WAITED FOR A MIRACLE TO REVERSE RIGGED ELECTION BUT NONE CAME - SAD TIME FOR AMERICA

 I'm having a hard time writing this post this month. It has not been the best month of our lives. We have prayed that the Lord would step in and help President Trump find a way to expose the fraud that was used against him in the election but that didn't happen. President Donald Trump left office on January 20th as Joe Bidden was sworn in as President of the United States.  In his first week, he has already turned the clock back 4 years to the O'Bama era with executive orders that have undone many of the great things put in by President Trump. He's killing jobs with his war on fossil fuels. He's ready to grant amnesty to millions of illegals and opening our borders. He has stopped construction on the border wall along our southern border, not only costing jobs and wasting materials already purchased, but opening a way for millions to cross into our country illegally. Our America will never be the same. The Washington swamp is alive and well these days. Trump was feared by the left and many on the right because he was trying to expose the swamp and drain it.

On January 5, Georgia had a run off election for two senators. Of course, the two democrats won as Georgia used the same counting machines and allowed for unverified mail in ballots. This put the Senate in a 50/50 split with the vice president, Kamala Harris, as the tie breaker.  It is a scary thing as without a Republican majority in at least one house, the left can put through most of their radical, socialist agenda. Congress will probably be insignificant from now on because of President Biden and his executive order power. He is like a dictator right now, making law without Congress' approval. in the first 10 days in office he has signed 42 EOs. The most any other president has signed in that short time is 5.  It's going to be a long 4 years. Still praying for a miracle from heaven.

 On January 6, Congress met to accept or reject the electoral college votes from the states. At least a million people gathered in Washington DC, with Trump banners and American flags. They came to show support for President Trump and plea for the Congress to listen to the objections of the representatives and senators regarding the electoral college votes in 6 states. As President Trump was speaking to the crowd, a group of rioters, dressed as Trump supporters, stormed the capitol building where the Congress was meeting. The Capital Police couldn't (or didn't) hold them back so they were soon inside the building doing damage. When the Trump supporters got to the Capitol building, no sooner than 30 minutes after the rioting started, the barricades were down so many walked up the steps and into the building. Video shows the police actually opening side doors to let them in and watching as others climbed the stairs inside. Of course, Trump supporters who came to peacefully protest, a God-given right in America, were immediately blamed for the break in. President Trump has been vilified and accused of inciting an insurrection. Of course, the fake news media jumped on the band wagon with these accusations and big tech banned President Trump from his twitter account because of his dangerous rhetoric. We listened to President Trump's whole speech and found nothing to suggest he incited any to breach the Capitol. He said that he knew the crowd would peacefully and patriotically march to the Capitol Building..... Hardly speech that would rile up a crowd to storm the building. The interesting thing about all this is that President Trump was still speaking to the crowd  when the the riots began. The crowd listening to President Trump was at least a 30 minute walk away from the Capitol Building so he hardly could have caused them to riot. According to news that has leaked out since this incident, it was a planned attack by both right and left extremist. The rumor has it that Nancy Pelosi, speaker of the house, was told about it and wouldn't allow the capitol police to call in the National Guard to help secure the building. (Hmmm -  did she want this to happen?) The media, early on, was calling the people a mob as they were gathering peacefully to hear President Trump speak. They were accusing the President of setting up a coup to take over America. This was before he even was on the scene of the peaceful protest. The mainstream media was setting up their audiences to easily be swayed that the Trump supporter were dangerous and out to take over the country. So not true. We've come to the conclusion this was all a plan to make Trump look bad in hopes that his supporters would no longer support him. All this, though, has only made his popularity among the right stronger. Now, the congress plans to hold an impeachment trial on Trump this next month for inciting as insurrection. Funny thing is that he is no longer in office for which they want to impeach him and thus can not be removed from that office. It's all a ploy to silence the right and negate his support.

All summer long, we have been plagued with riots in many on  our
major cities across America. The left has called these peaceful protests as
the protesters burned down buildings and took large areas of the cities hostage.
As soon as the right is accused of breaching a building they are rioters and evil.

The ban of President Trump on any social media platform has led to the taking down of Parlor, a conservative site similar to Twitter. Many companies have vowed to not employ Trump supporters nor carry their products. Book deals have been canceled if they are written with a conservative view. Several Trump supporters who attended the rally in Washington DC, were fired upon returning home and others have been refused seats on airplanes. The left media platforms are suggesting that all media forms that are conservative be taken down, as was Parlor, saying they just spew lies. The interesting thing in all this, is that it is the left the takes anything the the right does and twists it to meet their narrative. Most of President Trump's incredible accomplishments were never reported or, if they were, he was ridiculed for taking such action. We witnessed this kind of thing while we were on our mission in Russia.  Putin closed down all media outlets that were not state owned so as to silence all speech that might be contrary to what he wanted the people to hear. We are headed in that same directions, if this trend continues.

Conservatives have been encouraged to use these other platforms
to keep their message alive.

75 million people are praying for this man to find the strength
to continue his fight for America and her people

And then there was the inauguration day in Washington D.C. Because of the riots on the capitol on the 6th, by January 20th Washington D.C. was in a police state. 25000 National Guard troops were stationed in the city and a 10 foot high fence with barbwire along the top was constructed around the capitol building. Joe Biden's inauguration was attended only my invited guests and the parade afterwards resembled a military parade in Russia or China. No fans along the streets, only troops. Our America is slipping away to power hungry bureaucrats who care nothing about the people, only control. We must pray a lot for our country to maintain the freedoms we have too often taken for granted.

I take comfort in some things I have read at Gospeldoctrine.com. I am reading the Book of Mormon again and then reading the commentary on the that website. It gives me some added insight to individual verses in the chapters.  I found this quote by Heber J. Grant who once said, "...Let us be faithful in keeping the commandments of God and then we know that we can win the battle, though we may be opposed by man with his tens of thousands...." I remember Elijah telling his small army, there be more that be with us than be with them. He then opened the eyes of those with him and they saw the legions of heavenly chariots surrounding them. I, also, read this recently, "Remember, they that be with us on both sides of the veil, those who love the Lord with all their heart, might, mind and strength, are more than they that be with them. If we actively trust in the Lord and His ways, if we are engaged in His work, we will not fear the trends  of the world or be frightened by them..." I'm praying every night that we can withstand the evil that is beginning to enclose all around us, with faith the the heavenly angels are with us. 

Along with this, I love this quote -
'It will be all right in the end. If it's not all right, it's not the end.'

Enough about the politics. There were some great things that happened despite the depressing news all around us. (BTW- we have turned off all news except for one show on Newsmax, the Greg Kelley show, and our lives are much happier. Ignorance is bliss as they say.)

We took down all the Christmas decorations on January 1 and, as always, it was good to get our home back to normal without the clutter of decorations. I didn't realize I had so many Santas until I took them all down and put them in one area before packing them. I may have to quit buying them or I'll run out of places to put them.

This picture doesn't catch all of them. Our tree
was also decorated with Santas, not shown in this picture.

With Christmas put away, it was time to focus on an upcoming visit from Andrea, Casey, Charlotte, and Lydia. The Westovers took Jillian to Rexburg, Idaho to get her started at BYUI . They, then, came our way to spend time with us while they got Charlotte settled into her new apartment in Provo. She began classes mid January at BYU. We loved having them here in Heber as it had been almost a year since we had spent time with them. They were gone most days getting things set up for Charlotte but we did spend most evenings together. One late afternoon, we met them at Jon and Mindi's home. We toured their home so the Westovers could see all the improvement they had made in the past year and then sat and visited for a while. We then went to Pizza Factory for dinner together. The conversation was lively and fun. Always good to get family together. Ryan and Katie were supposed to come spend some time in Heber with all of us at this same time but Grace got a fever just before they were to leave St. George. Because of COVID fears, they decided to stay there a couple days rather than coming our way. We were sad. They had been on a two week winter break spending time in Las Vegas, Death Valley, and St. George.  We were sad not to have them here with us but didn't want to risk possibly getting exposed to COVID. Todd was out of town on business.

 at 

At Jon's home

 At Pizza Factory - a family favorite when were all together.

Aria's birthday was January 9. Kailee threw her a party on that day. We decided to not attend the party but to take Aria her card and money on her special day. We suggested Todd and Kailee let her learn about money and take her to the store so she could buy something she wanted and pay for it herself. They did exactly that after her party. They put Aria's money in a fanny pack for her, took her to Target and had her pick out something she wanted. They then took her to the self serve kiosk so she could pay for the dolls she had picked out. She even put the money in the machine and got the change all by herself. A great learning experience. When they were young, we used to take Jon's boys out to dinner and then to a toy store to buy a gift with the money we had given them. That was a fun experience until they got too old for toys. 

Two LOL dolls, of course

Scanning the items.......

........and paying for them.
It looks like Avery wanted to help too.

When Todd and Kailee got back from Hawaii a week later, they picked up the girls in Melba, Idaho and drove to Heber with the girls so we could do a birthday celebration for Aria here. I had spent the week designing and decorating a special LOL doll cake for Aria. Her presents were also LOL dolls and games. (She's obsessed with all things LOL.) We had dinner and then opened presents and had cake and ice cream. Aria was thrilled to have more LOL things. We always leave the presents we buy for the girls up here so they can play with them when they are here.

That cake took some work. It's been years since I've done
a cut out cake like this one. It was challenging but much fun,
especially when I had a cute finished product.

Waiting patiently to open her presents.

Yummy cake but first to blow out the candles

Finding the LOL dolls and accessories in a bowl of fizzy, purple
water.....thanks to the clever packaging of the LOL company.
So much fun for the kids.

Another fun thing that happened this month was that we had new carpet put in our bedroom. After 14 years, the carpet was looking a little old and out of date. We found a carpet we loved and ordered it from our neighbor and friend, Guy Blaine.  When it came, in the color was a little off so he ordered a cutting of another dye lot. It came back about the same so we decided the original one would due. Because it was not exactly like the sample, we were given a discount. The carpet was laid on a Saturday and by that night we had our room put back together. We love the carpet look and feel. 

We took all the furniture out of the room on Thursday except for the bed.
Friday morning we got up and took the bed down, so the room was
totally empty, ready for the installing of carpet. That didn't happen
until Saturday so we spent one night sleeping downstairs.

Paul tearing out the carpet on Friday. Guy came and
helped him so it didn't take more that a couple of hours.

The finished product - looking good.
Deon and Gary came over and helped us move in
the rest of the furniture and set up the bed so we could sleep
in the master bedroom that night.

We got the bug to do something with the office downstairs which is never used except when grandkid come to play and they use it as a principal's office. We decided to take it all apart and put it into an exercise room instead. That will get more use that the office did and maybe even keep us in shape without having to go to the gym. It should also increase value of our home as exercise room are in big demand in homes these days. We moved the files into the storage area and gave the desk, entertainment center, and 2 chairs to the St. Vincent donation center. On the Saturday our carpet was being laid upstairs, Paul removed the carpet from the old office area. The carpet layer then finished off the edge at the doorway, ready for laying interlocking rubber tile pieces. That happened on the last Saturday of the month. This is going to be a fun change for our home.

So grateful we found an organization that would come pick
up our furniture and take it away to be sold at their donation center.
It would have been very difficult for us to get rid of it any other way.

Floor done. Now the search for the right exercise
equipment. That'll be a project for next month.

It was Deon's birthday this month on January 28. Paul and I took her and Gary to lunch at the new Junction restaurant here in Heber.  We love having them close enough to do things together like this. The new restaurant was beautifully done, as compared to their old one, and the food was good. As always, we enjoyed being with Gary and Deon celebrating her birthday together. 

We've been concerned with the lack of snow in our area this winter. Many of us have been praying that the Lord would send us moisture soon. Our prayer were answered this month when we woke up to 7 inches one weekend and then 4 inches the next weekend. We pray this will continue in the upcoming months so our water supply will be sufficient this summer.

That about wraps it up for the month of January except for some lessons learned and inspiration found.

    1. From President Nelson: Our Savior and Redeemer, Jesus Christ, will perform some of His mightiest works between now and when He comes again. We will see miraculous indications that God the Father and His Son, Jesus Christ, preside over this Church in majesty and glory. But in coming days, it will not be possible to survive spiritually without the guiding, directing, comforting and constant influence of the Holy Ghost.

    2. From a conference talk: My message to you today, is simply this. The Lord is in control. He knows the end from the beginning. He has given us adequate instructions that will see us safely through any crisis. His purposes will be fulfilled and someday we will understand the eternal reasons for all of these events.

    3. From President Nelson: Even more amazing than modern technology is our opportunity to access information directly from Heaven, without hardware, software, or monthly service fees.

    4. If I am doing right, I am preparing for thrones, principalities and dominions....with that view of the subject, all the outward circumstances of this life do not trouble me.

    5. From Elder Uchdorf: In the coming days, weeks, and months - as stretching and hard as they may become - I invite you to trust God's love and the Spirit. They will enable you to be an angel of light to those around you.

    6. From Elder Uchtdorf: A lesson I learned early in my life is that no matter how dark the night, there is always the assurance that the sun will rise again. We can take the resolve to continue forward and upward with patience and steadfastness. We can do it now!

    7. Comments on Nephi's broken bow: Here is the classic scenario: life is tough - you're in the middle of a difficult trial, then something terrible happens.....Here is where the real trial of faith begins. You didn't think the Lord would allow something that terrible to happen to you because you're already having a hard time of things.....The Lord will bring all of us to our knees at some point. He will push us to our limit to see how far we will go and still be faithful....

    8. Faith doesn't always take you out of the problem. Faith takes you through the problem.

Faith doesn't always handle the pain. Faith gives you the ability to handle the pain. Faith doesn't always take you out of the storm. Faith calms you in the midst of the storm.

    9. From President Nelson: Dear friends, the road ahead may be bumpy, but our destination is serene and secure. So, fasten your  seatbelts, hang on through the bumps, and do what's right. Your reward will be eternal.

    10. Just a good thing to remember.....

AND A LITTLE HUMOR.....

Until next month, hang in there. Be positive and kind. Know that the Lord is in charge and things will work out in the end.  He has a plan and His plan is perfect for us.

Picture of peace and tranquility here in our  little ole Heber Valley