Huge Things!

Weather Report
High 54 Low 40Sunrise 7:47 a.m. Sunset 7:53 p.m. = 12 hours & 6 min. Daylight.

We will be going off Daylight savings next week and then I will lose my time to go walking. What will I ever do for exercise in this big city and with an office job – woe is me!

The biggest huge thing in Alaska, Denali,! We were able to go to Denali with the bishop from Fairbanks. He had put our name in the lottery and we won. During the season you can only get in by bus but after the season they allow 400 cars a day to drive in all the way on 4 different days. Almost 6,000 people apply so we were very lucky. And the day was the most beautiful! They say you only see Denali (Mt. McKinley to the lower 48) from top to bottom 10 days out of the year and the day we went was one of those days. It was a fantastic day where we not only saw the mountain but we saw an unbelievable 13 bear and 10 wolves right by the road.

We saw the "three bears", actually mamma and her two babies. One of the baby bear stood up on her hind legs and the three of them crossed the road between all the cars who had stopped to see them. When in a bus all summer you can’t get out of the bus to even take a picture but when you drive in you are allowed to get out of the car. If the animals get within 50 yards you have to get back into your car. So the wild animals never see people. They are used to vehicles traveling on the roads but really never see people.

This wolf was feeling pretty good as he stretched for us. We saw three bear eating a downed caribou and all 10 of the wolves had just finished a caribou and were stretched out in the sun. It was so funny to see. I want to tell you more of the wonderful day but won’t so just know it was a once in a life time opportunity that we are so thankful to have had. 

The greatest huge thing was the spiritual experience we had two weekends ago at the temple with brand new members of the church from Fairbanks. These were all people that we helped do packets. To see Br. Rodriguez sobbing as he was baptized for a father and grandfather was more than we could take because after doing the research for his family we felt like we knew them. He will be eligible to go to the temple for his endowments in October. He and his wife are talking about waiting until their wedding anniversary in January. Br. Rodriguez says he just can’t wait that long.

Sister Davidson called us and asked us to attend the sealing session where she was sealing 30 people in her family. When we got there she asked us to be proxy for her parents while she was sealed to them. What an unspeakable honor! I have always wanted to have a “real spiritual” experience in the temple and we had one that day. When one grandmother was being sealed to her husband the sealer stopped and asked, “Who said yes?” The proxy answered that she had. “No, the sealer said, “I heard two people answer.” Then he looked at each one of us and asked again, “Who said yes?” None of us heard two yes’s. Afterwards I asked Sister Davidson if that was her grandmother who answered. She said she knew that it was. This family history is so wonderful and such a blessing in our lives.