My Family History Journey

It has been a great day! I had time today to listen to Talking Scriptures podcast on Doctrine and Covenants 137 & 138. As I have already written about..I am inspired to do better at being curious and asking questions..seeking for personal revelation. Mike and Bryce’s podcast was very enlightening and the following quote by Elder Maxwell really hit me.

On the other side of the veil, there are perhaps seventy billion people. They need the same gospel, and releases occur here to aid the Lord’s work there. Each release of a righteous individual from this life is also a call to new labors. Those who have true hope understand this. Therefore, though we miss the departed righteous so much here, hundreds may feel their touch there. One day, those hundreds will thank the bereaved for gracefully forgoing the extended association with choice individuals here, in order that they could help hundreds there. In Gods ecology, talent and love are never wasted. The hopeful understand this, too.^[34]

My sister, Allison, died of cancer just a few months shy of her 30th birthday. I have never doubted that she had work to do on the other side but this quote adds to that perspective and understanding. She had severe rheumatoid arthritis and maybe her ability to share the Gospel, to be an example and a missionary would have been impeded by her physical limitations if she had continued on this earth bound to her body? It gives me comfort to know that her amazing ability to listen and to teach (she was a trained teacher while on earth) are being utilized in heaven to help bring the Gospel message to a few of those 70 billion.

Bryce Dunford, one of the instructors for Talking Scriptures, shared a story about how he taught a grieving student to think of her deceased father as the one who taught the person in heaven for whom she, the student, was performing vicarious ordinances here on earth. So, today while I attended a sealing session at Oquirrh Mountain Temple, I thought of my grandmothers, Allison, my nieces Taylor and Lila Rose being the ones who are teaching the women who were sealed to their parents today or for whom I will do endowment and initiatory work in the next two weeks. CONNECTION is such a powerful motivator and catalyst for good.

I have also realized that I need help more than ever from the other side of the veil but, they might be too busy teaching the people there to give me much help. I need to do a better job on my side searching, praying and asking for revelation, for dreams that will help me continue connecting people to my Family Tree.

Today I studied more about the redemption of the dead from Doctrine and Covenants sections 137 and 138. I listened to Pres. Ballard’s talk given in October 2018 General Conference titled: The Vision of the Redemption of the Dead. I think sometimes I get too caught up in the many facets of doing Family History and I forget the big picture. The big picture being that redemption of the dead is a key part of the Plan of Salvation and a clear sign of how much Heavenly Father loves each of us. He loves the child born in 600 B.C., the child born in 1300 A.D., as much as He love me.

D & C 138: 23-24:

23 And the saints rejoiced in their ^aredemption, and bowed the ^bknee and acknowledged the Son of God as their Redeemer and Deliverer from death and the ^cchains of ^dhell.

24 Their countenances ^ashone, and the ^bradiance from the presence of the Lord rested upon them, and they ^csang praises unto his holy name.

I am so grateful for the knowledge I have of this magnificent work and the testimony I have that this is truly the Lord’s work…”to bring to pass the immorality and eternal of life of man and women.” I am humbled by the magnitude of this work and the way that it makes life “fair.”

This morning I worked on finding the parents of Hannah McKean, my 5th great grandmother on the Watt side. I didn’t have much success but I will keep trying and praying for help from the other side.

I talked to my sister, Krista, today and she related that she and some of my other siblings had dinner at Dayna, my sister, and Brandon’s on Saturday night. They had a chance to share some memories together with my parents. Quinn, my brother, and Brandon, my brother-in-law, videoed the memory-sharing. I am so excited to see the video and hear the stories.

I just wrote down the story my father-in-law shared with me about a Christmas he had in Phillipsburg, Pennsylvania, while he was serving in the Navy. I need to review it with him and finish it before sharing it.

I am so grateful for this work. It is overwhelming, sometimes difficult and frustrating but, always satisfying and rejuvenating. I know that I am being blessed as I devote some of my time to gathering Israel on both sides of the veil. I have more energy and more focus. I listen to people better. I am learning to step out of my comfort zone. I am better organized and more productive in my use of time.

I think that I want to formalize this hour of Family History so that I have a little more structure. Mondays I will do searching and finding names to take to the temple. Tuesdays I will do more searching to follow up on Mondays names. Wednesdays I will do indexing. Thursdays I will work in Memories uploading pictures, writing stories, exploring. Fridays will be Rootstech, reviewing talks and classes, etc. Saturdays will be exploring Activities section and involving others in my FH. Sundays I will work on my personal life story.

Today using Ordinance Ready tab, 5 names were found for me to do Initiatory work on this Thursday. I need to help my mother-in-law find 5 names to take also. I think we also have sealing appointment that day at 4 pm. I already have 6 names for sealing ordinances and 1 endowment which is next week on Dec. 8.

I reviewed the names for initiatory today and they are women who were wives of my cousins 3 or 4 times removed. Some lived in the States and others in England and Scotland. One of them was born in Scotland but died in Singapore. That sounds like quite a story.

One of the talks in church yesterday was on Family History and the speaker, Bro. Padilla, said that it is estimated over 110 billion people have lived on the earth. We have a lot of work to do! What an amazing task to connect all of those people to the Family tree of the earth! No wonder Pres. Nelson has said that gathering scattered Israel is the most important work we can be involved in at this time.

It has been 21 days since I started this iteration of my journey! I have missed posting only 1 day! I am pretty excited about the changes I am experiencing in my life. I have become a weekly temple attendee. I notice more people around me being interested in Family History..I am not claiming that it is my influence that has caused that. I know it is the Spirit of Elijah working to encourage all people whatever their religious beliefs to seek for connection to the past, to hear and tell stories, and to share love and concern.

This holiday weekend has been so memorable! Jessica, my oldest daughter, was here for Thanksgiving Dinner and the whole weekend. I hadn’t planned on her at all because she had to work on Thanksgiving Day but one of her co-workers volunteered to work her shift! It was so wonderful to see her walk in the door on Thursday afternoon. I think it was a blessing from the Lord. Nicole came home for Thanksgiving also and she helped me with pie-making on Wednesday and a lot of cooking on Thursday. Samantha helped out a lot with cooking and running errands on Thursday. We got to spend time with Cassandra on Friday and Saturday.

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Last night, all of our girls, Gil, Dan (Samantha’s boyfriend) and I met at Schmidts Christmas Tree Corner and picked out a Christmas tree. That has long been a family tradition to buy a fresh-cut Christmas tree. The girls will run around the lot in between the trees playing hide and seek whatever the weather. There was no running around last night but we were all together and got a picture together. The tree is still in the garage and not decorated but we will get to that tomorrow night hopefully. We have never bought our Christmas tree this early but we were all together and it seemed important to do.

Tonight, I had the opportunity to listen to Gil senior tell about playing Santa Claus for a family in Phillipsburg, Pennsylvania when he was in the Navy. I wish I would have recorded it on Family Search. I am going to write it up and then have him edit it and maybe then I can get him to record it while reading it.

I have learned a lot about using this blog and I know I have a lot to learn but it is coming. This week I will be getting up at 4:15 to do my Family History. I do so much better in my day when I give my best to the Lord early in the day.

Well, I made it almost 3 weeks without missing a post until yesterday. I did post my Day #18 late because of some issues with uploading the media files. On Friday, Day #19, I didn’t get my hour of Family History done in the morning. Then right after I finished work we left for bowling with the Parkins. I fell into bed later that night exhausted.

Today has been a great day! Jess, Samantha and Dan went with Gil and me and we climbed Squaw Peak in Utah County. We had a lot of fun and made some great memories.

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Hiking is something my family and I greatly enjoy doing together. We have hiked in Zion National Park, Bryce National Park, Yellowstone National Park, Grand Staircase Escalante National Monument, Grand Teton National Park, Grand Canyon National Park as well as numerous state parks in Nevada, Utah and Idaho. We have never taken our girls to Disneyland but we have amazing memories of some of the most beautiful places on earth.

I didn’t write on this day. It was extremely busy with work and then time with the Parkins at the bowling alley and I was exhausted when I got home.

Wonderful day making memories with my family on Thanksgiving Day. Nicole and Samantha did the Utah Human Race with Gil and Nicole’s friend, Owen. I had to work and so I didn’t do the race so I could start work at 7:45. My plan was to be done with my list by 3:30 and I was pretty close, got done at 4:10.

Nicole and Samantha and Gil did last minute grocery shopping and cooking. They really worked well together though it got stressful at times. One of the best moments of the day came around 2:20 when Jess walked through the door!! I hadn’t been expecting her because she had told me.she had to work on Thanksgiving. Apparently, a co-worker wanted to work so she switched shifts and decided to surprise us. It has been wonderful to have her here. Liz came with her and had dinner but then Liz had to go back k for an appointment tomorrow. Jess is staying until Sunday.

We had a very nice Thanksgiving dinner at Steve and Tracy’s home. It was so nice to see nieces and nephews that I haven’t seen much lately. Some us played the game Relative Insanity,..very fun game that made me laugh a lot.

It is so fun to hear memories shared between siblings, cousins, in -laws, etc.. Especially while eating such good food prepared with love.

Today I got a chance to make some history or rather memories with my daughter, Nicole, and my mother-in-law, Brenda. We spent afternoon making apple, cherry, and pumpkin pies. I have been helping my mother-in-law make pies for many years. I use my Grandma Baldwin’s Never Fail Pie Crust recipe that truly has never failed for me. Sometimes the pie filling isn’t good but the crust is always light and flaky.

It is fun to see the way Nicole enjoys making pies. She did some great designs this time leaves, hearts, turkeys, braided crust, lattice crust..she even made a smiley face on one of the cherry pie. I will post some pictures tomorrow.

I also got to talk to Brenda about her holiday memories. I was driving at the time so I couldn’t write things down. I am going to try and use the record feature in Memories tomorrow. Brenda talked about sharing Thanksgiving dinner with many of her Brady family relatives. They actually lived on the same street in a little enclave in the Fort Union area called Bradysville. She didn’t remember a specific dish that was her favorite but she remembers not liking bread pudding or head cheese. Brenda told me that she wishes she had written down her mother’s recipe for some sweet pickle/relish that she loved to eat but hasn’t been able to find a recipe for it.

This conversation made me realize that I really need to write down some of the recipes that my family likes and that I like of my mother’s and my mother-in-law’s or those favorites will be lost.

We also made Grandma’s macaroni and cheese casserole and cooked sweet potatoes for sweet potato casserole and those who eat plain sweet potatoes.

Today I went to the Jordan River Temple and did sealings. I did them for cousins living in the 18th century in British Colonial America and Alsace, France and Indiana. I love hearing the words of the sealing prayers.

Nicole just got home from Dixie State University with a couple of friends. They are eating the white bean corn tomatillo soup I made this evening. Nicole was welcomed home with the first snowfall in the valley of the season.