One of the Seven

Well, I just moved home to my parents house after living in Bozeman for the last five and a half years.  I'll be here for another couple weeks before I make the final move (it's been a long process with many steps!) out to Indiana for grad school. 

These last few weeks have been kind of a bittersweet process of saying "see you later" (I refuse to say goodbye!) and just tying up loose ends.  It has been hard, but there have been some amazing experiences that came out of it all.  One example is a friendship I had that went through a lot of ups and downs over the last year.  I've know the whole time that it was worth it to me, but this last week I had the opportunity to see that our friendship had meant something to this other individual as well, which was kind of really cool to see.

Also along the lines of tying up loose ends, I had a chance to see one of my best friends this weekend who I don't get to see all that often anymore since she moved out of state.  We were visiting, and she told me about an idea that she had. 

In Bozeman, our stake president had asked us to do 7 Simple Things: 1. Personal prayer morning and night 2. Family prayer morning and night 3. Personal scripture study daily 4. Family scripture study at least 5 times a week 5. FHE weekly 6. Attend church weekly 7. Attend the temple monthly

Anyhow, my friend was talking about how, where she lives now, it's sometimes hard to have family scripture study because she and her roommates were never around at the same time, so she decided to start a blog (called One of the Seven) and invite a couple other people to join and contribute.  We share our thoughts from our personal scripture study for the day, and kind of count that as our family scripture study.  I LOVE IT!!!!  Such an amazing idea, but then again, she's amazing, which is why I'm friends with her! :)  I'm so exited for this because I am moving to Indiana and will no longer have roommates to scripture study with, so I'm glad that my friend had this idea.  I'm not gonna lie, it pretty much made my day!  Huzzah! :)

The Touch of The Master's Hand

Twas battered and scared, and the auctioneer

Thought it scarcely worth his while

To waste much time on the old violin,

But he held it up with a smile.
 "What am I bidden, good folks," he cried,

"Who'll start bidding for me?

A dollar, a dollar - now who’ll make it two _

Two dollars, and who’ll make it three?

"Three dollars once, three dollars twice,

Going for three". . . but no!
 From the room far back a gray-haired man

Came forward and picked up the bow;

Then wiping the dust from the old violin,

And tightening up the strings,

He played a melody,pure and sweet,

As sweet as an angel sings.

The music ceased and the auctioneer

With a voice that was quiet and low,

Said: "What am I bidden for the old violin?"

And he held it up with the bow;

"A thousand dollars - and who'll make it two?

Two thousand - and who'll make it three?

Three thousand once, three thousand twice

And going - and gone," said he.

The people cheered, but some of them cried,

"We do not quite understand -

What changed its worth?" The man replied:

"The touch of the masters hand."

And many a man with life out of tune,

And battered and torn with sin,

Is auctioned cheap to a thoughtless crowd.

Much like the old violin.

A "mess of pottage," a glass of wine,

A game and he travels on,

He's going once, and going twice -

He's going - and almost gone!

But the Master comes, and the foolish crowd,

Never can quite understand,

The worth of a soul, and the change that's wrought

By the touch of the Master’s hand.

~Myra B. Welch

Love Story Meets Viva La Vida

This is definitely worth a watch--amazing piano music, amazing songs, amazing musicians... can life get any better? I submit that it cannot!! (and yes, that was a Brian Regan reference).  Anyhow, definitely watch the whole video; it's so cool to watch them really start getting into the music, and Jon Schmidt's explanation of how/why he wrote the song adds to the coolness factor.

Icicles and the Sunrise

The following pictures are some that I took this last week on one of the days when I was up early enough to see the sun rise.  I was eating breakfast and looking out the windows of my house, and saw the colors of the sunrise reflecting off of the icicles, and it was pretty enough to motivate me to grab my camera and open the window and take the screen out so I could get a clear picture (brr!).  They're not spectacular pictures, but they make me happy :)

 The sun rising over my town :)

This one shows the colors really well :) 

My favorite, just cuz it looks cool :)

Why Economics is Cool... seriously

The following is a quote by Adam Smith (considered to be the father of economics) in his book The Theory of Moral Sentiments, Part I, Section I, Chapter I, p. 9, para.1.:

"How selfish soever man may be supposed, there are evidently some principles in his nature, which interest him in the fortune of others, and render their happiness necessary to him, though he derives nothing from it, except the pleasure of seeing it."


I love this quote!!  My second degree is in economics, and my first (agribusiness) focused heavily on economics.  In most of my classes, my professors would talk about "incentives," and what motivates people to do what they do (this is important when you're trying to figure out how to get them to do something different). 
Any economic models we looked at relied on the assumption that people act in ways that maximize their personal benefit, and in class, this was usually measured by monetary (or at least tangible) gains, mostly because it's hard to quantify the "utility" or happiness that someone gets from cheering for their favorite football team (go CATS--beat the griz!!!!), owning one more car, teaching a class, snowboarding, or whatever.  The cool thing though, is that while the models we used in  class might apply in generalities, they do not necessarily apply to individuals.  The reason for this is that individuals take into consideration those things that are not tangible, or that cannot be measured quantitatively, such as the happiness (or sadness) that their actions bring to other people!!

Again:

"How selfish soever man may be supposed, there are evidently some principles in his nature, which interest him in the fortune of others, and render their happiness necessary to him, though he derives nothing from it, except the pleasure of seeing it."

Think about it--there's so many little things that people do that don't really bring them any benefits other than just seeing the happiness of those around them:  stopping to ask someone if they're okay if they slipped on the ice, dropping off cookies to someone who has had a hard day, helping someone dig their car out of the snow, sharing their lunch with a friend who hasn't had time to eat all day... the list could go on and on. And that is cool :)

Hope ya know, we had a hard time

Today I was looking for a quote that a good friend of mine gave me a couple years back and I accidentally came across this video, and it just seemed to fit the day.  The town where I live just got about two feet of snow in about 24 hours, which isn't a huge amount, but it's definitely enough to cause problems getting from point A to point B.  The cool thing about it is that all day long I've been seeing people whose cars are stuck in the snow... and every time, there always seems to be random people who have stopped to help.  Yay for people!!  :) 
How this all ties together though, is that we really have no idea what another person is going through, whether it's the person who is stuck in the ditch, or whether it is the person who is helping to dig them out.  So when it's been a hard day, and you see someone else who looks like they might be having a hard time too... take a moment to to help. Cuz guaranteed, you'll both feel better.