I Love to See the Temple

It's not time for my weekly update, but I just had to share this. Last March we took Abby to walk around the Mesa, AZ temple. She was so excited! It was a great experience, and this is what I wrote about it then:

Abby is fascinated with temples. One of her favorite songs is "I Love To See The Temple" and she has known the words to both verses for a while now. Whenever we see an ornate building she gets excited and asks if it is a temple. The other day she was eating a cracker and bit off the two top corners, leaving a 'spire' in the middle. She turned to me and said, "Mommy, Mommy! Look! It's a temple!" Then she surprised me by saying this: "I am going to get married in the temple." Wow. My heart melted. A few days prior, we had been looking at pictures in the Gospel Art Picture Book (in an effort to try and help her practice being reverent for church) and we came to the picture of a man and woman in their wedding clothes outside of a temple. She asked what they were doing and I told her they were getting married in the temple. But it still surprised me when she said that she would get married there. I know she doesn't understand the concept of marriage, but I was amazed that she realized it was something important and was able to relate it to her own litle world.

Last Monday we decided to go to the temple for Family Home Evening so Abby could walk around the grounds. The whole way there she kept squealing and saying, "I can't wait!! I'm so excited!" While we were there I told her that temples are for families and they help families to be together forever. But she was more interested in observing that the temple was as tall as the palm trees... So the next day I asked her about our temple trip and asked what temples are for. Again she surprised me and said FAMILIES! She really was listening. Then I repeated that temples help families be together forever. But how do you explain forever to a 2-year old? I told her it meant that Mommy would always be her Mommy, Daddy would always be her Daddy, and Spencer would always be her brother because of the temple. Abby is so eager to learn and she accepts every new concept presented to her. Now I really understand the scriptures that tell us to become as a little child.

Yesterday Anthony got home from work early and we decided to take the kids down to the construction sight for the new Gilbert, AZ temple. It will be beautiful when it is completed. The whole time we were there I kept thinking back to Abby's trip to the temple grounds last year. She is such an amazing girl!