FHE

Tonight we had a FHE lesson about Temples. We talked about why temples are so special and how they are different from our regular church buildings. We talked about some of the things that we do in temples and what you have to do to be able to go inside. We then showed the girls some pictures of our favorite temples and why each is special to us. Some of the temples we talked about:
*Salt Lake Temple, which has always been one of my favorites, and is where my parents were married.
*Mesa Arizona Temple, where Kent and Johnice were married.
*Washington DC Temple, where we and lots of our friends and family were married. This is the temple I went to for our youth temple trips. It is also mine and Aaron's favorite, which is why we chose to be married there, even though the Raleigh Temple had just opened a few months before we got married. It was definitely worth the six hour drive.
*Raleigh North Carolina Temple, which is the one and only Temple Dedication that I or Aaron have ever been to. It is also the temple that my parents worked in for a while a few years ago. Most of my siblings are only about 30 minutes away. I hope to be able to take the girls there when we are in NC next week.
*Houston Texas Temple, which is the temple district that we live in now.
The girls loved looking at the pictures and talked about how pretty they were and said that they want to go. So we have decided to take a FHE field trip soon to visit the Houston Temple. I think it is important for them to go now. Even though they cannot go inside, they can still see and feel how sacred and beautiful it is and set a goal of entering when the time comes. If we had prepared more, we could have made the sugar cube temples for activity, but it really was a last minute lesson. However, it was also one of our best FHE ever because the girls seemed to be listening and enjoying it. We sang "I Love to See the Temple" for our closing song. I LOVE to hear my girls sing--especially primary songs.
For dessert, we made some patriotic cookies that we had planned to make on the 4th of July, but completely for about it. So the girls and I made them this afternoon and had so much fun doing it.

Katie and the star shaped sugar cookies.

I just got a new camera, which I hadn't planned to write about, but I had to when we realized that it didn't make Katie blink when I took her picture. For the last 3 1/2 years I have had my old camera, I have had the hardest time getting a picture of Katie whenever a flash is required because it ALWAYS made her blink. Okay, not always, but 99.99999999999999999999 percent of the time, she blinked. It was always very frustrating for us both, so this is a huge deal and extremely exciting news. And as you can see from this picture, she was in complete shock when I told her she didn't blink when I took her picture.



Katie's huge smile that followed me telling her she didn't blink her eyes again! LOVE the missing teeth!



Sarah decorating her cookie and sampling the sprinkles. She asked for help and this is what I found when I turned around after helping her.



And a few minutes later, this........



I wonder why we even made the cookies. Why didn't I save us all the time and trouble and just pour the sugar right down her throat!



Sweet, innocent look. "Who me? I didn't do anything!" Now we all know why you're so sweet Sarah! You really are PURE SUGAR!



They turned out pretty cute, and VERY tasty!