Stake Conference

This past weekend was our Stake Conference. We had the opportunity to hear from our Stake President and his counselors, as well as, Elder Pocock and Elder Holland! It was a great experience for our little family to hear from all of these men. The spirit was strong and their messages were beautiful. At the Saturday session Elder Holland didn't prepare anything for his talk, he said, "I just want to talk with you." He then went on telling us of his love and concern for all of us, as if he wanted to get to know us personally, you could really feel his compassion towards us. What a wonderful man!

Because of his love and concern he pounded on the pulpit and said don't you dare lose your faith when storms come, that is when you need it the most. I've known how important faith is, but Elder Holland spoke about it in such a unique, spiritual way that it seemed completely new to me. It was like my eyes were opened finally. I didn't have anything to take notes and I was wrestling with Anna, so I can't remember most of his other points, but that one point made me realize that there really is no more sitting on the fence. I've always been quiet and never wanted to talk about the church to anyone because I didn't want to put any pressure on them, or offend them. But what I realize now was that I wasn't following the Spirit or relying on my faith. I can't be afraid anymore because this is the time when we need to put our trust in Lord, he won't led us astray. I think that I will always stress about bad times, and standing for something openly, but I know that Heavenly Father will be there, the Lord is on our side.

This doesn't come close to what I am trying to express, but I wanted to share a little of what I learned that has strengthened my testimony.

Ernie and I watched as a line was formed to shake Elder Holland and Elder Pocock's hand. They did not leave until every person that wanted to shake hands with them were shook. We know because we were one of the last people to shake hands with them. What wonderful men!

In the spirit of General Conference that is coming up here is another wonderful man.

I got this in an email from mom. It is a beautiful clip made by the Relief Society from one of Elder Uchtdorf's talks.

It Has Been A Long Time

I haven't looked at our blog for a very long time. School, primary, and family takes a lot of my time, but I finally caught us up. I almost forgot most of the things that our little family has done in the past couple of months, it was nice to reminisce.
This video cracked me up, I think you'll enojoy it too!

Volleyball

I am a big fan of volleyball. I love watching college teams and really enjoy to playing it. This season I had the opportunity to play in a tournament in Moab, and it was a lot of fun! I got to watch and play all day and all night. We did really bad so they put us in the C bracket. I thought we would get squashed because teams from all over Utah and Colorado came to play, and they were good. But when the tournament finally started for our bracket we won our first game, then our second, then our third and so on! We played the last team and lost, but since it was double elimination we had one more shot and we nailed them right between the eyes (figuratively speaking), winning the tournament. It was about one in the morning when we started playing the last game and there was some crazy things going on by the end of it. Some of our cheers consisted of "Meatloaf" I still don't know where that came from.

New Year's Eve

Many of us can't remember a lot about New Year's Eve.

(Like this one)

Poor guy coundn't make it to midnight.
After we put the kids to sleep the night came alive (for some of us anyway). We played the Wii, and some kind of bored..oh I mean, board game and watched some movies. It was a lot of fun.

Our Trip to Gunlock

Our little family went to Grandma and Grandpa Anderson's cabin in Gunlock for a weekend. It was fun to get away, lay back and kick up our feet. I loved the HUGE, gorgeous windows grandma put in. You can see part of the windows from these pictures.

I had to take a picture of this view as we were traveling. I loved the red mountains.

Anna is usually quiet when we are in the car, but this time it was too quiet. I looked back and I saw this!

She just ate a bite of her chip, and just as she was about to eat another bite she fell asleep. I think Anna and Will Anderson are the only ones who can fall asleep while eating chips!

Christmas

Christmas was fun last year, but this year blew that one away. Anna was able to help us get ready for Christmas by: helping set up the Christmas tree, eating sugar cookies, picking out presents, and letting mom get extra wrapping practice (she got curious about some presents under the tree and felt obligated to find out what they were).

There were a lot of festivities, and here were the top three....
#3.) Putting the Christmas tree up and dancing to Christmas songs at the same time!

#2.) Watching Frosty the Snowman at Musti and Papa's home.


And the number one favorite was......Christmas Morning! We had our orange juice, then we excitedly gathered around the Christmas tree and opened presents. Anna was a little confused that we could open them now after I had to tell her no for so long.

Ernie and I decided that after opening presents we should end on the best present of all. we read from Luke in the Bible. It was a nice reminder of the true meaning of Christmas.

"One Year Older and Wiser Too"

Anna turned two on November 15th. She is the best daughter I could have asked for. I am still shocked by how old she is already. I really only blinked once and there we were singing her birthday song. Here are some pictures from her special day.

She is an amazing little girl. Her love and charity towards others is boundless. I thank my Heavenly Father every day for sending us such a sweet angel.
Thank you to all who helped us celebrate Anna's Birthday!

Halloween

Halloween is always a fun time. I enjoy seeing all the costumes and wishing that I had enough imagination to come up with something fun. This year Aunt Cheramie found the best costume for Anna.

She loves to get dressed up so this was perfect for her. Thanks Aunt Cheramie!

After getting ready we went to great grandma and grandpa's. The perfect house to find lots of treats (I mean ice cream!)

After we stuffed ourselves we headed off to Papa and Mutsi's. Brooklyn was there with her mom and dad and we had a ton of fun. We ate Musti's Halloween dinner (fingers and all), then we had even MORE treats and watched a fun movie.

By the time we got home we were two tired girls!

From Crib to Bed

Anna has exchanged her crib for a bed! She does very well and has only fallen out twice. Each time she fell she was stunned to be on the floor, but she picked herself back up, got a comfort hug from mom and went back to sleep.