Check, Check & Half-Check

3 days away from "Happy Half-Birthday" which means only 6 months until 27 and the end of 26 for 26. But the good news is I'm checking things off my list.
On Tuesday I went bouldering in Little Cottonwood Canyon with 2 of my oldest climbing friends, Adam and Cody. It was a lot of fun and actually the first time I have bouldered outdoors. I am kind of scared of falling when not attached to a rope. Although this was not on my list we did do something that was. Last week I borrowed my roommates longboard and played around on it during my lunch break in my work parking lot. So since Cody and Adam are boarders, we drove downtown to longboard around the city. Starting at the library we rode to 300 South then down to State Street, then Main Street catching Trax and riding down to the Gateway. We road around for an hour and a half and I never fell. I would say that it counts for learning how to longboard fairly well, but don't worry it was a lot of fun and there will be more of it to come.

Learn to skateboard...Check.
Sorry no photos of the longboarding, but here is the joy of bouldering.

Wednesday for Relief Society we visited Gilgal garden. The amazingness of Gilgal is legendary. Ever since I heard there was a garden in the SLC that had a Sphinx with the head of Joseph Smith I had to go. After raining earlier in the day it was freezing cold, but that would not kill my spirit. I have never explored a more interesting garden which in a weird way shares a man's testimony of God and the gospel.
Check it out sometime...http://www.gilgalgarden.org/

You know you love a Joseph Smith Sphinx

Lastly, I finished reading the April Conference Ensign last week. This is the first time I have ever read the conference Ensign from cover to cover and it will not be the last (particularly because my goal is to read both the April and Oct. Conference talks). So I give myself a half check as I have accomplish half of this goal.
Conference is a great event and luckily we get to enjoy it again this weekend. Here are some of my favorite things from April and I look forward to more in Oct.
THANKS CONFERENCE!

Promised blessing from President Packer recounted by Margaret S Lifferth
"While we may not see an immediate, miraculous transformation, as surely as the Lord lives, a quiet one will take place...The Lord will pour out his Spirit upon us more abundantly. We will be less troubled, less confused. We will find revealed answers to personal and family problems."

I loved President Eryings' statement, "The Lord always suits the relief to the person in need to best strengthen and purify him or her." Trials can be blessings even if we don't realize it at the time.

President Uchtdorf said, "We have to stay with it. We don't acquire eternal life in a sprint -- this is a race of endurance."
And
"Start where you are."

Probably my favorite talk was Elder Holland's "None Were with Him." I remember listening to this talk in April and I still remember the awe I felt hearing his words. His talk teaches the doctrine of the atonement with a focus on the moments Christ suffered on the cross and the Spirit of His Heavenly Father departed from Him. He was left to feel the loneliness that so many of us feel throughout our lives so that He would be able to succor us when we feel "totally, abjectly, hopelessly alone." I had never thought about that moment before, but as Elder Holland teaches, "It was required, indeed it was central to the significance of the Atonement, that this perfect Son who had never spoken ill nor done wrong nor touched an unclean thing had to know how the rest of humandkind would feel when we did commit such sins."

I love the gospel. I know that my Savior atoned for my sins and that it is through Him that we can return to our Heavenly Father.