The Most Popular Kid

My life really is great. Last Sunday our stake had a special fireside with Tad R Callister himself. Flashback to the MTC when I got to meet him in the flesh and shook his hand for far too long. He spoke about the Book of Mormon, quashing any theories about its origin other than that Joseph Smith  translated it by the power of God.














After practicing post moves at the gym for an hour, I saw Le Petit Nicholas, a hilarious French film. A boy in Nicholas' class gets a new brother and tells him about how his parents were acting weird beforehand and then disappears, as if his parents got rid of him. Nicholas sees the same signs in his own parents when they come up with an idea to get his dad a raise at work, so he has to convince his parents to keep him. I ran into Joshie Boy  and so we enjoyed the film and our juice boxes together.

Thursday is my favorite day of all the days. We had a mission reunion and I was on time and got front row seats and everyone was dressed like missionaries. I was seriously in heaven. PRoney spoke about how in order to be happy we need to love everyone and keep the commandments and how we need to look for opportunities to improve peoples' lives, since we are no longer missionaries. While everyone was standing in line for crepes, I got a tour of the house from Sister Roney (along with a bunch of mission swag) and I love her. Then I talked to everyone there (and confused them by bringing my brother along instead of a lover). Once most people left, I talked to President Roney all about my life and I love him. I stayed there until 11:30 and then exited via his balcony tube slide. I love everything about this night except that it ever ended.

A couple of my teachers messed up their scheduling a bit and so I ended up having 2 tests scheduled for Friday through Monday. Which would have been great except I have AT Clinicals until 6 on weekdays and GC this weekend. Since the testing center closes at 6 on Monday for FHE, I had to take my both tests Friday night. Ugh. But I'm pretty smart, relatively unphased by testing, and they didn't go too badly. Then I watched BYU football crush UCONN (my hometown!) with some friends and Greg's old ZL. Then I caught up with my lovely roommate, Emarie, for the first time in ages. Then I made this movie for Derek's birthday.

Mom came an hour earlier than planned to pick me up, but it was good because my phone was lost and no alarm set that morning and I still needed to pack for the weekend. We watched conference on Derek's huge TV and then shared a meal at Tucanos in celebration of family reunions and birthdays.

Greg hates watching conference with us because we make jokes or comments on occasion. Sorry not sorry. After the second session, we drove to SLC, dropped the boys off at PH and visited the mall. Where we ran into my Canadian mission daughter, Sarah De Oliveira! I like her a lot. She hung out with us for a while and helped us eat some cheesecake. I wish she lived closer.

After sleeping on the most uncomfortable beds and having Weeny K knee me in the butt several times, we went to the morning session at the Conference Center. If you were worried about us arriving on time, don't. We were there before security. That's real life.

We had lunch at Granny B's house (although Papa Bear would have been perfectly happy to let us die of starvation during the afternoon session). We ate a thousand pies and I came home with at least seven of them. I'm expecting to be voted most popular kid in the ward next Sunday.

Also we found this car stethoscope.
Let's hope it's never used on humans.

In light of our continuation of work on our Family History board game, "Guilt", here's a story for you: Derek and I both hate olives. Least favorite of all of the foods ever. So this one time, our Mom (knowing that even at that young age we contained an inhuman amount of hatred for these small, variously colored food poops) proclaimed that we each had to eat one olive in order to get dessert. Naturally, we threw them on the ground while her back was turned. Bowler that I am, mine bounced off the baseboard and rolled neatly under the fridge, where it may or may not have remained until this day. Derek's hit my mom in the foot. She then picked it up, thought it was mine, and made me eat it. Derek got off scott-free and ate his dessert unabashedly. Until tonight, when we made him eat a small fruit that bore an uncanny resemblance to these atrocious excuses for nourishment. #suckstosuck #karma

And here are some messages that I got from conference:

Lawrence, Cook, Hales, Eyring, Clark: Ask, what do I need to change? Then be disciplined. Set goals to improve. Roneyism: Make a specific 20 year plan, goals to get there/be the person your ideal spouse should marry, use all your backbone to get there. 

Holland, Renlund, Nelson, Monson, Rasband: Love people like a mother loves her children. Raise a sin-resistant generation. Roneyism: Love is the key. Look for opportunities to spark people everywhere and always. 

Stephens, Keetch, Uchtdorf: Rules/commandments/gospel are designed for our happiness. Roneyism: If you want to be happy, love everyone and obey the commandments.