Lyla's testimony

Olivia, Lyla and I were walking down the street and Lyla shared with us her sweet little testimony. She said:

"I love Heavenly Father and Heavenly Father loves me. I love Jesus and Jesus loves me. I love John the Baptist and John the Baptist loves me."

I am so glad that Lyla shared this sweet and simple testimony with us.

Lyla goes to primary

When Lyla first started going to nursery she loved it. Then at the beginning of the new year she went from being the youngest surrounded by older kids to the oldest surrounded by babies, including some poor babies who were always crying. Lyla decided that she no longer liked nursery, in fact she really didn't like it. The only way she would go is if Matt and I would sit in nursery. We did that for a while, but she still didn't love it. Matt and I thought that Lyla would probably do a lot better if she were in Primary. We talked to the Primary President and she agreed to allow Lyla into primary early. I was a little nervous the first Sunday she was to go and was really hopeful that things would go as well as I assumed they would. Her first Sunday she happily marched herself in and sat down with the Sunbeams and loved it from the very first second. I waited for a while and peeked on her, one of the Primary leaders came out and said that Lyla was doing a great job. She was sitting reverently with her arms folded and singing all the words to the the primary songs nice and loud (we had been practicing the primary songs so she would know them.) When I came to pick her up everyone came to tell me what a great job she had done in Primary. They said she even volunteered to say the closing prayer in front of all the primary in closing exercises. They knelt down to help her say the prayer, but she said she could say it herself (later Olivia informed me that Lyla had done a good job saying her prayer, she didn't say "thanks you for the ice cream" something that she likes to say and usually causes her to erupt in laughter.) The primary president said that during sharing time Lyla raised her hand to answer questions and the primary president said she thought "oh isn't that cute Lyla's raising her hand to try to be like the big kids...but was so surprised that when they called on her she actually gave the correct answer. Last week they asked if Lyla could give a talk in closing exercises. When I told her she was going to give a talk she became absolutely ecstatic, she was so excited.  When Lyla gave her talk and she did an awesome job.  When they called her name she marched right up to the podium with a huge smile. I went up to whisper the talk for her to repeat . Before she started I told her to speak loudly so that grandmother could hear her all the way in Japan, she said she would.  She spoke in such a nice loud clear voice, she did such a great job. The primary leader came up to me and said that not only did Lyla have such a great voice tone, but she was so expressive and had a big smile while she was speaking. I was so proud of Lyla, she is such and outgoing and friendly little girl.

City girl

The other day we were on our way to church and Olivia asked "Mom that's called a gas station, right?" I told her "yes, that is a gas station." She went on to say..."doesn't that just make you feel like we are out in the country?" I responded that gas stations don't really make me feel like i am out in the country. "Take a deep breath...can you smell that? Aahhh just like we are out in the country" she said. I asked her to explain to me how gas stations make her feel like she is out in the country. She explained that whenever we go out into the country there are gas stations everywhere. I asked when we have been out in the country, she responded, "you know like Utah and California." It seems to me my sweet Olivia considers any place outside NYC "out in the country."  She is right, compared to NYC (where we never really see gas stations) there really are gas stations everywhere when we are outside the city.

Lyla loves to read

Lyla has always loved reading books. It sometimes seems like she would be happy as could be if we sat on the couch and read book after book all day long. As a result we do spend a lot of time reading books. I always love when she says things that I know have come strait from her love of book reading. Some things I have recently heard from her...

- As we are approaching a large white building, "Mom are you taking me to the Taj Mahal?"
- Walking around the park  "I love pigeons! Pigeons are my favorite birds... and egrets too."
-"Mom do you want me to show you my veins? I love my veins!"
- After drawing a picture, I aked Lyla what she was drawing and she said, I'm drawing a picture of Claude Monet."