruit Leather
Cadbury Mini eggs
Capri Suns
Teddy Grahms
New Pencils (the kind that have the rotating leads)


Different ages would prompt different ideas...I also thought of after the fact...
raisins/craisins
Gatorade (a fam fave)
Popcorn
New Crayons
mini playdough like pictured above.
honeycomb or cheerios


Anyhow, we just love spending time together watching Conference!


If Interested...more new posts below:)