Sunday, April 30, 2006

Wirthlin Easter


Our first Easter together as a family. We had a wonderful Easter Sunday with John's parents and later we all had dinner over at Doug and Christina's house. I am wearing the beautiful Easter outft I purchased at Anne Taylor and John is wearing a matching lavender tie. We looked great!

Easter Dresses

Campbell and Anna looked so cute in the Easter dresses Mimi bought them. That is part of the Williams Easter tradition... beautiful easter dresses. Brittan and I had fun shopping together later that night and we found matching Easter dresses too! Thanks Mom!

Kaley and Campbell


Campbell and I are anxiously awaiting the kid's Easter egg hunt. Campbell and I quickly found 18 colorful eggs all over the back yard. Three of these eggs had money in them. We collected a total of $3 dollars! That was so much fun :)

The 2 girls



Brittan and Anna at the Larson Cousin reunion. Thanks to Grammy we had a fun weekend full of family time and lots of sun! Thanks Grammy ... you pulled off an amazing event!

Friday, April 28, 2006

Resignation

I resigned from my job, Thursday April 27, 2006. I gave them the required notice--so my last day at the Clearinghouse will be May 31, 2006.

Just thought you might like to know.

Brittan

Monday, April 17, 2006

Bar Results

We found out this morning that Brian passed the Florida Bar Exam! It also looks like he is authorized to be sworn in! This is very exciting news--thanks for all of your prayers!

Brittan

Sunday, April 16, 2006

Focus on Mom!

Mom was recently highligted in a Florida-based carriage/driving magazine called WHIPS. (The picture that I have w/ mom and Kentucky Lass is not uploading--I'll try later)

Member in the Spotlight……Danette Williams

1. Who are you and what is your farm? My name is Danette Williams and my husband, Greg, and I own C&W Mountain Horse Farm in Brooksville.

2. When did your interest in Equines begin? As a little girl I had a Quarter Horse named Little Egypt. I had a lot of fun with her.

3. Where did you live at the time? Kissimmee

4. Who, what, how did you get started in driving? I learned to drive at a horse farm in Jacksonville. I went for a week. Then I had a trainer come to the farm to teach my gaited horses.

5. Does your family share your equine interests? I didn’t know that I had married a cowboy. We raised our children in Tampa and have been married for 28 years. About 6 yrs ago Greg began the trail to retirement and we bought 5 Mountain Horses. We have 5 children so I though that was appropriate. But next thing I new we had 20 horses. And today we have 150!

6. What breed(s) to you have now? We have all gaited Mountain Horses. We raise Kentucky Mountain and Rocky Mountain Horses for trail and show.

7. Do you show or just pleasure? We show our horses at World,, International and local Kentucky Mountain Saddle Horse, Rocky Mountain Horse and Gaited Horse Shows. Some of the shows even have driving classes now. I do a lot of ground driving with all of our horses as part of their training , but so far I have been driving only for my own pleasure.

8. What is your favorite thing to do with your equine(s)? I love driving everywhere.

9. What are some of the highlights of your equine life? It is very fulfilling. I love the simple aspects of everyday life. I love being outside and enjoying the beautiful splendor each day has to offer.

10. What has been your greatest accomplishment? Learning to drive has been a great accomplishment for me. I love grooming, harnessing and driving.

11. What has been your most exciting event? We had a trail ride for our horse customers in December. It was very fun to keep up with the group in my meadowbrook cart. We were traveling at a fast pace and there were so many bumps in the road that a lot of my stuff popped out of the cart. I had to back track to find it.

12. What future goals do you have? I have a team of horses, Sis and Sas, 2 full sister palomino Kentucy Mountain Horses. I hope to become more confident driving them. They are great.

13. Who is or was your favorite horse and why? My favorite horse is Kentucky Lass. She is a 2001 Kentucky Mountain World Champion All Around Mare. She is my favorite because she is brilliant, sweet, and beautiful and she has a very nice gait. In 2003 I was able to assist the trainer in teaching her to drive. She took to it very quickly. It was very gratifying.

14. What changes would you like to see in your local club? I have been to several Whips events, but haven’t gotten in touch with anyone since the hurricanes.

15. What would you like to see more and/or less of in the newsletter? The Whips newsletter informed me of several events that I attended. It is very informative and I really enjoy reading it.

Is there anything else you would like to share about yourself or your farm that was not asked? My great grandfather was a Baptist preacher in Plant City in the late 1800’s. He went by buggy every weekend to a different church “preaching the gospel”. I have his doubletree. I love to be in a buggy and think about what it was like “way back when”.

Sunday, April 09, 2006

Giving a friend a Book of Mormon

I have wanted to give one of my law-school friends a Book of Mormon for several years. I have always waited for the perfect moment, and I have always talked myself out of the "perfect moments" that have come along.

A few weeks ago, I went to Barnes and Noble and I paid 22 dollars for one of the Doubleday versions of the Book of Mormon. I figured that if I would be more likely to follow through with my goal of giving away the Book of Mormon if I had actually spent some money on the gift.

I was planning on giving my friend the Book of Mormon, on Monday April 3, 2006 (her Bday), so I was hoping to find some extra confidence by attending and listening to the sessions of General Conference.

On Sunday Morning, M. Russell Ballard spoke about "Creating a Gospel Centered Home". He encouraged us to forget our guilt for our failures in missionary work, and to instead focus on making our home a testimony of our faith. Then he encouraged us to welcome people into our homes, and to let them abound in the spirit that will be in our home. He also said that if we are truly converted to the gospel, we will not have issues with sharing the truth with our friends. This gave me strength--because I want to be truly converted to the gospel.

"Some of you may even feel guilty that you are not giving much help to the missionaries.
Today I invite you to relax and set aside your concerns and focus instead on your love for the Lord, your testimony of His eternal reality, and your gratitude for all He has done for you. If you are truly motivated by love and testimony and gratitude, you will quite naturally do all that you can to assist the Lord in "[bringing] to pass the immortality and eternal life" (Moses 1:39) of our Father's children. In fact, it would be impossible to keep you from doing it."

So, after general conference, I started my first fast in a long time (Annastyn stopped nursing in March) so that I would have the courage to deliver the intended gift. I was nervous and I almost talked myself out of it--but I stayed the path! Nothing dramatic happened either for the good or the bad--she is still my friend and she was very gracious in her receipt of the gift. I felt very encouraged in my efforts to work on being a member missionary.

Elder Ballard said: ". . . [a successful missionary experience is] not defined by whether or not people join the Church as a result of our contact with them. Our opportunity and responsibility are to care, to share, to testify, to invite, and then to allow individuals to decide for themselves. We are blessed when we have invited them to consider the Restoration, regardless of the outcome. At the very least, we have a rewarding relationship with someone from another faith, and we can continue to enjoy their friendship."

Saturday Easter at Grammie's house

This Saturday (April 15)--Grammie is throwing an extended family reunion--"Cousin Power"

Kaley is flying down from Utah on Thursday to help Grammie prepare.

I'm hoping to take pictures of all the different members of our extended family, and I'll post them here next week!

***Remember that we all need to have our taxes done this week!***

Tuesday, April 04, 2006

Some things that I have written:

Just thought you guys might want to see some things that I have written that have been published online:


http://www.ncstl.org/news/Mitchell3-06 (March 2006)

http://www.llrx.com/features/csieffect.htm (May 2005) (although it looks like all of my symbols have been changed to question marks?????)

Saturday, April 01, 2006

Post favorite thoughts from Conference

Saturday April 1st 2006:

Saturday Morning:

president Monson talked about keeping our bodies (temples) free from certain influences. He named things like pornography, excessive debt, immodesty, immorality, and vulgar language. He also stressed with equal importance the necessity of positive influences. He specifically named keeping our temples/bodies clean and fit. Working on fitness is something that I struggle with in this fast paced world!

Saturday Afternoon:

Elder Perry discussed the responsibility of the parents to bring children to sacrament meeting in a timely and reverent fashion. He talked about the sacred privilege that we have to renew our baptismal covenants on a weekly fashion. As a mother of young children, this is something that I definitely need to work on. We have dedicated many family nights to principles of reverence and we even hold 'mock sacrament meetings' where someone gives a talk--so that Campbell can practice sitting quietly for some length of time. However, we have a long way to go before we find the magic solution for timeliness and reverence! Hopefully, this talk will provide us with the needed inspiration.

oh well--dad needs the computer! Post your thoughts!!!

Love, Brittan