By Heather B. Moore
“Don’t you dare step into that Mormon church. You will go to [bleep]!” Carole’s mother had said more than once.

The sentence didn’t need to be finished for my good friend, Carole. She was Catholic and I was Mormon. Yet, we’d become the best of neighbors in a small apartment community in sunny Southern California.

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By Danielle Ellis
Church members in the Las Vegas area have been taking more responsibility for weekly building maintenance for several years, but the transition will be complete on August 1, 2010. On that date, the Church Facilities Management will officially turn over all weekly cleaning responsibilities to the members. Weekly housekeeping includes cleaning bathrooms, wiping doors and glass, sweeping, mopping, vacuuming, trash removal, etc.

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By Leslie Albrecht Huber
In July, many of us turn our thoughts to the pioneers who made their way to Utah during the mid-1800s. When we think of these pioneers, we imagine their journey beginning in Nauvoo, Illinois. But for many of the Utah-bound pioneers, the journey started long before they ever took a step beside a covered wagon. Many had already been traveling for months and for thousands of miles. For thousands of early LDS converts, the journey to Zion began in Western Europe. One of these immigrants was my great-great-great-grandmother, Kerstina Nilsdotter.

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By Danielle Ellis
For anyone interested in going to college, there are plenty of questions. Which classes should I take now? Where should I apply? How do I pick a major? How do I choose a career? Should I go to a big university or a small college? Is it even worth going to college now?

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Ranger Don Bolton sits patiently at the front desk, waiting for a “paying customer” to walk through the doors of the Old Las Vegas Mormon Fort. Three Daughters of the Utah Pioneers arrive to clean its new visitors’ center as well as the oldest structure in all of Las Vegas, standing sturdily behind it.

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By Krista Ralston Oakes
Several years ago we added some new decorations to our home at Easter time, and we leave them up all year round, long after the bunnies and baskets and plastic grass are packed away. Three are paintings, each by a different artist, of the Savior emerging from the tomb. One is a painting of the Savior in Gethsemane.

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By Danielle Ellis
When the 7.0 earthquake leveled much of Haiti on January 12, 2010, charitable people all over the world mobilized to help. LDS people, always at the forefront of disaster relief, sprang into action. Thousands of monetary donations poured directly into LDS Church Headquarters; the Church, through LDS Charities, provided tents, food, propane stoves and solar panels, teams of doctors and nurses, and clinical social workers. But the needs were obviously huge, and many people knew they could do more to help.

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By Danielle Ellis
Surround Yourself with Greatness.” This is the commitment a young Chad Lewis made to himself while he was half a world away from home, serving a mission in Taiwan. He read an old talk by Gordon B. Hinckley, “Caeser, Circus, or Christ,” (available at speeches.byu.edu; 1965) and resolved to himself that he could surround himself with great music, great books and great people, and this would help him to become the man he wanted to be.

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By Stephanie McMillan
The room was filled with laughing kids, shushing each other with pointed looks and fingers pressed to lips. Trying desperately to listen, we were often diverted in our best efforts by a more interesting eight-year-old neighbor and the treasures he hid in his scripture bag. Sister Huffaker bravely stood at the front of this melee each and every Sunday, singing out and sharing her love of music with our rowdy crowd.

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By Ken Craig
In the summer of 1988, as a shocking reaction to my dad’s midlife crisis that he insisted he was not having, our family moved to the tiny Hawaiian island of Molokai. People have two reactions when they hear about Molokai: 1) Where? and 2) Isn’t that where the lepers are?

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By Kenneth W. Long
The short December day has drawn to an end. My newspapers are not delivered, my hands are numb and my face is cold. The hand-me-down jacket I inherited from my brother who inherited it from my sister does little to fend off the chill. I am at the corner of 8th and Franklin, having just lobbed the Review-Journal onto the front yard of Jack Scholfield’s house. I have papers to deliver and homework to do, yet I am stopped because I am scared of something I do not understand.

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By Shellee Nihipali
My husband Kaleo and I were married in the Las Vegas temple in 1999 and assumed that children would follow soon after that. They didn’t. We prayed for our family to grow, we searched for answers, and we went through countless tests and doctors’ visits. At times, we would get overwhelmed and feel pretty hopeless. But no matter how hard things got, we could always find peace at the temple. It continues to be a place where we can forget our cares, even if just for awhile, and focus on things more eternal.

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By Kimberly Reid
OYM. Do you know what it means? I didn’t when I first visited an institute in Manitoba, Canada. I went partly as a vacationer visiting a friend, partly as a Church magazines employee investigating why member missionary work had taken off so dramatically in a local branch.

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By Lu Ann Staheli
Men are that they might have joy.” Nephi’s words are true, but as President Dieter F. Uchtdorf has said, “We know that sometimes it can be difficult to keep our heads above water. In fact, in our world of change, challenges, and checklists, sometimes it can seem nearly impossible to avoid feeling overwhelmed by emotions of suffering and sorrow.”
We’ve all had moments we thought our burdens have been too much to bear, so where do we find the joy? Elder Marlin K. Jensen says, “. . . within the family we experience most of life’s greatest joys.”

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By Lu Ann Staheli
Husbands are commanded: “… love your wives, even as Christ also loveth the church, and gave himself for it.” (Ephesians 5:25) Perhaps because we were older when we married, or maybe because my husband had good parents, or simply because of the man my husband grew to be from his life experiences; but when it comes to loving husbands, I am truly blessed. I have one of those husbands who gives freely of himself to ensure that I know how much he cares for me.

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