Letter - YM YW Missionary Activity, Fossil Springs Hike, Celebration of Light

August 24, 2014

Today has been a nice Sabbath Day.  I love Sundays.  We had spiritual ward council this morning as we discussed the wonderful church wide 2014 auxiliary training videos that are on lds.org and as the bishop told us about a man in our ward who needs our collective faith and prayers in a special ward fast next week because he is going to have brain surgery.  It is a very serious, dangerous surgery.  I am so, so sad for this family.  They are good friends of ours.  The auxiliary training videos made a big impact on the way I plan on teaching my children and my young women from now on.  They were awesome.

Last Monday I had an experience that I felt motivated to write about.  You can read about it HERE. 

Tuesday we had a really fun combined YM YW’s missionary activity.  The young men were in charge of it.  They had four adults set up in different classrooms around the building prepared to teach a 15-20 minute lesson about their missions.  The presenters shared a funny mission experience, a spiritual experience, explained how their mission has impacted their lives even now, and shared a small sample of food from their mission.  The young men’s president prepared four different sealed mission call letters (not individualized) for each of the YM and YW to open to determine which of the four missions they would learn about first and which room they would start in then we rotated so everyone got to listen about each mission.  That helped us to get the YM and YW split up into different groups so they would hang out with different friends than normal.  There were four very different missions that were presented, Brazil, Mongolia, New Jersey, and Italy.  Brett Lantz, the man in our ward who served in Mongolia served with Grandma and Grandpa Angle.  Brother Lantz shared about a man he baptized who later became the branch president and then a little while after that got to go to Salt Lake and meet Pres. Hinckley and help translate the temple film into the Mongolian language.  Pretty cool.  The youth really loved this activity, Spencer said he really felt the spirit and really wants to go on a mission.  It was so successful we’ve talked about doing this activity every six months or so with four new missions and missionaries each time.

Wednesday I did sealings in the Mesa temple since the Gilbert temple is closed.  The Mesa temple was recently closed and remodeled a little bit.  They’ve put beautiful stone tile by the recommend desk and in the foyer and they’ve also combined sealing rooms 2 and 3 into one big sealing room.  I saw Pres. Christensen from our stake who is a member of the Mesa temple presidency and he told me that the tile in the foyer is in a checkerboard pattern because when the temple was originally built it had a checkerboard pattern and they are trying to restore the temple more like it was when it was originally built. 

Marlee being silly after school on Wednesday

Thursday Spencer had his first flag football game.  Sadly they lost by two points.  Friday morning I went visiting teaching.  The kids had a half day of school so that afternoon Spencer went to hang out with several friends at Tyson Moore’s house while the other kids and I went swimming at the Lamoreaux’s.

Bryant got this fun mustache on his birthday date with Grammy Sanders at Peter Piper Pizza

Yesterday morning Chad and I woke up bright and early to go hike and swim at Fossil Springs near Strawberry.  Our friends Kyle and Heather Robinson came with us.  At one point there were going to be eight couples going, but one by one they all dropped out and it ended up being just us two couples, which was ok.  I know people have busy lives.  We left at 5:45am.  It took us about one hour to hike the four miles down to the waterfall near the spring.  We swam and explored for a couple of hours.  Chad even convinced me to swim through an underwater hole in a rock into the “whirlpool”.  Since he was there to help me I decided to try it.  It was scary because the current is pretty strong in the whirlpool and whips you around a bit and it is too deep to touch the ground.  You get tired really fast.  Even if you’re holding onto the rope.  You have to be a pretty strong swimmer to get out of there or else be able to climb up the slippery, wet rope or get pulled up the by the rope.  Earlier this year one our friends got stuck in that whirlpool for a long time and almost drowned before someone noticed she needed to be pulled out.  Chad told me he helped his young men get through it by holding onto the rock and sticking his leg part way through the hole so they could use it to pull themselves through and promised me I could to that too.  I’m so glad I did it because it was SO COOL!!  After swimming, we ate the lunches we packed and hiked out  It was quite a bit harder to hike out.  It was almost like climbing stairs for 4 miles, we made it out in one and a half hours.  We got home about 3:45pm.  I’m not too sore today.  Only my calves hurt.  I was so self-conscious of my huffing and puffing on the steep parts climbing out.  I’m not used to that kind of elevation.  I wasn't really huffing and puffing that bad, but I was still worried that everyone was noticing my loud breathing that they would think I was really out of shape.  I shouldn’t worry about what other people think so much. A big THANK YOU to Brenda for coming to stay with our kids while we were gone!!  She's wonderful.

This picture was taken last Fall when Chad went to Fossil Springs with the Young Men.  It shows the whirlpool area that I swam into.  The whirlpool is on the left and you have to swim into it through an underwater hole in that rock in the middle of the picture.

I'm a lucky girl to be married to this handsome guy.

Me floating in the current that flows into the big cave.  It was a natural lazy river.

Going into the little cove behind the waterfall.

There were tons of fish in the water 

For my quote today I’ll share an experience I had and wrote about Thursday morning.

Thursday, August 22, 2014

6:30am

Yesterday our Relief Society started a “Celebration of Light” where for next three weeks we have been asked to share thoughts and messages from our personal scripture study with each other on our Relief Society Facebook page leading up to a Sept. 11^th Thursday night Relief Society Dinner.  On a side note, I think it is cool that we are doing this activity, which has been planned for a while now, during the same week that the church shared this video encouraging all to “#ShareGoodness”.  Coincidence?  I think not.  Anyway, this morning just after 5:00am when I was in a semi-conscious state  between awake and sleep I had a dream where I saw three objects that had people or a person in them go through a force field of some sort.  When they went through the force field they lit up but for only a short time.  Some stayed lit longer than others and some had a brighter light.  Then in my dream I had the thought, “The human body can only stay lit so long”.  I have been thinking of this dream ever since.  Initially I interpreted that dream and thought to mean that humans can only feel light and stay lit for so long, but with the gift of the Holy Ghost they can feel that light longer, even permanently.  That is why it is so important to stay worthy of the Holy Ghost and to share the gospel with others so they can receive the gift of the Holy Ghost.  Then shortly after that I realized that the words “human body” that I thought in my dream can also mean the natural man.  In Mosiah 3:19 we learn that “the natural man is an enemy to God … unless he yields to the enticings of the Holy Spirit, and putteth off the natural man and becometh a saint through the atonement of Christ the Lord, and becometh as a child, submissive, meek, humble, patient, full of love, willing to submit to all things which the Lord seeth fit to inflict upon him, even as a child doth submit to his father.”  As we qualify for the gift of the Holy Ghost by putting off the natural man we can feel Heavenly Father’s light longer and more strongly in our lives.

Love,

Mindy

Wasted Watermelons

August 18, 2014

Today I threw several watermelons away that rotted because I never harvested them.  Sadly, this isn’t the only thing I’ve grown that has gone to waste.  I do great at planting a garden and weeding the first month or so then when things get a little hot outside I get too tired, busy, lazy, etc. to go out and harvest the things that are there waiting for me.  This made me think about other blessings that I might be able to claim if I made a little effort.  What is keeping me from those blessings?  Laziness, being to busy, anger, resentment, low self-esteem, inability to forgive, pride, feeling ashamed, fear, retaliation, and vengeance are all tools of Satan to keep me from claiming the blessing that could be mine.

However, the teachings of Jesus Christ, which are the key to mostly likely achieving happiness in individual and family life, gives the antidote to those temptations.  Jesus Christ teaches, diligence, being still long enough to ponder, joy, happiness for others, individual worth, divine nature, reaching out to others, forgiveness, humility, asking for advice, heeding good advice, praise, faith, sympathy, turning things over to the Lord by using his atonement.

I also realize that I could have also blessed other’s lives if I would have shared my watermelons with my neighbors instead of letting them rot in my own yard.  The Lord wants me to claim blessings to bless my life and the lives of those around me.

Love,

Mindy

Letter - Bryant's b-day, Camping, Safeguards, Chiasm

August 17, 2014

It has been a GREAT week.  Monday I did laundry as usual, went to the chiropractor and got a half hour massage instead of my normal chiropractic visit.  It was heavenly.  I’ve been so tight lately which keeps pulling my neck out of place so Dr. Haynes recommended the massage.  Monday afternoon I did some last minute birthday shopping for Bryant.  As Tilly and I walked out of Walmart we got rained on.  It was a quick little down pour, which was wonderful.  We need rain so badly.  Monday for FHE Chad taught us a lesson 3 from Preach my Gospel.  We want to get through all the preach my gospel lessons before Karalee is baptized in November.  Her baptism will be on the 3^rd Saturday which is November 15^th so save the date!!

Tuesday was Bryant’s 10^th birthday.  Here is the tribute I wrote about him on Facebook.  “It is my Bryant boy's 10th birthday today. I LOVE this boy!! He has so much enthusiasm for life. He is smart as can be and keeps me on my toes. He is a deep thinker and asks thoughtful questions about gospel subjects and pretty much everything.  He’s observant and kind and helpful.  He is silly.  He is a good friend.  He got an air soft gun and a pet beta fish that he named Jimmy the 11^th.  (We have not had 10 other fish named Jimmy in case you’re wondering.)”  Bryant and our kids love having a pet.  Marlee can’t ever remember his name and she keeps calling him Bobby the 3^rd.  It cracks me up.  We also got Bryant a cowboy rope.  He loved roping when we were in Snowflake a few weeks ago.  We need to set up some sort of roping dummy for him to practice on. Bryant, Tilly and I went to lunch at Subway on his birthday and they gave him a free foot long sub.  For dinner that evening we got Panda express.  Later he had scouts and I had Young Women’s but I came home early so we could have cake and ice cream before bed time.  I made him an Oreo cake and it was delicious.

Wednesday Brenda was nice enough to take my girls a little earlier than normal for Grammy Days and I was able to make it to a session before Marlee needed to make it to Kindergarten.  I am sure thankful for Grammy Days.  They have been a huge blessing in my life.  Thank you Brenda!!!  Wednesday afternoon Spencer did baptisms for the dead after school on Wednesday with Brenda, Anna, Hayley and the Brooks cousins and then they went out to dinner.  Chad had a basketball game that evening and the kids and I went to watch.  I love to watch him play basketball. 

Thursday morning I made a quick trip to Walmart to get the final things we needed for our camping trip.  Then I went to lunch with one of my laurels who is about to leave for college for her birthday.  Then I came home and packed things up.  We left to go camping around 4:30.  We went to the upper Tonto Creek campground.  It was such a nice camping trip.  The weather was wonderful.  The company was fun--Chad’s brother Jace and his family came with us.   I slept well at nights and so did all of the kids.  We fished and I think the boys each caught 3 fish.  We went on a little hike.  We were even treated to a nice rain and an awesome Thunderstorm on Friday afternoon.  Thunder in the mountains is amazing and loud yet Tilly slept right through it!  Our trip was pretty much “perfectly perfect”.  (If you’ve ever read the children’s book Moostletoe you’ll recognize that phrase.) You can see LOTS of pictures here.  Several of the pictures were taken by Jace and Macaia.  They have a nice eye for pictures and a great camera.

We got home from camping early yesterday afternoon.  I’ve been doing laundry all through the day and night since then.  Marlee got sick last night because she ate pizza and other cheesy dishes at our ward potluck party yesterday evening without a lactaid pill.  I had to change her sheets three times.  Poor girl.  I’ve come to realize that it really is true that laundry is like interest.  It never sleeps nor sickens nor dies, nor does it take vacations and if you fail to meet its demands it crushes you!! (I’m paraphrasing this quote by J. Reuben Clark Jr.)   

We had a great lesson in our laurels class today.  We went over the proclamation on the family.  Some of the girls really opened up.  Only two of my six laurels come from two parent homes.  I taught that we strive for the ideals spoken of in the proclamation on the family and they expressed anger that they have towards parents who don’t live up to all their responsibilities.  We taught then that it is important to forgive, even though they will be held accountable like it states in the proclamation.

Tonight we had a back to school fireside.  Pres. Derrick, our stake president talked about safeguarding ourselves from pornography.  He shared that a pattern of prayer and scriptures EVERYDAY is important.  He mentioned it is particularly important for newly returned missionaries.  He said that 8 out of 10 newly returned men and women missionaries are neck deep in pornography within 14 days of coming home from their mission and are no longer worthy of a temple recommend.  8 out of 10!!!  In 14 days!!  He said it is because they stay up late telling stories of their mission, then they wake up late.  Satan tells them they’ve done a good job and that they deserve a break and within 3 days their pattern of prayer and scripture study is gone.  Then they start playing online video games and porn pop up ads come up and they don’t have enough spiritual strength to stay away.  He said 1 out of 3 returned missionaries are inactive within 1 year of returning home.  That is so sad.  He promised that “exercising faith in simple ways invites the Holy Ghost” and that the Book of Mormon is a powerful safeguard.  He also shared that 3 Nephi 10:11 – 3 Nephi 23:1, where Jesus’ is speaking, is a chiasm.  I learned about the chiasm in Alma 36 when I was in seminary but I didn’t know there was another one.  I’m anxious to study it.  The central theme in the chiasm in 3 Nephi is the Book of Mormon.  Pretty cool.

My quote for today is from the 2^nd verse of As Zion’s Youth in Latter Days,

“We know we can withstand

The evils that would weaken us,

The sin that would destroy.

With faith, we hold the iron rod

And find in this our joy.”

I know this is true.  The iron rod, the Book of Mormon and words of living prophets, bring joy, safety and power to withstand Satan.

Love,

Mindy

P.S.  I love Hymns.  They are powerful sermons.  I wrote a little post about them on my blog this week. 

http://chadandmindysanders.blogspot.com/2014/08/hymns-are-powerful-sermons.html

Hymns are Powerful Sermons

I love Hymns!  I love primary songs and sacred music.  I love that with only a few, simple words they can teach powerful sermons.  I love that they can penetrate deeply into my soul.  Several times in my life I have had words to hymns and primary songs come to my mind to give me comfort and peace and/or teach me the words of God.  On Monday morning as I was driving school carpool we were listening to the Mormon Tabernacle Choir on Pandora.  As they sang “Where Love Is” the phrase “'Tis love we get when love we bring” stood out to me.  To back track a little farther, on Sunday in my ward’s Gospel Doctrine Sunday School class, my friend Nicole Rudd shared that when we do good to others, we get good returned to us because it is a principle of the law of the harvest.  So on Monday morning that phrase stood out to me as another principle of the law of the harvest.  It also reminded me to give love in all my relationships and to teach my children to love others if they want to be loved.

Letter - School routine, Spencer Made the Team, Goblet of Gratitude

Sunday, August 10, 2014

School has resumed and we are in a comfortable routine again.  I get up at 6:10 (which is earlier than I’d like) to read my scriptures and make lunches.  Spencer’s jr. high starts at 7:25.  His carpool picks him up just after 7:00 so we now have family scriptures at 6:40.  I then have time to exercise before I fix Karalee’s hair and then drive the carpool to the elementary at 7:50.  Then I pick Spencer up from football practice around 4:00pm.  Speaking of Spencer playing football, we found out Thursday that Spencer made the 7th grade flag football team at his school!! This was his first time trying out for a team where there was a chance he might be cut. I was anxious most of the week and all day Thursday waiting to find out if he made it or if he got cut. As a mother, I've come to find that my kid’s joys are my joys. Their sorrows are my sorrows. I'm glad this ended up being a joyful moment for us. What makes it even better is that his cousin Porter made the team too and they'll get to play together.

Karalee loves her 2^nd grade teacher.  She has Miss Braidi.  Bryant also had her for 2^nd grade.  When Miss Braidi saw Karalee she commented that Karalee looks nothing like Bryant. A few days later she called to tell me that even though Karalee doesn’t look like Bryant she acts just like him.  That is a good thing because she loved Bryant!  I had forgotten that she calls her students’ parents when they’ve been doing a great job.  It is so nice.  Marlee loves school and I haven’t heard any bad reports so she must be doing great.  She, like her brothers and sister before her, has Mrs. McKinney.  She is happy to go to school and is happy when she comes home.  Bryant got the teacher he hoped for, Mrs. Nolan.  He seems to enjoy school so far.  Spencer loves jr. high but did not like the fact that he had a LOT of homework last week.  I hope as he gets used to the classes and what is expected of him in his assignments that they will become easier for him and not take him so long.

Spencer first day of Jr. High, 7th Grade

Bryant first day of 5th Grade, Mrs. Nolan

Karalee 1st day of 2nd Grade, Miss Braidi

Marlee first day of afternoon kindergarten, Mrs. McKinney

Bryant is in 5^th grade this year and has decided to join band.  At first he wanted to play the cello, then I talked him into playing the violin instead of the cello since I already have a violin, then he wanted to play the cello again, but when we found out how much cellos cost (we’re not fans of paying rent, and it’s costly to rent cellos too) we asked him if he’d consider a different instrument and he decided to join the band since his friend Ari is also going to join band.  Bryant has now decided to play the trumpet.  He’s very excited.  I’m glad too because I think it would be hard to stay motivated to play the cello since it’s so big to lug around.  Band starts on Wednesday.  Last Tuesday when I was taking Paige, one of my laurels, to Young Women’s I remembered that she used to play the trumpet and I asked her if she would be interested in selling her trumpet.  After speaking with her mother, who happens to have taught Bryant in primary for three years and loves him, they decided to just let us borrow the trumpet for now and then if Bryant sticks with it for a few years they will decide on a price and sell it to us.  I know practically nothing about band instruments but it seems like a pretty nice trumpet.  I feel kind of leery about borrowing it; I would prefer if they just sold it to us because I worry that we’ll break it or something.  I expressed that worry to Paige and Karin, Paige’s mother, but they said everything would be fine and not to worry about it.  It is nice that we are blessed to let Bryant tryout band for at least a year without having to pay for an instrument though!  We picked up the trumpet yesterday afternoon and Bryant and all the kids and I have enjoyed learning how to produce sound from the trumpet.  Even Marlee has learned how to do it.  I think Chad would have preferred a quieter instrument though.  J

On Tuesday last week Marlee and Tilly and I invited a few of our friends over for a mother daughter brunch.  Since Marlee doesn’t have to go to Kindergarten until noon it worked out nicely.  We used our Sunday dishes and I made muffins and bought some juice and one friend brought fruit, another friend brought veggies, and another friend brought scrambled eggs cooked in a mini muffin tin.  It was so much fun!!  I hope to do it again regularly.  

Bryant’s 10^th birthday is on Tuesday the 12^th.  He’s requested that we go camping for his birthday so we are pulling the kids out of school on Friday and we will leave Thursday night.  We are camping at the Tonto Creek Camp ground.  It should be fun!!

Karalee was asked who her hero was for a school project and she chose her Daddy!!  He's my hero too.  

We went to watch my niece Karsten play Little Red in Into the Woods.  She did great!!

Ashton was part of the stage crew so luckily we got to see her too.

I love this girl!!  I'm so glad she keeps me company while her brothers and sisters are away at school. 

My quote for today is from Elder Uchtdorf’s talk Grateful in Any Circumstances.  “It might sound contrary to the wisdom of the world to suggest that one who is burdened with sorrow should give thanks to God. But those who set aside the bottle of bitterness and lift instead the goblet of gratitude can find a purifying drink of healing, peace, and understanding.”  I know there are several members of mine and Chad’s extended families who are struggling to find peace, healing and understanding.  Chad and I included.  This quote really helped me this week because there have been times over the last few months where I have been quite discouraged as I try to build unity, love, peace and forgiveness.  I know those feelings of discouragement are not from the Lord and that when I have gratitude for the blessings I’ve been given and by looking for the good in others I will have the strength to keep from giving up.  Heavenly Father wants us to have peace and resolve unkind feelings.  I want to be an instrument in His hands in fostering that peace.

Love,

Mindy

Life Lessons

What life lessons have you learned?  A few weeks ago I was asked if I had any suggestions or wisdom about life. These life lessons are what popped into my head: 

1) Give sincere compliments to as many people as you can
2) Be confident
3) Read your scriptures daily 
4) Say your prayers every night and morning and keep a prayer in your heart
5) Look for opportunities to help others
6) Stretch yourself by doing hard things
7) Attend church every week and be on time so you can take the sacrament

These things have brought me happiness even through hard times.