Our journey to eternity.

December 29th, 2012 Beau and I decided would be the perfect date to be sealed to our little family.  I had been anticipating this our whole marriage. Both Beau and I were inactive for a very long time, since teenagers. I had a testimony of the gospel that had been collecting dust, and I knew Beau had a testimony as well. It would just take us sometime to get where we needed to be.

It all started in 2010.
Towards the end of my pregnancy with Noah, I had an urge to start going to Church. I realized I would be a mom soon, and I wanted to be the best example to my little baby. I was raised in the Church and I knew I wanted my son to be raised in the Church as well. Beau and I started to go to Sacrament, and then would leave and head back home. We slowly were making our way back to the Church, putting one foot in at a time.

I had delivered Noah and was a new mom. I had so much love for this perfect little being. I couldn't imagine loving anything more than I loved my new little perfect baby. I had so many happy feelings about becoming a parent. I started to think about Noah having to grow older and not be so perfect anymore. I didn't want this little angel to ever have to make a mistake or face any kind of struggle. The thought pained me. I then kind of had my "AH-HA" moment. I instantly felt the spirit and remember crying, it had been a while since I had felt the spirit this strong, it was a feeling I missed. I likened this love I had for my Noah to the love my Savior must have for me. I knew he loved me, but in that moment I had never had anything to liken that love to, until then. I remember feeling so much love from my Father in heaven in that moment. This feeling I had that day was going to help start build my little testimony that had been burning to grow. That night I made a promise to my Heavenly Father that I would start praying every night, to help me know what the right thing was to do and to help me stay close to my Savior.

Going to Church for all three hours was hard. I had a husband that wanted to leave after sacrament to watch football,  and I didn't know anyone in our Ward. It was much easier to go home after the first hour, than it was to stay. It wasn't until weeks leading up to Noah's blessing that I got a phone call from the Bishops office that would change that. They called to ask if I would meet with the Bishop before Church. I immediately got anxiety. What did the Bishop want? I had never met our Bishop personally, why would he want to meet with me? I honestly was scared to death.

I got the the Church for our meeting. He invited me into his office, and asked me if I knew why I was there. I still had no clue. We went on to getting to know each other a little better. He then told me why I was called in to meet with him. He wanted to ask me if I would accept a calling as a Young Women's leader.  I told him that there had to have been a better person for this calling. I told him how inadequate I felt to teach. I myself was just coming back to the Church and learning and building my testimony. I felt there was no way I could teach these girls, when I was the one in need of teaching. This then led into my past, which was led into repenting of my past. He had made this whole process, which I had never even intended on doing, so easy. I was long over due for this and it felt so great. At first it was weird knowing I had never met this man until now, and now he knows all of my past, and that I'm not so proud of past. I told him how hard I was trying to better myself as a wife and a mom and a person. He then asked me if I knew how callings worked. I hadn't. He explained to me that when calling a person, it takes a lot of prayer. They pray that they might know who would be best for that calling, and that they can get inspiration as to who that would be. And that they were inspired to call me. I immediately started crying, I had chills. I knew right in that moment, Heavenly Father was answering my prayers. I accepted the calling. He then told me they would set me apart the Sunday that Noah would be blessed. Timing couldn't have been more perfect.

Through many prayers and stressful studies I would prepare my lessons for Young Women's. I finally had an excuse to go all three periods of Church. I had a calling. This calling helped me grow into our ward and get to know people, it helped my testimony grow and helped me build relationships with both amazing people who were examples to me in this time of my life, and with also my Heavenly Father. I later got to get my patriarchal blessing. Which was also a blessing in itself. So many great things had started to happen to me and my family when I had started to become faithful in my calling and in Church. Beau ended up getting a calling as well, and now he had an excuse to go all three hours. Thank goodness. We also started taking the temple prep classes. I knew and hoped it was in our near future but knew we still had a lot of work to do to get there.

About two years later 2013, I then got pregnant with Hudson, another great blessing. We were so happy. Our family was growing and so was our love and faith.  We were being poured with blessings and it was so easy to see Heavenly Fathers helping hand in it all. Another true testament that what we were doing was right for our family and made us happiest. The minute I found out I was pregnant I knew I wanted Beau to be able to bless our baby. My dad had blessed Noah, which I was so grateful for, but I really wanted it to be Beau this time. I didn't want him to miss out on this opportunity again, and I knew he didn't want to either.

Beau started to prepare himself so he could get the Priesthood. He had only ever been ordained to a teacher before he became inactive, so he had a lot of work to do.  I remember reading through my patriarchal blessing one morning. I read over a part where it had told me my husband would be a worthy priesthood holder. I started bawling. I had read that before but never put much thought into it, knowing Beau had a lot to give up, and a lot to do before that time would come. Never knowing that in such short time this blessing would come true. One of my greatest blessings yet and still one of both mine and my families greatest blessings. I was so grateful to my Heavenly Father in that moment. He had been answering so many of my prayers in these last two short years, and my heart was so overwhelmed with love and gratitude for him.

It was time for us to plan a date to get sealed. I was engulfed with joy and happiness. I remember driving in the car with Beau one day and saying to him, "Is this real? If you would have told me a year ago, we would be where we are today and ready to be sealed, I would have told you you're lying." I was so proud of Beau and for all that he had done leading up to our family's sealing. I was proud of both of us. We had come a long way, and we were the happiest we had ever been.

It was December and I was trying to plan the perfect date. Bucky and Julie were living in Texas at the time and would be coming to St. George for Christmas, We didn't want them to miss it. My sister would also be down from Salt Lake, so we thought Christmas time would be perfect. It would be our Christmas present to one another, and nothing could make a greater Christmas. But this also made it a little stressful, money was tight. We had things we needed to get in order to go through the temple as well as buy Christmas. I was stressing about how we could make it all work, but just knew that if we kept on praying, paying our tithing and choose the right, Heavenly Father would make it all work out. And he did.

Saturday December 29th came and it was the most beautiful day. I was feeling the spirit so strong through out that whole day, and I couldn't have been more at peace. We dropped Noah off to my sisters who would be taking him down to the temple to meet with us when it was time. I had no idea what we were in for, everything was so new to both Beau and I, but we both knew what we were doing was right and we couldn't wait to be an eternal family. All of our close church friends and family came. They were all so happy for us and our journey to get to the temple. There was nothing but happy tears and smiles.  The time came for us to get sealed to Noah. The moment we were looking forward to the most. I remember being nervous because I wasn't sure how Noah would react to everything. Being in an unfamiliar place, and seeing mommy and daddy all dressed up, not to add he was going to be skipping his nap. We were all in the sealing room and that's when our little angel, all dressed in white, entered the room. He truly looked like an angel. He was perfect in every way and grinning from ear to ear. There wasn't a dry eye in that room that day. I can't even describe how second nature this all was to Noah. It was like he knew exactly what to do and what was going on. He didn't question anything. He just had a smile on his face and was perfect the whole time, and what made it even more special is Hudson was there with us as well. The love and spirit felt on this day in that room was so beautiful, and so peaceful. I had never felt more at peace in my life. Our day was perfect, and our family was perfect and now we got to be an eternal family.

I will never forget those beautiful feelings I had on that day.

I am so grateful to my Father in Heaven for being patient with me and for blessing me in a way that he knew was best for me, and was what I needed.
I am so grateful that my two babies chose me to be their mom.
Noah brought us back to the Church, and Hudson brought us to the temple. They are truly my angels, and they make me a better person every day.
I am so grateful for my handsome husband who makes me a better person everyday. I wouldn't be able to make it through this life without him. He has taught me way more than I will ever be able to teach him. He is my rock when I am weak and my light in my life.
I am so grateful for my examples that I am surrounded by, and I'm so grateful for the knowledge that I have and for the peace that it brings me into my life.
And I am mostly grateful that I am a daughter of a Heavenly Father who loves me, and I love him.