Bible in a Year

Prompt for week #3:

What would you want your children or grandchildren to learn from your example about making and achieving goals? (I am uncomfortable writing about me me me. But here I go):

"Suffer the Children" by Minerva Teichert

This artist gives me inspiration to KEEP MOVING FORWARD

Here's a goal I've done that I'm very proud of:

I read the entire Bible in a year. I thank my friend and former coworker Sue Taylor. Back in September of 2012 her pastor at the Long Point Methodist Church challenged his congregation to read the Bible in a year. Sue was fired up about it, and her enthusiasm drew me in. Actually, I had wanted to do it for a while, and all I needed to be successful is a reading plan and a buddy to hold me accountable.  Sue provided me with both. Every week she would bring me the reading schedule printed in her church bulletin.

I highly recommend reading the Bible in chronological timeline order rather than reading it in the order the books are arranged. A chronological schedule may be found at this link.

I didn't just read the Bible, I took it further and read all four of the LDS Standard Works -- the Bible, the Book of Mormon, the Doctrine and Covenants and the Pearl of Great Price-- in about 16 months. And when I finished, I was so fulfilled that I jumped in and read them all cover-to-cover a second time, this time completing the task in 15 months. 

There's a time and season for goals. In 2013 I only had one child at home and he was a teenager who barely came out of his room. I had the time and the concentration I needed for all of the reading. That's not to say a young mother couldn't read the Bible in year. I'm just saying I was able to succeed when I no longer had the distraction of a passel of children.

I will confess I got off track for a time. I was way, way behind Sue and was embarrassed to admit it to her. In March I took my Bible to Ireland on a trip. I had a nasty head cold the first two days and the weather was so blustery I stayed inside our cottage and

What Grandma Taught Me.

The prompt this week was: "What is something you taught yourself to do without much help from anyone else?"  However, the memory that came to me most strongly and most immediately was not of what I taught myself, but rather, something my Grandmother Audrey Nelson Cordon taught me. I have had so many wonderful teachers in my life.

My latest flower embroidery project, unfinished.

When I was around 9 years old Grandma Cordon came and stayed with us for a whole month to get acupuncture treatments from my father. I think it was March of 1976. It was a happy time for me. I was not blessed to be raised near grandparents. They lived  in Idaho and Utah and we usually only visited them once per year. Grandma's visit to our California home bolstered my self-esteem. I felt unconditional love from Grandma which was something I needed.  She was so patient and so fun. I always felt important and  confident around Grandma. I loved her very much.

Grandma was tiny, around 5 foot tall. She felt a little soft when you hugged her, but she was not really plump. A big nose held up glasses through which peered melancholy eyes. The sadness on her countenance was juxtaposed with her loud laugh and penchant for dressing in bright colors like hot pink and orange.  She had a wonderful sense of humor, like all of my father's family, but she cried easily. When I was older I learned that she suffered from

Defining My Dash in 52 Stories

This blog is my effort to take on the challenge from LDS Family Search's #52Stories Project, Define Your Dash.  The dash refers to the space between birth and death, such as one might see between dates on a grave marker. Years and years from now, my marker might read something like this:

Megan

Devoted Wife, Mother, Friend

1966 - 2076

The dates can tell you some things about me. For example, thirteen LDS temples were standing the year I was born. The newest one was in Oakland, California, just across the bay from the liberal mecca of San Francisco. There was high political unrest in the US in 1966-- civil rights demonstrations, war protests, stirrings for expanded women's roles in society. The Black Panthers and the National Organization for Women were both founded the year I was born. 

However, the dates don't tell you that I was born in that hotspot San Francisco to a mother who travelled there from Alaska to give birth, because she wanted me to thrive in a liberal political climate. The dates don't tell you that I did not get much instruction in liberal politics because Idahoan Mormons adopted and raised me, or that