More Thanksgiving Fun Times

Dale carving and Cameron sampling
The Clark Family Rock Band: 1st two pics include L-Jeremy on guitar; Alisa on drums, Jef on vocals, and Cam on guitar and another of Alisa on drums. 2nd photo - Grant doing drums as son, Avery watches. 3rd -Mary keeping the beat. 4th - Chad, the "little" drummer boy-

Collette with Jeremy's Mikelle

Jeremy doing his balancing act with Mikelle.

Traditional basketball game with the Clark boys: Jef, Cameron, Jeremy, and Chad.

Julie's Birthday Celebration

This past weekend, I was able to go to American Fork for my sister Julie's birthday. She loves this annual gathering of her family to help her celebrate. It was so great to see her and my family and to visit with each other. We all enjoyed watching Julie open her presents and of course all enjoyed eating birthday cake and ice cream. I was excited to see some of my nieces and nephews and some of their beautiful cnildren, too. A nice surprise was when my very special friend, Arlene Smith Heiner, dropped in to say hi. I mentioned on her blog that I was going to be there and told her to swing by if she could and she did! We missed Polly and Dave, they were away visiting their daughters and families, and Dix, who was in St. George with family. A big thank you to Collette and her friend Kellsy for driving me down and to my brothers and sister and their spouses for making this event such a special one for Julie and for all of us.

Sonya and Julie opening presents

l to r: Alex, Brent, and Dennis

Mark and Lori

my friend Arlene and I

front l ro r: Jenny holding Tosh, Julie, me, Mark and Alex; back: Katie, Adam, Kim holding Kayden, Andy, Betty, Dennis, Collette, Sonya, Lori, and Brent

Fun Times!

Alisa and Grant were able to get away together on a business trip for a few days, so Avery, Kyler, and Zadyn got to stay with Grandpa and Grandma. We had a fun time and stayed busy with their school work, watching movies, playing at the park, decorating Halloween cookies, going to the Jerome Homecoming parade and football game, and to the Farmer's Market, where they did a fun craft and helped Grandpa sell his bbq sauce.

This last one was on the parade route. We were sneaky and watched the beginning of the parade and then hurried and parked at the end to see it again. Jeremy and Sarah came for the weekend, too, and we had a fun visit with them and their cute Mikelle and Isaak. They are growing up fast, too!Last night for our YSA branch, we had a fun pumpkin carving Family Home Evening. Thanks to my friend, Cathy, for taking these pics for the branch history and for you all to see what a great group of young people we have! Pictured here are: Collette and Maria; me, Katherine, Matt, and Stan in the background; the whole group and their creations.

Check out my last weekend blog on The Clark Family Blog

Conference Weekend

I love fall! I know this is mainly due to the fact that my Mother loved this season as well. I love the beginning of October as I watch with excitement as the leaves begin to turn and as our pumpkins and winter squash mature. And it also means that we get to watch General Conference. This is something that our family has enjoyed doing together over the years, sometimes living in areas where we could only hear it on the radio or watch limited sessions on a local TV channel. When Dale was Stake Media Chairman, we would go faithfully to the stake center with him and watched the sessions as he recorded them for stake and ward libraries. This continued even after he was released until we got dish network.
Our young single adult branch were given some conference tickets this rotation and it didn’t take us long to work out schedules and arrangements so we could make the trip down to Salt Lake and watch two sessions in the Conference Center. We had only been to conference there in the center one other time some years ago when Collette was away at school, so we were glad that she had that Saturday off from work so she could go with us. Pouring rain didn’t damper our spirits as we made our way to the Conference Center Saturday morning. We arrived early so that we didn’t have to be too far up in the balcony section. For those of you that have had the privilege of attending conference live, you know how great it is to watch down front as General Authorities and church leaders come in and take their seats while the MoTab quietly rehearses. There aren’t words to describe the feelings that come over you when the choir stands as signal for all to stand and the entire place simultaneously becomes silent as the prophet and his counselors walk in. Tears came to my eyes and the Spirit bore witness to me that President Monson indeed is a prophet of God. We so enjoyed listening to all the inspired speakers and music and there is just something about being there in person that makes it extra special…(and the fact that I stayed awake through it all!). We were able to watch the afternoon session with my sister Polly and her family in Sandy and then eat and visit. This was a treat for me, as I don’t get to Utah as often as I would like and see my family.

(l to r - Will, Paul, Joel, David, and Dale)

Dale went to the priesthood session with David and his three sons as we girls had a wonderful visit. Polly had just been to her high school reunion, so we laughed and reminisced over the class photo she had and memories of those younger years. It is always such an emotional and spiritual rejuvenation for me to share experiences and common convictions with my strong, special sister. Sunday morning, we had to be in our seats before Music and the Spoken Word began its broadcast.

We were pretty excited to hear this program live and it was touching to hear the commentator talk about a story of service to orphans that paralleled a similar experience Collette had on her trip to China with the BYU-H choir. It was just as powerful the second time we stood and reverenced President Monson and others as they entered the center and my heart and spirit was full again as we witnessed first hand the Lord’s counsel through His servants. Walking through Temple Square after the session, we stopped and listened to the sister missionaries sing hymns and we were so thrilled to see and talk to the sister missionary from Denmark (back row first one on the left in blue) that came and helped out with the Twin Falls Temple Open House. She was the missionary who welcomed, explained procedures, and showed the video in many of the tour sessions that Dale and I led. Small world!

We were "true tourists" and had someone snap our picture. We listened to the afternoon session on the car radio as we drove home and feeling ever so blessed for our opportunity to attend and listen to conference and to be with family.

Staying Busy With Life

Don't faint, whatever you do! I have been a bit lazy...well a lot of lazy...but I have the incentive back to blog again (thanks, Polly, for inspiring me to get moving!) A lot has happened in my life since the temple dedication and here are a few high lights.Some friends talked me into taking a new gym class for the month of September on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday mornings. I was ready for something different so eagerly signed up. On Mondays we did kick boxing and that was a challenge. The instructor really got into it, shouting and grunting incentives and she thought I was really getting into it, too, when I would scream out...she didn't know that it was from kicking the steel pole below the bag! But I just named my bag "frustrations" and mastered the punches. Wednesdays, we did some taibo (sp?) aerobics and that really was a workout, but much better than sweating with the oldies and Richard Simmons! Fridays, we did spinning. I really liked that, it was the easiest for me, seeing how I had already been doing 45 minutes on the eliptical machines upstairs. I decided that it was good to change it up again and signed up for the pilates class for October. After my first class, I thought I was going to die! It was the hardest class so far for me. I wanted to quit, but will keep trying. My friends are very encouraging and I will try not to be afraid of the instructor when she yells at me to keep my stomach in!
I have loved being in the temple every Thursday morning since it opened. I have done many names in initiatory and endowments sessions. I feel so at home there because of the connection from my open house and dedication experiences. It is a thrill to always see so many friendly and loving faces that I know from my stake serving and participating in sessions. Our young single adults have done baptisms and confirmations and have already participated in cleaning the temple one late evening. I feel so blessed to have a temple so close and I am just basking in the spirit and love I feel there.

Fall brings Book Club again and it's fun meeting with friends to discuss interesting books and current issues. We've discussed the delightful book, The Sunday Philosophy Club by Alexander McCall Smith while enjoying yummy German chocolate cake. I will be reviewing the next book entitled Leap of Faith: Memoirs of an Unexpected Life by Queen Noor. This author is Lisa Halaby, the distinguished Arab-American who married King Hussein of Jordan and became Noor Al Hussein, Queen of Jordan. Here are pictures of our Tuesday Book Club.

Other books that we will be discussing this year are: the children's book, Bronze Bow by Elizabeth George Speare; Winners Never Cheat by Jon Huntsman; The Goose Girl by Shannon Hale, The Mother Tongue by Bill Bryson, and Three Cups of Tea by Greg Mortensen and David Oliver Relin. In December, we have a tasters lunch of favorite holiday recipes and donate money to our local library for a new book.

We had the chance to go to General Conference this past weekend, so stay tuned...that will be my next blog.

An Awe-inspiring Experience

Finally, I am able to sit down and blog my wonderful experience with our Twin Falls Temple dedication. They had such a grand write-up in the Church News about it, I hope that you can all read that. I still can't believe it sometimes that it is over, but we are so grateful to have our temple completed, dedicated, and up and running.

On the morning of the dedication, Dale, Collette, and I went in to the stake center to view the cornerstone dedication via satellite that Bonneville was taping for the 14 stake area. We went about an hour early to secure a good seat and as we sat there listening to the feed of hymns playing along with a prepared video of our temple inside and out, I grew more anxious and scared as time when on. I watched the procedures very carefully, especially the music part, so that I would know just what to do when our time came. When we saw President Monson come into the celestial room, I was overwhelmed, knowing that we would personally witness this in just a few hours. The music, talks, and dedicatory prayer were so inspirational. And of course the highlight was the Hosanna Shout. I was pretty nervous when the session was over and reminded to Dale that I would like a blessing. He asked a friend, Gordon Ford, a counselor in the Stake Presidency, to help and Gordon invited us all to go to the stake offices. Our stake president and his other counselor, also very good friends, arrived there shortly after. Within minutes, the entire stake presidency, along with Dale, participated in the blessing. My stake president, Paul Tateoka, gave me an incredible blessing of comfort and peace. He then blessed Collette. I was calm and felt I could do the task before me with faith and trust in the Lord's guidance.

We warmed up and rehearsed in the stake center at 3:30 and then walked over to the temple. We were instructed to be there 30 minutes prior to the start. It was amazing to be in the temple and to walk right up to the celestial room. Dale was able to be in the celestial room and sit by me close to the organ. I programed all the stops for the organ as we practiced earlier in the week and began to play prelude. My fingers were a bit shaky at first, but I settled down pretty quickly. I was nervous still, but my stomach wasn't as upset, even with the camera close by. Ten minutes before the start, I could hear it turn and zoom in on me a couple of times. I really wasn't told at anytime during the whole training and rehearsal process just when to start or stop the music. I took my cue from the morning session I watched, so when the people stood up in the celestial room and the brethren walked in and then everyone sat down again, that's when the organ music stopped. It was electrifying when the people stood up and the prophet and those with him walked into the room. I could not see them because my music books were too tall and I didn't want to mess up the notes by looking away! I could feet the spirit so strong. I ended the prelude and began to arrange for the first hymn. I heard President Neilson, who was sitting by Dale, whisper to me after a few very silent moments..."Sister Clark, you have about 4 more minutes..." The brethren were early this time, so I put my prelude book up and played another song or two. I was a little embarrassed, but I hoped those viewing it would think it was "technical difficulties". The second little glitch came during the first song when I tried to play on the upper register for the softer parts and it blared out louder than the intended softer sound, but only those close to the organ may have noticed. I felt the impression to stay on the bottom keyboard after it happened again on the next song and not worry about the top one. I was a little frustrated and to be honest, I probably didn't get everything I could out of the experience and what was said because of my worrying about technical things. Didn't I get a blessing and shouldn't everything be working perfectly? It came to me that even though things didn't go as smoothly as I was hoping, what I did was acceptable to the Lord and everyone there. Talking to people afterwards, they didn't notice a thing. I didn't play wrong notes that I was aware of and the choir was so wonderful. I remembered also that it sounded so much louder to me with the external speakers right below me, so it turned out okay. I was so grateful to be in the celestial room and to play the organ. It was inspiring to be in the presence of the prophet, he looked very tired to me, but it was the 4th session of a very long day. His daughter was with him as Sister Monson was ill. She told of how Sister Monson washed and packed everything for Pres. Monson so he could go. The dedicatory prayer was so awesome, I am glad I can reread and study it again. I stood and did the Hosanna Shout and then hurried to get on the organ for the song. I think we rattled the chandelier! During the closing song, there were many quiet sobs heard, the spirit was so strong. I was very touched and overwhelmed. I loved the experience now that I can reflect back and see things for what they were, not for how I perceived them at the time. Thank you for all your support, I definitely know I was given much "outside" help to do what I did.

Going now to the temple is such a unique experience because of all that I was involved with as it became a reality. Giving tours, taking friends through, practicing and then playing in the celestial room, it all makes it feel so much like "my" temple. I looked in the corner of the celestial room after our first session where the organ was and will probably always look there and remember the humbling experience I had and thank my Heavenly Father for the talents he has blessed me with.