Easter

A few months ago, a very sweet 50 something year old woman was baptized into our faith.  One day just before her baptism, we had a lunch date at Applebee’s and she asked me why Mormons don’t wear cross necklaces.  I did my best to sum up this story I’d heard from President Hinckley several years ago.  Here is the exact text:

He told about talking to a Protestant minister following a temple open house. The minister had asked why there were no crosses anywhere if we say we believe in Jesus Christ. President Hinckley answered, “‘I do not wish to give offense to any of my Christian brethren who use the cross on the steeples of their cathedrals and at the altars of their chapels, who wear it on their vestments, and imprint it on their books and other literature. But for us, the cross is the symbol of the dying Christ, while our message is a declaration of the living Christ.’

“He then asked, ‘If you do not use the cross, what is the symbol of your religion?’

“I replied that the lives of our people must become the only meaningful expression of our faith and, in fact, therefore, the symbol of our worship” (“The Symbol of Christ,” New Era, Apr. 1990, p. 4).

President Hinckley further explained, “On Calvary he was the dying Jesus. From the tomb he emerged the living Christ. … Because our Savior lives, we do not use the symbol of his death as the symbol of our faith. But what shall we use? No sign, no work of art, no representation of form is adequate to express the glory and the wonder of the Living Christ. He told us what that symbol should be when he said, ‘If ye love me, keep my commandments’ (John 14:15)” (pp. 6, 7).

This is the thought that’s been going through my mind the most over the last few weeks as we prepared for Easter to come.  I don’t have any personal issues with the symbol of the cross.  I think it’s a very meaningful symbol to help someone be reminded of their faith and their devotion to Jesus Christ.  In my mind, it’s no different than the CTR ring I wear to remind me to “choose the right”.   But just because I wear a CTR ring, doesn’t mean that I don’t have to actually follow through and make good choices.  I also believe that just wearing a cross around your neck is not action enough to guarantee salvation.  You must live the life God expects of a a follower of Jesus Christ.

I’ve also been thinking about whether or not my actions and thoughts adequately declare my testimony of Jesus Christ.  I definitely have room for improvement.  But in the end it all comes down to my family.  I love my husband and I love my kids.  I don’t want to be separated from my family after death.  And at this time of reflection and recommitment, I am recommitting to be better.  To be a better wife, a better mother, a better daughter, a better sister and a better friend.  I will never be able to repay the gift of the Atonement and Resurrection.  But I want to live a life that is worthy of the sacrifice of the most perfect person who ever lived on earth. 

I am grateful to know that Christ lives.  I am grateful to know that if we live our lives worthy of His blessings, we will all be together again as a family for eternity.  I am grateful to celebrate Easter not because Christ died for us, but because Christ lives for us.  To me, it makes this trial we call life, all worthwhile.

Windows, Schmindows

It's not Easter without tulips.  Tulips are my favorite flower. 

We had a wonderful Easter here in AZ.  It was sunny and warm, but not hot.  (We've had years where the "hunt" had to be in the house because it's so warm outside that the chocolate had no hope of surviving.)  

We didn't get dressed up, watched church in our PJ's, (click here for an explanation), and had a delicious ham for dinner.  I love making hams... so easy and no pressure to make sure it's fully cooked, because it comes that way!  I just wish my kids were more excited about ham.  And I dusted off the scrapbooking supplies and worked on finishing my album from our last Maui trip... in October 2006.  Yeah, I know I'm a bit behind...

The biggest news of the day was feeling an Earthquake!  It was little for us, but came from the 7.2 quake in Baja yesterday.  It was the kind that rocks and sways... almost like being on a boat.  And I did get just a touch of queasiness for a minute there.  I always think earthquakes are "cool", but that's because I've never been near the epicenter of one.  I know I shouldn't think they are cool.  I will repent tonight.

I want to upload pictures from Easter, but I'm having difficulties on multiple fronts. 

First, I can't seem to transfer pictures from my camera to the computer without it being a major production.

Second, not all my pictures from Easter even got uploaded, and some of them got dumped into the wrong folder.

Third, Photoshop isn't working right.  My Organizer is a total mess, and un-installing the program last night didn't help at all.... because thanks to my trusty "Missing Manual", when you un-install PSE, you also have to "deactivate" it and erase the "catalog".  Those geniuses over at Adobe are almost too freakin' smart for their own good.  And I'm sure if I have to stoop to calling tech support, I will be routed to India, which will involve a lot of "can you say that again?"s...

Fourth, Blogger, in all it's newness and glory won't upload my pictures directly from my hard drive.  I don't like this at all.  The only way I can get my photos into my blog is by uploading them into an album in Picassa and then transferring them over from there. 

And Fifth, the stickie note program in Windows 7 is cool, but was totally making my speed tank, which in turn caused other programs to freeze up repeatedly.  So no more long-term stickie notes on the desktop for me.

And if one person comments how these problems would NEVER happen with a Mac, I will punch your lights out.

March Madness

Disclaimer: This post is LONG... I decided to lump one 11 day vacation into one post... mostly because I won't have time over the weekend to deal with doing it in pieces....

Here's a brief rundown of how our trip went (I'll save the pie chart for next year....) :

Friday: drove 800 miles from AZ to Bay Area, left 90 minutes later than planned, so we arrived about 2 hours later than planned due to traffic, etc. that we would have missed had we left earlier in the day. Got to my mom's house, wolfed down some Papa Murphy's pizza (not my favorite, but I was too tired and hungry to care...) and ran the kids across town to my sis-in-law's house for a sleepover.

Saturday: slept late (like 8:30) and enjoyed every minute of it! Went to Kohl's with Eric and my mom and dad (and Brayden) and used my dad's 30% off coupon to buy Eric a new suit and I got this:

Eric and I have been in the market for new wedding bands and this one I just fell in love with. I'd seen one online just like it, but was nervous to buy a diamond online. I've been to dozens of stores and just couldn't find one that matched it until now! And yes, it's a certified diamond and it's being sized right now, so you won't get to see it on my finger for a couple more weeks! We then met over at Jeff's house to grab kids and carpool to Oakland to visit the Chabot Space and Science Center. Very fun place and FREE because I bought a membership at our local Science Museum. Gotta Love FREE anything, right!?! The highlight was staying late at night so we could look through the telescopes. We saw an amazing upclose view of the moon and one of the planets. I think it was Venus, but it might have been Mars. Can't remember. If we could have stayed later, we would have gotten to see Saturn. I was bummed we missed that one. I think Saturn is definately my favorite planet. I was also thrilled to see that the museum hadn't phased out Pluto, since it's technically not a planet anymore. Maybe that stupid decision has been reversed and I just haven't heard about it!

Sunday: went to church in my home ward when I was little with Jeff's family. More on that here. Had a very quiet afternoon at my mom's house and spent some time working on geneology with my mom and dad. Of course, this was about the only time all week that I had to read blogs!

Monday: Christy had a mini-reunion at a park with high school friends (see link from Sunday for more on that) and the guys (Eric, Taylor and Grandpa) went and saw 10,000 BC. Megan and Grandma went and got pedicures and French Toast for lunch at IHOP (this is Megan's new favorite restaurant). I took Brayden and Ian with me and grabbed Wendy's to bring to the park. Then we headed for Dublin to visit dear friends - the Daytons. We have lots of dear friends in Dublin, but over the years, the Dayton kids and our kids have just "clicked"... after not seeing each other for a year or more, they can disappear and play and we have to drag them out when it's time to leave.

Tuesday: went and did a session at the Sacramento Temple with both sets of parents. The murals inside the first room were breathtaking. Every beautiful part of the Sierra foothills was painted into those murals. It absolutely blew me away! Then we had lunch at The Old Spaghetti Factory and I had a fantastic burger. It had swiss cheese, real, thick bacon and pesto mayo. Yummm! I did forget to ask the waitress if the bun was sesame free... thank goodness is was! The thought didn't even occur to me until she set my plate down in front of me! Tuesday evening we had dinner with Amy, Kevin and my nephew Ben. It was a fun night and Amy told us all about getting cheap (but very real) pearls in Qatar (where Kevin is going back to on his next deployment) and she took $20 from us to restock us on Kinder Chocoloate (only available at the Travis AFB Commisary)! Megan and Taylor got to go to Mutual and AD's with Ashlyn and Lyndi, which they LOVED!

Wednesday: We went to the movies - Horton Hears a Who.... It was really cute! Very well done and definately a must buy on DVD. We met Elise, Kate, Matt, Grandma W, Ethan and Dallyn there. The adults definately were outnumbered! The rest of the day on Wednesday we hung out with Elise and Alan, Kate and Matt. We all went for dinner at Red Brick Pizza and Alan and Taylor played lots of Guitar Hero!

Thursday: We hung out at Grandma Wanlass' house in the morning with her, Grandpa and Ethan and Dallyn. Then, we all went to a park and taught them how to geo-cache. We made little bags of candy and Eric went around the parks perimeter, hiding each one. Then each kid in the group got to use the GPS to find their own bag of candy. It was a lot of fun! The younger kids were happy to play on the slides and those little boys kept their grandpa busy chasing after them! Then Thursday night for dinner, we went to Jeff and Molly's house. We made tacos and fajitas for dinner. The kids played and all the adults (and teens) watched I Am Legend. I didn't get to see the whole thing, but it's not the most uplifting movie you've ever seen.

Friday: We met everyone (both sides of the family and friends from Dublin) at the Jelly Belly Factory. We've been there several times over the years and I've never seen it like it was on Friday! We waited in a line that took about 90 minutes to get through just to see the tour. But the tour is awesome and well worth the wait. We love the free packet of Jelly Bellys they give you as you leave and we stocked up on Belly Flops for our friends at home. By the time we were done on Friday afternoon, it was time for my brother to get into town from Eureka. Back at my mom's house, we put the kids in matching white t-shirts and took some pictures of them for my mom to hang on her wall. This by far was the best one:

Saturday: All Rossiter relations nearby gathered at the Rossiter Hotel for an Easter BBQ. We had an egg hunt, a pinata (my mom's favorite new tradition), and WAY TOO MUCH FOOD!

Also on Sat, Eric finally made a decision about his wedding band and ordered it. He ordered his online... there were so many great choices, it took him a really long time to decide. It really helped that he showed the pictures to family and got as many opinions as he could. Here's what he finally decided on:

It's made of Carbide Tungsten, which above all DOESN'T scratch. Anyone who knows my husband really well, knows that scratches (on anything, cars, LCD screens, wood, etc.) are one of his BIGGEST pet peeves! I hope the ring is as nice in person as it is in this picture!

Sunday: We went to Sac Meeting with my parents, Adam and Ben. My mom sang in a group of six women and it was gorgeous. Maybe I'm a bit biased, but I think they sounded better than the ward choir. Then Sunday afternoon, Adam and Ben took off for Eureka, my parents took off to have Easter dinner with more family, and we had the house to ourselves for 1 whole hour! Of course, we spent that time packing up and getting ready to leave the next day. Then we dropped the older kids off at Jeff and Molly's house for one last playdate and headed to Fairfield to help Mom W get Easter dinner in the oven and underway. We all gathered at mom and dad's house later after everyone was done with church and had a fantastic ham, garlic red potatoes, a fabulous green salad, rolls, and 3 kinds of dessert. This didn't include another egg hunt for the kids! Taylor finally broke out his airsoft gun and let Ashyln take it for a spin. Someone needs to give that girl some more instruction - she fired off, never hitting a thing, and no one helped her... they all just watched it! Dallyn (age 2.5) was absolutely obsessed with T's gun... after it was unloaded and safe, he ran around the house with it, shooting everyone and everything he could. He was in heaven! We slept over at mom and dad w's the last night before heading home.

Monday: another 800 miles to get home, but we were so glad to be in our own beds, use our own shower and find everything in top notch shape when we returned after what felt like a decade!