Brent bought me a new coverlet for my birthday. Isn't it nice! It came with pillow shams too and I like that it is white because it matches my bedroom trim better.
Here I am at 17 years old. This is my graduation picture. It has been 37 years since I had this picture taken. I just celebrated my 55th birthday. I wanted to take a moment to reflect on all the changes I have seen in my life and name a few of the many, many blessings I have received. It was during my Senior year of high school that I began to write to the missionary Brent Barlow. I had a boy friend at the time, Bruce Ledger who was wearing away at my virtue. Asking to write Brent on his mission was inspired by Heavenly Father to help me retain my virtue. During the first year of Brent's mission I broke up with Bruce and graduated from HS and began at Goldenwest Junior College, in Huntington Beach, California. Brent became my best friend and I have never ceased to be grateful the Lord brought us together and that we were able to be married in the temple. We set many goals for our future family, writing back and forth during firesides. One of them was that our sons would be Eagle Scouts. Another was our sons would go on missions. One of the couple goals we set was that we would keep our marriage strong and would put each other first. Our children would attain higher than HS education and all marry in the temple to spouses the Lord had ratified. We moved to Montezuma Creek, Utah before we were married a year because we wanted me to be able to stay home and raise our children. We didn't know it at the time, but this decision would effect our entire family. 1)the lessons I learned in Montezuma Creek, population barely 300, would be a great foundation for me 2)the choice we made to put our children first would make it possible for us to achieve our goals that we set.
Our goals have all been reached! What a blessing to us that has been. We took the Lord at his word, had family prayer, family scripture study and FHE, tried to keep all the commandments and the Lord made it possible for us to reach our goals. Our children and their families are our greatest blessings, they have brought us the most joy in this world and we can never thank the Lord enough for blessing us.
My face has changed a lot, much time has passed since this picture was taken, but life has just gotten better and better and you know what? I have discovered that you can always trust the Lord, always.
5 comments:
I like how the goals for your children only involved your sons, the daughters were not worth any investment. I guess that puts Jen and Becky on the bottom two of the favorite list.
Having our children get higher education involved the girls, didn't it Ryan and getting married in the temple to the right person....I think you should read more carefully before commenting.
xxxoo
Mom
Thank you for posting the pictures of your new coverlet. It looks nice in there! I had a realization from your 17 year old picture. Stephanie has a lot of the same facial features. It is a very beautiful picture.
I love your new bedding! I'm glad you up and at-um enough to blog again. Keep getting better. I'm glad you guys not only had goals but you finished them!
Jen
Syl, that is kind of a scandalous little outfit for your picture. I think that you look great, but it is no wonder that you were having issues with retaining your virtue.
What an exciting and inspiring time it must have been in writing to Brent. I think that is so great that you set goals for your family, as well as your marriage. And it sure looks like things worked out well for you in that department.
I like the way that your bedding looks all put together in your new and recently transformed bedroom. I hope that the DVD player has been the comfort that you were looking for during the recovery. Just so you know Gwen has been talking to you on her play phone everyday, and today she talked to Papa too.
We are thinking of you, and I am glad to hear that you had a good birthday.
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