The Lights: Look How They Shine for You

Thursday night several friends and I piled into my car and drove to Salt Lake City to visit Temple Square. After getting a little nourishment at Olive Garden we walked a few blocks to see the sights. Downtown was all a buzz with The Nutcracker, a Jazz game, the Kurt Bestor Christmas concert, and surely other festivities.

Temple square was pretty and the weather was pretty nice. Even though snow would have made it pretty, it was also nice to not have to deal with that. We wandered around Temple Square and the Main Street Plaza seeing the nativities from around the world, the luminaries, and all the lights. And after lots of photos we headed over to the cafe in the Joseph Smith building for some hot chocolate and to warm up. After downing the big hot chocolate, the walk to the car was anything but cold. It was a great evening. Thanks for the idea Linds!

FHE - Rock Band

This week we had family home evening at my house because the guy who was supposed to host it had a hot date. (At our age, that's a legit excuse.) So I had to come up with something quick. Rock Band always seems to be a crowd pleaser and Nick was generous enough to let me borrow his system and the game. (Thanks Nick!) Rock Band at FHE was a hit. We had 14 people as opposed to the normal 6 to 8. We had a few new people visiting FHE for the first time. It's always great to meet new people. The more the merrier, right? And of course there were drinks and snacks. Can't forget those. Here's some of the action photos.

General Conference: Priesthood Session

We have a tradition in our family when it comes to conference time. The priesthood holders that can, get together and attend the session in our old stake center. Following which we go to dinner at Bajio in Riverwoods. It's a nice tradition. This year those in attendance were my father, brother, 3 nephews, and a nephew's friend. We missed having Josh with us. He used to be a regular until he moved to Washington.

There was a little special treat for us during conference. President Monson told a story about Theron Borup. Everyone in our group kind of did a head whip to look at my dad. It's not that often that you hear the name Borup and generally when we do it is someone that is related to us. Dad confirmed that Theron is his cousin and that he worked in personnel for many years at the church office building. I had never heard the story before but Dad had.

Oh and about the bow tie... I had to try and compete with all the attention that Nick was going to get with his magician-looking mustache. Yeah, I failed miserably.

Monkey Boy Baptism

Last Saturday I got to spend the day in Kaysville for a special family occasion. My youngest nephew turned 8 years old last month. This month he was baptized and confirmed a member of the LDS Church. He was very excited about it all. He looked quite handsome in his nice suit. Although it's not the typical baptism photo shown above, it's pretty typical for him. :)

Oh, and he was only barefoot the for the pole climbing.

Meet the Mormons

Today I was reading my regular subscription to Lifehacker. They often have handy tips and other great information for day to day life. Today I was reading Get the Most Out of Your New Town. I thought it was pretty interesting. Here were their main suggestions:

1. Get a local phone number.
2. Subscribe to the local paper
3. Get a map
4. Check out the local restaurants
5. Find the local activities

But here's where it really caught my attention. The section was entitled Jesus and Wine. The title alone was interesting but then it listed a website called meetup.com where you can find connections with other people similar to you in the area. Here's my favorite quote from the article:

Be it beer or wine; darts, dirt or dreams; Mormons, Wiccans or atheists; or whether you're a Republican, Democrat, independent or Libertarian, there's little more than booze, religion and politics that can help you feel right at home again.

Really?! "Mormons, Wiccans or atheists"? It just makes me think that whoever was creating that list has no idea (or at least some preconceived idea as to) what a Mormon really is.

Plus really, have the Mormons ever been hard to find?! They're always knocking on your door. :)

Seriously, So Blessed!

Lindsay, I finally checked out Seriously, so Blessed! You were right! It is HIL-AR-IOUS! I'm only sorry that I didn't check it out sooner.

For everyone else, "Seriously, so Blessed!" is a blog by a fictitious young newlywed Mormon sister who has the perfect life and wants to share it with the world on her blog. It's only funny if you know someone who is like this. But don't worry I'm sure you know someone that's a match. It's like Legally Blonde for Mormons.

"She" also has some funny t-shirts available to buy. (http://www.seriouslysoblessed.com/t-shirts.html) Here are a couple of them. Unfortunately they are only available in women's sizes. I would buy the Diet Coke one.

LDS Church and Facebook?

Apparently there has been a rumor circulating about the LDS Church possibly purchasing Facebook. Have you ever heard a more absurd rumor? I'm mean really! What would the church want Facebook for? Some kind of covert online proselyting? What's even more funny is that KSL felt the need to report that the rumor was not true.

KSL: LDS Church answers rumors about buying Facebook