Body Worlds 3

Wondering awe!

-"It is only with the heart
that one can see rightly
What is essential
is invisible to the eye."-

I had heard from many people how amazing the production of Body Worlds 3 was. I really wanted to see it and experience it for myself. Last night I got the chance to do just that. I knew I was expecting to see something amazing but I don't think I could have truly comprehended the magnitude of this production without seeing it first hand. The human body is truly amazing in so many aspects. I think the thing that I found most awe inspiring was the way that everything must work together to create a living, working properly functioning body. It encompasses so many things, down to the very tiniest of hair-thin blood vessels that must all work in tandem to sustain life. The process they used to preserve the bodies is called plastination. By injecting a plastic dye into the arteries which then hardens, they were then able to dissect the hardened vessels and display them as they would be in natural form. Amazing. We were able to see how muscles work and how the nervous system is layed out, down to the tiniest nerve endings. My words do not do justice to the complex wonder of it all. I felt after viewing this exhibit that the intricacies, complexities and workings of the body must be of divine inspiration and creation. There could be no other explanation.

Rileys Mission Update

Riley and His Companion on Santa Clara Island

Riley is still serving on the Island of Robinson Crusoe. He is enjoying serving the people of the Island and getting to know them better. The following is a portion of his email that I received today along with some fun pictures.

This week has been a good week here on the island. We have worked hard in service and tried to do our best in teaching.
This week we dug a huge hole ( by hand ) for a septic system. It was actually a lot of fun. It was about 7 feet deep.

Digging a hole for a septic system

We did a lot of teaching this week as well. I am starting to get a little bit worried about Jorge, he leaves to go fishing for three days at a time and we really are not able to find him very often and it is very important to find your investigators if you are going to teach them, if you know what I mean. There is a young kid here in the branch that brought one of his friends to English class, then he brought him to church. It was a lot of fun to see him come to church we are going to see what we can do with his family. Really I don´t want to just baptize a little kid without his parents because they don´t have very much of a chance of being able to endure to the end with out the parents. So that is pretty much our situation here on the island.

Riley and the Seals on Santa Clara

You asked about the island of Santa Clara. (Last week Riley and his companion received special permission to accompany a conservation group to the Santa Clara Island to be interpreters for them. They were the first missionaries to ever visit the island.) We saw a lot of seals and crab and some fish. I haven´t seen any dolphins or whales yet, but they say that this is the season to see them. So we will have to see what happens. That is something I would really like to see. Going to the Island was a really fun service project. We had to get onto the island with these little boats because there are no docks on that island. Well I was the second to jump off, and when I tried to jump the ocean went down like six feet from the rock and I fell in half way! my legs in the water and my upper body hanging onto the rock. Well I am an obedient missionary and I do my exercises in the morning so of course I am physically fit. So I pulled myself up out of the water. It was just funny. Everyone on the boat laughed because the Elder fell in the water. I took a lot of pictures and I am going to try and send you some.
I actually helped my Mamita decorate her tree today and I felt like I was at home. It was a lot of fun.

Amazing light show!

Davies Times

Send your own ElfYourself eCards

Enjoy the small moments

This weekend after cutting down our Christmas tree I was surprised to find that my motivation to put it up and decorate it was not to be found. In years past the requests and pestering could be heard from the moment we would get our tree home. "Lets hurry and and put it up", and then "Let's decorate it NOW"! Despite being exhausted from the outing I would bring the boxes upstairs and start to string the lights. When my children were younger they would eagerly await the completion of the lights and with ornaments in hand begin the hasty placement of each one. After admiring the beauty of the tree, including the coveted placing of the star, we would have family prayer and then tuck the children into bed with a quick story. Then ever so quietly I would begin redecorating the tree so that the decorations would be a little more spaced (one ornament on a branch, instead of four on the same spot) just a little more how I thought it should look.

This year I had no anxious fingers waiting to place their ornaments, no pleading requests to hurry and put the tree up. I took my time and decorated it the way I wanted it, but it just was not the same. I missed the little hands and even the bigger ones eagerly placing ornaments haphazardly on the tree. It really was kind of lonely. In retrospect I wish I would have left those ornaments of years past just as each was placed. I wish I would not have stressed so much and just taken time to enjoy the moment. All too quickly time has passed and little hands have become big hands who now have their own little ones to care for. Enjoy the journey, and the precious memories you are creating. Time goes so quickly (I now you mothers of two year old's are thinking it can't go fast enough) it can and it does! There is no going back except through the moments and memories that we create.