Wow! It's been a while...

Well, it's been a while since I last posted in here. A little under a year probably, and so much has happened.

First of all, up until October, 2012, I was attending the Brookshire Ward in Taylorsville. And then, I found the Midvale Union Fort 9th Branch. This is a midsingles branch that caters to members of the Church who are 31-45 years of age and are still single, or have been married and divorced w/o custody of minor children. I had been doing double duty, attending the Brookshire Ward, and the branch for two months. And I was planning to finish out the year that way, and start fresh with the branch in the new year.

And then something happened that changed my plans drastically...

The branch had been meeting at the Midvale UF Stake Center. However, parking there was a horrid nightmare for 600+ singles, even with carpooling. Just to describe how large this branch is (and branch in my opinion is an oxymoron), we have 3, count them, THREE elders quorums, 6 Relief Societies, and I believe one quorum of high priests (yes, there are single high priests in this branch, and one of them is a couple of years younger than me, give or take; and that's nice having a contemporary who is advanced in the Melchizidek Priesthood; he's got my back!). This branch encompasses Taylorsville, Kearns, Murray, Utah and other 'burbs in SLC, going all the way down into Utah County too. The boundaries start at 5600 S and southward. Crazy, huh?

Yep, it was totally crazy. And because of that, the branch presidency had a major quandary on their hands. They didn't know how to solve the parking problem and had made a matter of prayer for weeks. At first President Norton thought he would have to dissolve the branch and tell everyone to go back to their family wards (which in my opinion would've led to me resigning myself to become a spinster, a fate worse than death I thought at the time). In fact, at the big meeting, he was in tears, saying that in his prayers, he kept saying, "This is not fair. These are my kids." But he got a major wake up call from Heavenly Father, saying that we weren't President Norton's kids; we were Heavenly Father's kids, and that he had a plan for the branch. It was decided that the branch would move to an old Church building by the U of U Institute building that wasn't being used. This facility had a large enough chapel and cultural hall to accommodate all of us (all 700+ of us), and it had a tiered parking garage. And here's the kicker: the meeting times would be moving to 9 am from the 1 pm that we were all used to. It was in that moment that I made my decision. I'd had my paperwork requesting my records to be transferred all filled out and signed by both me and my family ward bishop. It just had to be turned in. I decided to transfer then, so I could continue going to the branch. I turned it in to a member of the branch presidency, and a week (and one hospitalization) later, I was a member of the Midvale Union Fort 9th Branch.

In this, I've been blessed. My Relief Society president moved into my apartment complex soon after and she and I have been carpooling together to church. Recently, with my calling to serve in the temple on Saturdays, she's been giving me rides to my temple shift. It was her idea too. She wanted to attend the temple, and reasoned that the best way for her to motivate herself to do it was to drive me to my temple shift and then do some temple service while I was on shift.

All in all, I've been majorly blessed. I just hope I can continue to be so. I'm just taking it one day at a time and doing all I can.

Slan go foill...