General Conference

This week we were back to the grind. Well, we’re seeing the fruition of our work, so it seems enjoyable… but still hard work. Tom has done the lion’s share of the house renovations. He laid a good deal of the floor and has the sore knees to prove it. He has been victorious, though. The jeans have lasted through the renovation!

This week we finished the floor and installed the trim. My, it looks nice! We have a little paint touch up and then it’s on to the back porch and the garage. We got a lot of the mess cleaned out of the garage. Took the metal to the recycler, took reusable stuff to Salvation Army. I think we need to work on our measurements better. We had four boxes of tile left over… but had to skimp and use odd pieces to finish up the last little closet with the hardwood flooring. Since that color is not out of stock, except by mail order, it would have taken 10 days or more to get the final pieces. And we couldn’t order two pieces it needed to be a box. So Tom used his ingenuity and solved the problem

I buckled down and worked on my writing. I feel like it’s coming along pretty well. Research. Write. Research. Write. This week I learned about Certificate for Difference, leverage, and day trading. Next week it should be currency trading and cryptocurrency. I also talked to two other people- one wanting to promote Atari gaming and one his recycling building material site. I need to submit proposals to them.

Next Saturday is my Women’s Retreat. As I looked at all I had to do, I thought, you did not do a good job of delegating! Some of the things I chose to do because I could, some because I didn’t want to put a financial burden on my counselors, and some because I just wasn’t smart enough or fast enough to delegate. Sigh. So this week I will be focused on that. I need to make cookies for 125 women and three gallons of potato soup. I need to buy all the other food.  Here are the finished hearts.  Silly blogger won't put the pic in right.

Deborah helped out a lot by making hearts for decorations and my counselor and secretary are doing most of the decorating. 

I finished gifts for the teachers and counselors and the necklaces for all the sisters attending. I’ve made final coordination with teachers and with the ward set-up person. I finished the program and set it off to be printed. Phew. Maybe most of it’s done. Tom has agreed to come and help serve lunch and I got other men from the ward to come as well. I keep wanting a checklist for this meeting. I’ve asked my secretary to do it… but I haven’t gotten it. So each year I we muddle along. And I haven’t taken time to do it myself.

It’s past time to start our garden. We’ve just been so busy. I want to refresh it with fertilizer or horse manure. And now the asparagus is starting to grow. It’s time to weed and prepare the rest of the garden.

We lost our first chicken of this group on Friday. She was there at 6 and feathers by 8pm. We left to go to the Donkey Basketball game and didn’t close everyone in because this one chicken was still out. If I have to lose a chicken, I hope it’s the one who insisted on wandering places she should not be.

The donkey basketball game was fun. A lot of laughter and rooting for both sides.

Happy Day! Today in General Conference we heard the announcement of the Nairobi, Kenya temple! What a joyful day. It is a dream come true for many saints in East Africa. I expect this announcement will inspire many saints to put their lives in order and to do more research on their family lines to be prepared to take their ancestors to the temple.

At our ward conferences we have been hearing that those we do temple work for become our guardian angels. How wonderful it will be to have more angels guarding the faithful saints in Kenya, Tanzania, Rwanda, and other nations that will flow to the temple. Who knows? Perhaps peace will come to Somalia.

I loved listening to two days of General Conference. It was so uplifting. The overall message I received was that the world was in turmoil of the last days. We cannot avoid living in this tumult. We won’t change the world. But we can change ourselves. We can grow more spiritual, more Christ-like and more compassionate. We can have the Holy Spirit to be our guide. We can, from a depth of love, reach out to others to invite, guide, and correct so their lives may be blessed by Gospel Truths as well.

While we may not have peace in the world, we can have peace in Christ. Because of this peace we will rise above the trials of the world. It’s doing the little things, the daily decisions of prayer, scripture reading, Family Home Evening, keeping the commandments, and church attendance that step by step change our hearts and help us become like the Savior. I know for the longest time I thought the doing of these small things was the end in itself.

Only later did I realize they were just means to an end. The end is when we love as the Savior loves, speak as He would speak, think as He would think, and do as He would do. The more we open ourselves to his influence, the more we can change and become as he is.

I love General Conference because it inspires me to become a better person.