President Hinckley Passes Away

SALT LAKE CITY 27 January 2008 President Gordon B. Hinckley, who led The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints through twelve years of global expansion, has died at the age of 97.

President Hinckley was the 15th president in the 177-year history of the Church and had served as its president since 12 March 1995.

The Church president died at his apartment in downtown Salt Lake City at 7:00 p.m. Sunday night from cause’s incident to age. Member of his family were at his bedside. A successor is not expected to be formally chosen by the Church’s Quorum of the Twelve Apostles until after President Hinckley’s funeral within the next few days.

For more information follow this link to the Church website.

Myths & Reality

My amazing daughter had this post on her blog, and I just loved it! I felt so inspired when I read what she had written, and when I watched the video!! I couldn't think of how to put it into my own words, so I decided to copy her post, and put it on my blog. I hope you enjoy it as much as I did.

"For those of you who do not know, we are Mormons, members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. I LOVE my faith and I believe it is true with all of my heart! I came across a video today that I think would be very interesting for anyone who might not understand our church and beliefs. This film was originally made to be viewed by journalists preparing to cover the 2002 Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City. It talks about some major misconceptions about our church & highlights some of the great things we do! :) If you are interested, and have about 10 minutes to spare, please enjoy... "

"Myths & Reality"

Hawaii Trip

This first picture is the sun rising over Diamondhead.

This was the view from our table where we ate breakfast at a beach restaurant.

I am so excited that we finally made it to Hawaii! Gary and I celebrated our 34th anniversary by taking a short trip to Oahu. We went Friday morning, and returned home Monday night. If any of you know me, I hate to spend money!! So a short trip was all I wanted to do. We were able to go fairly inexpensively. The Hawaiin Airlines flights were cheap ($139 per person each way - nonstop from Phoenix), the Ohana Islander Waikiki hotel was inexpensive ($99 per night - a renovation rate), but nothing else on Oahu was low priced! I couldn't believe that a gallon of milk there costs $6.99! But besides the high costs we had a lot of fun! We really enjoyed the Polynesian Cultural Center and our crazy tour guide (Cousin Leon from Samoa - whose whole name was way too long to remember), the beautiful beaches and scenery on the windward side of the island, the Temple grounds and Visitor's Center, the church meetings we attended next door to the Temple, getting to watch a baptism in the ocean right across from the temple, the perfect weather, the rainbows, and the nice people at our hotel and at Hawaiin Airlines. We did not enjoy the confusing public bus system, the crowds in Honolulu/Waikiki, the high prices for everything, and not having enough time to see and do everything that we wanted to. If we ever get there again, we will take more time so that we can schedule more things and see more islands. But for our very first trip to Hawaii, it was great!

I do have a few tips for anyone going to Hawaii for their first time:

• Pay the extra money to take the Polynesian Cultural Center's bus ride to and from the Center. It is well worth the $20 per person for the guided tour of the island you get on the bus ride there, the comfortable bus (as opposed the uncomfortable city buses), and the same bus and driver waiting for you at the end of the night to take you to your hotel.
• Also pay the extra $10 per person to have the tour guide take you around the Center. It is so nice to have someone to show you where everything is, and make sure you get to see most of the shows. It is impossible to see every show in one day (I wish they would open earlier in the day so that you could). They have a deal that I didn't know about, where you can go back for free within 3 days and see the stuff you missed the first time. I don't think you get to see the evening show again, but it would be nice to be able to see all the villages, and do more of the activities during the day. So if you have the time, schedule a second day to go back.
• Go to the beach across the street from the Temple. It is a beautiful secluded beach with hardly anyone there. Just go down the path to the left of the Temple Garden area that is right across the street from the Laie Temple.
• Don't bring any fruit with you to eat on the airline coming back to the mainland. Even though we bought our apples in Arizona, and they let us take them on the flight going to Hawaii, they wouldn't let us bring them back.

This is us at the luau at the Polynesian Cultural Center.

The Laie Temple was beautiful. The next picture is of the baptism in the ocean.

This is the beautiful beach across from the Temple.

Family Photos

Here are two of the family photos that Becky's brother took for us! I think they turned out so cute! They make me smile!! I love my family soooo much! They are the best!!!

Christmas Card/Letter and Family Pictures

My kids talked me into sending out Christmas cards after Christmas. I only ordered 30, thinking I didn't have that many friends to send them to, but now I wish I would have ordered more. I will definitely order more next year! I was a little embarrassed to send them out after Christmas was over, but I am so glad that I did! I have already heard from two friends that I haven't heard from in a long long time! And they have blogs too! So I have added links to their blogs on mine. Pepper (Price) Pond and Jill (Fortner) Frailey were both Sister missionaries that served here. They were both very close to our family! We love them a lot, and feel bad that we haven't kept in touch with them. But now it will be nice to be able to keep up with their families through their blogs! I love blogging!!!

My whole family got together on New Year's day to take family pictures. Becky's brother, Ryan, took the pictures. Thank you Ryan for taking the time to do that for us. Hopefully we will get the pictures emailed to us soon, so that we can post them on our blog. I took a few pictures of the grandkids (minus Nolan) in this big tree. Clockwise starting at the bottom are Marina, Gavin, Cole, Lauryn, Ethan, Molly, and Hadley. I have the cutest grankids in the world!!!