Gift from Baby Benjamin

 Baby Benjamin gave me a gift on Christmas day - my very first BYU Cougars shirt. Since my dad was always a HUGE BYU (Brigham Young University) fan, all of his kids, including me, became BYU fans as well. 

Knowing I had never owned a BYU shirt, Jared bought me one for baby Benjamin to give to me for Christmas. I LOVE it!

I proudly wore the shirt last night while watching BYU play in the Alamo Bowl against the Colorado Buffaloes.

I credit BYU's overwhelming win (36-14) to the lucky shirt I wore. They played an incredible game and proved without a doubt which team was better even though Colorado had the Heisman Trophy winner on their team and their QB was Deion Sanders' son. Deion is a famous pro football Hall of Fame Cornerback and is also the coach for Colorado.

BYU's QB, Jake Retzlaff, played a much better game than Colorado's QB did even though Shedeur Sanders was named Big XII offensive player of the year and is going pro. 

I just love watching BYU win, especially in a bowl game. Thankfully, Jake Retzlaff will be returning to BYU next year. He's one great QB.

Shower For Baby Benjamin

For a while now, Jared & Catherine have been calling their unborn infant "baby Benjamin". We all call him that now. 

Since Jared and Catherine were able to come to Utah for Christmas, Cheryl and I decided to throw them a "couples" baby shower. Aunts and uncles were invited to the wedding celebration, so Jared wanted to invite some of his cousins that he hasn't seen in a while to the baby shower.

The shower was well attended. Our own immediate family added up to 15 of us. We also had Michelle, Heather & Randy, Amberly, Ben & Eboni, Michael & Jessica, Nathan & Stephanie, & Kristen in attendance. It made for a pretty full house. Jared, obviously, couldn't invite all of his cousins. 

Cheryl did a great job with the decorations:

She even decorated the mantel and put balloons in the family room tree (not pictured here)

It was fun for Jared (and the rest of us) to catch up with some of his cousins that he hasn't seen in a while.

Everyone seemed to have a great time eating and then we played 3 games and opened gifts. Kessler wanted to get in on the action by helping Catherine open the gifts.

After Jared & Catherine opened their gifts, they had a gift for Cheryl from baby Benjamin. He gave her a sweat shirt and note asking her to be his godmother, which is a big thing in Colombia and the Catholic Church. Cheryl accepted the job and gave Jared & Catherine a big hug.

We are thrilled to be getting a new grandson in early March, and we love the name they have chosen - Benjamin Noah. They wanted names that would work for both the USA and Colombia and those two names fit the bill. 

Jared & Catherine flew back to Arizona this morning. Christmas is over, the baby shower is over, and the house is awfully quiet again.

Happy 49th To Us

 Alan and I just celebrated our 49th Wedding Anniversary. Besides having to go to a morning appointment with my orthopedic surgeon because of issues with my left hip and right knee, the day was great. We decided to celebrate our anniversary by eating lunch at Red Lobster after my doctor appointment.

It has been years since we've eaten at Red Lobster. Since I don't like fish, I got fillet mignon instead. Very tasty - much better than any kind of fish! Alan got a variety of fish (shrimp, lobster tail, and salmon).

I can't believe that we have been married 49 years. I also can't believe how quickly the time has gone by. I really enjoyed the congrats we received via text message from our 5 wonder children who are the product of our marriage. They are our pride and joy and greatest blessing to come from our union so long ago. We love our kids and grandkids to eternity and beyond.

In one year, we will be able to celebrate our 50th wedding anniversary. That's the big one I've longed to celebrate for a while now. My mom wanted to celebrate 50 years with my dad, but, sadly, she passed away just over a year short of reaching that goal.

Alan and I have grown older and wiser together and I appreciate and love him more with each passing year. God brought us together and I'm thankful that we are sealed together for eternity. Very comforting to know that he will always be mine.

Kids Make Christmas Fun!

I made these Christmas Santa Sleigh Stockings for each of my grandchildren this year. The older ones got a gift card inside and the younger ones got other gifts to open to go along with it. It was fun making them and I think the kids enjoyed them - even Evie, Ella, and Livi.

This note was tucked inside the sock:

Here are a few photos of Christmas day as a family. Cheryl took Kessler and Wesley separately to the dollar store to have them pick out a gift for every member of our family. It was so fun, and funny, what they picked out for each of us. Ryan got this beanie from Kessler to keep his head warm while snowboarding and some Christmas glasses from Wesley that light up. So fun!

After opening gifts, we ate our traditional ham Christmas dinner.

Christmas is a lot of work, but it is so worth it. It always turns out to be such a magical day, especially when you have little children around. We love it whenever we can get our family together. We were missing Kyle, Milo, and Clara though. Wish they could have been here with us.

Lessons From Fog

 The night Alan and I picked Kyle up from the Salt Lake City Airport on December 6th it was very foggy. It wasn't foggy here in Riverton, but was very foggy as we approached the airport. Fog is an interesting phenomenon. You are literally in a cloud. Visibility was poor, but we could see enough to be able to stay on the road. The fog would lighten up at little as we traveled and then it would become more dense again. It can be very unnerving to drive in fog.

Kyle told us that before his airplane took off they mentioned to the passengers that because of visibility problems in Salt Lake City they might have to land in St. George, UT. Kyle was hoping for the best, that they could land in SLC as planned, and his wish came true. 

On the way home, it was still foggy for the first 10-15 minutes but then the fog lifted. We were relieved that our visibility was suddenly so clear, allowing us to make it home without any problems.

I want to compare fog with our situation here on the earth. Before we were born into this life, things were crystal clear. In a nut shell, we had heavenly parents who loved us and wanted us to come to earth to get a body, gain experience, and prove ourselves worthy to live with them again. 

Since a veil of forgetfulness was cast over us when we entered mortality, things aren't so crystal clear any more. We live in a precarious situation where a fog of sorts hampers us from seeing clearly who we are, where we came from, and what we are doing here. Unless we have God's plan of salvation, which the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints offers, we would be completely lost, not knowing which path to take to get back to our Father.

I often think about all of the people on this earth who are wandering aimlessly through life not knowing who to turn to for directions. They are, in a sense, caught in a fog and don't know where to go. I feel very bad for these people. They may be living happy lives focused on earthly pleasures and accomplishments, but they are missing out on the joy that comes from eternal pursuits.

Looking toward eternal happiness has always been my goal since I was a little child. I guess I gained a strong testimony of Jesus Christ, my Savior, at a young age. I know that it is only through Him that I will be able to return to my Heavenly Father. That has been and will always be my biggest goal. I want to make sure that every one of my family members ends up in our Father's kingdom, but each of us is responsible for getting ourselves there. Nobody can do it for someone else. It's all about choices. One has to want it!

My favorite scripture is found in 2 Nephi 31:20. 

"Wherefore, ye must press forward with a steadfastness in Christ, having a perfect brightness of hope, and a love of God and of all men. Wherefore, if ye shall press forward, feasting upon the word of Christ, and endure to the end, behold, thus saith the Father: Ye shall have eternal life."

It's my favorite scripture because it tells me what I have to do to have eternal life with my Father. It is all laid out here for us plain and clear! We must:

1. Believe in Christ

2. Have hope

3. Love God & all men

4. Feast upon the word of Christ

5. Endure to the end

That's what I have spent my life trying to do. Have I ever messed up? You bet! But I repent and try to keep moving forward. Nobody is perfect. God doesn't expect us to be perfect in this life. This life is a test. God will judge us on our works and the desires of our hearts. I hope and pray that my works and my desires will save me in the end. 

My eyes are wide open and my vision of the future is clear. Through Christ, I can do all things.

Smile

 As a teenager, one compliment I heard from others about my mother is that she always had a smile on her face. I didn't acquire that trait, but I love that she was known for that.

One day, just prior to my mother's death, I was at the grocery store and ended up at the deli to get some fresh cut turkey meat for sandwiches. I guess I must have had a sad look on my face because the woman behind the counter said something to me that kind of hurt. I don't remember her exact words, but she said something to the fact that I never have a smile on my face. Hmmm...I had never heard that from anyone else before. Maybe they were just being polite to me. Her statement caused me to look inward and to do a self-evaluation.

First of all, I tried to justify my lack of smiling to the fact that my mother had been diagnosed with lung cancer and was living out her last days on the earth at that very time. What was there to smile about? I was very sad that I would soon be losing my mother. I also tried to justify it by thinking about how boring grocery shopping can be. Does anyone go around the grocery store smiling happily from ear to ear?

Once my justifications were over, I realized that I did have things to smile about. Not everything in life is sad or boring. After all, I had the gospel of Jesus Christ. What more did I need? I had a testimony that this life will have its ups and downs but that with the help of Jesus Christ I can rise above any trial that is sent my way. Nobody gets out of this life without any struggles and trials. 

Getting old is my current struggle, but that doesn't mean that I need to hang my head low and be miserable all the time. No! I can find joy and happiness every day of my life. I can always find ways to put a smile on my face. I don't want to be known as a sourpuss.

I have tried to keep a positive outlook on life. This life is just temporary. Better times are ahead, for sure, once we pass through the veil into the next life. I am definitely looking forward to those better days, but until then, I will try to be more smiley here and now like my mother was.

Gift Giving

 Christmas is in the air and one important part of Christmas is gift giving. I admit that I'm one of the worst gift-givers around. I have a very difficult time coming up with great, meaningful gift ideas for people. I have always struggled with it. Because of this, coming up with Christmas gifts for people every year can be painful for me. I should, but don't, enjoy Christmas shopping. Admittedly, some gifts have been well received, but some have fallen flat.

I'm going to share a story about one of my gifts that fell flat.  When Alan lived in San Francisco during his first trimester of Dental School just prior to our wedding, I sent him a gift that I thought would be well received, but it really wasn't. The back story is that as a child, our family used to go pine nut hunting in the fall. We would camp out on a Friday night up in the mountains and then look for pine cones filled with delicious pine nuts on Saturday morning. My dad used to roast the nuts with a little salt added and they tasted so delicious. They are delicious raw, also, but I prefer them roasted. 

One day I saw some roasted pine nuts at the store and since I love them so much, I thought that giving some to Alan as a gift would be so perfect. It wasn't for Christmas or for any other reason other than I just wanted to gift him some, so I mailed them to his address in San Francisco.

I discovered that just because I value something doesn't mean others will value it as well. After receiving my gift, Alan couldn't for the life of him figure out why I would give him a gift of roasted pine nuts. I tried to explain it over the phone, but I don't think he ever really understood what these nuts mean to me. I thought he would love them just as I did, but that wasn't the case. That was one of my biggest gift failures, but there have been others.

I am of the opinion that God gives us gifts that maybe we don't willingly appreciate or value as much as He does. He gave us the ten commandments, but not everyone values them or abides by them. He gave us, through Jesus Christ, the ability to repent of our sins, but sometimes we don't take advantage of that gift and keep living our lives like little sins don't matter. God gave us our wonderful bodies, but we don't always take care of them as well as we could - like not exercising enough, unhealthy eating, or not getting enough sleep. I'm not perfect in these things. Most people aren't. 

God gives us gifts because He loves us. I hope that I can always appreciate and value every gift God has blessed me with.

Loneliest Thanksgiving Ever

 We had some great plans for Thanksgiving, but it was all turned upside down when I got sick, followed a few days later by Alan. I got some kind of stomach bug and was sick all night long on Sunday morning before Thanksgiving. I couldn't eat much for three days. I felt well enough to go to the grocery store to get last-minute items on Wednesday. Alan wasn't feeling great, but he was able to go to Costco for apple pie and a few other items. He started feeling worse after that. 

We were supposed to be getting together at our house with Eric's family and Ryan, but I can't blame them for not wanting to come over and risk getting exposed. It wasn't a fun bug at all. Therefore, Eric & Nicole did most of the cooking at their house and then I picked up some food for Alan and I from their house. It was delicious, but we missed being able to eat with family members. Cheryl's family got together with the Stronk family.

Maybe things will work out better for us next Thanksgiving.