Friday, October 28, 2011

Books!

I love books! When I step into a library I feel like I can fly. I feel limitless. There is no end to what I can read!


Because I love books, I have a handful of happy memories associated with books.

When I was very young we didn't have a television. We lived in a town so small, that we did not even have a library close by! Instead, we had a library truck that came to the neighborhood every week. I remember the stacks and stacks of books that my brothers and I would check out. Once inside the house, we would all pile onto the big chair in our front room, where my older brother would read to us. AWESOME!

When I was eleven I tackled the Lord of the Rings series. I was determined to be as good at reading as my older brother. He said they were hard, so I took the challenge. I packed up the first book in the trilogy and a chocolate bar and headed  out to my backyard swing to read. Over the next couple of days the trilogy took me from friendly countryside to enchanted forests, to a grim dank cave with an enormous spider, to the battlefield with elves and dwarfs, and finally safely back to the countryside! Sometimes the story was so real and intense that I turned the page without even licking the chocolate off of my fingers first! By the end of the book I looked up at the sky and said "Wow! That was amazing!" I felt all the thrill of the adventure, but never even left my swing!

I think that I love books so much because my parents started me young. They read to me and taught me to read. They took me to the library and let me pick out my own books. We read as a family or I saw them read by themselves. Of course, we also read the scriptures (the Bible and the Book of Mormon) together.

Did you know that the scriptures tell us to read books? I love that!

"...Study and learn, and become acquainted with all good books..." (Doctrine and Covenants 90:15)
"...Seek ye diligently and teach one another words of wisdom: yea, seek ye out of the best books words of wisdom..." (Doctrine and Covenants 88:118)
So there you have it. Champion good! Read books!

Friday, October 21, 2011

Home and Family

Yesterday I was in bed sick. I had time all day, between coughing, sleeping, and blowing my nose, to think about anything and everything. It was a change from the go-go-go of my regular schedule. As the minutes and hours ticked past, I found a theme in my thoughts: home.

My home in Virginia

Normally while doing missionary work here in California, I try to avoid thoughts of home. Virginia is a long ways from California. Thinking about it takes my attention off of my work and sometimes makes me homesick. But that is not what happened yesterday.

No matter where I am, home is with me. I am on the other side of the country, but I still remember what it looks like, what it sounds like, and what it feels like to be at home with my family. It's my favorite! The cozy, familiar, whirl of home life feels safe and happy. I want to feel like that all the time everywhere! The cool thing is that I can.

God is part of my  family. He is my Heavenly Father. The familiar, safe, and happy feelings I associate with home on earth is exactly how I am starting to feel around God. That is totally awesome. That is the way it is supposed to work. The closer we come to God, the more at home we feel. We can have the happy, cozy, whirl of home everywhere we go. We can feel happy and safe.

"Heaven is a continuation of the ideal home" (Preach My Gospel, p. 85).

Champion good! Make home heaven; and make heaven your home!

Tuesday, October 11, 2011

Dear Readers!

Sad news. I have had to remove all of the fabulous pictures from my blog. Apparently, you cannot use other people's pictures (even if you link them) because it is a copyright risk. I have decided to not risk it!

The good news is that I am going to try and include pictures that either I take or draw in future postings. Of course, this will be risky in its own right. However, I think it's worth it!