BYU Women's Conference.

My Si Foster friend got asked back in January to be a presenter at women's conference on "Neglect not the gift that is in thee".....why it is important to share our testimonies through our talents. Si has amazing cooking talents and is great at making so many of us feel adept  in the kitchen and shares so many awesome recipes on her blog...along with some family stories and her faith.   She has been struggling and agonizing over this talk  for months....but today she did her "thing," was marvelous and can breathe a "Si" of relief for a job well done. I got to be a witness to all of this. Because she had this assignment, we made plans, got hotel rooms and decided to attend the two day event.  It was a blessing for me.  I needed a spiritual injection and a reminder about covenant keeping.  It was a fun and spiritual filled two days that I spent mostly with Si, her daughter Brooke, Diane Lake and Mel Evans.

Amber Crane, Erin Blake, Barbara Schwartz, Nan Bruske, Mel Evans, Diane Lake, Si Foster, Laura Blenap, Me, Angie Smith, Kim Johnston....all Si's cheerleaders and support team.

Some of my other friends were also presenting this year.... Karen Nickl on marriage relationships and Emily Hoffman on balancing life.  They were rock stars as well.

 Just when I thought I have heard everything from Karen about relationships and marriage, she comes up with new interesting stories and a different take on relationships.  She is so wise. After she compared Jewish bridegroom promises to what the Savior's parable of the bridegroom in the scriptures teaches us, she gave practical ideas on ways to improve marriage:  1.  Contemplate how difficult I am to live with.   2.  Stop looking over the fence...or stop recording your spouses failures. 3. Love and touch  4.  Be kind no matter what.
 She gave two "wants" at the end that I'm going to adopt.
*I want to suffer less in my trials.
*I want to Trust more that Jesus Christ and Heavenly Father have everything under control.

Me at the FRONT of the line for the Karen Nickl presentation with Gina and Karen.... I lost my name tag somewhere...which gets me into the events, luckily my friend Diane got two sent to her...so I was Diane for the day.

Emily Hoffman is a great presenter  and a dynamo.  She shared about Managing and balancing life....or how the Just Say No policy doesn't really work because we are saying No to many good, better and best things.  
1.  Balance and agency are linked.   We need to stop saying I have to....  the "have to" plan is Satan's plan, the "choose to" plan is Christ's plan.  We have our agency.
2.  All choices have a Yes and a No component.  Make sure we know what we are saying "No" to everytime we say "Yes."   Be more cognizant of our choices.
3.  Can't vs. Don't.  Don't is more impowering, it implies choice.  Can't implies sacrificing...it takes our control away and feels like outside forces are in charge of our agency.   So....Choose what we Don't do rather than Can't do.   Studies back this word/thinking up.

Another speaker I really enjoyed was Todd Parker on Scriptures as a spiritual life jacket.  Just as we wouldn't go white water rafting without a life jacket so we shouldn't go out into the world without a light jacket.  I didn't get a lot of notes because the power points were awesome and Si took pics of those to share with me later...but the gist is reading our scriptures buoys us up in life and allows our light to shine and help others.  He talked about sharing our spiritual "light" jackets...we are angels for others on this earth and our call is to minister.  There are also guardian angels and heavenly angels we can call upon when we are living in the light.

Matt Townsend spoke about communicating with our Young Adult children.   He shared how the word communicate comes from "to commune"...which implies spirit.  To commune with nature or someone, we need to get in tune with and be in the spirit.  This will  help us in our relationships with our children.  We need the spirit and to stay in the spirit when dealing with our children.  Having a child is not a trial to be endured, but actually children provide our greatest access to our  Heavenly Father. We are here to become more like him.  They help us to work on this.
During his panel a young adult shared a Stephen R. Covey quote that I really like, "Be a light, not a judge. Be a model not a critic."
1. Make sure your YA knows YOU have a testimony.
2. Help the YA to feel empowered about their lives.
3. Let them fly and make mistakes
4. Communicate.....validate don't invade.  Invite don't expect.

 Being with friends and recharging my spirit made for an Extraordinary two days for me.