Baadsgaard Reunion 2024

When Family Comes Together in Love

My husband and I are serving a full-time two year mission for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in Oakland California. We left behind our home, family and easy retirement living. Why would we do that? Because we love our Savior and desire to help others come to know the healing, hope and joy we've found. We've had incredible experiences we will treasure forever. One unexpected experience happened on Memorial Day. While we were serving at the mission office in Oakland, California, we watched on our phones as our supportive, loving children and grandchildren gathered at our home in Spanish Fork Utah to re-landscape our front yard. Previously our son John had built a retaining wall and our daughter-in-love Bekah had designed and purchased all the plants for the transformation. It felt like Christmas. Why would they do that? Because they love us, they love each other and they love their Savior. When a family comes together in love, beautiful memories are made and endure forever.

Alice is baptized

April 28, 2024

Dear Alice,

 I’m so excited that you are turning eight years old this year because that means that you are old enough to choose to be baptized. I’m so happy you have made that choice. I remember when I was baptized on my eight-year-old birthday in a little white church across the street from my house in Union, Utah. My congregation had all the children being baptized sit on small wooden chairs and talked to us for a while. I don’t remember what they said, but I do remember what I felt.

I felt excited and a little scared before I was baptized. Maybe you are also. When I was baptized, the water was warm and I felt clean and happy when I came out of the water. Then I put my dry clothes back on, walked out of the church and into the cold January winter air. I remember looking up and seeing lacy white flakes of snow falling all around me. Even though it was cold outside, I felt warm inside. I knew God loved me and was pleased I wanted to come home to heaven someday.

I also knew that Jesus was my best friend and that if I tried to live like Him that I would be happy. When I was your age, they waited until Sunday to confirm me at church and give me the gift of the Holy Ghost. I felt protected when the men with the priesthood made a circle around me and put their hands on my head as my father confirmed me.

What I didn't know was that the man I was going to marry someday was being baptized on the very same day, January 6^th (my birthday) in a little town called Spanish Fork, Utah. He was a little scared and excited too. Because we both wanted to be like Jesus, we found each other many years later. We recognized we had the same dreams and plans for life.

           When your grandfather got back from his mission to Samoa, we were married in the SLC temple and made special promises to God. We were sealed for time and eternity. Pretty soon your mother was born. Then she grew up and married your daddy in the same SLC temple and then pretty soon, you were born.

Being baptized is such a sacred time because we participate in our first saving ordinance and make our Heavenly Father our first official promise. You are a daughter of God, Alice, and your Heavenly parents love you. They want you to be happy so they made a plan of happiness for you to follow so you can return to them. 

Now that you are eight, God thinks you are wise enough to know the difference between right and wrong choices. Heavenly Father knows that some of the choices we make will not be wise. Because He loves us, He wants us to know how to change so we will not be trapped by our mistakes. So He invites us to make a promise to Him and then He makes a promise right back to us. When we make a special promise to God and He makes one right back to us, it is called a covenant. Heavenly Father never breaks a promise.

The promise you make to God is that you will remember Jesus, follow Him, serve others and keep His commandments. Heavenly Father promises you that He will forgive you if you repent. He also promises that you can return to live with Him and gives you the gift of the Holy Ghost to help, guide, protect, warn and comfort you.

           Did you know that you can be re-baptized every Sunday? Everybody makes mistakes after they are baptized so Heavenly Father gave us the sacrament every week. That is when we remember the covenant we made when we were baptized. We think about our week and decide how to be better during the coming week. We think about our Savior Jesus Christ and how He atoned for all our sins, pains, disappointment and grief. We also think about Christ’s resurrection and that we can be resurrected too someday. Taking the sacrament with a humble heart is just like being baptized again.

I hope you will write about how you feel in your journal the day on your baptism day. Never forget you are a child of God and can inherit the eternal life God has planned for you. And never forget your grandma loves you with all her heart.

Love,  

Grandma Baadsgaard.   

 

Oakland Temple at Sunrise

As part of our two year mission for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, my husband and I work in the office of the Oakland San Francisco Mission right across the street from the Oakland Temple. My husband took this picture while on a morning walk at sunrise. We have the great blessing of attending this temple every week where we feel peace and joy and experience an eternal perspective for the challenges we face in life. I love the temple and feel so blessed to live close by this House of God.

Cambodian New Year Celebration

I LOVE serving a mission in Oakland and San Francisco! We are surrounded with so many beautiful people and cultures with fascinating traditions that truly enrich my life. For example, we served at a Cambodian New Year Celebration recently. 

We have a small Cambodian branch in Oakland that meets in the same building we do each Sunday. Many of the small church units around here have young missionaries and senior missionary couples who attend their services so they can bless the lives of those in the small branch. 

Of course these missionaries soon discover they are the ones who are being blessed by wonderful people of multiple cultures and backgrounds. 

A small Cambodian branch sponsors a New Year celebration for the whole Bay Area and has been doing this service for 28 years. As people immigrate to the US, many young people lose the traditions of their parents. So this small branch sponsors this celebration to give Cambodian families in the bay area a chance to celebrate their heritage. 

This Cambodian branch puts together a wonderful program of dance in the auditorium and then provides a free meal of Cambodian food after. Hundreds of people show up and enjoy the evening, all for free because of the generosity of the members of the church here. 

Moody Family Visit to Oakland/San Francisco

Moody family at the Oakland Temple

We love having our family visit while we are serving a full-time two year mission 

in Oakland/San Francisco California

Celebrating Christmas on Temple Hill

The lights on Temple Hill at the Oakland Temple are stunning this year.

My husband and I were in a volunteer group that helped install the lights.

The lights represent the light of Jesus Christ who offers each of us joy and peace.

Meet the Waymans

Some people just don’t know how much good they do because they are too busy serving others to notice themselves.

Meet the Waymans.  

The Waymans are a senior couple in the California Oakland San Francisco Mission. Before coming on a mission, Sister Wayman was an elementary school librarian who regularly brought whimsy and delight to countless young children. She became the characters in the books she read aloud and dressed up in a different costume for every holiday of the year.  As an educator, Elder Wayman saw the potential of each student he worked with and inspired them to see their worth and aim for the stars. Hundreds of young people have had their lives profoundly changed by the care and attention this couple has given them.

Their greatest career, they will tell you, is being the mom and dad of eight beautiful and remarkable children and now many grandchildren. The Wayman’s home was filled with love and fun.

When asked how she finds the energy to serve so many people, Sister Wayman simply answers, “I received so much anonymous service in my life as my husband faced major health challenges, I just want to pay it forward.”

Elder Wayman is on his third kidney transplant and has to take a handful of pills every day. They have faced the possibility of death together numerous times. Perhaps that is why they are often seen holding hands.

“We have had so many miracles in our lives,” Sister Wayman says. “Finding three people willing and able to donate a kidney to save my husband’s life is perhaps the biggest.”

One of those donors was the Wayman’s daughter demonstrating the deep love in their family. Recently all their children pooled their money and surprised Elder and Sister Wayman with a beautiful home remodel while they were away serving in California.

The Waymans are called as a Pathway coordinator. Pathway is an educational program with certificates and degrees for those who have not had an opportunity to continue their learning for a variety of reasons, including the inability to pay for higher education. This program, offered by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, is remarkably inexpensive and mostly on-line except for a weekly in-person class with all the students in their group.

If there is a need in the mission, the Waymans always step in to help. They recently filled-in at the mission office when they were short staffed and now they are filling in the visitor’s center as well.

Perhaps one of the most endearing qualities of this couple is the way they love to feed people . . . both their bodies and their souls.

Sister Wayman is a ball of sunshine holding a cookie sheet with her latest culinary delight. Her husband is always helping out in the background to support a wife with boundless energy and the desire to feed and nurture everyone around her. In the wee hours of the night when others are sleeping, Sister Wayman is dreaming up ways to celebrate others by creating delicious meals and scrumptious treats. She invites neighbors and friends over for dinner and creates magical birthday celebrations so everyone feels noticed and appreciated.

Sister Wayman creates celebrations. She takes the time to know when those around her have a birthday or anniversary and then she come up with a surprise party complete with balloons, streamers and the most delicious treats. 

Elder Wayman is right there at her side helping to cook, carry, set up and take down the magic they create together. Having faced the possibility of death many times together, they don’t take each other for granted.

Elder Wayman was diagnosed with kidney failure at a young age and they both know life is unpredictable and presents challenges. But they both choose to see the miracles instead of the tragedy.

The Waymans always seem to notice when someone needs a ride to church, a warm hug or a little cheering up. Their love creates the sparkle in other’s lives.

 “When nothing is expected and everything is appreciated, life is magical.” Sabin Conference Talk Oct 2023

The Waymans expect nothing from life or those around them. They appreciate everything. Because of the lens they choose to look through, their life is truly magical. Those around them find that the Wayman’s sparkle has rubbed off on them, making their life magical as well.