Conference Bingo

 

(Side note: next time I do a giant conference bingo I will only do a 10 by 10 as a 14 by 14 is still a little large for getting bingos or even black out...I also gave an individual bingo prize to everyone each time they marked 5 words during conference)

 

For conference we all made up Bingo sheets and as we listened we came up with lots of words you can use for conference bingo. At our house when you get a bingo you get a piece of candy. With all these words I also made a GIANT conference bingo to work on together and have everyone mark them with their own individual color. The top picture is individual conference bingo and the bottom picture is giant conference bingo or collaborative conference bingo. I wanted to share this list with my friends and family so that they too could take advantage of it while conference is on this weekend! Enjoy!

(He) Lives

Aaronic

Acceptance

Addiction

Adversity

Age

Agency

Alma

Amen

Ancestors

Anchor

Angels

Answer

Apostles

Appreciation

Atonement

Authority

Baptism

Beginning

Belief

Belong

Bishop

Blessings

Bodies

Book of Mormon

Bread

Brothers

Build

Calm

Caring

Celestial

Change

Charity

Chastity

Cheer

Children

Choir

Christians

Church

Clean

Comfort

Commandment

Compassion

Conference

Confidence

Contention

Contrite

Conversation

Counselors

Courage

Covenants

Created

Crucifixion

Cry

Darkness

Daughters

Day

Dead

Desire

Devil

Devotion

Disciple

Discouraged

Doctrine and Covenants

Earth

Education

Elders

End

Equal

Errand

Eternal

Eternal Life

Evening

Evil

Exalted

Example

Faith

Family

Fasting

Father

Fear

Feast

Forgiveness

Fortune

Foundation

Freedom

Friends

Fruit

Garden

Gate

Gethsemane

Gift

Glory

God

Good

Gospel

Grace

Gratitude

Great

Growth

Guidance

Guilt

Hands

Happiness

Harvest

Head

Healing

Heart

Heartfelt

Heaven

Heavenly Father

Help

High Priest

History

Holy Ghost

Home

Honest

Hope

Humanity

Humility

Humor

Husband

Hymn

Immortality

Industrious

Inspiration

Jerusalem

Jesus Christ

John the Baptist

Joseph Smith

Joy

Judgment

Justice

Keys

Kindness

Kingdom

Kneel

Know

Knowledge

Laman

Leaders

Learn

Lemuel

Life

Lifted

Light

Lives

Lord

Love

Marriage

Marry

Mary

Master

Meat

Media

Melchizedek

Members

Men

Mercy

Mind

Ministry

Miracles

Mission

Missionaries

Morning

Mortal

Mortality

Mosiah

Mother

Music

Nations

Neighbors

Nephi

New Testament

Night

Nurturing

Obey

Old

Old Testament

Opportunities

Ordinances

Organization

Overcome

Parents

Partners

Patience

Paul

Peace

Pearl of Great

Perfect

Perfection

Peter

Pioneers

Plan

Ponder

Poor

Power

Prayer

Preach

Price

Priesthood

Primary

Prize

Proclamation to the World

Procreate

Promise

Prophecy

Prophets

Pure

Quorums

Rebellion

Received

Redeemed

Redeemer

Rejoice

Renewal

Repent

Repentance

Rescue

Restitution

Restoration

Resurrection

Revelation

Righteousness

Risen

Rock

Sacrament

Sacrifice

Saints

Salvation

Sand

Satan

Save

Savior

Scriptures

Sealed

Search

Serenity

Service

Shelter

Sin

Sisters

Son

Soul

Spirit

Spiritual

Stakes

Steadfast

Storm

Strength

Strong

Study

Symbol

Teacher

Teachings

Temple

Temptation

Testimony

Thanks

Thomas S. Monson

Time

Tithing

Tolerance

Traditions

Transgressions

Trials

Trust

Truth

Unique

Virtuous

Vision

Ward

Warnings

Wars

Water

Weak

Week

Widow

Wife

Witness

Women

Work

World

Worth

Years

Young

       Zion

The Humble Christ Child.

 

While moping my kitchen floor in preparation for Christmas day a thought came to my mind that brought tears to my eyes and a greater appreciation for why we celebrate this blessed day. Many of you like me are probably getting the last minute things done such as buying those last gifts, making and delivering treats for neighbors, and cleaning the house. The house cleaning is my main goal for today.

How different that first Christmas was from today. My house will most likely end up being "good enough" when the exhaustion sets in tonight, but it will still be mostly clean and it will be safe for my children. Already it is much cleaner than it normally is on any other day. Yet when I think about the first Christmas night I realize that there was no "nesting" done in order to prepare for the birth of the new baby. Can you imagine bringing a baby into the world, wrapping them in a blanket & laying them in hay used by animals? The idea is unheard of and yet every year we celebrate the birth of a baby who came into the world this way.

Joseph and Mary's humility amazes me. Never did they fight for a proper setting for the birth of a king. They humbly took what was offered them and went on with the task of bringing our Savior into this world. I imagine they were gracious and grateful for a place to bring this child into the world not matter how humble the setting.

So as I prepare my home for jolly old Saint Nick I hope that I remember that while I am blessed to live in a clean, heated, beautiful home of modern convenience the most important part of this Christmas season is that our Father in Heaven sent us the gift of his perfect son. His perfection was not in how clean his surrounding were or whether there was a bow on the frankincense and myrrh or not. His perfection came in how he loved so perfectly His brothers and sisters and how perfectly He followed the will of His father. Perhaps that is what we should finish off our year with and how we should start the next year. Maybe that will change the world in all the ways it needs to be changed. Maybe all we need is to love our Father and His son and all His children just as perfectly as we can. Then when we do make mistakes we can repent and try a little harder tomorrow to do our best yet again. Merry Christmas brothers and sisters!!!

Love,
   Marlies

Being cared for by the Lord: Modern Day Miracles

This is a hard post for me to write. Maybe I am prideful. Perhaps it could be I don't want to admit my struggles. Either way I feel a need to share how my personal testimony of faith has grown in the past three months. Perhaps the hardest part about writing this is knowing how much to share. I have always lived my life with an open book kind of policy and my husband has not so out of respect for him I have to be cautious.

In Malachi 3:10 it says, "Bring ye all the tithes into the storehouse, that there may be meat in mine house, and prove me now herewith, saith the Lord of hosts, if I will not open you the windows of heaven, and pour you out a blessing, that there shall not be room enough to receive it." There are very few places where the Lord tells us to test him, but this is one of them. My little family has been blessed over the past three months as we have "tested" the Lord by working harder at being more diligent in paying our tithes and offerings.

We, as many others, have struggled in this economy to meet our financial obligations. It is amazing to me that as we have been able to cut some of the debts out and I have been blessed to pick up a job watching kids that we have not seen an increase in our spending money whatsoever. I am baffled that we were able to pay the other bills we were previously paying. Either way we have been greatly blessed to be able to make ends meet as well as we have.

This summer we had a few mistakes that ended up with some excessive overdraft fees at the bank. We worked hard to fix them, but it seemed like no matter how hard we tried we just could not catch up. Just when we'd think clear sailing was around the corner we'd end up with something new that we couldn't figure out how to fit in the budget. The never ending cycle was wearing on our mental health and Kent and I were struggling to be kind to one another. We were both stressed to our limits. Then the first miracle happened.

In September I was stressing about how we were going to get a large bill paid that was coming up in October. I opened up the bill expecting it to show an owing balance and to my surprise it showed a negative in front of the total we owed. Not only did it show a negative it was negative about 2 months worth of payments. I was quite perplexed and then I was worried. What if it says that, but I am misunderstanding what I am reading. I'd better call. So I did and to my delight the woman on the other end said, "yes it is showing that you have a credit of...." She went on to explain that I would not owe a balance until December 1st. I clarified that with her again and was thrilled to finally see a light at the end of the tunnel. I was amazed that my call had not put her on alert. I had figured that someones payment had been credited to my account and they would be quick to search for the error, but she acted as if it was no big deal so I was not going to convince her otherwise.

As December 1st rolled around I was again expecting to get the bill and although we had climbed out of the whole we had got ourselves into I was still not certain how we were going to pay this bill. When the bill arrived I was stunned again. I had expected to see the negative gone and it was, but I had not expected to owe a $0.00 balance. I do not know how it happened; computer error, human error, an unknown donor? I do not know! This is what I do know. It was a miracle from God. God sent us a huge sum of money in a way that made sense to us. God took care of us when we were struggling to care for ourselves.

Again a few weeks ago we were short being able to pay the mortgage on time and I did not want to have to wait until payday and end up with an expensive late fee. We were blessed to find out Cort needs glasses, but we didn't have the money for the glasses as well as the entire sum for the mortgage. Again we were blessed. I had the faith and asked God to help me know how I could pay for the mortgage on time. With 5 separate deposits we were blessed to receive we were able to pay the mortgage on time and even get all the bills paid up to our next pay day. I am so thankful this fall the Lord saw fit to bless my family and to teach me at least 2 very valuable lessons.

#1. When we pay our tithing the Lord really will, "open you the windows of heaven, and pour you out a blessing, that there shall not be room enough to receive it." I am amazed at all the little ways the Lord has blessed us as well. People asking if we needed this or that and it being exactly the thing we needed to buy, but weren't finding the money for. He really does take care of those who place their trust in him. Lesson #2. We may think we take care of ourselves and our families, but really it is the Lord who takes care of us when we allow him to. The political catch phrase of the day is, "you didn't build that, the government did." Perhaps there is a half truth in that. We didn't build anything...the Lord did. We only do what the Lord has allowed us to do. We are eternally indebted to him. While we can never truly pay him back I hope that we as a country will at least try. We owe him so much!

Merry Christmas 2012

Dear Friends and Family,

The end of 2012 is here and apparently the end of the Mayan calendar also. Of course we are confidently looking forward to 2013 and all the learning and growth it will bring. As I look back on 2012 we truly have been blessed. Just to fill you in here are our top 12 of 2012.

12. “Heart Attack” (FYI not a real one) for Kent &; I love you stickers for Marlies on Valentine's Day

11. 1^st Snowman for our front yard here at this house

10. University of Utah gymnastics! We even got to enjoy a long anniversary date for the Pac-12 Championships.

9. Spring, Summer & Fall flowers that made beautiful flower arrangements for us to enjoy!

8. Braxton played T-ball and got to attend a T-ball clinic with the Salt Lake Bees.

7. We got the opportunity to teach Braxton about the Olympics and we all enjoyed watching.

6. Braxton lost his 1^st tooth in July!

5. Braxton turned 6 and moved onto the 1^st Grade...

...Cort turned 2!

4. Kent planted a garden, Braxton watered it, 

and we all weeded & harvested it.

3. Family Camp outs, Family Reunions, 

weddings, baptisms, 5K with siblings 

and chances to strengthen family relationships!

2. We took a trip to Kanab and

saw the North Rim of the Grand Canyon

1. We finally got another girl in the family...she walks on 4 legs, drinks from a bowl, and barks. Perhaps we should be more specific about what kind of girl we want next time.

All through the month of November we have been counting our blessings. We have truly been blessed to have each and every one of you in our lives! We are grateful for this Christmas season and the opportunity to reflect on our gratitude for the Savior. We hope that your family is well and blessed. Have a Merry Christmas & a Happy New Year!

Love,

The Robison Family

Celebrating a Season of Gratitude

For quite a few years now Thanksgiving has been my favorite holiday. I love taking the time to recognize all that the Lord has blessed me with. When I was growing up Thanksgiving dinner was delayed while we all sat around the table and took turns stating at least one thing we were thankful for. As an adult I haven't always been able to enjoy that tradition. This year I will be able to enjoy that tradition regardless of where the dinner is spent. 

Today I came up with a great way to help my family love the holiday and learn to count their blessings. This evening I took Braxton outside to find some leaves so that we could have some leaf rubbings to give the Thankful sign some more color. The leaf rubbings were even more fun than I remembered. I was surprised that my 6-year-old said he hadn't done a leaf rubbing before. The plan is to have each member of the family write one thing they are thankful for each day throughout the month of November and post it on the door. For a little more fun we may even add pictures of some of our favorite things that we are grateful for. I hope that your family can also find a way to make this a season of gratitude. After all really celebrating Thanksgiving is the best way to prepare for a wonderful Christmas!!!

Perspective from a 6-year-old.

Tonight Braxton and I read scriptures before he went to bed. It was great to read and help him to understand them. As we discussed the resurrection and what that means I explained how one day Kent and I will die, but because of Christ's resurrection we will live again. Braxton then asked me what day we would die. I told him I didn't know, but I hoped it wouldn't be for a really long time. Earlier in the conversation I drew stick figures on a pedigree chart to visually explain how Jesus Christ is our brother not our Father and he told me that Jesus Christ and Heavenly Father needed beards on their stick figures. After I told him we wouldn't die for a long time he indicated that Kent was not too far away from dying. He went on to share that when he had stuff (hair) under his nose (mustache) and not just his chin (goatie) he would die. So those of you with full beards watch out...you don't have much longer to live! :)

2 Minute Confidence Booster

Ever need a shot of self confidence? Here you go! Hold a confident pose for 2 minutes! Such a great video about how our non verbal communication can change how we view ourselves. Have a look! 

http://www.ted.com/talks/amy_cuddy_your_body_language_shapes_who_you_are.html