Happy Birthday to Me!

First, I want to tell my Mom that blood clots are not allowed, especially not in your lung, or anywhere else. I hope you are doing well and feel much better soon!

Tuesday is the official release of the first volume of the new official history of the Church, Saints. One of the Church History directors, Keith Erekson, came to Riverton and gave us a very interesting lecture on the creation of the work. 

He also gave us all a copy of the first volume as thanks for our help as the technical people support the software for publishing, cataloging, finding, digitizing, etc.

A paper copy of the book is a great way to read it, but it is already meant to be a very interactive work. A copy will be available in Gospel Library. There are links to all the works, and if the info comes from old letters or journals, digital copies of those items are available as well. Very cool. The first few chapters are online.

But I love that it is written as a story. After the researchers did their work, story tellers were then hired to tell the story in an interesting and readable way, and guys like Brandon Sanderson were consulted to help ensure the book was readable and not a stuffy, hard-to-read academic work. It reads like a novel, but everything is based on real research. If the story says it was a rainy evening, then there is documentation that it really was a rainy evening.

And, they don't avoid any of the controversial or tough doctrines or history. If interested, you can go to other articles that tell more about the particular events and doctrines. Anyone can look at everything we have.

You might be interested in Elder Snow's account of how this work came to be.

My YSA-attending older children, I believe there is a fireside for you on September 9th about it. I recommend you watch. These are the people for which I do what I do--which is for all of us. I am grateful to be a small part of all of this!

By the way, Keith Erekson encouraged us to show off our link to this work, so that's what I'm doing!

I should mention that we celebrated my birthday last night. Andrew is making a beautiful cutting board with the help of Kerry Newbold, which is awesome. My new shirt is the above photo. Our bedroom has a nice quilt. Susie took me to Antman and Wasp, which I enjoyed immensely. And, the frozen yogurt cake was great.

I love you all!