I am grateful for a happy family

Jonathan and I are so lucky to have the two best families in the world! I felt especially blessed because all of the Patterson family was able to be together for Thanksgiving this year. (It's really hard to get all 16 of us together.) We spent lots of time with my family and not as much with the Nelson's because Jonathan and I were sick, but soon all of the Nelson's except us will be living together so we will have plenty of time to spend with them! YAY! The best part about our families is that we are all stuck with each other forever! We are all sealed to each other and if we are all worthy, we get to spend eternity together. That is the biggest blessing I have in my life!

The growing Patterson family!

The fighting to stay alive Nelson family!

I am grateful.

This is another weird post, but I am grateful for this blog. When I first started it, I just thought it would be a fun way to keep people up to date on what was going on in our life. Little did I realize that it would help me express my feelings and share my testimony. This month of blogging things I'm grateful for has been such a good opportunity for me to look at my life and find things that I'm grateful for. This has definitely been a great thing for me to do and I plan on continuing to write about things I'm grateful for throughout the year.

A Double Baby Shower

While all of my family was all together, we celebrated our two new baby girls, Lyla and Clara. Lyla is 5 weeks old and Clara is due on January 25th. They are my parent's first granddaughters and we all love them so much! We had dinner at Fats. Oh my goodness! The food was amazing! I want to go back so badly. As soon as the table was cleared, we started opening all of the adorable presents. Both Lyla and Clara hit the jackpot! There were so many cute clothes and headbands for both girls.

Some of the group celebrating our baby girls!

Mom and Annie

Every little girl needs a tutu!

Every Apple employee needs an iPood onesie for their baby!

I am just grateful!

I am grateful for unexpected opportunities. Earlier this week, Jonathan and I were contacted about a new adventure and then we also came up with one of our own. We'll see if things actually work out, so I won't say anything more about it at this time, but we're really excited about both things! (Neither one is a child by the way...)

I am grateful for a day that happened 9 months ago.

We've been married for 9 months?! That is so crazy!!! In some ways it seems like we've been together forever and yet it still seems like we got married yesterday.
I love thinking about our wedding day. It was a very bright, sunny February morning when we were married at the LDS Sacramento Temple. I remember sitting in the temple with Jonathan before we were married. It was so calming just to sit there by ourselves. Then we were escorted to the sealing room. It was overwhelming to see all of our family and friends there to share this very special day with us. After the ceremony concluded, we were told to kiss and my dad groaned so loud! I love my dad. In the sealing room, there are two large mirrors hanging on opposite walls. As we stood inbetween them, we saw eachother standing. The interesting part is that I saw hundreds of reflections of Jonathan and only one of me and he saw the opposite. We were told that it is symbolic of who we need to focus on. Jonathan needs to focus on me and I need to focus on Jonathan. After the ceremony was over, it didn't feel like we really needed to do anything else. The most imporant part of the day was finished and the rest was just icing on the cake.
The LDS marriage ceremony that happens in the temple is different from your normal marriage ceremony. The main difference is that we are married for time and all eternity. There's no til death do us part. This means that I get to be with Jonathan for our life here on earth and after we die. It such an amazing blessing to know that whatever happens to us in this life, we can be together forever.

I am grateful for the internet.

Think back to when you didn't have the internet. Yes, we did somehow live without it, but it has helped make things easier to do. Think about it. My oldest brother went on a mission for our church before they allowed the use of email, so we were forced to write letters to Brazil. If I remember correctly, it would take over a week for a letter to even reach him. It was nearly impossible to have a real conversation with him. Then just a few years later, when my other brother served his mission he was allowed to email us once a week. It was amazing to have him answer our questions so quickly. It was amazing! It is so helpful with school and just everyday life. I am so grateful!

I am grateful for our first married Thanksgiving!

So, it didn't turn out at all the way we planned, but it was still ok. We really figured it would be like last year, but that didn't happen at all.

In the Nelson family, the girls bake pies on Wednesday. It was so much fun doing that last year, so I was really looking forward to it for the whole month. So of course, I get a cold this week. You see, Jonathan's brother Adam has cancer and is on chemo, so his body cannot handle being sick right now. I am super paranoid that I'll get him sick, so I'm not going over there until I feel a lot better. That means no pie baking for BJ. Lame!


This year we also planned on doing the opposite of last year so we would have dinner with the Nelson's and dessert with the Patterson's. Well that didn't turn out either. Jonathan was sick for a couple of days before Thanksgiving too and was trying so hard to get healthy in time for Thanksgiving so we could spend the day with both families. But that didn't happen. His worse day was Thanksgiving. We were just going to stay home, but then he got a horrible headache and we had no medicine to help with the pain. So, we ended up going to my parent's house to get medicine and food. As we were driving, Jonathan told me that this was his worst Thanksgiving ever. (Though he did remember a worse one.) That made me really sad, but it didn't really surprise me. His family loves Thanksgiving and this year has been a really tough year for pretty much everyone so we are all extra grateful for our blessings.

So we got to my parent's house and I immediately sent Jonathan upstairs to lay down. He ended up sleeping for 4 hours in spite of the insanity going on in the rest of the house with my brood of 5 nephews and a sleepy little niece. He then got his own little Thanksgiving dinner at 9, and I was sure glad to see him up and eating.

So this year was our very unusual Thanksgiving day. I am still grateful though. Sure, we didn't have the perfectly planned Thanksgiving we wanted, but I think we have something so much better. We will now always remember our first Thanksgiving as the time when Jonathan was sick and I was there to take care of him. I think that will be so much better than anything we could have ever planned.

Garrett finally likes Chris!

Grandpa with most of his great-grandkids.

Some of the madness Jonathan slept through.

I am grateful for today.

I am so grateful that I get to spend all of my day today with my family. (That's why this post is so short). I hope you have a wonderful Thanksgiving filled with lots of family and even more delicious food!

These are some of the people I get to be with today!

I am grateful for my brothers and sisters.

I love my family and I really love that it keeps growing. I grew up with 2 older brothers and an older sister. It always seemed kind of small, but it has grown a lot since then. Thanks to a few great marriages, I now have 5 older brothers, an awesome younger brother (yeah be jealous) and 6 wonderful sisters. I love my family so much and all the wonderful examples they are to me. It is such a blessing to have them around and see how strong they are in various ways. 


There are times in each of their lives that they have hard trials to go through, but they rely on the Lord and are able to be better for what they've experienced. I've seen this a lot lately with two of my brothers. They are both having health problems and now both are on chemo. Instead of feeling self-pity or questioning why it has to be them, they are both full of hope and working hard to get healthy again. I haven't even mentioned the hard work that my sisters are doing to take care of them. They are such a strength for their husbands as they've done all that they can to take care of them.


I love the my siblings that I was blessed to grow up with. Each one of them have been such great examples to me. Because I'm the youngest, I've been able to see the importance of the decisions that you make throughout all stages of your life. What really had the biggest impact on me was seeing their joy at their weddings. I realized that it was not only important to marry the right person (which all three of them did), but to also marry in the temple. There seemed to be a change that happened to each one of them and at the time I didn't understand it, but I knew that I wanted what they had. I now understand what was different about them. When someone gets married in the temple, they are not just married until death. They are married for time and all eternity. This means that they will have each other forever. The individual becomes part of a pair. That was the change that I saw in my siblings. I am so grateful that I followed their example and was also married in the temple.


I love having a younger brother. It is the BEST! Being the youngest in my family, I was a little worried about how it would be to be an older sibling. Luckily, I have one of the funniest, silliest, and sweetest younger brothers. I just love him so much! I am grateful that I will be able to watch him grow into a strong and righteous man.


I love all of my siblings. I can't imagine what life was like before they came around. They are all such great examples to me and I am so grateful to have each one of them in my life.

I am grateful for temple Tuesday.

I am grateful that every Tuesday Jonathan and I go to the temple. It is such a wonderful place to go to and serve the Lord. I love the temple. It is a very sacred place. Every time I'm there, I feel like I'm home. It helps to give me some much needed perspective on my life. I have the tendency to stress myself out, but almost as soon as I step on the grounds of the temple it feels like my worries and stress just melt away. My mind is so much more clear when I am there. I know that the temple truly is the house of the Lord. I am so grateful that we live so close to the temple and have decided to make our attendance a priority. It has given our marriage even more strength. I know that we can face any challenge so long as we continue to strive to follow the teachings of Jesus Christ.


I attached this video because I feel like it will help show why I am a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of latter day Saints. There is a strength that comes from living the gospel of Jesus Christ that will help you through times of trial. I know this is true. I have seen it in my life and the lives of so many around me. If you want to know know more about my beliefs, click here. You won't regret it.

I am grateful for hidden talents.

Everybody has different talents. Anything from being comfortable with talking to strangers, to cooking amazing meals, to being a good listener. For the longest time, I didn't think I was able to be crafty and make things myself. This past year has shown otherwise. Not only can I use a glue gun for various projects, but I can sew, really well. I've never even taken a single lesson and yet if I put my mind to it I can do it. My mom even told me that my top stitching (that's when you sew really close to the edge of the fabric) was comparable to her own. It's just so neat that we can learn and discover new talents that we never thought we had.

I was able to cut these out and make the cute little bows.

I didn't cut these out, but I did put them up for Halloween.

Some of my projects for Christmas.

Printables are so easy to make!

A present for my mother-in-law.

I am grateful for the beauty of the earth.

We live in such a beautiful world. It is remarkable just how much beauty there is around us. A few nights ago, I was walking to my car after class and I saw the most incredible sunset. I couldn't believe how gorgeous it was. It was a breathtaking sight. I'm going to share some words from one of my favorite church children's songs.

Whenever I hear the song of a bird 

Or look at the blue, blue sky, 

Whenever I feel the rain on my face

 Or the wind as it rushes by, 

Whenever I touch a velvet rose 

Or walk by our lilac tree, 

I'm glad that I live in this beautiful world 

Heavenly Father created for me.

He gave me my eyes that I might see 

The color of butterfly wings.

 He gave me my ears that I might hear 

The magical sound of things. 

He gave me my life, my mind, my heart: 

I thank him reverently

 For all his creations, of which I'm a part.

 Yes, I know Heavenly Father loves me.

I know that this world was created for you and me. It is so beautiful and diverse. I hope that you can see all the beauty around you too. 

I am grateful for modern medicine.

It is the such a wonderful blessing to have modern medicine and so many people that are working to make it even better. My eyes have really been opened these past few years seeing how it's helped my family members. It is incredible to see illnesses that used to be death sentences for people are now treatable. We will in such an amazing time!