Oakland Temple

Today I went with 2 sisters in our ward to the Oakland temple.  It was a relaxing ride there as I sat in the back, talked here and there, and looked at all the scenery.  We got to the temple and it reminded me so much of the Laie, Hawaii temple.  Just beautiful.  The flowers outside were amazing...and then I looked over and saw polluted San Francisco.  The temple is up much higher so you can see all of San Francisco and man is that place nasty.  The smog was horrible!  I've never seen anything like it.  I may complain that there isn't anything for my kids to do in Tracy but I would take that anyday over the city life around here.

So as we were driving to the temple a few things came to mind that I haven't journaled about.  I kept thinking of Levi.

He never calls us Mormons.  He only refers to us as Christians and I have always liked that.  When we visited Steve, Barbara, and Aaron while coming out here, Levi commented to me, "I know grandpa is a Christian."  I said, "Oh yeah.  How do you know that?"  He responded with something like, "Because of all his Jesus stuff around his house."  It just made me giggle a little bit because he isn't kidding!  Barbara works for Deseret Book and so she has TONS of paintings (like several per room) in their house centered around the gospel. 

Levi also is the one who inspired me to give something back to Heavenly Father this year.  I remember Hannah saying something about not doing New Year's resolutions but instead giving something or doing something for Christ that year.  I had taught the boys about that and he decided he was going to read the scriptures every night, on his own.  He has not missed a night.  And he spends so much time doing it too.  I don't know when I read all the way through the Book of Mormon but I know I was an adult and he is going to get that done as a 10 year old.  Just amazing.

So he inspired me to do something.  Each month I am doing something different.  In January I only listened to Christian music, in February I was going to read from the Ensign everyday (which I did horribly!) and this month I am working on keeping the Sabbath Day much more holy than I have been.

So yeah, not much to report.  Just some thoughts.

(from the roof)