August Visitors and Events 2014

 I am cheating a little on the first photo, as it was really the last day of July...but we need to start an August post.

We started the month with some Phoenix area friends stopping to take time with us.

We had Linda Spesia and Janelle and Diane Broderick over for dinner this week while they were attending the Family History Conference at BYU.  I did not realize how hungry I was just to visit with friends!  We have been SO BUSY trying to settle in and having company and getting used to our new callings, that we have not really had time just to talk!

THANK YOU FOR COMING TO SEE US!

Next we met up with our dear friends the Morris' from our Mission Presidency.  They were in town to attend the Ogden Temple Open House in preparation for their involvement in helping put on the Phoenix Open House in several months.  They got lots of ideas of what to do and what NOT to do from their experiences here.

Again, it was delightful just to have time to visit with people who know us and our background.
THANK YOU MORRIS'!

We had another Returned Missionary come visit the end of July that I missed getting in the photo.  TALITHA MORRISON and her Mom stopped by one night and it was just so great to visit!  She is adorable as always and doing so good!  We look forward to seeing her more often when she gets into school!

Mid August I hooked up with Nicole Okeson Ellis...the first Sister I went out teaching with when I arrived in Phoenix 3 years ago!  OH THE MEMORIES!!!
We had the best time visiting  and catching up and giving advice to each other!  That's what Sisters are for!

And to top it off, I got a mini recital in my kitchen!  Nicole is a professional flutist so it was really an honor to hear her!  We look forward to going to some of her concerts this winter at BYU as she is getting her Masters.
















Finally!  The day arrived when DANA could come visit us in Utah!  This is us at the airport.  On my personal blog I have all the temples we have visited and all of SLC that we visited so far!
Dana is my dear friend from AZ that lived by me and was baptized while we were living there.  She is up staying with us for BYU Education Week.
We celebrate daily the Gospel in our lives and how blessed we both are to have it and each other as Sisters!

 Saturday we were invited to a sealing in Mt Timpanogos Temple where we ran into a bunch of our Returned Missionaries!
L to R: Logan Van Kampen. Juan Castanos, Michael Nield, us, Brady Jones, Joseph Barley and Harrison Wardle.










NICE BOOTS Logan!!


















The Bride and Groom!!!
Danica and Adam O'Neal!!!

It was a beautiful sealing with great advice from the sealer.  He talked about the sealing room being an extension of the celestial room...same chandelier in miniature and everything!  The promises contained in the sealing ordinance are very special!

It was an honor being with this great couple and we hope they are super happy in their new move to Washington!

Look for a couple more sealings next weekend!



 This has been a busy 8 days for us...3 temple sealings to go to... so it is the BEST kind of busy!


Friday we were privileged to attend the sealing of Carlos and Jaine Arias.  Once again, the sealer did a wonderful job of helping them see the blessings of obedience to the temple covenants and he was so funny and kind.  We loved meeting Carlos family from Venezuela.  They are genuine and loving people!  They are off to a great start!

 They chose the Bountiful Temple to be sealed for all eternity.  I had been at the Ogden Temple Open house earlier that morning, so it was truly a special day!

 Saturday took us up to Rexburg Temple for the sealing of Tony and Brittany Pollmeier.  We were pretty excited about this one.  In the waiting area we met Brittany's Mission President and Wife from her mission in Russia.  This will become more and more common to have two RMs marrying...Love it!

I was SO EXCITED to meet Tony's Mom that I had talked on the phone with his whole mission!  I hope to get a photo from her to add to the post.  She promised.

And what better than to be there with Jeff Griffin, former companion to Tony but happy to see him with his eternal companion!  It was like old times being at the temple together!

 This was our first time inside the Rexburg Temple and it was just lovely!

CONGRATULATIONS to Carlos and Tony this week!

While we were in the area, we arranged to meet up with Aubree Fluckiger who lives in Rexburg.
She is one of our amazing first Sister Training Leaders...and we KNOW she was in the right place at the right time to bless the lives of the influx of Sister missionaries when the big wave hit!  She is as beautiful outside as she is inside and it was so great to visit with her again!

 These next couple of photos are the Nield Famlly with us...we did not have a tripod on us so we took two to get everyone involved!


 It was an  honor to meet the parents of Michael.  As one of our assistants, we got to know him a little more than some of the missionaries and we knew how much he loved his family and what great people they were!



It was fun to meet his brother Josh as well whose mission overlapped Michaels by about 6 months.  They live in Pocatello.

 Also in Pocatello was Sam Blackburn who had only been home from his mission for 4 days!  I am sure it surprised him when I messaged him that we were in the area, and his sweet Mom invited us for dinner!  What a treat!

 We had a great time visiting while eating one of our favorites...Hawaiian Haystacks! YUM!


We learned how Sams mission blessed him and his family. 
We learned the story of the tarantula in a box...ask him about that sometime.

And, we got to tell his Mom what a great son she has and thank her for sharing him with us!

THANK YOU DEAR FRIENDS FOR THE VISITS!  We love you!

PHOENIX TEMPLE PROGRESSION- MISSION VIEWPOINT 2012-2014

 PLEASE CLICK ON THIS LINE FOR A HISTORY IN PHOTOS OF THE GROWTH OF THE PHOENIX TEMPLE AS IT WAS VISITED BY MISSIONARIES!

We begin with a visit to the site with Elder Tad Callister of the Presidency of the Seventy and Elder Michael Pickerd our area seventy at the time.  December 2, 2011.
Elder and Sister Winchell were the missionary couple on site at the time.

 We began taking our missionaries to the site as they departed the mission in about January 2012.  Prior to that time, they were mostly digging down and there was not much to see on the surface.  As it rose, we felt our missionaries would like to see the temple under construction.

 We took our Sister missionaries hiking over near the temple site in March of 2012 and this is overlooking the site...not much to see, but it was coming up! 

 You can see the temple now coming up behind this set of missionaries...

 This series of photos is in October of 2012 when Elder Neal L Andersen of the Quorum of the Twelve came to visit the area and we had a special Mission Conference.  We were able to tour the site with him and took the following photos.

 This is Elder Andersen with the project managers and other authorities inside the temple on the main floor.

Check out the link above for some cool photos looking up through the ceiling of what will be the celestial room!

 We were bringing both departing and arriving missionaries to the site so they could see the end in sight...meaning, that this is what they are teaching people about so they can enjoy the blessings of the temple.

 We hosted several Mission Leadership Council hikes where we would end up overlooking the temple site.  This one had a nice breakfast associated with it.

 I was able to be at the placing of the HOLINESS TO THE LORD plaque on the front of the temple and that was pretty sweet.

 We got some really nice, artistic shots of departing missionaries in the evening.

 This is Elder Winchell showing what we call a "Witness bolt."  The little nub on the end would break off to "witness" that the bolt was secure and perfect.
What a great object lesson for missionaries as they would be witnessing constantly of the security of the Gospel!

 another great shot of departing missionaries!

 You can see through the history of our photos the "CATCH THE WAVE" as more and more missionaries joined us especially large numbers of Sister missionaries!

 I was also able to be at the temple for the placing of Moroni May 2013 along with the 2 Elders who served that area.  Elders Moala and Knabe joined me and helped with some photos.

 Here we are shouting "Hurrah For Israel" in honor of the placing of Moroni!

 We had these two Sisters going home together and got a beautiful shot of them with the backdrop of the temple!

 And then there was this beautiful shot!  Pretty nice how nature cooperated so willingly!

January of 2014 we got our entire mission together for a shot at the temple site after a mission-wide conference in Tempe with 2 other area missions.  It was a unique opportunity!

We happened to be in the area one night when they were testing lights...pretty neat!

 This shot with shadows was after a Mission Leadership Council that we held in the building there once we were moved out of the Mission Home as we were leaving the Mission.

This is one of the last shots that I have of the temple. June 2014.

Now, this is something completely different...if you look at the link above, you will see the history of the mission in our MISSION TEMPLE QUILT.  Each of our 650 missionaries signed a piece of fabric with their name that I sewed into a quilt representing the temple that welcomes the people they teach.  It started out with about 6 rows of missionaries who were currently serving when we arrived in June 2011, and grew to contain 25 rows of 27 squares before it was completed.  I had to add one row to the pattern I had designed when our mission was increased with the "Catch The Wave" influx of missionaries in 2013-14.
When people would come to visit the Mission Home, they would always love to see the Mission Flag and the Mission Quilt. 

This last photo you see was at our ward building after we spoke back in Provo...and many parents of currently serving missionaries loved seeing their child's quilt block!  I believe this is Elder Lowers family, and he is now home.  His block is up higher because he came to us only 1 year ago when our mission boundaries grew to include Flagstaff.

Enjoy this  picture tour of the Phoenix Temple.  We hope you get there in person one day to see how lovely it is in person!
LOVE YOU!  Sister Cheryl Taylor

PHOENIX TEMPLE UPDATE

Thought you would all enjoy this photo of the new Phoenix Temple.  Open house begins on October 10 and Dedication is November 16.  Look online for when you can get tickets to the open house.  Remember, if they "sell out" (get filled up), they will work you in!  Especially if you bring a non-member along!  That is always the best plan anyways!  Love you all!  Taylors

I’m sure by now you’ve all heard that dates have been announced for our beautiful Phoenix Arizona Temple. Just in case that information has not yet made it to you, I wanted to pass it along.......

Open House: Friday, October 10 - Saturday November 1. Reservations for the open house will be available beginning Monday, September 29, 2014, at 10:00 a.m.

Cultural Event: Saturday November 15.

Dedication: Sunday November 16.

Temple Opening: Tuesday November 18 for all patrons

Such an exciting time for our area! One more bit of information that you may or may not have heard: The Phoenix Arizona Temple Cultural Celebration as a website — BeALightPhoenix.com, which is where you might recognize a few faces of the youth in the area. This is a resource for all of those involved.

STEWART FALLS- August 2014 APM Hike

We had our first official APM RM HIKE today!

Amy Folsom suggested we do Stewart Falls up Provo Canyon and Alpine Loop...so that is what we did!  We left fairly early and were really glad we did!  There were quite a few hikers out today, but definitely a lot more as we were heading down!

In attendance were:
L to R roughly...
Amy Folsom, President Taylor, Kelsie Taylor, Jordan Hastings, Jenny Greenwood, Lexie Pickett, Sister Taylor, Jessie Scott, Brady Jones, Breyton Barber, John (roommate to Colton) and Colton Anderson.

And as if it were planned...we ran into (for the second time in several weeks) Breanna Whipple and her husband Jared!  Breanna is also one of our Spanish Hermanas.  We are pretty excited, because we found out that they are avid hikers and may host a hike for us down the road!

 We had a couple of daring duos today.

First Colton and John went UNDER THE FALLS a couple times.

Lets just say that they water was freezing and then they were wet the rest of the hike and continued to be cold!

But, it was fun to watch them and very beautiful to see them through the falls!









Thanks for the sacrifice guys!

Most of them took off shoes and socks and waded across the river.

 And another daring duo, Jordan and Breyton, climbed way up to the top of one of the falls.

 Who says that socks have to match...but they do need to be as bright as the shirt you are wearing!



















Coming down it was just fun to visit, watch RMS visit and see how incredibly beautiful it was.



There is nothing like being with people who are HAPPY!  Who know they are headed in the right direction.
Who care about others.
Who work hard!
Who follow their Savior Jesus Christ and know how to have fun doing it.

We love and admire all our RM's!

This photo does not even do justice to the view we had.


We kept looking and looking for saguaro cactus...but strangely enough, it was no where to be found.

We will have to settle for the green, lush mountains of Utah.

THANKS DEAR FRIENDS for taking time to hike with us, for talking to us and making us feel like real people again.  Our current callings have us rather isolated from social situations, so this was a real treat!

We look forward to next months hike!  Let us know if you want to be included in the invite!