Facing Personal Goliaths

Each Fast Sunday, we have a combined YW lesson taught be a presidency member.

I was really excited to be able to teach the girls this past week. 

Initially, I was really struggling as I tried to determine what to teach.

As soon as I came across the Ensign Article from President Monson, "Facing Your Goliaths", 

I just knew it was what Heavenly Father wanted the girls to hear. 

The lesson turned out great. 

The spirit was so strong as we discussed some of the "Goliaths" we as women often face. 

The girls named off things like...

Self-Doubt

Personal Image

Modesty

Confidence

Making and Keeping Good Friends

(isn't it funny how the adversary knows just how to get us?)

The spirit was definitely present as we discussed the "5 Stones" that we can use in 

order to fight and defeat our "Goliaths" in battle. 

Throughout the lesson I testified of Heavenly Father's personal love for each of the girls. 

Here are a few ideas and things I created for the lesson... feel free to use!

 For the table display, I printed the top pictures and put them in frames. 

I went in my backyard and found "5 Stones" and wrote the different points on them.

I would pull out a new stone and place it on the table as I would present the new topic.

I also found these really cute rock candies at Macey's. 

I packaged them up in a cute tube cellophane bag (found at Pebbles in my Pocket), 

and topped them off with some cute ribbon and a tag I created.

Von guten Mächten (Dietrich Bonhoeffer)

1. Von guten Mächten treu und still umgeben,
behütet und getröstet wunderbar,
so will ich diese Tage mit euch leben,
und mit euch gehen in ein neues Jahr.

Refrain:

Von guten Mächten wunderbar geborgen,
erwarten wir getrost, was kommen mag.
Gott ist mit uns am Abend und am Morgen
und ganz gewiss an jedem neuen Tag.

2. Noch will das Alte unsere Herzen quälen,
noch drückt uns böser Tage schwere Last.
Ach, Herr, gib unsern aufgescheuchten Seelen
das Heil, für das du uns bereitet hast.

3. Und reichst du uns den schweren Kelch, den bittern
des Leids, gefüllt bis an den höchsten Rand,
so nehmen wir ihn dankbar ohne Zittern,
aus deiner guten und geliebten Hand.

4. Doch willst du uns noch einmal Freude schenken
an dieser Welt und ihrer Sonne Glanz,
dann wolln wir des Vergangenen gedenken,
und dann gehört dir unser Leben ganz.

5. Lass warm und still die Kerzen heute flammen,
die du in unsere Dunkelheit gebracht.
Führ, wenn es sein kann, wieder uns zusammen.
Wir wissen es, dein Licht scheint in der Nacht.

6. Wenn sich die Stille nun tief um uns breitet,
so lass uns hören jenen vollen Klang
der Welt, die unsichtbar sich um uns weitet,
all deiner Kinder hohen Lobgesang.

Text: Dietrich Bonhoeffer (1944) 1945/1951

i love the mountains, 

i love the rolling hills...

This Friday I had the opportunity to go up and share some time with the young women at camp Mia Shalom. 

It was such an unforgettable experience. 

I'll admit--- In the past, I have never been the biggest fan of yw girls camp. 

The bugs...no cell phones...no showers... typically not my cup of tea.

However, for whatever reason, my eyes were really opened to the real importance of girls camp this year. 

As I pulled into camp Shalom  for the first time in YEARS, I felt so much joy and gratitude. 

It is a place where many of my most important memories live,

 including the place where I learned for the first time what my testimony was.. 

I realized that girls, including myself don't go to girls camp because they love the bugs,

or smelling like an awful fire, or getting grimmy (okay, well maybe some of them do).

The main reason we go is to be spiritually fed. To become closer to our Savior and to feel His love.

This theme for camp this year was...

It was amazing to see how much the young women had changed in the course of a week. 

When I met up, hugged, and greeted them, I could tell that their countenances had changed. 

They were all glowing with the love and light of Christ. 

It seriously touched my heart. Once again, the youth are amazing. 

We spent the day singing, hiking, laughing, talking, making friendship bracelets, studying.

Favorite part of the day?

Testimony meeting. 

I'll tell you what, I was so extremely touched and humbled to be able to hear the testimonies of the girls.

I guess sometimes as a leader, I have felt like I may not always "getting through" to the girls.

More than anything, I want the girls to know how precious they are in the sight of their Heaveny Father.

It was amazing to just sit there and listen the girls pour out their hearts. 

I was so touched when one of the young women stood to bear her testimony. 

She stood and testified in the light of the fire that she knew that her Heavenly Father loved her.

Unconditionally.

Regardless whether or not she was smart.

Regardless if she wore makeup.

Regardless if she lived in a big house.

As each girl stood to bear their testimonies, the spirit was tangible

. It is an experience and moment that I will never forget.

Their testimonies and examples strengthened me personally as a women.

I love the young women.

I love learning from them.

I love knowing and feeling proud that they are our future.

I love girls camp and the experiences it brings.

Can't wait to go back next year. 

Have I Done Any Good

in The World Today?

__________________

So as of late Brett and I have been serving as ordinance workers in the Timpanogos temple.

 I love it. That’s all.

Okay, maybe that’s not all I wanted to say…

Although it’s challenging at times to wake up at 3:30am in order to get to our shift on time

 (we work the 5:00am-11:00am) shift, it is SO worth it.

One of my many favorite things about working in the temple? 

Definitely the beginning of the shift.

Before starting our rotations one of the temple presidency members always

take a moment to share a thought with us.

These priesthood holders are so wise and such spiritual giants.

They always enlighten my understanding of the gospel and temple ordinances.

Anyways, this past week, the Temple President spoke to us

about the joy that comes from service. It really touched my heart.

As he spoke to us he asked us, “What is the prayer that never goes unanswered?”.

 When he first asked this, I was pretty confused.

 I knew that there was NO prayer that ever goes unheard,

 but I wasn’t sure which prayers NEVER went unanswered.

President Reynolds proceeded to explain that the prayers that never

 go unanswered are the ones where we are asking who is in need of our help.

Boy, isn't that true?

 In my life as I have prayed to know who to serve, I have ALWAYS received a response.

 Why is this significant?

When I am serving others, I feel pure joy.

Regardless of what is going on in my life, regardless of my situation,

regardless of how I am feeling,

when I drop what I am doing to serve others around me, I feel so happy.

This is probably one of the other greatest reasons I love serving in the temple.

 As President Reynolds spoke to us, it made me think of

one of my favorite quotes by Camilla Kimball.

 “Never suppress a generous thought.”.

I love those small “do good” promptings.

 Listening to President Reynolds reminded me of the importance of serving

others and acting on the promptings to serve.

I decided I really wanted to re-commit myself to praying more for opportunities

 to serve and acting upon those small and quiet promptings.

I recreated this simple quote to print out and put in my scriptures to remind me of my goal.

What a sweet and simple reminder.

I just want to get my Subway on!

The other day I was reading a post by Sextant of Navigating the Finite about why you should never choose the shortest checkout line at the grocery store. You really need to go and read it cause it's hilarious!!! Go on, go read it, I'll wait...

See, told you it was hilarious right? What makes it even more hilarious is that this kind of stuff has happened to us all. I know it's happened to me, and usually when you I am in a super big rush. Which bring me to one of my pet peeves (oh...there are many).  So what is one of mine? It's people that are not working, that choose to go out to lunch during the lunch hours between noon and 2pm. Ok, I know...this is America, we can have lunch whenever we want. But c'mon people!!! Some of us only have one hour for lunch and you, for whatever reason, have the whole day!

For instance...last week on Thursday, I went to a Subway Sandwich Shop for lunch. The line is out the door, I waited about ten minutes to get close to the front of the line. There is one women ahead of me and ahead of her is a young man about 18 and dressed casually, with him is a young girl about 16 or 17 wearing super baggy boys basketball shorts and a little girl about 4 years old. Obviously they have been waiting just as long as I have and have had tons of time of peruse the menu, but they get to the front of the line and when they are asked "May I help you" they get into a huge discussion of what kind of bread they want, as that's the first decision you have to make at Subway. I mean, c'mon...are you aliens? Is this your first time on planet Earth? Is this your first visit to a Subway Sandwich Shop? Do we need Jared to stand behind you to explain the menu?

Then...they have to make the decision of what kind of bread their friend that they are taking a sandwich to wants. Then do they want it heated or not? Anyway, you get the point. These two are obviously unemployed or students, or they could be employed but obviously not working that day considering their casual dress and the baby girl. I'm sure they've been to Subway 100 times and already know the menu and even if this is their first time there, they've had at least 10 minutes to study the menu while waiting on line.

Me on the other hand...I'm tired, hot and still have 4 more hours of work to go before I can go home. I'm in a hurry, only have 1 hour for lunch and I'm hungry! I have already wasted 10 minutes in line and 10 minutes waiting for them to decide what they want to eat. There should be a line for working professionals to go through, like the merchant line at the bank! That way those who only have one hour for lunch don't have to deal with the riff-raff that is just out for a casual lunch..don't you think?

The Red Bird of Paradise

Yesterday I did a post about a man that was so enchanted by my Arizona Plant that he stole a bloom from it. We've always just called it the Arizona Plant, but it actually has a name. My cousin Norrie who lives in Arizona City...and c'mon, if you are going to live in Arizona isn't Arizona City the best place to live?

So Norrie told me they have tons of those there and they are known as the Bird of Paradise. I always thought this was a Bird of Paradise...

Bird of Paradise

Turns out that the Arizona Plant I have is called "Red" Bird of Paradise or more formerly Caesalpinia pulcherrima.

So I went out this afternoon and took a few pictures of my Arizona Plant aka Red Bird of Paradise so you could see it close up.

My sister says that mine isn't blooming as well as hers because mine gets quite a bit of water when the grass gets watered, while her's is in a place at her home that hardly gets any water at all. These plants are pretty drought resistant which is probably why there are so many of them in Arizona.

Check out the colors......BEAUTIFUL right? I did a post in August of 2009 with lots of pictures on my sisters Arizona Plant. You can see them HERE. But here's a closeup picture of hers.

Stolen Flowers

See these flowers? A stranger gave them to me today. No...actually, a stranger stole them for me today. Aren't they pretty?



























See...here's what happened. Today after work, I was at home in my bedroom. My bedroom has a sliding glass door that faces a quiet street to the side of my house. I happened to see a small pickup truck go by. Mexican music was blasting out of this truck...very loud Mexican music. So I moved closer to the window, being nosey to see why the truck wasn't moving.

I see this man step out and walk over to my Arizona Plant, a plant that was planted by my mom and dad in the corner of the front yard. It only blooms when it's super hot as hell!

You can see the plant in this picture. (This is the view from my bedroom, don't you love it?) See the beautiful orange flowers? Well I guess this man just couldn't resist and I saw him walk over; after leaving his truck running in the middle of the street, and he took out his pocket knife and cut off one of the flowers. At that moment he looked up and saw me looking at him out of my bedroom window.

He looked at me kind of sheepishly and did a thumbs up. I took that to mean, "is it ok that I am stealing one of your beautiful Arizona flowers?"

Being totally generous of flowers that just bloom by the Grace of God, since I had nothing to do with it, I gave him the "thumbs up" right back so he would know, "Sure dude, it's all good...go ahead and steal one of my pretty little flowers!"

He then turned around and drove off and I went into the kitchen to tell my mom what had just happened.

About twenty minutes later, as I was looking out the kitchen window...I know, I know...I'm like one of those lookie-loo neighbors that never minds my own business!

But ok, I was looking out the kitchen window and I see the same little pickup truck pull up and park  in the street along side my house and I realize it is the same truck. So I tell my mom, "Uh oh...that guy that stole the Arizona Plant Flower is back!" The guy gets out of the truck and I see that he is holding some white flowers in his hand.

I immediately thought, "Stalker alert!"

So he starts walking towards the front of my house and I head back into my bedroom where he is waiting outside the sliding glass door. Now I know why no one wanted this bedroom cause it's way too accessible to the street!

I open the screen door and he hands me the flowers and he says, "I felt bad that I stole your flower and so I stole these further on down the road to pay you back." Can you believe that? I take the flowers and tell him that I understand his stealing the Arizona Plant Flower because it's so beautiful and so unusual and they don't normally grow in California. He agreed and then said, "Well, the real reason I stole it is because yesterday I buried my wife and I'm heading to the cemetery and I saw your flowers and knew she would have loved them, so I had to take one".

Is your heart breaking yet? Mine did...

I told him how sorry I was and told him that I was sure his wife would love it and that he didn't have to repay me. He said he just felt bad because I was so nice to let him take one flower and he wanted to do something nice for me and now he was going to have to go steal flowers from somewhere else to repay the person he stole my flowers from!

I bid him good bye and put my pretty flowers in the pitcher you see in the picture above and sat there thinking about the whole thing and then said to my mom who had followed me outside, "Mom, if you had just buried your wife yesterday, would you be driving on the way to the cemetery with joyful Mexican music blaring in your car?"

Hmmmm, would you? I was brought up with the tradition that when someone dies you have a suitable period of mourning or "luto" as we say in spanish. You don't watch TV or listen to music or go to dances or parties. But I know that now a days, we don't mourn but we celebrate life...so who knows.

What say you? Does this seem odd or normal to you? Either way I had something interesting to blog about and I got to show you all my Arizona Plant and also I can brag that the beautiful pitcher and bowl that the flowers are in was made by my mom in a ceramics class she took eons ago. Isn't it pretty? I love it!