Elder L. Tom Perry

Aaron and I went to eat at The Mandarin Chinese restaurant in Bountiful while we were engaged. Elder Perry happened to be there eating. He was just sitting a couple of booths away from us.

At one point, Aaron said he would be right back, and he walked over to Elder Perry's table and squatted down next to Elder Perry and started talking to him.

After he was done, he came back over and sat down with me. He told me that he had pointed to me and asked Elder Perry, "see that girl over there? I'm going to marry her... and I was wondering if you would seal us in the temple?"

Elder Perry agreed and gave Aaron the phone number of his secretary and told Aaron to call her and have her schedule it. Because of a prior commitment Elder Perry had, we changed our wedding date a couple days earlier so that he could be our sealer. It was so exciting.

As the wedding day approached, Aaron got a call from the secretary telling him that Elder Perry had been given an assignment I think taking him out of the country and would not be able to seal us after all. We were disappointed, but we understood.

The sealer we did have was amazing and we really loved him.

Since this experience at The Mandarin, I have always remembered this experience when I have seen Elder Perry speak. Hearing about his passing yesterday was very sad for me and brought back that memory again. I grieve every time one of our church leaders passes away, but I'm grateful for the legacy and the loving counsel they leave behind.

Elder Perry will be missed.

Am I Happy?

Truthfully, I have no idea where to even begin.

I don't know how to catch up on what has happened in the past few years...

so I will just begin with what happened last night.

I received that acceptance letter in my email last night.

My first reaction was paralyzing fear...

but knowing that this is the right step for me gives me enough peace to help me move forward instead of retreating.

I have been praying for a long time to know what to do and where to go and what path I am supposed to be on. I realize now that certain things had to happen in order to get me to this decision and put me here.

The photo that I have had at the top of my blog for years definitely comes into play in making this decision.

I haven't been happy for a long time.

Are there things in my life that bring me happiness? Yes.

Is my life what I expected it to be or what I ever wanted? No.

Anyone who knows me knows that what I believe will bring me the most happiness in this life is to remarry and have more kids. That is something that is out of my control though.

I believe I am as happy as I can be in my current situation.

Aaron Jr makes me happy...

But could I be happier? Yes.

So, since my hopes and dreams of remarrying and having more kids is not coming my way as quickly as I would have imagined, I finally decided it was in my own hands to take the advice on the photo above and change something. I finally realized that waiting impatiently for an amazing guy to come along was not helping me to reach my goal of finding more happiness. So far, it has mostly brought disappointment and discouragement. I realized that I had to change my way of thinking and change what I was willing to do in order to progress in my life.

I realized that waiting around has never and will never be what the Lord wants for us.

He wants us to keep pressing forward.

He wants us to be steadfast.

He wants us to keep working towards something.

He wants us to have faith and trust Him.

I have been paralyzed for a long time, mostly out of fear.

I am scared the the unknown.

Many talks from Prophets and Apostles, many scriptures verses, and many words of advice from family and friends have brought me to this place...

...this place where I am having to have faith and be brave enough to take some steps into the darkness in order to find the light.

I have decided to also pay attention to what I have learned in the past.

Fresh Courage Take.

This most definitely is pushing my courage to the limits right now. :)

This doesn't mean I won't panic many more times before I begin this journey and during this journey... but it does mean that I have to push through the panic and keep moving in the direction that feels right at this time in my life.

I received that email last night...

then while reading my scriptures this morning,

I came across these verses in 2 Nephi 32:

These verses brought me comfort this morning.

You better believe I will be praying always throughout this journey so that Heavenly Father will consecrate my performance... I will need Him all the way through it.

Wish me luck.

Better yet... 

Pray for me.

I'm Back!

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I haven't posted since January 1st? Really? Unbelievable.

And sad.

Well, for a long long long time, there has been some sort of spam attaching itself to my blog and every time I opened my blog, another tab would open right after with some sort of ad. No matter what browser I used, it would happen and it was really discouraging. I don't know if it happened for other people who came to my blog, but it made it so I didn't want to post anything because I didn't know what to do about the spam.

Well, yesterday, I finally found a site where I could ask them what to do about it, and the guy who answered my question had the right answer. THE SPAM IS FINALLY GONE! YAY!

Now I feel comfortable posting here. I don't know if anyone even still visits my blog, but if not, that is ok because I have felt an urgency to begin writing on here again so that I have my thoughts and experiences here.

So much has happened in the past few years since I stopped posting regularly. It makes me sad that I am so far behind. A few years ago when my computer crashed, that set me back months and then I never felt like I could post unless I was able to catch up completely. Then that cycle has continued and now here I am several years later and realize that I don't have to catch up... I can just start now.

So, here I am starting now...

(in a new post)

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