January the rest of it

So me and my family have been working on quilt squares to make a blanket for my dad. This process started back in November and I finally got it finished and mailed off to my dad. He loved it and sleeps with it at night. 

Everyone drew a square and did a great job. Just a few of them...

I captured Paisley's hand and foot print and this was her square. 

Ashley had an idea to do a cartoon because she knew that my dad likes them. These are two guys after a hunt and it says "Great hunt! Lets go eat!" and the other guy says "Hang on! I gotta post this on my wall..." (since my dad likes Facebook)

Taylor's decided to do a cartoon too and his shows a scene in a pet store and then cat has two fake legs in the background and you see a piranha in a fish bowl in the foreground. 

This month was Jeff's annual kickoff awards dinner. He made agent of the year this year! (There is about 120 agent in the Inland Empire that he was competing with)  We did some last minute shopping to get me a sparkly dress and away we went. 

Jeff got a few awards. 

Congratulations! So proud of him. 

I've enjoyed getting to know some great people at New York Life over the years. 

Citlali and her husband Jacob put on a good night. 

Jeff's award for agent of the year is this statue of a bear fighting a bull. 

Meanwhile the Taylor's took Ashley to Castle Park for some mini-golf.

Ashley being a rebel as she's sitting on the rope that clearly says "don't sit on the rope" ha ha. 

I've been doing some sewing and crocheting for charity as I wait for my surgery date. One of the things I've made are bereavement quilts for Kaiser. I like them because they are small like doll quilts and I can use my leftover scraps and do something productive with them. 

The other project I did was crocheting red baby hats for the American Heart Association. I dropped them off so they would be ready to deliver to hospitals in February. 

Ashley, Kate, Kristin and I got to do a Disney day one day when the kids didn't have school the next day. I keep forgetting we have the passes! Even though there are a lot of blocked out days we've been able to get some use out of them which is fun. 

I don't know what is going on with our hair in this picture but it's pretty hilarious. 

Jeff and I scored some Hamilton tickets this month. They were impossible to get in New York and expensive in LA. We saw them in San Diego with the traveling group which was still expensive but not as bad. We went with the Bagleys and had a great time. 

We ate dinner right on the water in San Diego before the play. 

On Facebook people kept asking where this was in New York, ha ha.

We loved Hamilton!

The music was great and it was fast paced throughout. Fun night.

Taylor went on a hike with his running club buddies. They ended up getting the cars stuck in the snow on the first trail that they went to and had to go to another one. 

Ashley got to go to Mormal this month and had her first date. 

The cousins came over to help her get ready. 

It was a group effort! Jenae did her makeup, Jolene braided her hair and Elsa curled it. They did a great job!

Ashley went with Brigham. They are just friends but they've known each other since they were little and they hang out in the same group of friends so it was perfect that they went together.

The funnest part was they wanted to recreate a picture of Ashley's Dad and Brigham's aunt when they went to a dance together when they were teenagers. Small world!

They went with a bigger group to the dance. Sadly the group didn't want to stay at the dance long and Ashley and Brigham were having fun when they said it was time to go. 

After all the dress shopping, prepping and everything they ended up only staying at the dance for about an hour :(     That's OK they will just have to go with their group of friends next year!

Exciting for Janell's family. Levi their youngest was baptized this month. 

January 29, 2018

Hello Family!

      That's no fun that ash had to leave Mormal early! But it's alright though, because Mormon Prom is much more fun. It's fun talking to these Utah missionaries about school dances, they're so innocent. My companion said at his school dance had someone doing suggestive dance moves, and they we're physically taken out of the dance. If only California was like that haha.

      Last week was not so fun for me... well just the beginning. I got really sick Monday night, and stayed in Bed all day Tuesday. After lots of medicine and sleep i felt good enough to go out the next day. I felt super bad, because I haven’t been immobilized by a sickness my whole mission, and i wanted to go out. But we called our mission nurse and she told me to stay in. It was funny because they next day i was giving a training at a meeting, just a district meeting, and i was very out of it. I don't remember what happened at all in it, but i heard i did pretty good!

      The snow has all melted, and now we're getting rain! This is the exciting part of the year, when there's usually 1-2 thunderstorms a week! It's nice having different seasons out here. It makes every month unique. 

      Work wise, big things are happening here! This ward hasn't had a baptism since last May, and we have 3 people we are working with who are progressing greatly towards baptism! One of the big problems, is there is a big disconnect with the ward council and the missionaries. There was an incident right before i got here which lost much of the trust with members. We've been slowly rebuilding it, and we are even meeting with the bishop soon to discuss what we can do to help him. We are hoping we will get the members much more involved in the work coming soon. As zone leaders, we meet with the stake president every fast Sunday, so this next Sunday we are going to discuss how to help the ward councils. 

      Something I’ve been focusing on a lot recently is the Doctrine of Christ. It's really something amazing to look deeply into. I've been studying the parable of the sower, and the roots it describes is the Doctrine of Christ. I makes me appreciate the Book of Mormon even greater now as i've learned and understood how big a role, faith, repentance, making and keeping covenants, having a close relation with the Holy Ghost, and enduring plays in our eternal progression. It has been explained to me recently that the plain and precious truths lost in the Bible was this Doctrine. This is the message we declare to the world, and we have it because there was a restoration. Understanding this has made my desire to share this with others, become much greater. It's something I wish I would’ve understood earlier on the mission, but i guess that's why I'm here.

      Sadly, my time to be on the mission is closing very quickly. It has come to my attention that if i am going to try and apply to some other schools, it probably should be soon. So if yall could find my transcripts, and anything else you need to apply, Within the next couple months, i will be starting the applications. It's sad to think this is coming so quickly, but I’m glad to know that a mission does not have to end when you go home. I may not be teaching repentance and baptizing converts, but it will still be my job to establish the church. I love you family! Have a great week!  

-Elder Beaulieu