Let's Celebrate!!! 🎉🎁🎂🇺🇸💥

Dear friends and family,

What a crazy-fun week!!! Lots of guests and seeing people I know,  

Large groups are now a regular sight.  This is one youth group.

With friends from Gilbert, the Cavenees

birthday and 4th of July celebrations, welcoming President Randall and his family, 

Pres. Randall and fam meet the PRS fam
(they have 3 children ages 8, 13, and 15 with them on their mission)

and commemorating the completion of the Book of Mormon translation 187 years ago!! Good stuff!

This week on our exchange day I was with Sister Anderson, bringing it back to our MTC days together. I saw a woman walk in who looked so familiar, so I said "hello!" and asked if she had been in before and she said she had been there in October and then we both realized that I had taken them on a tour in October!!... And that sure wasn't a family I could ever forget as I watched all the kids walk in. The Boswell family has 11 children, 2 of which have left on missions since October! 
 

The Boswells

The Spirit really is amazing because I remembered where their two kids are serving and all of their names after they did a basic "refresher" and ran through them all! The Holy Ghost can bring things to our remembrance. It was an awesome tour and we shared our favorite Book of Mormon stories in the Smith home, which was especially neat because they were on their way to Palmyra to be part of the cast in the Hill Cumorah Pageant!! Such a neat family, so closely knit and centered in the gospel of Jesus Christ. I loved them!

I turned 20 on Sunday (2 whole decades old!! Woohoo!) and had a great birthday!! Thank you to everyone who sent an email, card or package... I felt so loved!! :) The sisters decorated the back room for me and our house which was so cute!  

The big 2-0!!

It was a super-busy day at the site and so good!! It slowed down for just a little bit so Sister Walker had me help her decorate cakes for our Sunday dinner/birthday party because she knows I love that kind of stuff.  Dinner with site fam was so much fun!! It was a great weekend of service, celebrations & yummy 4th of July picnic food! I'm so grateful to be serving with the people I do, and know part of the reason I was called to the Priesthood Restoration Site is because I needed them in my life.

Being at the site has made me so grateful for the way Heavenly Father works in our lives, often times without us even realizing it. For example, Isaac Hale was raised by his grandparents in Wells, Vermont after his mother died. It was there he met Elizabeth as early as age 12, and later they would marry in Wells. Hunting brought him to the Susquehanna Valley in 1788 where he and Elizabeth would raise all 9 of their children, Emma being their 7th. In 1825, when Joseph Smith was 19, Joseph would come to the area for work boarding with the Hale family as he worked for Josiah Stowell, and after a little over a year of knowing and courting Emma Hale, they would be married... And together, supporting each other, they were able to do so much! I think it is amazing how the Lord was able to get each of these people in the right place at the right time so that the restoration of the gospel of Jesus Christ would be able to roll forth!

Something else that is cool to think about is that the Book of Mormon is considered the "keystone of our religion," because everything we believe is supported by the Book of Mormon-- Joseph Smith, modern day prophets, our beliefs, etc. Pennsylvania is also considered the keystone state because Philadelphia is birthplace of the nation where the Declaration of Independence was signed and the Constitution was made! Heavenly Father knew there needed to be a place where freedom of religion could be, where men could worship how, where or what they may.

We love being the Keystone State!

Make the Book of Mormon your own personal keystone! When we rely on our Savior and his prophet's teachings, we will never fall and the adversary will have no power over us. Have a wonderful week everyone! Hurrah for Israel!

Love,
Sister Larsen