Thursday, October 31, 2013

Memo of My Missionary- Chilling in the Back of a Patrol Car?

this is our ride

this is elder webb's last week. sad day :(

so awesome!!
Glenn's animals :)
look out! piggy coming through haha

i'm so short

Glenn bishop and Shelly
at glen's house this is Ricardo aka Retardo he is my fav

so cute

These pigs are so big

so fun!!



Chilling in the back of a highway patrol car lol.


Friday, October 25, 2013

A Sage Visit at the Foot of Mt. Timpanogas

We have a friend, who served a mission in New Zealand twenty some years ago. His Mission President was Herschel Pedersen, who had someone ask if they could put together this book about him:



  Bro. Pedersen has been a tool in the hands of God for bringing abot many miracles in many lives. He spent decades reading the standard works all the way through four times a year! He can quote scripture references like I've never seen.

 Anyway, our friends invited us to go with them to visit Bro. Pedersen. It was like being at the feet of a sage. We sat and asked questions and he would give us scriptures and examples from his life. Then, his wife set the table with some homemade soup, which was lovely. Afterwards, the four of us went to the Mt. Timpanogas temple which is quite unique in its design. On the way home, we had dinner in a restaurant near Brigham City which is famous for its meats and fried chicken, but also had unique inventions like turkey steak and vegetable steak. They served soft, moist rolls and corn pone with raspberry honey-butter. It was a great day trip!
At the Pederson's home.
The glass work in the celestial room just makes my heart sing.
Exclamation point.
Oh look, there's some people.

Arrow of Light

Porter has completed the Cub Scouts requirements and received his Arrow of Light.
His mom got to paint colors on his face representative of different things.

Thursday, October 24, 2013

Memo of My Missionary- King of the Hill

 climbing! king of the hill lol...who shall win?





















 healthy breakfast
Grrrr...

















 Sister Barlow
  im a blanket making pro now!
Labor of Love


















 fun in the sun

Memo of My Missionary- Hands Down

 Stefanie Buttram and her children Jestin and Ivie Shriver have decided to exercise their faith in Christ by entering the waters of baptism together on November 9th! i love them all they are awesome! and Glenn Leighliter is getting baptized this saturday at 6pm.
So Jestin is 12 and has been going to church all by himself for a couple weeks now. he loves it. he even went home teaching with the young men's president. he will be a good addition to the ward cuz there are no deacons lol. Ivie is 10 years old. she is probably my favorite. She said "i trust you! i dont want anyone but  you to baptize me!" i love that she trusts me. i just love kids! Ivie is so excited about getting baptized she is telling everyone. she even wanted to announce it in church at the pulpit lol. She has been going to church with a member family for a couple months now. she even has a part in the primary program this week. Stefanie is the mom and she way cool. she has a lot to repent of but that's what the Atonement is for right? she is way excited to get baptized with her kids. we taught her WoW [the Word of Wisdom] and [the law of] Chastity cuz we knew she had some issues with those two things. enough said about that. i have really enjoyed teaching them. the two kids opened up to me from the start. it took Stefanie a little longer to trust me though. like ten minutes and she finally would talk openly with me. she is a good person. so help me if people judge her at church i will be furious. she has tattoos and stuff. shouldnt be an issue though because this ward is hands down the most Christlike ward i have ever associated with in my life. closest thing to Zion i have ever seen.


church house

finding idea

miner street



Friday, October 18, 2013

Memo of My Missionary- Conference

this conference was hands down my favorite i have ever heard. idk why that is. perhaps it is because i was listening more for my investigators and receiving revelation for them instead of me. yeah i think that is why. :) i just love being a missionary. i dread coming home cuz life gets so much harder is what they tell me.

we watched all the sessions at the church. except for the saturday afternoon one. we watched that one at Sister Barlow's house with Glen.


fun times

exchanges, Elder Tidwell (ZL)

rock star

my district

Wednesday, October 16, 2013

Package from Guam

My Auntie Connie over in Guam has blessed us with Chamorro treats! Thank you SOOOO much! I shared one bag of sembe with the kids and hid the rest. I'm pretty sure she made the guyuria herself. This was a very timely arrival as we JUST FINISHED the last bag of guyuria that Auntie Judy gave us. Oh, how the Lord looks out for me!  And a couple of the children tried an achiote seed just to see what it tastes like- not too good, I gather. Good for red rice, though!
Did you know that I love used postage stamps? Because they have traveled.
Guyuria is in the big bags. They are a cookie made with coconut milk. The children nicknamed them fried caterpillars. I can't resist them. The red-labeled bags are sembe or Japanese rice cracker. The red seeds are used to color rice for parties, and other foods, too.
These are >spicy< and crunchy and coated with soy sauce. Kiki named them canoe crackers. I shall savor each one.

Worker Bees

Wednesday is deep-cleaning day around here and today my little worker bees just made me so proud and happy. Today's "zone" was cabinets, so I assigned each kid a section and not a single kid started complaining or getting a bad attitude. They turned on music and just went to work. I am so thankful! I was able to get everything swept, vacuumed, mopped, and oiled. Feels GREAT! Tomorrow it's salsa time!

Honors Clinic In a Town That Doesn't Exist

Last year, I thought it would be a good experience for Rylee to be in the musical play at the middle school so I talked to principal Mr. Cazier who was totally down with that. So, from March to May,  Rylee would go to the choir class first thing in the a.m. and then come home. This year, she asked if she could take the actual choir class. (The teacher is not doing a musical this year.) She gets up and out the door at 7:30, catching a ride with a friend whose grandparents take her to school.

One morning when I picked her up she was uber excited because she was selected to be in a group to go to an Honors Clinic. So, this is like, the best of the best of the best, SIR! This group met the bus at 6:00 on a Sat. morning and conglomerated with groups from other schools at the Mountain View High School a couple hours away. I opted NOT to go at 6 a.m.

The kids spent all day working on different pieces with a critically acclaimed (for this region, at least) conductor dude. They were fed pizza for dinner and hung out til showtime.

After struggling with my GPS to even FIND Mountain View, WY (which it never did! it only found one in California), I did the old-fashioned thing and printed a map. GASP! I actually forgot there even existed such things as atlases. There's something really wrong with me.

Anyway, I did manage to show up at the school before showtime. I got to hang out with the awkward middle-schoolers for about 45 minutes. I don't even want to write about that...

The choir concert was really enjoyable. My tiny phone didn't have the capability to film (store) all the songs so I only got the first one which was an African song. They also did Shanandoa, and a couple of others that I really enjoyed but cannot think of the name.

As a side-note: Band members were also there for the same thing- Honors Clinic- and OH MY! I have endured many a middle-school-band concert and then understood what my parents had to go through. But, THIS...    THIS group sounded SOOO good. Which proves my belief that when a person really CARES and has PASSION about what they do they will excel because they contain their own motivation to work on it, to do what's required to become better. The band conductor picked a Western theme and it was extremely fun.

Oh yeah, Rylee said that on the drive down, the bus hit  a deer. It cracked the windshield, broke a head-light, sent kids and skittles flying all over the place. But everyone's okay.




Just waiting.

This guy has great energy.

Triumphant after.

Following the bus home so I wouldn't get lost.