The Errand of Angels

Saturday was such a great day! I had the opportunity to go to our Stake Women's Conference. This is one of my most favorite things each year! It is so uplifting and so much fun! We meet at 9 am and have classes until 12:45pm then we have an awesome luncheon with cutely decorated tables. This year's theme was 'The Errand of Angels". I learned some great things.

We first heard how they came up with the theme for this year. A member of the Stake Relief Society presidency was driving into the beautiful valley we live in. It was evening time and as she was driving down the hill she noticed all the little lights on in the houses. She thought to herself...I wonder what everyone is doing? And she thought about the mothers who were cooking dinner, changing diapers, cleaning the house, reading to her children, helping a neighbor in need, and so many more things. And then she thought these women where all these lights are, are being angels. Those lights represented a valley full of angels.

We then heard from the Stake Relief Society president and she talked about the theme. One of my favorite quotes she quoted was "Those who scatter sunshine to others cannot keep it from themselves." She talked about speaking softly and kindly to our children and husbands and by doing this we can change the attitude of everyone in our home. She talked about listening to the spirit and doing it right away when the prompting comes. Because the Lord is asking you to be an instrument in His hands and needs you to do this thing right away.

We then separated into classes. My first class was awesome! It was about serving the Lord. The teacher talked about how we need to do everything we do for our Heavenly Father. She told a story about how she has been working on doing everything she does for our Heavenly Father. When she cooks dinner she asks the Lord what should I make for dinner tonight. One particular night she asked and felt like she should make broccoli and cheese soup. So she made it when 5 of her 6 children got home they started complaining about the dinner. Saying things like, "yuck Mom, not broccoli and cheese soup, I hate that." And other complaints that are similar. She just smiled and thought to herself. Thats ok I didn't make it for you I made it for the Lord. Her 6th child (her 9 year-old daughter) returned home from an activity and they sat down for dinner. Her 9 year-old looked sad as they sat down. They said the prayer and as they were praying her 9 year-old began to cry. When they were finished her mom looked at her and asked what was wrong. She said, "Mom I've had a really bad day, but broccoli and cheese soup is my favorite, so thank you for making this for me Mom it's made my day better." Her mom didn't know that she was having a really bad day and didn't know that broccoli and cheese soup would make her feel better but Heavenly Father did know and because this women was focused on the Lord, He was able to use her as an angel to make her 9 year-old feel better. I was so touched by this story.

The next class we went to the teacher talked about a demonstration this lady does at conferences she talks at. She gets a volunteer to hold up a picture of Christ and asks everyone to focus on Him for just 15 seconds. She then grabs a stuffed monkey out of her bag, she pushes a button and the monkey starts screaming and she throws it into the crowd. How many people do you think were still looking at the picture of Christ? Our teacher then asked us to think about what our 'flying monkeys' are in our lives. What are we doing that distracts us from focusing on our Savior?

The next class we talked about visiting teaching and how important it is for us to visit our sisters. It was very motivating.

Next we had President Draper speak to us. He gave us some awesome statistics for our Stake...we have:

• 1,381 women ages 18+
  
• 1,534 children ages 3-11 (220 of those are in our ward)
  
• 540 children ages 0-3
  
• 275 young men ages 12-18
  
• 251 young women ages 12-18
  
• 110 missionaries will be serving in our stake by the end of the year
  
• If our stake does not change and we do not spilt in 2 years we would have 400 missionaries serving from our stake

He urged us to say 1 prayer a day just expressing gratitude to our Father in Heaven. He also asked us to try to find a few minutes a day to sit and ponder who we really are. President Draper told us to remember that we are all children of God, He is our father in heaven and He knows our name and knows our trials and pains. Just think about it...think about how much you love your children. The love that our Father in Heaven has for us is even stronger than that! Isn't that amazing! He will not forget us and when we are going through a tough time that is when the Savior is there with us the most. Just as us parents see our children struggle and we can't always help them because they have to learn. We too have to struggle and have trials to learn and our Father in Heaven gave the greatest sacrifice His son, so we will be able to have someone who has felt what we are feeling so we can make it through our trials. It was so uplifting. I love being able to be uplifted and have a great time with all my friends. I love the luncheon part! It's awesome! This year I signed up to decorate a table. This is what mine looked like. (Thanks mom for the helpful ideas!)

Mike wrote the chinese charaters for me. :) What a great husband. One of the best things was that when I came home Mike had the whole house clean. When I got home he was on his hands and knees mopping the floor. He is so good to me! :)