About time to get some thoughts out

I have felt for awhile now that I wanted to make a post, but I have neglected it because most of the time when I feel like I need to get my feelings out it's because I'm having a "bad night". Meaning an evening spent down memory lane, feeling very sad and wondering why the start of 2012 had to get off so rotten. I mean, New Year's is supposed to be a happy thing, right?? My last tough night I had was when Lindy posted her poem she wrote for school. And then right after that mom posted about the apples. Earlier in the afternoon I had visited Chandler's facebook page, and read some of the continuing thoughts of his schoolmates and friends. Instead of posting on my blog, I just write in my journal and get all my emotions down on paper. It feels very much like a releasing of pent up emotions and sadness and helps me to talk myself through things. But I also feel that is something you don't all really want to read :) So tonight, I am feeling a surge of emotion at the other end of the spectrum, and I feel this is something I can and would like to share with everyone.

Life has not been all roses and sunshine thus far into the year. But neither has it been all gray and gloomy. While I have experienced the most intense heart-ache I have ever felt, so too have I come to know my Savior in a way I never could have before. Many of the plain and simple truths I have been taught all my life became real to me all of a sudden. The simplest and most important thing I have learned is that God loves Me. With everything going on in the world, all the billions of people going through tougher times than I, He took the time to show me His love and heal my heart. I learned truly what it means to turn my sorrows over to Him who has born it already. Christ has been through it all and more, so that I wouldn't have to suffer alone. At my lowest moment, I was given a blessing through the priesthood and from that moment my burden has been lightened. I have felt a closeness to the Spirit that used to be absent in my day to day life. It's not as hard to remember to read my scriptures every day, and I have found myself quicker to count my blessings and to thank my Father. Just yesterday my visiting teachers came, and she read the scripture
Helaman 5:12 -- And now, my sons, remember, remember that it is upon the rock of our Redeemer, who is Christ, the Son of God, that ye must build your foundation; that when the devil shall send forth his mighty winds, yea, his shafts in the whirlwind, yea, when all his hail and his mighty storm shall beat upon you, it shall have no power over you to drag you down to the gulf of misery and endless wo, because of the rock upon which ye are built, which is a sure foundation, a foundation whereon if men build they cannot fall.

I would have to say that the devil himself has given our family a pretty good row this year, but Christ is my rock and my foundation! Through all that has happened, I can't help but feeling a little triumphant at the victory I have won! I know there are still going to be hard times for a very long time, the family reunion this year is going to be difficult, as will Thanksgiving and Christmas, and next New Year's. But the testimony I have gained is engraven on my heart as deeply as was my love for Chandler. At the same time I feel sad, I also feel a little assurance, my family is forever and death itself cannot break that bond. My thoughts have been turned to grandma Koyle lately as well, and I have been recording some of my memories with her so they too can be cherished throughout my life until I see her again. How grateful I am to know the things I know!!