Family History Experience 19 Sep. 2013

Story of the three brothers of Dan Edwin Bighorse who wanted their temple work done.

  I am grateful for this special experience that my foster mother had and shared with me, which greatly defined my life.

  I was living in Bitterspring, Ariz. I had had no contact with my foster parents for an extended period of time.

  I had graduated from the LDS Lamanite placement progam, and had started a family, I had a lot of crucial circumstances that occupied my life. So I guess I was not reachable to the three ancestors who wanted my attention. Thus, they visited my foster mom.They told her they wanted their temple work done and that her foster daughter Marie was the one who should help them. They also told her that their brother, my grandfather was close to death; and that he was the only one who could give me the information.

  After my foster mom contacted me and lit a fire under me, I went to my grandfather to acquire his life history and to obtain the names of those who wanted their work done. He gave me a lot of other information but to my surprise, he did not tell me the names of the three who visited my foster mom. I was happy to get more names but I knew none of these name were the three who visited my foster mom.

 I had questioned him each visit but he did not remember these three brothers. I just assumed that he could not remember.

  On our next visit we were sharing a meal with my grandparents and all of the sudden out of the blue, he sat up and said "SHO," and commanded our attention.  He proceeded to tell us the name of the three men. During this revelation, we found out that these brothers of my grandfather were from an earlier marriage and a couple of them were 50 years older than my grandfather.

  My great-grandfather, Gus Bighorse, was married a few times. My grandfather was the oldest of the siblings in the last marriage of Gus Bighorse and Mae Bah Manygoats Whitehair Bighorse.

  I took another 6 years to do their work. I have had many wonderful experiences that convince me that this work of the dead is of extreme importance in this life. We are Saviors to our families on the other side...as we save them, we also save ourselves. Amen

Written and shared by Marie Singer Goldtooth

(narie5844@gmail.com)

with Sister Elaine Olson

Tuba City, Family History Center, Tuba City, Arizona

22 Sep. 2013

Stake Primary Day 14 Sep 2013

What a fun week this was.  On Saturday we had a big Stake Primary Day.  We had lots of kids, lots of great leaders and LOTS of FUN.

Sister Allen is an amazing leader.  She divided the kids into three groups and each went to a station focused around the theme of I am a Child of God.  

The bike rodeo course had signs that said, things like Did you think to pray?  Read your scriptures, etc.  The older group loved the course and rode like experts, the youngest kids rode tricyles and loved the course just as much, but watching them pump up the slight slope was pretty funny.  

In the kitchen they made play dough and talked about how their actions shape their lives.  They got to pick two colors and I was pretty impressed that the older kids liked it as much as the younger ones.

In the cultural hall they got to close material to make very simple scripture bags.  They would go over to one of five sisters who would sew the bag together.  Then they got to choose a tablet, a small notebook, a pencil.  a card with the Articles of Faith, a pamphlet with A Proclamation of the Family.  They were able to decorate their notebooks.  Sister Norris said it was neat to see them bring them to church today.  We spoke in Kayenta, so we did not get to see them.

Sister Allen also had Bishop Luna and Bishop Blodgett speak to the kids for 3-5 mins, then everyone ate a the longest submarine sandwich ever.

On Thursday we had about 300 boxes of peaches come into Cameron where they loaded them onto trucks and trailers to take to the various units.  We delivered about 165.  I just sent out an email and told everybody that they had come in and then they came and picked them up.

The sisters either bottled them or made jam.  I suspect a lot were eaten before they ever made it to the bottles. ;o}  It went over so well that we are ordering more peaches this week.

Tomorrow we have our missionary training meeting and then on Thursday we will do our Demo with the participants.

The new Seminary teacher and his wife arrived Friday.  They seem very nice and eager to get started.  We told them to try and relax and get settled, then we will put them to work.  Elder Walker's brother was killed in an auto accident, so they will be traveling to California next weekend for the funeral.

One of our Gardening couples left today, two left last month and the rest will leave in the next few weeks, so Elder Olson and I will be the lone rangers again.  We will hopefully get a new group in Feb.  If you know of anyone who would like to serve here let us know.  The days  are long, but the rewards are great.

Stake Temple Day 7 Sep. 2013

Dear Family & Friends,

  These are pictures of our Stake Temple Trip on Saturday, Sep 7, 2013.  We had members from all the Wards and Branches in our Stake.  The session was filled to overflowing and the young people did baptisms for about 3 hours.  It was really quite amazing.

We attended a Chapel meeting at 9:15, then went to the next session.  It was so fun to see all of our Lamanite friends sitting in the session.  I was able to get many pictures, so I shared just a few.  They plan another trip in December.

  We were able to stay with Laurie, Harrison, Cassidy, and Uncle Evan.  It was so fun to visit and share time in Laurie's home, which isn't far from the Temple.  Laurie has quite a bit of space for her horses.  Cassidy participated in Holbrook on Sat.  Here is the email from Uncle Evan, the proud grandfather:

Cassidy and her mom left Snowflake for Holbrook at 6:45 a.m.  Harrison & I left for Holbrook about 3 hours later. Cassidy earned ribbons in four of the seven events in a field of 17 contestants, as follows:

 

6th Place: Western Showmanship, which is leading the horse with a halter

1st Place: Western Pleasure, which is along the railing walking, trotting, loping & reversing

2nd Place: Western Reining (in the sprinkles), which is guiding the horse in circles, backing up, and pivoting around

1st Place: Western Bareback (in the rain), which is a pattern without a saddle

 

Last, she was asleep when they got home last night at 8:30 p.m.

 

All in all, she made her mother and the rest of the family proud.  Cassidy and her mom had worked hard learning everything.  Next stop is the Arizona state fair in mid October.

 

Grandpa Olson, alias Evan

They were already headed to Holbrook by the time we were up and about.  It was fun to visit with them Friday night.

Tonight we visited with two of our ward families and then stopped at the Stake President's to put the pictures on his computer.  He might be sending a few to SLC.  Maybe you will send them again sometime.

   We had some great times this last week in the family history center.  The YM and YW have spent several nights in there finding their ancestors.  On Tues we had 12 people and Wed. 9 which was very exciting.  Hopefully they will continue to come in and become even more involved in finding the ancestors.

  Our new Seminary teacher will arrive this week and start teaching the following Monday.  Our Stake President has been teaching Seminary since school started.  He does a wonderful job of engaging the kids into the lessons.

  It is late and tomorrow is another full day.  Hope you will go and find one of your ancestors.

Elder & Sister Olson

Little People in the Garden

Some days are just more fun.  What a cutie and so polite.  

One of the things coming from this program is the fact that they are relearning what their ancestors already knew and did to be self reliant. Not only are they feeding themselves, they are healing themselves, physically, emotionally and spiritually.

Evelyn showed Brayden how to look for the red tomatoes and the RED raspberries.  He quickly learned that green raspberries don't taste like the red ones.He learned very quickly. Now he knows the color red and RIPE! And he is only 2. ;o}