Between school, clinicals, and the holidays we have been super swamped! So we have some catching up to do in this blog-o-sphere.
Nov 13: We went to our first Fire Side, which was the Fire Side the BYU football team was hosting the night before their game against UNM. We met the Tornows there and had a really great time. I was a little hesitant to go because I wasn't sure how long it was going to last and sitting for long periods of time really does a number on my bum. We took the risk and went and boy were we blessed. The BYU players sang a few hymns, some of the players shared a talk, and we had great fellowship with our pals.
Two of the talks in particular touched my heart. The first one was by Manase Tonga - who had a bit of trouble at BYU some time back and was placed on academic probation which resulted in him being redshirted in 2008. Subsequently he had to leave the university all together and had to reapply for admission. He shared about this hardship and likened it to quick sand, and shared about the fact that things usually start off small (perhaps undetectable) such as missing one class, sleeping in late a few too many times, then skipping assignments, etc....Such is our life - It's easy to spot the BIG problems rumbling down at us, but its the smaller problems we miss and that we blow off but in the end the snowball effect of it all ends up overwhelming us and taking us down. He mentioned a quote by LaVell Edwards that said (something to the effect of) that the greatest thing in life to have is options. We maintain our options by living righteously and choosing the right. We will all stumble and fall but thankfully we also have a Heavenly Father that loves and forgives us.
The second talk was by Holly Mendenhall who focused on encouraging women to also think about their choices and where those choices can take them through the course of their lives. She also shared about marriage and the hard work it takes to maintain a marriage, which was refreshing to hear someone talk about hardships and the overcoming of them in a marriage. Marriages are not designed to be perfect, however with hard work, love, and dedication to one another they can be great blessings!!
Nov 14: We went to the BYU vs. UNM game and had pretty good seats - The Tornows met us there midway through the game, as their daughter and son had football and soccer games galore over this weekend!!! After the game we all headed to PF Changs for their son's birthday dinner! After that Mike, Justin, myself and two of their kiddos headed to the UNM basketball game. We had an absolute BLAST!! Here are the pics I managed to get:
COSMO!!!
Oh yeah...... BYU won the football game and UNM won the basketball game - Just in case you were wondering ;)
