The Bountiful Gal - Standing For Truth

 Yesterday I hosted a State Championship Meet at my gym.  It's a big event and I've been stressed for months making sure I've done everything and prepared all the little things for this event.  This last week I didn't sleep but a couple of hours thinking of all the little details that I still needed to do and making sure I remembered everything.  One of those details was making sure I had an American flag for the National Anthem. While preparing for the event I found out that one of the little gymnasts who would be there was Alex Boyé's daughter.  The minute I found out about the connection I wanted to contact him and see if he would sing the National Anthem to start the meet.  His daughter would be in the first session, the timing was perfect.  I went onto his social media account to ask, but then chickened out. That night as I laid in bed I kept wondering why didn't I reach out.  Why didn't I just ask?  Worse case would have been he didn't ...

 It was a late foggy night in December of 2012.  I was on my way home from the NICU in Layton, UT driving back to North Salt Lake.  It was extremely hard to see the road.  Plus the fact, I was tired.   Hope was my 5th child and another c-section.  I had complications through her whole pregnancy, but she made it safely and with the help of the NICU was learning how to eat.  I drove up every night to see her and hold her!  But because of my young children at home I couldn't ever go till after 8 pm.  So by the time I was driving home it was always around 11 pm at night.  If you know me at all, this is way past my bed time. The fog was so heavy that you couldn't see but a few yards in front of you.  As I continued down Legacy Highway, I began to see the light of the Bountiful Temple.  It was an beautiful sight!  I couldn't make out the actually temple, but I could see the light and it was a beacon of hope to me in the dar...

  Today was one of those days I saw a silver lining in having church online.  Since I got married, Zac and I have always lived states away from my family and we have never been able to support each other while giving talks or lessons in church.  Well, today, thanks to Covid, my family was able to login online and watch Abree and I give talks in church today.   It may not seem like a big deal, but having my family on watching and supporting me meant the world to me.  Getting to share my testimony with them and then us being able to discuss more details brings me closer to Christ.  I hope you all have the opportunities with your family to grow in Christ. I normally wouldn't share my talk online, but with the craziness of the world I feel it's pretty applicable.  Hope you enjoy! Through much prayer, I feel that I should speak from Elder Bednar's talk, We Will Prove Them Herewith in this past October General Conference.   Elder Bednar begin...

Growing up my mom taught us that if you weren't in the pews at church you were in outer darkness.  I used to laugh, but it help me always be on time to church because I didn't want to be in "outer darkness".   With social distancing going on in church now, it's hard to get a pew seat in church unless you are there 30 mins early.  Well, this morning I wasn't paying attention to the time and we didn't get there till 10 mins before church started.  Because of this we were back in the cultural hall part of the church.   This is now the conversation between myself and my oldest daughter, Abree. Abree :   "Mom, This is so far back!" Me :   Laugh.  "Yes, this is what your grandma calls 'outer darkness' " Abree :   Thinks for a second and then says, "Yes!  That's exactly what this is!"   How do I learn in outer darkness? I learned early on in college that I can't learn in the back!  It's just not my learning abilit...