I attended an event recently about the importance of defying tyrants with the doctrine of the lesser magistrate. If you care at all about keeping the power of government within its constitutional bounds, it is imperative that you learn this doctrine and how to apply it to protect your life and your family. Here is a similar video of the presentation that I saw, below, with the same presenter. I encourage all who care about enjoying liberty to watch it, learn, and take action. You can get the book of the presenter, Pastor Matthew Trewhalla, here. I agree with the tagline “Divine Law trumps human laws.” Amen!
Some people may ask about how Romans 13 fits in with all this. Pastor Trewhalla has an appendix in the book all about that. This is all the Spirit of 1776 folks! He said that the roots of our great USA come from this doctrine, all modeled by the Sons of Liberty in Boston, Massachusetts.
That’s Hilda Labrada Gore shown above. I’ve been listening to the podcast she does for the Weston A. Price Foundation for years, ever since it started when I lived in southern AZ. It’s called The Wise Traditions podcast, over here. She feels like an old girlfriend, one of my Veggie Gals, even though we have never met. Definitely a kindred spirit. That’s why I am so excited to hear that she got to be at the RFK Jr. confirmation hearing for one day for his nomination for Trump’s Secretary of Health and Human Services.
Credit for Book Cover Images Above and Below: amazon.com
Listen below and enjoy. I love that she says so many women in the crunchy mom influencer space were there, like Zen Honeycutt and the lady beyond the 1K hours outside podcast, Ginny Yurich. She says she definitely felt such a power of love emanating from these people to support RFK Jr. as they watched. Go MAHA MAMAs go!
I agree with one of the hosts that government can’t make us healthy. Health is largely based on personal choice, and it is cultivated not injected. Health is something that moms, more than any other people, can bring about, not the government. That’s part of the role of mother, as nurturer. Government’s job is stay out of our health choices and not have laws that limit our options for health and health care. Now that RFK Jr. has been confirmed, I hope he reigns in the government’s reach regarding health instead of extending it.
He is definitely a humble man. I love that he said that for decades he has prayed daily that God would use him to help improve the health of children. He has done that with the Children’s Health Defense Fund that he started (I totally recommend you get on their email list). Now as HHS Secretary he can continue this mission. I also love that he has gained humility from his long-ago years as a drug addict. He said publicly that he goes to AA meetings every day to stay sober. That’s the humility we need in leaders.
Want to hear his story? Watch below and hear his journey towards faith in God. His story is an amazing testimony of God showing up in his life in what some people call synchronicity or coincidence.
This is soooo late, but I’m finally getting it up before February is over! Here are the pretty, happy, funny, smart and/or interesting things I smiled at in January 2025.
On New Year’s Day I got to play Settlers of Catan Cities and Knights version with my firstborn and his wife. After seeing my offspring play this game for years, and playing it myself with them halfheartedly, occasionally, I’m finally feeling the charm of the game. They brought their own copy of the game from their home in Texas, including the upgrades that my son printed with his 3-D printer. See the bright blue hexagons below with the white squiggly line? That’s supposed to be water with ocean froth. He printed those plus the tan frames for the hexagonal pieces, as well as the little sheep with the number 2 by it. It’s like we are back when he was 6 and he drew something that made me beam, which I’m bragging about :-). My daughter-in-law won the game. It was so fun to see her interact with my son as they talked back and forth making deals to stay out of each other’s way as they built their cities and strategized.
I felt so blessed to play this game with them, as at first it looked like I wouldn’t be able to play ANY games with them. We were planning on having a big family New Year’s vacation at my parents’ cabin in the mountains. They were already there and we were driving up to meet them. Staying at this cabin in the winter involves meeting my dad with his ATV in a parking lot so he can drive us up the mountainside with his snow tracks. For this particular trip, my sister and nephew were doing the pickup duty. On their way to meet us, the ATV broke down. There was no other way to get there, on the deep snow, so we had to turn around and go home. I was feeling so sad that I wouldn’t see my son and his wife. I knew they had a flight to catch the next day to go back to their home. How happy I was the next morning when I woke up to a text from dear son asking if they could come by and see us at our home. My son said they were able to delay their flight a day. So, they came over and we played the game and had a wonderful time. On top of that they announced that their Christmas gift to me was tickets to see Little Women at the Hale Center Theater in March. I’m so excited! They remembered how much I love the book/movies (see here) and decided to gift me tickets! How thoughtful!
Two of my sons got to go target practice shooting with their aunt, uncle, and cousin on New Year’s Day, while I was playing Catan with their brother and sister-in-law. This was to make up for the aborted trip last Christmas Day that got canceled due to illness and rain.
We watched Wicked as a family on New Year’s Day, in our “home theater” (family room) after hearing so much hype about it. I enjoyed it, although the skeptical part of me keeps wondering if there’s some hidden agenda behind it. Is it really promoting good? Why does something that promotes good have to be named the opposite of good? Is it all a bunch of psychological trickery? It reminds me of Disney’s board game Villainous, which I enjoy playing, but why is it set up for the players to be playing the villains instead of the heroes, with the winner being the villain who is first to accomplish his or her goals?
I went thrifting on the day after New Year’s with my teen daughter and found the treasures above. I was thrilled that she actually asked me to take her thrifting, as those moments are rare, and I am always looking for an excuse to thrift. Those black ankle boots in the upper right are brand new, Franco Sarto boots, that looked never worn, totally brand new! $16 instead of over $100, baby! Maybe because they are not the current trendy version of their boots. That doesn’t matter to me. I don’t care about having the latest fashion. I’m OK with finding quality classic pieces. That’s why I love thrifting!!!! I just love all these finds!!! Those potholders also looked brand new, Kitchen Aid brand, and the cheery cherry pattern just makes me so happy! $3 for the pair! I love that they are short and so quick and easy to put on to pull stuff out of the oven. I have them hanging from magnetic hooks on the fridge right next to the oven now. Then there’s the brightly patterned sweater, and the brown loafers, and the two cute shirts and the Christmas picture book, two Easter chapter books, a knitting book, a Christmas traditions book, and to top it all off, Samuel Hahnemann’s Organon of Medicine, which is the Bible of homeopathy written by the founder of homeopathy himself!!!!! You can find it free online, but it’s so much nicer to have it in book format!!! What a deal!!! This was such a fabulous day for thrifting. Plus, my daughter found some clothes she wanted and some boots.
The haul above was just from one store. One the same day, I went to a another thrift store and found the goodies below.
I just love the sweater with its popcorn stitching and the eyelet top. I love that I found another copy of Emily Belle Freeman’s Christ Centered Christmas, after giving away my first copy to my married daughter when I stuffed her stocking on Christmas Eve. One book I found turned out to be a garbage book, that’s why I blacked it out in the photo. It’s in the landfill now. Maybe I should have burned it so no one else will find it :-). I was so thrilled to find the Necessary Lie. I heard the authors speak over a year ago at a fireside and bought the book for my husband for Christmas. It’s about a married couple who escaped North Korea. My husband binged on North Korea escapees for months so that book added to his binge. All in all the above totaled around $100 so I decided not to go thrifting until February.
I had a great post-Christmas Veggie Gals/Jolabokaflod lunch party on Jan. 3. This post here explains Jolabokaflod. Girlfriend Kathie hosted the grand event. She has a large, lovely home. Inside this large, lovely home she has a long dining room table that fit all 14 of us! Her tree shown below, is so beautiful, I’m sure you agree.
Oh, what delightful times! I invited some long-lost friends from Layton who I know from when I lived there, and they made the trek. Oh what joy comes from visiting with long-time, dearest girlfriends!
We had a yummy lunch, mostly carnivore for me. I had some of the low carb stuff like the soup and admired the tother beautiful carbs, such as the carb laden dish shown above, and did not partake.
After lunch, we then opened our white elephant books for our Jolabokkaflod book gift exchange.
Here’s one of my girlfriend’s reactions when she opened up her book.
It’s a book about the history of the ancient Filipino people. That’s my Veggie Gals for you! So interested, even downright giddy, in good things, even if they are ancient and obscure, to the point of never-even-heard-of-before.
Hostess with the Mostest Kathie had such a cool Lego Christmas Village display. How fun! I wonder how she stores all this during the rest of the year.
The following Sunday, I played the shortest Scrabble game of my life with my two sisters, one son and one daughter. My sister came from Maine to bring her daughter to BYU-Idaho (not the one she brought last fall) and spent some time with our side of the family and then her husband’s side. So we had a family gathering while they were in town, chatting, doing a puzzle, and playing Scrabble. What made it fast was that we each started with 10 letters and we agreed to do fast turns, because some of us, including me, dread the long turns that Scrabble tends to involve. (Bananagrams is so much better.) It was probably the worst game of Scrabble, i.e. lowest scoring game, I’ve ever played since I just put down the first word I could think of to keep to the time limit, but it was still fun.
I loved watching different videos of Gil Bates’ 60th birthday party, like the own below. His birthday, Jan. 1, is close to the birthday of my Girlfriend Mindy, Dec. 31. She turned 60 as well! It reminded me that my oldest brother is turning 60 this year too. What does this mean? My generation is old! Old is good though!
Below is Gil praying with his family before they have a big family dinner for his party. He’s such an amazing father. Watch the video above to hear his children singing his praises and telling stories. I just love all this!
I enjoyed watching this video that my husband’s cousin Lynne did regarding Joseph Smith and the environment he came from, including his family tree. Go here to watch. The two images below are from that video.
Solomon Mack was Joseph’s maternal grandfather. It’s so wonderful that he had a testimony of Jesus Christ to pass down to his posterity, as shown in the image above.
I was so happy to see that Sarah Mackenzie shared the above book in her video, which I have over here (scroll down to the very end for the video), recommending it as a book for moms to read to feel more joy. I have used it for Morning Basket with my son and gave it to my son-in-law for his January birthday. He got a set of books about Tolkien for Christmas from my daughter so he’s getting into Tolkien. I figured this would make his learning journey even more fun!
I enjoyed watching the presidential inauguration with my son for part of our homeschool day. I didn’t vote for Trump but still enjoyed it. Who knows how much of Pres. Trump’s speech was theatrics and how much is not? How sincere is Pres. Trump in invoking God’s name and appealing to the right? Is he just doing it all for show and to get more power? I don’t know. It was refreshing, however, to hear a U.S. President refer to God. I hope it’s for real.
I did enjoy seeing all the fashions of his family, at least the females, for the different events, the actual inauguration ceremony, and then the balls and dinners, and such, surrounding the whole thing. I didn’t love First Lady Melania’s hat, because it didn’t show her eyes. I agree that it also makes her look like Hamburglar from McDonalds, as someone on the Internet first said. (You have to be a Gen Xer or older to get that.) Some of my girlfriends liked it though, saying it’s a gangster hat. They said it made it look like she was telling her husband’s enemies to back off.
I love that the inauguration ceremony took place in the U.S. Capitol Rotunda. The paintings and the statues there have such a rich heritage of America’s godly past. Here’s more about that with a video that explains it all.
One of Trump’s daughters, Ivanka Trump, shows her gown for some of the inauguration gala events above and below. Courtesy of Ivanka Trump’s Instagram account. Both are so lovely although slightly immodest. I would never wear either except in my fantasy life :-). Oh, they are both just so beautiful. Wow! I know the above one is a copy of Audrey Hepburn’s dress in Sabrina but I don’t know about the other one.
I just love the way J.D. Vance’s wife is smiling at him during his swearing in as the new V.P. I wish for every husband to have such an adoring wife who looks at him like that. Then his little daughter sucking her thumb? So totally adorbs. She definitely looks like her daddy.
This is one of my VG girlfriend’s new phone wallpaper. It definitely made me smile.
I was sad to hear of Wayne Osmond’s passing. The video of his funeral including his brother Donny singing in a big family choir made me cry and smile. Watch it here, it’s posted below the story I tell of Donny’s mother giving away a Book of Mormon to the Queen of England. I just love the Osmonds. What a great family that has brought so much light, laughter, and love into the world.
Hearing about this new board game coming out in 2025 made me smile for sure. Not that I’ve ever knitted anything. I’m just in love with the idea and hope to do it someday. The game is a standalone sequel to Calico, which I reviewed here.
Here’s is what some of the pieces look like. Looks fun and cozy!
Speaking of knitting, wearing my sweaters continued to keep me happy. I love that I can wear one of my new thrifted sweaters with so many different pants or skirts! I just love the snowflake necklace too that I got in my Christmas stocking, pretty sure from my married daughter playing Santa. I love that I can wear it with so many different tops. I know I posted this last month, but this sweater and necklace continue to make me smile so much. 🙂
I decided that I want to resume my reading of the Saints books, from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. A few years ago, I read Vol. 1, I think maybe Vol 2. as well. I started Vol. 3 and never finished. I decided to read them backwards this year, starting with Vol 4 , then Vol. 3, and so forth. I think if I do it that way I will remember the stories in the books better for some reason. So, I’m in Vol. 4 and reading it almost every night on my phone with the black background until I fall asleep. You can read all the volumes here for free or get them in hard copy as well for a cost. Put the Gospel Library app on your phone and then you can read on your phone.
In January, I started mentoring my LEMI Hero Project Class with my 15-year-old son and 3 other students. We played the Diplomacy board game the first day, just to get them interested in the politics of Europe, which is part of the back story of WW1 and WW2. I love that two of my son’s best friends (he has about 3) love to play board games like I do and that we can borrow games from them, like this Diplomacy game.
Seeing snow outside my front window, with my fun New Year’s/Valentine’s decorations and twinkly star lights, made me smile with the hygge-ness of it all. It’s hard to tell but the window has my paper snowflakes on it.
Attending a Mock Caldecott Award Night at a local public library was so much fun! I loved seeing all these picture books that came out in 2024 that I didn’t even know about! Here’s a recap over here. This is definitely something to look forward to every January.
We had a birthday party for three family members on a Sunday night, Zooming in the two sons and their families from Texas. My son-in-law, my younger daughter, and one of my daughters-in-law each have a January birthday. I just love it when we can all get together, even if some of them are on the screen. We sing “Happy Birthday,” say a compliment or memory about the birthday person, while the in-person people east the birthday treat, and open gifts. Sometimes we play a Jackbox game, or another game, or I show photos of the birthday person/people, especially older ones. I love it that my daughter asked to use one of my ice cream parfait glasses to serve her husband his birthday treat. These glasses sit on the top shelf of my hutch with my Christmas -that-fit-into-Valentine-aesthetic mugs, shown below.
I finished on average a book a week in January. My favorite was the Kisses From Katie book, for my online Shumway Sisters’ Book Club. So, then I binged on a bunch of Katie’s videos in YouTube.
If you don’t know who Katie is, go read the above book and start finding podcast and YouTube interviews with her like the one above. She’s a godly woman who has adopted over a dozen girls from Africa in addition to having two biological sons. She also started a nonprofit organization to help children in Africa. So amazing!
I also read/finished these books. Some of them I started before this month, but I finished them all in January. Then here are all the books I completed in 2024.
Then of course I had fun with new sweater combos. Over here I have more of my sweater combos for winter.
I got this Little Women T-shirt from my trip to Orchard House last summer. I love that it can go with so many different sweaters: white, tan, gold, black, yellow, and teal.
Then this one can go with yellow, white, black, red, teal, gray, and tan. So versatile!
That’s a wrap! Now to get February’s PHFR/Things That Made Me Smile post!
Who’s going to RootsTech 2025? It’s coming up in less than two weeks! March 6-8 2025! It’s the largest family history conference in the world! It happens every year, sponsored by FamilySearch, in Salt Lake City, UT. You can go here to learn all about it. You can even attend some of the classes from the comfort of your recliner in your PJs! It’s so exciting to see the cool technology unveiled every year, with apps, software, and websites that increase everyone’s ability to search out and enjoy learning about their family tree. It feels like Christmas!
These classes will help you increase your skills and knowledge so you can build your knowledge of your family tree or add to it. Knowing who your ancestors are allows you to feel more connected to them, more joyful, and more open to the future. Learning about my relatives and the hard times they’ve gone through has helped me go through my hard times.
I also firmly believe that our deceased relatives are angels watching over us, and they can help us do things for us that we can’t do for ourselves, as we help them with temple work, in temples of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. This is something they can’t do for themselves. That’s my biggest reason for searching out my family tree! Kim Sorenson beautifully testifies of this in her story over here.
Go here to learn all about RootsTech, then register to come in person or online! In person attendance involves an admission cost, online attendance is free and limited to certain classes.
Be sure to watch Saturday’s Family Discovery Day, featuring speakers from The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. It’s always so inspiring! Go here to learn about that, and then scroll down to the end to see the schedule. Look to the right to see what classes are available online.
Here are some sneak peeks of what’s happening at RootsTech 2025 below.
Here’s one of my favorite videos from RootsTech Family Discovery Day showing Elder Neil L. Andersen issuing a temple challenge to youth. I have taken it to hear as well and been so blessed by it. It’s five years old but applies just as much to today. He’s speaking again on FDD this year too, with his wife.
I was soooo over-the-moon happy to see this YouTube video come up in my feed of suggestions!!! It has two of my favorite influencers, Dr. Ben Bikman (a professor at my alma mater, BYU, who I’ve blogged about here) and Dr. Jordan Peterson talking about what makes us fat and sick: too many carbs. Yess!!!!
For decades, I ate too many carbs, even though they were “good” carbs, meaning whole foods. I ate LOTS of whole grains (brown rice, whole wheat sourdough bread, millet, quinoa, etc.), TONS of beans, lentils, fruits and veggies. I spent 7 years being vegan or vegetarian. I thought this was THE way to eat, and that if just exercised more, I would be fine.
After eating this way and having 7 babies, I ended up weighing more than 200 lbs when Baby #7 was two months old. I was not happy with this. I wanted to cry!!! Fortunately, I have lost the weight and feel much better in my skin.
I was insulin resistant from eating so many carbs, even though they were whole foods/”good” carbs, i.e. complex carbs, for so many years. The video above explains the physiology. Watch and learn.
One solution is the keto diet. Dr. Bikman has an office down the hall from one of my siblings. His suggestion to my sibling to try keto helped my sibling lose weight and eliminate this person’s headaches. Keto has helped me tremendously, too, along with intermittent fasting.
How do you know if you are insulin resistant? Check the image of symptoms above. They all come from insulin resistance, according to Dr. Bikman. If your insulin resistant symptom is too much weight, get my ebook over here to see how I lost 70 lbs without exercise. Read more of my story over here.
Calling all homeschooling mamas, especially if you feel burned out!!! (Anyone else can read this too of course. :-)) It’s that time of year when homeschooling can feel really hard.
At least in a lot of North America, the skies are gray, the ground is brown, gray, yellow, and cold. Cabin fever can set in. That’s why I looooove the topic of the recent Read Aloud Revival Podcast/YouTube video, hosted by the delightful Sarah Mackenzie, pictured above.
She explains how books, both picture books and chapter books, are such great ways to “take us to lands away.” This totally helps us get those oxytocin dumps, along with gameschooling, which you can read about here and here. #abookandgameaday. This simple routine has helped me keep sane and happy while homeschooling, year in and year out, for many years! (My oldest is 31, my youngest is 15.) Plus relying on my philosophy of the organic seasons of learning, read about that here.
Winter/homeschooling/mothering in general can all make it impossible/hard to travel in person, but that doesn’t mean we can’t travel to fun places in our minds, with books!
One, two or more picture books a day can keep the winter blues away! With a library card, you don’t even have to buy these books. (Go here to see how a library card can help with your homeschooling in general.)
Watch below, then scroll down to see some of the books recommended by Sarah and me, to travel with!
My son and I just finished the above book together! We got to go to Manhattan last August (see here about our grand adventure with my two little grandsons), so that made reading the book extra meaningful. I just wish we had found it before we traveled. Such an interesting, fun book!
If you want to get Sarah’s list of recommended books for the Northeastern U.S., go here. So fun! It sounds like she will be preparing more lists for other regions. I can’t wait to see them! You can see other lists here. Bon voyage!
I love just reading picture books and talking about them, that’s always been enough for me and my seven children for the early years. When they showed interest in reading and writing, I added Mathusee math work and handwriting. Those who wanted to get into college, went and graduated, without doing worksheets about books or crafts, along with their scholar classes at our commonwealth. My post here explains what our homeschooling journey looks like.
If you have the energy, however, and desire to want some writing, crafts, and food to go with geography studies, then watch the video of Marcie Holladay/Single Mom on a Farm below and get her curriculum for the United States. This all looks so fun!
Since the presidential inauguration of Trump happened on 20 Jan 2025 without a hiccup, how does that fit in with Ezra’s Eagle prophecy? Ezra’s Eagle prophecy was first brought to light by Michael Rush. You can see my previous posts about it over here. He interpreted it as meaning that Biden, as a “short feather” would not have a second term as president. We have seen this come to pass. He also said that Trump would be a “short feather” and not have a second term and “appear no more.” Trump, however, has been elected and inaugurated for his second term, so is the prophecy still true?
It just depends on how you interpret the prophecy.
Here’s a different interpretation, in the video below, taking into account Trump’s successful inauguration. It’s very interesting! If you are used to just listening to videos and not watching them, please use your eyes and ears to pay attention to this video. You will miss out on the graphics and words posted on the screen if you just listen and don’t watch. Scroll below to see some of the screenshots from the video.
All screenshots shown above and below the video come from the video, which is from the YouTube Channel, Ezra’s Eagle.
So, according to the above picture, Trump counts as one feather, not two, and then he will appear no more. Hmmm….
Have I got a treat for you! I’m so excited to share this you! Meghan Farner, of Latter-day Disciples podcast, has written a book called Consider Yourself as Eve. Here are the images of the front and back covers of the book below. Then below that I have some webinars/videos the author has done with a few screenshots from one of the videos.
Credit for Book Cover Images Above and Below: amazon.com
The first video is the webinar she recently did with my friend Oak Norton of Scripture Notes. Learn more about Scripture Notes here.
Here are some screenshots of the video, showing an outline of the chapters of the book.
Then here’s a video below that Sister Farner did on her own YouTube Channel, Latter-day Disciples.
Here’s a video, below, that Sister Farner did with the Women and the Priesthood YouTube Channel.
I love how she talks about how priesthood ordinances play a role in the spiritual development of women. I also love that she says that a “helpmeet” is not a “little helper” but someone who helps you draw closer to Christ. It comes from Hebrew word “ezer kenegedo” which means an obvious example of a sacrificer unto death for love. Eve gave this example to Adam and we can each do it too as wives and mothers. I also love that she explains how we all have feminine and masculine aspects of ourselves, and that we can learn to align them with God’s will. She also explains how feminine and masculine aspects relate to the temple. I also love that she says we each have our own journey to follow back to God, but the ordinances to partake of on this path are universal.
Thank you Sister Meghan for these beautiful truths. They confirm what I’ve believed for decades, that Eve is a role model for each woman. She is a hero, the first female stateswoman. She sacrificed her own comfort living in the paradisiacal Garden of Eden so the mortal race could be born, so we could each have the opportunity to get a body, an earthly family, an opportunity for eternal exaltation, all resulting in joy.
As it says in the Book of Mormon Another Testament of Jesus Christ, about Eve and Adam:
“Adam (and Eve) fell that men might be, men are that they might have joy.” 2 Nephi 2:25
“And now, behold, if Adam had not transgressed he would not have fallen, but he would have remained in the garden of Eden. And all things which were created must have remained in the same state in which they were after they were created; and they must have remained forever, and had no end.” 2 Nephi 2:22
“And they would have had no children; wherefore they would have remained in a state of innocence, having no joy, for they knew no misery; doing no good, for they knew no sin.” 2 Nephi 2:23
“Now in this thing we do rejoice; and we labor diligently to engraven these words upon plates, hoping that our beloved brethren and our children will receive them with thankful hearts, and look upon them that they may learn with joy and not with sorrow, neither with contempt, concerning their first parents [Adam and Eve].” Jacob 4:3
In 1918, President Joseph F. Smith saw a vision of the spirit world. He saw many ancient prophets, including Eve. After seeing Eve, he said he saw “our glorious Mother Eve, with many of her faithful daughters who had lived through the ages and worshiped the true and living God.”
“Eve, so recently from the eternal throne, seemed to understand the way of life, for she was happy—happy!—that they had eaten the forbidden fruit. … Our beloved mother Eve began the human race with gladness, wanting children, glad for the joy that they would bring to her, willing to assume the problems connected with a family, but also the joys.” – Spencer W. Kimball | The Women of the Church
“By revelation, Eve recognized the way home to God. She knew that the Atonement of Jesus Christ made eternal life possible in families. She was sure, as you can be, that as she kept her covenants with her Heavenly Father, the Redeemer and the Holy Ghost would see her and her family through whatever sorrows and disappointments would come. She knew she could trust in Them.” – Henry B. Eyring | Daughters in the Covenant
“Eve came as a partner, to build and to organize the bodies of mortal men. She was designed by Deity to cocreate and nurture life, that the great plan of the Father might achieve fruition.” – President Russell M. Nelson | Lessons from Eve
“We all owe a great debt of gratitude to Eve. In the Garden of Eden, she and Adam were instructed not to eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. However, they were also reminded, ‘Thou mayest choose for thyself.’ The choice was really between a continuation of their comfortable existence in Eden, where they would never progress, or a momentous exit into mortality with its opposites: pain, trials, and physical death in contrast to joy, growth, and the potential for eternal life.” – James E. Faust | What It Means to Be a Daughter of God
“Some Christians condemn Eve for her act, concluding that she and her daughters are somehow flawed by it. Not the Latter-day Saints! Informed by revelation, we celebrate Eve’s act and honor her wisdom and courage in the great episode called the Fall.” – Dallin H. Oaks | The Great Plan of Happiness
“A choice, it might be said, was imposed upon Eve. She should be praised for her decision.” Boyd K. Packer | For Time and All Eternity
“We believe that the creation of a woman was the crowning, and final, and most glorified moment of human creation. That we start with light and dark; and land and sea; and we move through fish and fowl; and beast of the field; and we get to Adam and it’s still not good enough… and only when Eve was created — this is our theology. You say it’s political, but for me it’s theological. That is our theology — that the crowning creation and the glory of the human experience came with the creation of Eve.” – Jeffrey R. Holland | Q&A at Harvard Law School
If you want more wonderful words about Eve, read this book below! It will change your life, as it changed mine. It tells the truth about Eve. It also involves the translation of a Hebrew word, this time, the word “beguile.” Read it to find out more! The biography of the author, Beverly Campbell, is here.
I’ve been meaning to do this since the last week of December 2024 but just haven’t had much time with higher priorities. So I’m finally doing it now! Here are the books I read in 2024. (At least what I can remember. I’m not even including all the picture books I read aloud to my son and grandsons.)
The above book is just so wonderful! Brad Wilcox has such a gift of explaining the wondrous gift of the grace and mercy of Jesus, all wrapped up in the atonement. You can read my full review here.
I read this book above for my Sisters’ Book Club. We live across the country, from North Carolina, Colorado, and Utah, so we meet in Zoom. I didn’t actually read it cover to cover, but I listened to most of it and skipped some of it because it was a little too intense for me that month of March 2024 for my emotional state. It’s one of those books though that I’m glad exists to me help me “walk in someone else’s shoes” in order to feel compassion for those of another race and the prejudice they experience.
This above one is sooo good! My review of it is here. I like to have one spiritual book I’m reading at all times, which I read at night in bed, to help me unwind. (Besides the scriptures, which I read in the morning individually and then in the evening with my family.)
This one, above, is for homeschooling my son. It’s Volume 2 of the Tuttle Twins American History series. These books are a great way to learn American history because the history is told in story format, within a great big frame story. We read it aloud together every day for months. It was part of our Morning Basket time. I look forward to Volume 3.
My pick for Sisters’ Book Club one month. It took me over 100 pages to decide I liked the book. It was weird and wonderful. My married daughter didn’t like it.
Another choice for Sisters’ Book Club, this time picked by one of my CO sisters-in-law. It’s about time I read Tuesdays With Morrie, I’ve heard about it for ages. A delightful read!
Both books below were also for Sisters’ Book Club, and by the same author. She definitely has a beautiful way of weaving stories! They are both books hard to put down because I just want to know what happens next. Definite page-turners!
The books above and below were for the Moms’ Class at the co-op school I used to be part of. I absolutely loved them! Both are wonderful books to mentor mothers in mothering. I thought I knew a lot about Maria Von Trapp and her family but this book below taught me a lot more. She was definitely a woman driven by mission. It was so fun to read about her family’s escapades in America after they left Europe. Especially about her inner call to build a singing camp for families in Vermont, and how they barely got it in done in time before people started coming as guests. I just love books about family life, especially large family life, and especially families led by parents following God. You can read my review of the book above here. It’s so beautiful!
Reading the above book got me in another Sound of Music jag, similar to the one I had back in 2001 or something like that. So, I went looking for and discovered the book below and devoured it. It was like eating a 5-gallon tub of purely wholesome ice cream made with raw milk and whole sweeteners in one week. So pleasurable and nourishing to boot!!! Each of the 7 children who appeared in the movie has a chapter full of the photos and mementos from the making of the movie, preserved by their mothers. So, so, so fun! Can you believe one of the moms in my co-op said she has never even seen the Sound of Music movie?! She is missing out on so much! I hope she has rectified that cultural literacy oversight by now. The books above and below are so perfect for winter!
Reading the book below was pure comfort at the end of a long day. It is full of encouraging, spiritual stories. It’s soo, soo, good! This same author wrote a book I read over 20 years ago, called On Wings of Faith, where he tells the story of accompanying Elder Ezra Taft Benson on his trip to Europe to help people recover from WW2. The stories in the book below will definitely increase one’s faith in Jesus Christ.
The book above is another one that I love to read at night to bring in the Holy Ghost to comfort me. It is full of stories of family history miracles. Go here to read a short summary. So yummy!
These Gordon Korman books above and below are so fun! He has a talent for writing humorous stories of tweens and teens, especially in school settings. I listened to these as audiobooks with my 15-year-old son during our car time, driving to and from seminary and other classes outside the home. You can find these books and a lot of the other books I’ve mentioned in this post in everand.com. It’s super handy that everand has an app just like audible does so we can listen to these on my phone. Next year he’ll be driving on his own, so I’ve got to maximize this car time. Maybe we’ll listen to Little Britches next.
I’ve read these ones below before, so I didn’t read them all cover to cover, but reviewed them a bit for mentoring my LEMI Sword of Freedom Project Class. I did reread Across Five Aprils cover to cover. It’s such a great book!
This one above was especially wonderful to revisit after seeing the room last August, on my trip to Maine with my daughter and sister and son and other relatives, to see the actual room where the book was written. Here’s my blog about that trip.
Then there are the “fun books I dabbled in and didn’t finish.” These are books I read a lot of, especially at night or in the summer while sunbathing, but I haven’t finished yet. See below.
Then there’s the book below I read every night, and continue to read, as part of my bookly nightcap routine. I unearthed it when moving last spring. Like I blogged here, it was a total God reminder that He’s watching over me and wants to delight me. I read that page’s day of events in history and the related trivia questions. Sometimes they are too trivial pop culture for me so I just skip those parts.
I’d love to hear what you all read in 2024! Please share in the comments below!
What a treat!!! I discovered last spring that Sister Barbara Morgan Gardiner has a podcast for the Come Follow Christ scripture study program. This past week she featured Sister Julie Beck, former president of the Relief Society of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. I absolutely love Sister Beck! I blogged about her a long time ago, here, when I reviewed a book that she authored. She is a living treasure of covenant Christian wisdom. As is the host, Sister Gardiner.
Watch the video below to see/hear the podcast in YouTube form.
Here are some of my favorite parts of the video:
-the story about Sister Beck’s mother-in-law telling her son, as prompted by revelation, to find out if the Church is true so that he would feel motivated to serve a mission. Sister Beck says that every morning this wonderful woman would arise at 5 AM to fix a hot breakfast for her son before he left for work. I believe that this might the be story that Sister Beck tells in this article over here in this article called “Powerful Nurturing.” I read this story, when it was first published in the Ensign magazine, as a busy mom with 6 children at home and underfoot. I was so impressed by it that I incorporated it into a few talks I gave to homeschooling moms in the next few years after I heard it. How wonderful to hear that this woman in the story was her very own mother-in-law! I love that she emphasizes that this woman, her mother-in-law, June Strong Beck, did not do anything remarkable according to the world’s standards, but that she did remarkable, even eternal things in her small sphere as a wife, mother, and grandmother. Now her daughter-in-law is telling her story today and we can all benefit from it. I just love this!
-the story about how she met with her grandchildren over the phone to talk for two hours about how they each receive revelation, and how they can tell if it’s just them or the Holy Ghost speaking to them. She says that these cousins taught each other. I love this too!
-the story about how she was making sandwiches at home and felt the Spirit telling her to go see a friend. She resisted for some time, then finally relented. The friend wasn’t home at first, and just as Sister Beck was pulling out of the driveway, the friend arrived. Upon seeing Sister Beck, she said, “How did you know to come see me? I’ve been praying that you would come!”
I testify that revelation is a real, true thing. I have received revelation the past few weeks to guide me through a super difficult, dark time in my life. I am grateful for the answers that came to assure me, to guide me, and to help me be patient in waiting. A breakthrough has finally happened, after following this revelation. I feel much joy!
It truly is amazing that anyone can access the mind and will of God through revelation, through the power of the Holy Ghost. This is a superpower we can each access! As we qualify for the constant companionship of the Holy Ghost we can have this superpower with us always. This is so fabulous!
If you want more stories of revelation from the Holy Ghost see the following resources:
-more stories on my blog here, and here. Then here is one, from one of my son’s missions
-stories from my family devotionals ebook are here, in the January section
If you want to read all of Sister Julie Beck’s talks, go here. Enjoy!
Tree of Life Mothering 