In a world where womanhood, motherhood, and feminism are often discussed by opinionated and conflicting voices, I’m constantly pondering questions about a woman’s role in society. Do I need a career to make a valuable contribution to the world? Is my service at home looked down upon? How can I balance homemaking with raising with my children? When my children are grown, what will be my work? What is a woman’s role in the church? I found inspiration and answers to questions this week when I learned about my female ancestors’ membership in the Relief Society of Nauvoo. Relief Society is an...
LDS General Conference is coming up! Here are two free, printable activities you can do with your kids using photos of the general authorities as children. As you know, I love making coloring pages of our family and ancestors from photos, so I thought this would be a fun way to do the same for a conference activity to help my kids learn that the apostles were kids once, too. Have you read Kid Presidents? I would love to see a “Kid Prophets” or similar book with stories of the prophets and apostles as children. (Maybe one already exists.) Children...
At the recent LDS General Conference, general authorities of the LDS church spoke about worship, Jesus Christ, faith, and family. Like last time, I listened specifically for guidance relating to family history. Here are six talks that give nuggets of inspiration to help us go forward in our family history efforts. 1 – No Greater Joy Than to Know That They Know By Elder K. Brett Nattress Of the Seventy Elder Nattress asked us to ponder about the greatest gift we can give our children. There are many things I would like to give my children – an upbringing full of love and learning, a financial inheritance,...
Elder Quentin L. Cook talked about the joy of doing family history work and preparing for the temple in his April 2016 General Conference talk, “See Yourself in the Temple.” I’ve created a family home evening lesson plan that you can use with your family to discuss this important topic. “The combination of increased numbers of temples and advanced technology to fulfill our sacred family history responsibilities for our ancestors makes this the most blessed time in all history.” – Elder Cook Elder Cook challenged us to “honor the Savior and make any necessary changes to see ourselves in His...
In the recent LDS General Conference, church leaders spoke about a wide range of topics that comforted, taught, and inspired us. Many of the talks focused on personal conversion and our relationship with the Savior. Many other messages were about strengthening families and how we can improve our relationships with each other. As a family history consultant in my ward, the insights shared about why we should do family history research and proxy temple work for our ancestors especially stood out to me. Here are twelve of the lessons I drew from the messages that pertained to family history: 1 – We can...
In October 2014 General Conference, Elder Allan F. Packer spoke about family history in his talk, “The Book.” He said, Like partaking of the sacrament, attending meetings, reading the scriptures, and saying personal prayers, doing family history and temple work should be a regular part of our personal worship. He spoke about this on February 14, 2015 at the Family Discovery Day as well: Last year, our theme was “Igniting Interest in Family History,” and we introduced the “spiritual passport,” which encouraged members to begin collecting the stories and information that would help them and their ancestors qualify for eternal...
Elder Holland’s beautiful talk about mothers today made me think of all the generations of mothers that have gone before me. It is staggering to think about the lifelong carrying that all of them have done throughout time to make my existence possible. It is not only the prenatal carrying but the lifelong carrying that makes mothering such a staggering feat. Speaking directly to mothers, Elder Holland said: Thank you to all mothers everywhere for giving birth, shaping souls, forming character, demonstrating the pure love of Christ. Thank you for your crucial role in fulfilling the purposes of eternity. Be peaceful, believe...
Elder Hugo Montoya spoke during the afternoon session of General Conference today about bearing one anothers’ burdens. One way to do that is to go the second mile. “The Savior said, ‘Whosoever shall compel thee to go a mile, go with him twain.’ As an example, we are asked to attend the temple regularly, as our individual circumstances allow. Attending the temple requires a sacrifice of time and resources especially for those who have to travel a great distance. “Nevertheless, this sacrifice could be considered part of the first mile. We will be walking the second mile when we...
