Claim Your Blessings

Exactly 10 years ago (like to the minute - I think we were married at 10 or 10:30 am) I was in the Mt. Timpanogos temple getting ready to marry my sweetheart for time and all eternity. I remember being full of nerves and being both scared/nervous, and at the same time (if it's possible...) be filled with the reassurance that we were doing the right thing. I remember walking into the sealing room and looking around the room at friends and family members and just feeling so overwhelmed and FILLED with love. I couldn't believe that there were people there who had traveled across the country, people who had seen me grow up in the Young Women program, parents, grandparents, a few cousins - I was just overwhelmed with the love that filled that room.

I also remember thinking about other people who weren't there. Mostly friends who hadn't been endowed yet, and so weren't at the temple with us, or my siblings who were all too young to be there - and just feeling sad that they weren't there to share the day with us. (I compare it to when we will one day pass away, and are in heaven waiting for our family members to join us - I think that when there are people who haven't made the choices that will get them to where we will hopefully be - that we'll be sad that they are not with us, feeling that love and joy. We will miss them.)

Truthfully I don't remember a whole lot about the sealing....(I was really trying to just feel the moment, and soak up the fact that this man wanted to be with me for eternity!) except for the feeling of love. Love from Cory, love from our family, love from our friends, but most of all love from our Heavenly Father who sent us here to earth to experience these feelings of joy. We were lucky that my parents went back and wrote down thoughts from the experience to share with us. One of the most prominent things that I remember, and that was expressed in those thoughts my parents wrote down was the idea that Heavenly Father had many, many blessings in store for us as a new family and couple. He wanted to give us so much in this life, if we would live worthy for them. The sealer said the phrase, "Claim Your Blessings" - which has become our mission statement in a way. In fact - Cory made a nice bed for us for his wedding gift to me, and on the foot-board he had that phrase carved into it so we could be reminded regularly of it.

One memory I do have of the day was the rain. The pouring, torrential rain that was coming down in sheets. We were quite discouraged about the weather because we didn't know how we would take pictures after the sealing was finished. How would we get pictures of our new family in pouring rain? But as I had gone back to the bride's preparation room with the people who had helped me get ready my mom said, "Hey - it looks like the sun is coming out!" The windows in the bride's room are stained glass, so we couldn't see out - but we could see rays of sunshine peeking through. So we hurried to get ready to catch the moments of sun for our pictures. (But I hadn't eaten anything that morning and I was feeling dizzy - so the sweet temple helpers had to get me a snack (which they said happens frequently with new brides) to keep me from passing out...) But we raced out and did manage to get a few pictures taken. They weren't great pictures....but pictures none the less. (The quality of the pictures mostly had to do with the fact that I was trying to save money and not get a professional photographer....BIG mistake!!!!!)

Later we had a luncheon at Los Hermanos (still one of my favorite restaurants) with family and friends, and a reception in Orem that evening. I had some amazing YW leaders who basically put on the whole reception (with help from my friend Jessica's mom who did gorgeous floral arrangements!) and we literally had to just show up, enjoy the evening and feel loved. I left the reception crying....bawling - because I had never felt such an outpouring of love. Seriously - to this day I still can't think of more than maybe 5 people who we invited to our reception who didn't come. All night long we had a constant line, and loved every minute of it. I think more of it was because my family had moved just 2 months before from Orem to New Mexico - and people were coming to see them - but still - I felt a lot of love for my family. And to this day I still get almost teary eyed thinking of people who attended and made that day so special.

So - I had meant for this post to be just a quick walk down memory lane regarding our wedding day...but it got long - sorry about that. Overall I felt blessed, loved, and so excited about what was ahead of us. Who knew where 10 years would take us? I didn't know we'd have gone through years of infertility, moves across the country for several summers, building up our own business. I couldn't have pictured where we would be in 10 years - but I do know that overall I am grateful for where we have ended up so far. Here's to 10 more years, may they be as blessed as the last 10.