Phoenix Arizona Temple

 

Tomorrow morning, tickets are available at www.phoenixmormontemple.org to visit the newly completed Phoenix temple. The temple is open to the public for tours from Friday, October 10 through Saturday November 1 and is located at the intersection of 51st Avenue and Pinnacle Peak.

If you live in the area, this is an event that you don't want to miss.

While Church meetinghouses are open to all people who wish to attend religious services, temples, after they are formally dedicated, are open only to faithful Latter-day Saints, so the opportunity for anyone to visit, see, and feel the spirit of these insipiring and sacred buildings is rare and limited.

Temples are considered houses of the Lord where Christ's teachings are reaffirmed through marriage, baptism, and other ordinances that unite families for eternity. Inside, members learn more about the purpose of life and make promises to serve Jesus Christ and their fellow men.

Jacob and I were married in the Mt. Timpanogos temple 10 years ago and are forever grateful for the promises that we made to each other and to God in that sacred place. I know that temples are holy places where we make covenants with our Father in Heaven. I know that those covenants will carry weight in this life and in the life to come as we are faithful to them. I know that through temples families really can be together forever.

Come to the temple. We would love to attend a tour with you.

The load

I have been thinking a lot about how we each carry a load.

Burdens that we carry from choices we've made, the choices of others that affect us, or experiences that come to test and try us.

Often these loads are impossibly heavy, long lasting, and severe.

And many times we must carry our load alone.

I have seen this play out as Jacob has gone through two brain surgeries, radiation treatment, rounds of chemotherapy, and more than a dozen MRI's.

Each of these experiences he has passed through alone and no matter how much I want to, I am not able to bare any of that physical suffering for him.

But in the past many months I have experienced this truth stated so well by Elaine L. Jack, 12th Relief Society general president:

"We cannot always lift the burden of one who is troubled, but we can lift her so she can bear it well."

I have experienced the truth of that statement.

There are countless ways that people have lifted me during the last many months and those lifts have helped me to bear my part of this burden.

I could write for the next several hours about the things people have done to lift me, to lift Jacob, to lift our children, to lift our parents, to lift our siblings. 

Very specific and tailored things that we almost didn't know we needed until they were offered.

But in every instance, the acts, words, expressions, and service have provided a needed lift to help us continue on and put one foot in front of the other.

President Monson stated, "Usually our love will be shown in our day-to-day interactions one with another. All important will be our ability to recognize someone’s need and then to respond."

I am grateful for a loving Heavenly Father who has given each of us that ability- the ability to recognize someone's need.

And I am grateful that we are each endowed with the agency to respond- to respond to the need of someone around us.

Ultimately, we must yoke with the Savior whose yoke is easy and whose burden is light. He is the only one who can truly walk with us and help us carry our individual loads.

But in our daily lives we each have the ability to lift and respond to the needs of the people around us, to lift them so that they can bear their loads well.

That is our opportunity.

And blessing. 

The latest

I can't believe September is more than halfway over.

Time is a strange thing. Sometimes it seems to stand still and moments last forever, and other times it seems to fly by and you blink and whole days or even weeks have passed.

We ended the month of August with a week long visit from Jacob's parents. They came to help us during his radiation treatment and were wonderful in every way. They took care of the kids, made dinner, helped with the cleaning and house upkeep, and watched BYU' first game with us. They were great company to visit with. We are so fortunate that they are in a position where they can and will come down to help us whenever we need it, and we don't take that blessing for granted. I am so grateful for my in-law parents and consider our relationship one of my great blessings.

Three generations of Cougar fans

Jacob took his chemo the first week of September, we went to Austin for the BYU game, my sister came into town to help babysit, and we got caught up on "regular life." Aside from cancer life, there are things like paying bills, mowing grass (which our neighbor, St. John has completely taken over), cleaning house, grocery shopping, etc. that need to be done and it has been nice to have a few days and weeks to take care of that business.

Elsa and Anna

Last weekend was great and we got a visit from my oldest younger brother and his sweet family. They were in Utah for a month long visit (they live in NC) and popped on down for a week to visit their family in AZ. We loved having them here and appreciated the chance to get to know their kids a bit. Dave attended ASU's MBA program, so he and Courtney lived here for 2 years and we got to know them really well. They have always been so good to our girls, and taken such an interest in their lives, and it was sweet to see those special bonds renewed.

Tommy and his new cousin Margaret

All the cousins. Not a great pic, but you get the idea.

My brother Dave playing Legos with the girls

Me with my SIL Courtney and her new baby girl

I guess that is a bonus of brain cancer- you get to see a lot of your extended family. We usually see family members a few times a year, but I feel lucky that I got to see all of my siblings in the last month at my own home. I really love my siblings (And their spouses. And all my in-law siblings. And their spouses too. Lots of love here). We are different from each other, but we also have many commonalities that bond us a siblings and they are definitely some of my very best friends. I can say that, to myself, and to others who may get bogged down in the trenches of lots of little kids life- the payoff will come when those little kids learn to love and rely on each other and have good relationships that will be a strength and blessing to them their whole lives. Thanks parents for letting the younger ones come. :)


Two weeks ago we were gifted tickets from a friend at Jake's work to attend the Cardinal's Monday night football home opener and loved seeing the NFL. In just a week we saw football played at highschool, college, and professionally and it was cool to see how players mature and advance and their skills are honed. Ellie lost her first top tooth on Labor Day and we got to dog sit for our neighbors over the weekend. Our girls (not Tommy, yet) have an inherent fear of dogs (they get it from me), but they have all done so well to brave their fears and live with a dog in the house. They even thanked Heavenly Father in their prayers that the dog could come and stay with us.

He's watching the game....Cards won!

Dog sitting. Tommy is in love.

Dog sitting experts. They had to overcome some major fear on this one.

Love that gap toothed Ellie

Ada has Jake's cheeks and chin

We are still working out the details of Jacob's next oncology visit(s) and MRI. I'm not going to lie- we don't look forward to any of that, so for now we try and not think about it too much and just get on with things. Somehow, we are able to live normal life. I know that we are sustained through the prayers offered in the temple. The other day I was explaining to someone how we are able to enjoy our days and not be sorrowful and despairing all the time (which, I have learned, is a heavy and horrible way to live). I was saying how time, being grateful, and living in the moment have really helped us cope when the thought occurred to me that a large part of our ability to live with peace day to day is a blessing granted through the prayers offered in temples throughout the world. Thank you again and again for keeping Jacob on the prayer roll. I know that those prayers lift our spirits in a way I didn't comprehend before.

Life really is a test. We are here to prove if we are willing to be obedient to our Father's commandments and follow the example of our Savior. I am grateful to know that He does walk with each of us through our trials, and that we can still have joy and peace in the midst of affliction.

John 16:33...but be of good cheer. I have overcome the world.

Goals

A must have in life.
Jacob and I frame goals using a scripture found in Luke 2: 52 

"And Jesus increased in wisdom and stature, and in favour with God and man."

Jacob calls it the balancing wheel, and basically we set a goal in four quadrants of our lives- Intellectual, physical, spiritual, and social.

In this way we are able to increase in wisdom, in stature, and in favor with God and man.

During the calm periods since his diagnosis, I have found that goals help give me purpose and direction and keep my mind and days from wandering into unproductive and depressing paths.

So for the next few weeks I am going to...

-Work on improving my piano playing
-Exercise 3 times a week
-Start reading the Book of Mormon from the beginning (with plans to finish at Christmas)
-Call and catch up with friends and family members

The end.

Austin

Jake and I had the best trip to Austin over the weekend.

We went to watch BYU play UT and were not disappointed with the result. We've been to plenty of road games where the Cougs lost, so it was definitely sweet to have them win, and win big in Texas.



Of course, somehow I managed to miss THE PLAY of the game, you know, the one where Taysom Hill hurdles over the defender to score in the end zone. I had been in line to get us dinner and walked up the ramp and into the stadium just as the Cougar fans erupted in applause. Since they didn't replay that one (I guess it wasn't a Texas moment of glory), I didn't actually get to see the play until later that night. At least Jake got to see it, and I guess it makes for a good story.



The facilities at Texas are impressive. The stadium seats over 100,000 and it a classically constructed building. The campus is very well groomed and the buildings all have a similar look at feel to them. We enjoyed walking around and getting a feel for things the evening before the game.



The UT band is impressive and huge. I've never seen a band with more members. I guess the saying is true that everything is bigger in Texas. The fans were very friendly and genuine in wishing us luck and congratulations after the win. We actually sat on the UT side of the stadium, in the shade, and tried to be good fans too.





We stayed in a lovely hotel near the capitol and enjoyed walking all around downtown Austin the days we were there. It is a very clean, walkable, and interesting downtown and is on the banks of the Colorado river.  I fell in love with the composition of the federal courthouse. Especially at night, the light played on the different textures in such a beautiful way. We visited the flagship Wholefoods marketplace, ate some turf and surf tacos, walked along the river, checked out the capitol, and enjoyed touring around campus. Saturday we waited in line for lunch at La Barbeque, a food truck that has the 2nd best food in town, and to hours later ate some delicious ribs, biscuit, sausage, and pulled pork. It was worth the wait. Afterwards we took a self guided tour around town to see homes from Friday Night Lights. Recognize any of these?

Federal courthouse

 

Jake was a trooper and did this trip while taking his latest round of chemo. It really does wipe him out and cause some other unpleasant side effects, but he was uncomplaining the whole time, even as we waited in the BBQ line. We did take time to rest, sleeping in on both mornings, and resting in the hotel during the afternoons, and had some groceries on hand so that he never had to get too much stomach upset. He is one tough guy and really doesn't complain about his suffering.



We also paid a visit to the Lyndon B. Johnson presidential library. Jake has made it a goal to visit all of the presidential libraries, and has been to several already. It was interesting to learn more about LBJ and his rise in politics. He seemed to be a very driven guy and knew how to get people to do what he wanted. And thanks to him government programs are plentiful in the USA.



 

Jake and I were also able to meet up with several of our friends and appreciated them making time to see us. We saw Jake's roommate, and our mutual friend from the semester we were all interns at DC. He is still the same smart and funny guy and it was nice to meet his sweet wife and darling baby boy (I can thank him for the name of the blog -- a story for another day). We got to see two of my friends from growing up who are avid BYU fans too. And at halftime our sweet friends who used to live in AZ (and babysat our girls when we went to the Notre Dame game) came over to say it and visit with us. I loved seeing all of them and getting caught up on their lives.







We had such a great trip and it was just the break, recharge, escape that we needed. There is something about getting out of town that helps us forget our own troubles and see that there is a big big world out there. I also loved catching up with friends and felt like I was able to come back to myself in some degree. I really am a friendly, question asking, interested in other people kind of girl and it was so nice to get out of my head for a bit and think about other people.

I must end thanking the babysitters who made this trip possible for us- my sister Claire and Jake's brother Matt and our sister in law Jessica. Claire came to town with her own two kids and had 6 children in her sole care for 48 hours, and M&J took over on Sunday, taking the kids to church and feeding them dinner. We couldn't have gone without their help and are so grateful for that service.