Among Many of the Noble and Great ones....

As a somewhat belated Thanksgiving post I wish to express my gratitude to my Father in Heaven for His "refining fires". I am deeply touched with the knowledge that He knows me and knows what is necessary for me to gain exaltation. I have just finished reading the Work and Glory series and the spirit has whispered repeatedly to me: "what sacrifice am I offering to the Lord?" The early saints made obvious sacrifices in their devotion to the Lord: leaving families, homes, countries, and all in the face of terrible persecution. What am I doing today that will qualify me to stand with Abraham, Moroni, Moses, and Joseph Smith? Frequently the passage where Abraham sees "many of the noble and great ones" comes to my mind.

22 Now the Lord had shown unto me, Abraham, the ^aintelligences that were organized before the world was; and among all these there were many of the ^bnoble and great ones;

23 And God saw these souls that they were good, and he stood in the midst of them, and he said: These I will make my rulers; for he stood among those that were spirits, and he saw that they were good; and he said unto me: Abraham, thou art one of them; thou wast ^achosen before thou wast born.(Abr 3:22-23)

Was I among them? Will I be worthy to stand with them in the end?

I have recently come to a greater understanding of all that God requires of me to be His disciple. I have made the choice that if I have been called to experience something seemingly impossible to overcome the Lord can help me to overcome it and that I am willing to do whatever it takes to qualify for exaltation.

I just began reading Fire of the Covenant and the opening quote in the book is one given by Joseph Smith in Lectures on Faith:

"Let us here observe, that a religion that does not require the sacrifice of all things never has power sufficient to produce the faith necessary unto life and salvation....It was through this sacrifice, and this only, that God has ordained that men should enjoy eternal life; and it is though the medium of the sacrifice of all earthly things that men do actually know that they are doing the things that are well pleasing in the sight of God. When a man has offered in sacrifice all that he has for the truth's sake, not even withholding his life, and believing before God God that he has been called to make this sacrifice because he seeks to do his will, he does know, most assuredly, that God does and will accept his sacrifice and offering, and that he has not, nor will not seek his face in vain. Under these circumstances, then, he can obtain the faith necessary for him to lay hold on eternal life"

What more can I add than my witness that I know it is true! How grateful I am for that knowledge and for the peace it gives. Knowing that the Lord is with me always makes me realize that it is possible for me to accomplish all things. For, like Nephi, I know that He "giveth no commandment unto the children of men save He shall prepare a way for them that they may accomplish the thing which He commandeth them. (1 Ne 3:7)

Crunchy leaves!

Saturday we went over to Matt's parents' for Matt to help put up their Christmas lights while the weather was nice. The kids had fun raking up the leaves and walking through them.
Here's a hilarious video to represent Ammon and Afton's relationship. They have been playing very well together and it's so fun to watch them. I laughed so hard while watching this:

October in a flash!

October sure flew by! I can't believe it's already November! We had a great time last month and I wish I had more pictures, but I found that we were having so much fun I didn't even get the camera!
Sneaky little Ammon...I walked over to find this on the floor and this little guy in the b

The first snow! You can't really tell it's snowy, they went out before it turned into the blizzard. Ammon loved running around outside while the snow fell on his face. How cute!



Our first pumpkin carving as a family. I cut out the pattern and taped it on the pumpkin and Matt was in charge of carving and cleaning it out-I don't like that part. Ammon enjoyed watching Matt scoop out the "pumpkin guts" as Matt described to Ammon. We got him a little pumpkin to paint and he loved it! You can tell he was concetrating because his eyebrows are quite furrowed.




This is at our Ward Halloween party. I always love seeing what people come up with. People can be so creative!
Here's pregnant me as "Super Girl/mom" Thanks Meg for the use of the cape, shirt, and awesome boots:)
Matt as Clark Kent. It was great, I just wish I would have gone to the dollar store for the glasses instead of DI for the glasses. My mom found some awesome ones at the dollar store. Oh well, I know better for next time.

Our cute little super man. It was a great costume, comfortable and big enough to put warm clothes underneath.On Friday the grandkids went to Dave's work to trick or treat and Ammon had a great time. Thanks Dave! Then we headed out to Draper to get some pictures taken of the kids. It's always an adventure trying to get a decent picture of the 4 kids but the freezing cold and wind made it more difficult. I think they ended up getting a decent one and they'll have to swap Ammon's head because he just kept getting off the hay bale and running towards me...
We went to Brian and Malena's party Saturday night and she got pictures of us together, but I never pulled out my camera, so hopefully I can get a copy. It was fun and Malena went all out but we left early because Ammon needed to get to bed and I hadn't been feeling well. It was nice to get some extra sleep though! All in all, it was a terrific Halloween week last week, crazy, but fun and I'm glad we were able to take advantage of lots of fun Halloween activities. Now it's time to really get ready for Christmas-I'm trying to make most of the presents, so wish me luck!