TEMPLE YOUTH CELEBRATION & TEMPLE DEDICATION.

Last night was the Youth Cultural Celebration for the Temple. It was held at the fairgrounds and also broadcast to all of the Stake Centers. Most people were not invited to go to the fairgrounds. We had to watch it at the Stake Center. In a way, it was better, because we got to see President Monson a lot closer than the people in the bleachers. He rode into the area on a golf cart and had his only daughter with him. He visited with the youth as he was walking on stage. The sound wasn't turned on yet, so we couldn't hear what he was saying. There was a temporary stand with a podium set up for him. Since it was temporary, because he would be in the bleachers later, he was facing the sun. He had been setting down and put a pair of sun glasses on. When he got up to speak, he forgot about the sunglasses. I guess he realized that he still had them on and didn't know what to do. Leave it to him to do something cute. He took them off and put them on Elder Brent Nielson. Elder Nielson kept the sunglasses on until President Monson finished talking. When President Monson went into the bleachers, he took time to shake the hand of each Stake President and their wives.
The celebration was about the history of Idaho and the cultures of the people that came to Idaho. It lasted about 1 & 1/2 hours. They did a good job. One sad note about the event. The man in charge of this had cancer. He was in remission when he was first asked to be in charge of the event. He passed away on the 21st. (That is Rick's birthday and also President Monson's birthday.) He was able to see the kids perform in their dress rehearsalbefore he died.
I don't know about any of you that don't live in our area and what you got to see for the Temple dedication. But in our area, we were assigned 2 times to watch it-either 9:00 a.m. or 2:00 a.m. I had Rick get tickets to the 2:00 session in case I got to work, I could get in a half day at least. I don't know if the 9:00 a.m. actually showed the cornerstone ceremony or not. (When I've watched other dedications-they have.) Well, the 2:00 session did not show the cornerstone ceremony. I was a little bummed about that. Then I looked at the Times News on line. They have a short video of the cornerstone ceremony. If you didn't get to see it when you watched the dedication-click on the Times News link that I have on my blog.
This coming Friday-the 29th of August is my first time for serving in the Temple ! I'm excited.