Here's some inspiration

I love the talk by Jeffrey R. Holland "Cast Not Away Therefore Your Confidence."  It's been a favorite for a long time because it reminds me to stay focused on answers to prayer that I've already received and to move ahead with confidence. Some of my favorite quotes:

"It is the plain and very sobering truth that before great moments,certainly before great spiritual moments, there can come adversity, opposition, and darkness. Life has some of those moments for us, and occasionally they come just as we are approaching an important decision or a significant step in our lives."

**this is significant for me right now because we are trying to buckle down and be more disciplined in our finances. As Dave Ramsey says"live like nobody else so later you can live like no one else". I was gung-ho about cutting all sorts of expenses and was going a little extreme, which was hurting me and not anyone else in the family. The spirit helped me back on track and we just keep being blessed. Here's some of the ways: tax return came and another rebate of nearly $1000 came. The cell phone bill got slashed, home phone bill reduced, I had fun creating our new budget and could actually assign our money to places it needed to go!, I am filled with hope for our future financial life, I'm excited to have a huge garden and to preserve lots of food, we finally have a budget for car maintenance, and I'm going to spend cash for many things because it's easier to keep track, our fuel bill was $70 less than we budgeted so I was able to use that for something that came up, and today while shopping, almost everything I needed was on sale at Safeway! I got to save gas by not going to Costco and I spent the same amount on food. So many exciting events are coming up too, the new general women's meeting for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints  general conference, and BYU Women's conference. I know that life is a series of ups and downs so I'm going to savor this up for as long as it's here!

-Elder Holland again "...but once there has been illumination, beware the temptation to retreat from a good thing. If it was right when you prayed about it and trusted it and lived for it, it is right now. Don't give up when the pressure mounts. Certainly don't give in to that being who is bent on the destruction of your happiness...."Cast not away therefore your confidence." Stay the course and see the beauty of life unfold for you."

-"you will need information too, but in matters of great consequence it is not likely to come unless you want it urgently, faithfully, humbly....  If you can seek that way and stay in that mode, not much that the adversary can counter with will dissuade you from a righteous path."

Here's the link:

http://speeches.byu.edu/?act=viewitem&id=795

Happy weekend. The sun was out for a little bit today!