Happy Birthday Dan!!

Happy Birthday Dan! I can't believe that he turned 20 today! And since I met him back when we were 15, it's crazy to think that we've know each other for half a decade now!! I'm sooo excited to hear how he enjoyed all his birthday care packages and presents from his fam and me! Dan loves Toy Story and is super excited about the new one coming out (even though sadly he will have to wait until he finishes his mission to see it) so that was the theme and his fam sent adorable party paper goods and lots of fun presents wrapped in Toy Story wrapping paper. His aunt OE even baked and mailed him his favorite strawberry cake that he has each year for him to enjoy :) I'll post the pics as soon as I get his memory card.

I was thinking about how much can happen in a year! At Dan's last birthday, he was working on putting in his papers and didn't even have any idea where he would be going and now he has been serving for almost 8 months out and totally loving it!


Happy Birthday sweetheart!!! I love and miss you tons!!! XOXOXO

Luke and Felicity's Blessing Day!!

On Sunday, I got to join the Taylor's for Luke and Felicity's baby blessings at church and then Meg and James made delicious fajitas for all of us and we hung out and later enjoyed Jenny's yummy lemon cake!! Isn't the table sooo cute?

Jenny getting Felicity ready for pictures

She's sooo precious!!

Chad pushing Kami on the swing outside

Jack, Addie and Kent playing on the slide

James, his dad and Rob looking under the hood of Rob's new car

Megan holding sweet baby Luke

Gramsie with Evie and Jenny with Felicity

Welcome baby Luke and Felicity!!

Updates from Dan!!

Here are some excerpts from Dan's latest journal entries...
05/13/10- "Okay yesterday was soooo fantastic!! I had such a good day! I'll write all about it: In the morning, our studies were extra good! We had full studies, song, prayer and learned from each other. That started the day off right! We got out working right at 10:30am and started tracting. We got picked up by Nigel at lunch time and she took us out to a family favorite Thai place and it was really good! :) I had a delicious white chocolate raspberry oreo crust cheesecake crust for dessert and we had lots of fun! We went to Walmart after to get bottled water because we were out and I also picked up a Disneyworld present from the photo center for Brita! From there, Nigel drove us to a ward building to practice our musical number (for Zone Conference- Be Still My Soul) with the other guys and it's turning out really good!"

"We had almost 3 hours of tracting and 10 contacts and 3 lessons! We're being so blessed for being diligent and obedient and it makes me want to do better and work harder than ever! I know God is looking our for us, protecting us and helping the work progress. I'm sooo happy in this area and I love to see progress and success!! We're def changing this area around for the better! That's all for now... I'm at Zone Conference now and it's going really good!"

And the final mission stats for the week were 11 1/2 hours of tracting, 72 contacts, 21 lessons and 4 new investigators! WOW!

Pics!!

Dan emailed these to me about a month ago and I thought I'd post them just in case everyone hadn't seen them!


These were taken at a ward member's house they had dinner with back when he was still with Elder Blakemore.

News from Elder Cute and Precious Taylor :)

Here are some excerpts from Dan's journal entries that I just got today!

"I have so much to write about! It's been awesome! So Sunday (05/02/10): Church was good...a lot happened! Lots of people came up to us to tell us about someone to teach or to compliment us. It was nice. After church (oh yeah and we taught the YM about Christlike attributes and missionary work. That was fun and went well!) We taught a lesson to this one lady, Kristine, Her boss at work is a member so that's how she got in contact with the church. She's had one lesson before but that was a very long time ago. Bro. Leavitt [a ward member] was there and her boss came too! She enjoyed it and wanted us back so we set up a time! New investigator! After that lesson, we tracted for awhile and had dinner around 5:30pm. We had dinner at a family's house where their daughter is dating one of our investigators - and he was there so it turned into a lesson after! That family was cool - lots of siblings and their spouses and 12 little ones running around. We had dinner buffet style and it reminded me a lot of home! It was pretty fun!"

"Tuesday (05/04/10) we had district meeting and Rodriguez is a pretty fun district leader! Our district is pretty cool too. They're all blond except for Rodriguez and I. After district meeting, we got dropped home and then Nigel picked us up to go food shopping. She totally hooked us up! That was super nice! She even bought us toiletries and me envelopes for Brita's letters! :) We came home and started tracting. We tracted till about 2:30pm and then went to a lesson with we set up with Liz (who we found off of tracting last week). She was there and let us in! She didn't have too much time so we shared a message. got to know her just a little and said a prayer. We offered the lessons and she said she's like to take them so we're meeting again next week!"

"Things are amazing and my birthday is coming! I love and miss you fam and Brita! See you in 17 months! Peacies! XOXOXOX"

I love Coldstone!!

I scream...

You scream...

We all scream...

For ice cream!!

YUM!!!

Updates from Dan!!

Here are some excerpts from Dan's journal that I just got today, enjoy!!

"Another AMAZING day!! Things are the best! I love it! After studies, we got picked up to go to District Meeting (actually Zone Meeting since it's the first meeting of the transfer). We met at the same building as I did before (since I'm in the same zone again) and it was crazy being back! The Zone Leaders taught a great lesson on teaching and then we all went to In N Out. Rodriguez and I didn't get anything though. We're trying to not eat out so much lol since Nigel (Note from Brita- an amazing, generous member in Rodriguez's previous area who always helps them) takes us out so much. We got back around 2:15pm and started tracting! Gotta get our two hours in! We prayed for 10 contacts this time. We tracted until 4:15pm and right when Nigel picked us up... we got our 10th contact! Incredible!! We also prayed to get into someone's house [to teach a lesson] and guess what...a lady said we could come back today! :) The power of prayer again! WOW!"

I thought this story was sooo funny...
"We had a 6:30pm lesson with an investigator. Her husband is a member - his conversion story is so funny. After taking the lessons, he just couldn't decide if it was true. He needed to know. So he stayed up all night one night reading the D&C. Around 6am, he came to the conclusion after pondering for hours- 'this is SO BORING... it's gotta be true! If you were gonna make something up, I think you'd make it more entertaining. No one would just make this up.' We cracked up at that :)"

Dan said that he will send his memory card soon so I'll post those pics on his facebook as soon as I get them!!

Welcome to Our Blog!!

Hi everyone!! I've had some requests recently to start a blog and I thought it would be a fun way to share what I'm doing and type some of Dan's journal entries so everyone can hear all his news too!! I'm new at this (I still can't figure out how to upload pics :) so any advice or suggestions would be awesome!! Hope you enjoy...