I am so grateful for the Fathers in my life! I have The Best Dad in the entire world! I am so thankful for his teaching, love, patience, guidance, concern, kindness, example, Priesthood, testimony, faith, endless service, amazing strength, knowledge of so many details... I could go on and on! I love you Dad sooo much! Thanks for loving me! Thanks for sacrificing to have a family and work hard to support us! Thank you for teaching me to work, to show respect, to have faith, and to trust in God! Thank you! Thank you still for loving now my children! Thank you for finding opportunities to spend time with us! Working so hard in the hot sweaty sun in the front yard on our waterfall, you don't want to miss it! You in fact, suggest we work on it! Thank you! Thank you for sacrificing even physically not able to walk or stand because you have shoveled so hard and so long! Thank you for allowing and teaching my young people about forming, pouring and even finishing concrete, building and changing the world around them! Thank you! Thank you for teaching by example how to "Put Your Shoulder to the Wheel, and pushing with all your might!" You are a bright example to me and my young people for which I am forever grateful! Then you jump right in and play just as hard! Riding Green Valley loop on your bike, smiling as you watch them each face the challenges on their own levels! You encourage the work, and the play, you join in the rest at the pool and provide the fun of Grandpa in the water as well as the food to help everyone be happy! Thank you Dad! You follow the spirit to help and lift, providing a strong arm, a financial backup, a needed shoulder to cry on! I am so grateful for you! Thank you Dad!
I am thankful for Bradley, the father to my kids! He is so good to me! I am thankful that he honors the Priesthood, serves others, works hard, cares about us! Thank you Brad for having the faith to have a family! Thank you for standing as a witness, even in your own family of the truth! Thank you for being brave enough to go against the odds, and follow the spirit! I don't know how you were brave enough to serve an LDS mission, against all popular activities in your childhood, but you did! Thank you! I know that you didn't put off having a family to complete your education, despite all the odds! Thank you! Thank you for Jed, Liesl, and Chandler all of who we had before Law School! I don't know how you were brave enough to go to law school, but together we did, in fact together as a family we did! Thank you! I honestly don't know that we ever set our hearts on living in St. George, a vacation destination for millions, but we are fortunate enough, with Divine guidance and help, to live here, and not just live, but thrive here! Thank you for not saying that three children was enough and we were done, but for allowing the Hand of God to guide and direct to show us the bigger possibilities of Samuel, Brinley, Sara, and Jakob! Each one with their own challenges and tests! Each one beyond what we thought even possible! You continue to "go where no man has gone before" and you do it in faith, with a positive attitude! Then you volunteer to take on adventures with our family, seeking to reach out and even include others so that our children have opportunities to grow and develop! Adventures like this Ragnar. That was crazy! We - Yes you and I were there as the only adults responsible for I think 23-27 young people! That is CRAZY! Yet, I heard you claim them as your own! Some of those kids we had never even met before they gathered in our driveway on Wednesday afternoon! Yet, I believe each one of them went home having experienced something so strengthening, so deep, so positive in every way it will impact the rest of their lives, and most likely the lives of others in their families! All in the name of helping and serving, of a desire to make sure our kids have opportunities to interact and accomplish hard things with other good young people. We don't find those opportunities handed to our kids, so we create them! Wow! It was amazing! Thank you Brad for being willing to take it on!
I am thankful to my Heavenly Father - his Divine Direction! I am so in awe of the miracles he works in my behalf every minute of every day! Seeing the end from the beginning in brilliant detail to synchronize every facet of my life! Thank you Father! Thank you!
As I participate in difficult, trying opportunities like this weekend, where some teens push for "entitlements" they believe they deserve, I reflect on the wonder of my parents on every level for their patience and goodness in teaching, loving, serving endlessly, providing so many blessings for which I am not entitled or deserving, nevertheless, they give them anyway. I am sure there are so many details I take for granted! I am sure the work behind the details of my life are too numerous to identify! I am thankful for Fathers and Mothers who watch over and help me as I put my feeble arm to the wheel, and do the little that I can to push along! I want to increase in awareness, increase in love, increase in attitude as I serve and give, and to do so as my Fathers do! I know that the gifts and blessings I have been given, were not things I am "entitled to" and yet, I have been the recipient of so much and I want to meet the test of sharing and helping others along the path to return to our Father in Heaven! For the fruit, the blessings he wants to give us are numerous and beyond comprehension, and I sell myself short, thinking I have to hoard, hold back, and protect the gifts which I have been given. Such short sightedness! I wonder what my Heavenly Father calls my attitude. We have labels we put on teens when they act in such selfish ways, how selfish and outright stupid do I act as an adult.? I desire to shed the pride of this world. I desire to love and serve for "In as much as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me!"
Thank you Fathers for teaching, molding, strengthening me! I love you!