Mission Call

My little brother,

Elder Dustin Shane Swanger,

has been called to serve,

in the

Tulsa Oklahoma

Spanish speaking mission!!

He reports to the MTC on Aug 4th.

Woo hoo.

Life Lessons

These are my beliefs & lessons that I've learned,

and will probably continue to learn my whole life long.

We are all here on earth to learn. Our loving Heavenly Father sent us to "this mortal probation [which] is a perfectly arranged test" (All These Things shall give thee Experience, Neal A. Maxwell). We are tested and tried and to prove ourselves and become as God is. We all have hard times- or trials, it's universal. Although the trials vary person to person. These trials are meant to help us learn, help us grow and become better people.

Trials are interesting. They affect us in different ways, and invoke different reactions. There are many common reactions to trials including trying to run away, look for an easy button and lastly face it and fight. I've learned that when you run away there's no where to hide. Your problems follow you, they don't disappear when you close your eyes. I've learned that there's usually no easy way out. "If it's not fair, it's not a true trial. Whit out irony, inexplicableness and injustice it may not stretch us sufficiently" (Maxwell). If we could just wave a wand and "abra cadabra" they all go away, we wouldn't learn anything. Then later we'd find that we were what needed to the fixing, and the trial the method.

"Life is a school of experience" (Maxwell). I am learning that trials all have lessons attached to them. We may not see them or we may choose to take the "woah is me" road and host a pity party. I am learning to trust my Heavenly Father. He knows best. He knows me. He knows exactly what I need and when I need it.

C.S. Lewis said in his book Mere Christianity:

Imagine yourself as a living house, God comes in to rebuild that house. At first, perhaps, you can understand what he is doing. He is getting the drains right and stopping the leaks in the roof and so on; you knew that those jobs needed doing and so you are not surprised. But presently He starts knocking the house about in a way that hurts abominably and does not seem to make sense. What on earth is He up to? The explanation is that He is building quite a different house from the one you thought of- throwing out a new wing here, putting in an extra floor there, running up the towers, making courtyards. You thought you were being made into a decent little cottage, but He is building a palace."

Besides the painful remodeling with trials, I need to trust the Lord's timing. And it may take me a lifetime to learn, but I'll sure try. I've seen a few times in my life when things happened on the Lord's time table and not mine- and for reasons I wouldn't understand until later. For example the Lord prompted Joseph and I to start our family- instead of a family we've endured miscarriages & surgeries. But Doctor's wouldn't have known anything was wrong with me, reproductively. It's been almost two years since our 4th miscarriage we're still childless- then my husband lost his vision. It has been a blessing in disguise that we don't have kids while adjusting to our new life, I feel it would be so hard on us & definitely kids, if we had kids. I don't know where we'll be in a year, I don't know what we'll be doing. But I do know that things will work out, all will be well...

eventually.

*J&S*

Boo! ** update**

His mission call didn't come today!

**Update: His call left the office of the President, on the 14th!!**

We found this out because it was ward conference. And the bishop and stake president were apparently making faces at my brother, who then texted both of them. "no call yet" During the meeting!! The Stake President responded 1st with "I'll check" The Bishop responded later " Can't wait!" We got a call later that afternoon, letting us know the whereabouts of his call.

I still have absolutely no guess.

Which is funny.

And frustating to my brother,

so we've agreed that I will be trying to pull a Johnny Carson:

put his call up next to my head and make my guess then.

My Uncle is famous!

Sam Lincoln is Uncle Mick, That's awesome!! So funny!!

Saving our Garden!!

One Morning Val comes busting into the room.

"I need your cat,

there are hundreds of birds outside in the garden, eating it!"

"okay.."

Our silly cat sees the birds,

flattens herself into the grass (to be sneaky, I'm sure).

Then proceeds to do the slowest slow motion army crawl in the direction of the birds.

No help at all!

So we let Cookie outside to take care of the birds, instead she turns around and sits on the step and looks at us like "why did you kick me out"

So lets get the big dog, he'll get them for sure!

We send Tonka out.

He also sits on the step and looks at us through the door with a sad face...

Come on!

So Val and I grab the BB gun and air soft and shoot at the birds.

Problem solved.

Cookie Speckles & Tonka

Where in the World?...

Will this little Brother of mine go on a mission?

From Joseph & Shaylee

His papers are (finally) in. He should have his call by next Thursday.. Any guesses?