Tag Archives: love

What 50 Years Have Taught Me

Tomorrow I’m turning 50 years old and knowing that has caused me to be introspective about a few of the things those 50 years have taught me: *They’ve taught me that happiness comes when we put God first, family second, and everything else third. *They’ve taught me that excelling in the things of righteousness is […]

Kindred Spirits You’re Destined To Meet

“When you encounter someone you were destined to meet the conversation will take flight as if it were on the wings of angels, complete strangers confiding in each other as if you were lifelong friends.” – Kevin Hall Have you ever had the experience of meeting someone for the first time, but having that feeling […]

Worth The Effort

Normally for Thanksgiving I host my family and extended family at my home for dinner, but because my Mom and Dad have to stay isolated this year there wasn’t a dinner planned. So my husband and I decided we’d take our kids to Virginia to spend Thanksgiving with two of my brothers and their families.   […]

Today I #GiveThanks for my Parents

Today is Day #4 of the seven day #GiveThanks challenge. You can read all about the challenge in yesterday’s blog post I shared, but the gist of it is that each day for seven days you post pictures and a blurb about something you are thankful for on social media. I’ve been posting them on […]

The Miracle Of Hope

It’s only a three minute video clip, but it’s three minutes spoken by a man who is incredibly special to me (I’ll explain why below) that reminds us that what we need right now is RELENTLESS HOPE…it reminds us that WE CAN HOPE…that WE SHOULD HOPE…that WE HAVE EVERY REASON TO HOPE:

How We Avoid Becoming Pawns In Someone Else’s Game

An Ambassador in another country shared the following sentiment with me: People who wish to do evil for their own selfish purposes (whether it be fame, power, position, or fortune) have figured out they no longer need to wage a war to conquer society – they only need to feign they are two people with […]

DROP THE MIC! Seriously, It Couldn’t Have Been Said Any Better

There has been much said by many on the topic of politics, racism, hatred, anger, and all that divides so many people today. Much of what is said on the topics is done in anger or in inflammatory ways that only serves to make divides even larger. When I heard Dallin H. Oaks’ talk this […]

You Don’t Know How Strong You Are Til Being Strong Is The Only Choice You Have

“You never know how strong you are…until being strong is the only choice you have.” Over the course of my adult life I’ve gone through some really hard things that at times have been so painful I didn’t know how in the world I would ever be able to get through them. There’ve been days […]

Celebrating Daughters and Sons

To be honest I’d never even heard of a National Daughters Day until I saw a post on Facebook over the weekend from my Mother wishing her five daughters a happy National Daughters Day. I of course immediately googled it to find out what she was referring to.  Come to find out Friday September 25th […]

#BeNice

Tonight my kids showed me a social media post where someone shared their view on something and someone else disagreed with them by calling them a derogatory word, and sadly this exchange took place between two people who supposedly loved each other. I wrote a blog on this very subject five years ago because I […]

Want To Be Happy? Try A Dose Of Nostalgia

If you want to be happy try a good old dose of nostalgia. For those not familiar with that term it is defined in the dictionary as, “a sentimental longing or wistful affection for the past, typically for a period or place with happy personal associations.” With all the madness in 2020 I’ve thought quite […]

Go To Bed, Get A Good Night Sleep. Tomorrow Will Be Better.

After an incredibly long busy day today all I could think about was wanting to go to bed. As I sat down to write a blog the thought came into my mind that I should search past blogs I’d written that had the phrase “go to bed” in them. So I did and it brought […]

Relive A Favorite Memory

One of my favorite memories from childhood was a vacation with my family when I was a young girl living in Puyallup Washington. My parents took us to the San Juan Islands just off the coast to stay in a cabin on Orcas Island.  I remember taking the ferry over to stay in a little […]

Permit Misperceptions To Be Clarified and True Intent To Be Understood

In an incredibly powerful talk titled “And Nothing Shall Offend Them”, David A Bednar shares the following: “When we believe or say we have been offended, we usually mean we feel insulted, mistreated, snubbed, or disrespected. And certainly clumsy, embarrassing, unprincipled, and mean-spirited things do occur in our interactions with other people that would allow […]

Come What May And Love It

Joseph B. Worthlin shared the following story that has had a huge impact on my life: “When I was young I loved playing sports, and I have many fond memories of those days. But not all of them are pleasant. I remember one day after my football team lost a tough game, I came home […]

Wish Flower Or Weed?

One day my husband and I were walking along a riverbank when I looked over and saw an awesome Wish Flower. I used to see them all the time when I was a little girl living in Puyallup, Washington. They were all over our backyard and as kids we would go out and pick the […]

Diversity Is Required To Make A Company Strong, But Unity Is Required To Make A Company Successful.

Diversity seems to be a goal that every company is out to achieve these days. Yet as companies begin to broaden their hiring practices in order to achieve diversity, they often find that in solving one problem they have also opened up an entirely new one – creating unity amongst diversity. As diversity enters into […]

We Will Never Regret The Time We Spent, Only That We Didn’t Spend More

Tonight we said goodbye to our nephew and his wife as the two of them are moving back east to start a new job.  My nephew’s been living out here in Utah since 2012 when he first moved out to attend college and because his parents lived back East my husband and I became his […]

Dare To Be!

When a new day begins, dare to smile gratefully. When there is darkness, dare to be the first to shine a light. When there is injustice, dare to be the first to condemn it. When something seems difficult, dare to do it anyway. When life seems to beat you down, dare to fight back. When […]

When You Share Your Light You Are Helping Strengthen Mine

I have always been an optimist and a person who sees the glass half full.  A person who looks for the positive lesson in every challenge, who looks toward a happily ever after, and who believes there is far more good in the world than bad.  But this week I have struggled to feel that […]

Build Bridges of Understanding Rather Than Creating Walls of Segregation

Yesterday Russell M. Nelson, prophet of The Church Of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints released the following statement: “We join with many throughout this nation and around the world who are deeply saddened at recent evidences of racism and a blatant disregard for human life. We abhor the reality that some would deny others respect […]

Forgiveness Doesn’t Mean That What Happened Was Okay

I’m still struggling today to find words to express the sadness I feel about what’s happening around the world right now. I was reading back through things I’d written today and came across something I wrote on the 13th anniversary of September 11th 2001 about hatred. It reads:  “Holding on to anger is like drinking […]

Mothers Deserve To Be Celebrated Every Day

There are no words to adequately express the tender feelings I have toward my Mother on Mother’s Day. She gave birth to and raised ten children, doing so much of the time alone because my Dad’s job required him to travel significantly. Not only that but my Dads work required our family be moved every […]

Appreciate The Time We Have Left In Lockdown, And Stretchy Pants

Living in the Washington D.C. area in high school I was all about music groups like Erasure, The Cure, O.M.D., Depeche Mode, and the Smith’s.  Then my family moved to the Nashville Tennessee area during my Junior year of high school and I couldn’t help but fall in love with country too. I still remember […]

While You Are Growing Up, They Are Growing Old

Today I was really bummed out because it was my Mother’s 78th birthday and we couldn’t be with her even though she lives only fifteen minutes away.  With the quarantine we could only stand on her front porch singing Happy Birthday to her through the glass and then leave a cake an balloons on her […]

Focus On What You Can Control

“One of the happiest moments ever, is when you find the courage to let go of what you can’t change.” There are a million aspects to life that are out of our control. And focusing on things you can’t control is absolutely pointless…no matter how much you focus on them you can’t control them so […]

Nothing Could Be More Powerful Or Bring Us Greater Peace

When there are times of uncertainty, like what our world is facing right now, I often turn to reading inspirational talks in order to help me feel better. The talk I read today was by Marvin J. Ashton called “Peace”.  It was so powerful I had to share an excerpt of a story shared in […]

A Trip to Cabo, an 80s Prom Murder Party, and a Board Meeting

My week last week was completely insane. I started the week off down in Cabo San Lucas at the invite of some dear friends who’d asked my husband and I to join them for a few days at the beautiful Montage Resort in Cabo. You are probably thinking “oh , boo hoo…really rough life going […]

You May Be The Very Person That Can Do It

“You were born with the ability to change someone’s life. Don’t ever waste it.” We often hear that we must help ourselves before we can help someone else, and to some extent I believe that to be true.  But I also find it to be true that one of the best ways to help ourselves […]

Make It Mean A Little Bit More

“Three thousand feet up! Up the side of Mt. Crumpit, He rode with his load to the tiptop to dump it! “Pooh-Pooh to the Whos!” he was grinch-ish-ly humming. “They’re finding out now that no Christmas is coming! “They’re just waking up! I know just what they’ll do! “Their mouths will hang open a minute […]