I've been wanting to organize our kitchen drawers since we moved in. I found some organizers at thrift stores that worked as a temporary solution but they were very inefficient. They were too small for the drawers and left inches of awkward and unused space. Well I have finally built custom organizers for our kitchen drawers!






 My inspiration came from Kevin & Amanda via Pinterest. I looked at their pictures and then went to my local hardware store to find what worked best for me. Here is what I used and how I put them together:

Materials

Hammer
Miter Saw
Measuring Tape
Wood Glue
#18x3/4" Wire Brads
Poplar Boards at .25"x2.5"x48"


How to

Decide on how you want to arrange your drawer, measure your boards to fit and then cut the boards. Once I did that I dabbed some wood glue on the boards, stuck them together and then nailed two brads where the boards met. I did not glue or nail the inserts into the drawers. That way, as you can see from the picture below, they can be easily removed for drawer clean out.



                  




So for my church lesson this past Sunday I decided I wanted to use quotes and direction from the manual, but organize those things into categories that President Gordon B. Hinckley provided back in 1993 when describing the purpose of Temples. 

The Temple is a symbol of strength

Quote 1: “The temple is a constant, visible symbol that God has not left man to grope in darkness...The temple is a standing witness that the power of God can stay the powers of evil in our midst.”

Do you remember the first time you saw a temple? Do you remember when you first decided it was where you wanted to go someday? If you haven't been yet and don't know why you should go there let's learn more about the purpose of temples.

The temple is a school of instruction

Quote 2: “Though we live in a fallen world- a wicked world -holy places are set apart and consecrated so that worthy men and women can learn the order of heaven and obey God’s will.”

What is meant by “the order of heaven”?

Quote 3: President Brigham Young said, “Our religion is nothing more nor less than the true order of heaven - the system of laws by which the gods and the angels are governed.”

Under the definition of Law on the Harold B. Lee Library website a paragraph states, “Existence is a process of progressively learning to obey higher law. Obeying and conforming to law are understood as a sign of growth, maturity, and understanding and greater obedience to law produces great freedom.

We begin learning about laws and consequences soon after we are born on earth and we progress in our understanding and obedience to laws until we are able to come to the temple and further our spiritual education.

The temple is a house of covenants

Quote 4: “When our Heavenly Father placed Adam and Eve on this earth, He did so with the purpose in mind of teaching them how to regain His presence. Our Father promised a Savior to redeem them from their fallen condition. He gave to them the plan of salvation and told them to teach their children faith in Jesus Christ and repentance. Further, Adam and his posterity were commanded by God to be baptized, to receive the Holy Ghost, and to enter into the order of the Son of God.  - To enter into the order of the Son of God is the equivalent today of entering into the fullness of the Melchizidek Priesthood, which is only received in the house of the Lord.”

What is meant by entering into the fullness of the Melchizidek Priesthood?  

Quote 5: “The order of the priesthood spoken of in the scripture is sometimes referred to as the patriarchal order because it came down from father to son. But this order is otherwise described in modern revelation as an order of family government where a man and woman enter into a covenant with God - just as did Adam and Eve - to be sealed for eternity, to have posterity, and to do the will and work of God throughout their mortality. If a couple are true to their covenants, they are entitled to the blessings of the highest degree of the celestial kingdom. These covenants today can only be entered into by going to the House of the Lord.”
When one receives all the ordinances of the temple, he or she has received a "fullness of the priesthood." These temple ordinances culminate in being sealed to our spouse for time and eternity.
To those who have not found a companion whom they wish to marry or those who have gone through divorce, the blessings of the gospel are still open to you. Prophets have long taught that the Lord will judge us according to the desires or our hearts when certain blessings are withheld or covenants are broken in this life.

The temple is a sanctuary of service

Quote 6: “Temples are built and dedicated so that, through the priesthood, parents can be sealed to their children and children can be sealed to their parents. These sealing ordinances apply to both the living and the dead... It is not sufficient for a husband and wife to be sealed in the temple to guarantee their exaltation...they must also be eternally linked with their progenitors and see that the work is done for those ancestors….Exaltation is a family affair!”

President Gordon B. Hinckley taught: “This [the temple] is a sanctuary of service. Most of the work done in this sacred house is performed vicariously in behalf of those who have passed beyond the veil of death. I know of no other work to compare with it. It more nearly approaches the vicarious sacrifice of the Son of God in behalf of all mankind than any other work of which I am aware.”

Brother John A. Widtsoe once stated that “Those who give themselves with all their might and main to this work...receive help from the other side, and not merely in gathering genealogies. Whosoever seeks to help those on the other side receives help in return in all the affairs of life.”

The temple is a place of revelation

Quote 7: “In the course of our visits to the temple, we are given insights into the meaning of the eternal journey of man. We see beautiful and impressive symbolisms of the most important events-past, present, and future-symbolizing man’s mission in relationship to God...In the peace of these lovely temples, sometimes we find solutions to the serious problems of life. Under the influence of the Spirit, sometimes pure knowledge flows to us there. Temple are places of personal revelation. I promise you that, with increased attendance in the temples of our God, you shall receive increased personal revelation to bless your life as you bless those who have died.

Suggestions for Further Study:

The Law After Christ by Stephen E. Robinson


The Salt Lake Temple by Gordon B. Hinckley

Temple Worship by Richard G. Scott

Divorce by Dallin H. Oaks

The Necessity for Receiving the Priesthood Ordinances of Salvation by Bruce Satterfield

The Keys and Authority of the Priesthood by Dallin H. Oaks

A History of Temples by James E. Talmage





After a rough morning I decided to get out into the sunlight and run some errands.

I entered my local Target and saw an old man, gripping the handle of a shopping cart.

By old I mean hunched and gnarled and so frail looking I thought a light breeze might be able to blow him over. I realized he was just standing there in the doorway so I asked him if he needed any assistance.

"You know," he said slowly, "you're the third person to ask me that." His voice was airy and soft.

Without tilting his head he glanced up at me behind silver rimmed glasses. I don't know if it was even possible for him to move his neck to look up at me properly. It looked permanently fixed in its position so I bent down to meet his eyes. They were livelier than I expected.

"In fact, helps a comin'. Oh here she is," he declared and an old woman in a motorized basket began backing up towards him. In the meanwhile I held the basket he was supporting himself on, afraid it might roll out from beneath him causing him to fall. As the woman parked the motorized basket and he started to shuffle toward it, I gently put a hand under his elbow to assist him. His skin felt like that of an overripe peach; sagging and so thin it could be easily pierced or torn.

I didn't realize I had been holding my breath until he sat down. Then I let out a sigh of relief and made sure he looked secure. He thanked me and then slowly lifted his arm and pointed a bony finger at me, "You will be blessed!" he said in earnest.

I already had been.

I stepped aside and watched as he began driving the cart and as I passed him on the left to continue my shopping he glanced my direction with a twinkle in his eye and said, "I'm off to conquer the world!"







When I registered for classes, my senior year of High School a brand new course had become available. It was called Philosophy of Science and I knew as soon as I read the title that I would love it. Critical thinking, reading and science (excluding chemistry) were all favorite subjects of mine. The book we used for the course is shown above. I still have my copy all highlighted and written in. I hope my kids will someday enjoy reading it as much as I did. The class ended up being just as challenging and enjoyable as I hoped it would be. Below I share two essays I wrote for that class, that I recently found in my memory box. I'm not sure why I kept them but it was interesting to read them again.


The Background and the Beginning

      What is science? Where and who did it begin with? Did science even really begin or was it there all along? It is believed that it began with Thales of Miletus. THales and other Milesian philosophers such as Anaximander and Anacimenes made a definite break with the past. Supposedly, philosophy and science originated with them. What were the steps?
       First, technology. During the fourth and third millennia BC technological advancement took place in the Nile Valley in Mesopotamia, and there were similar ones occurring in the Indus Valley and in China. But let's go back even further. First there was Mettalurgy. The techniques of hammering, melting and casting were known before 3000 BC, people just advanced that by combining more and more metals in different proportions.  Spinning and weaving were also known in prehistoric times. Pottery is a third invention that had far reaching consequences for the economy of early societies. Accident surely played part in many of the discoveries. The point is: that even though technological advance may have been important, they imply no science, rather guesswork and luck. They demonstrate a highly developed ability to observe and learn from experience.
      Take medicine. The Egyptians began at an early stage to attempt to record imperical data for patients. There were 48 cases of injured people. Each report was divided into the title, the examination, the diagnoses, the treatment, and explanation of difficult medical terms.
      But the development of mathematics and its application to astronomy were even more important than medicine. The main achievement of the Egyptians in this area was the calendar. They divided each year into 365 days, that is twelve months of thirty days each, plus five additional days.
      In general though, the Babylonians far surpassed the Egyptians in both math and astronomy. The Babylonians had very accurate observations. The Babylonians had conducted extensive observations of a limited range of celestial phenomena long before Greek science began. And with the records they accumulated, they were able to predict certain phenomena. Yet despite all of these achievements of these many cultures it is reasonable to argue that Thales was the first philosopher-scientist. There are two important characteristics that distinguish the Milesian philosophers from earlier thinkers. There is what is called Discovery of Nature, and second the practice of Rational Criticism and Debate.
     Discovery of nature is the appreciation of the distinction between the 'natural' and the 'supernatural'. This means that natural phenomena are governed by determinable sequences of cause and effect. A single example will illustrate this: the theory of earthquakes which is attributed to Thales. Thales imagined that the earth was held up by water and that earthquakes were caused when the earth is rocked by wave-tremors in the water on which it floats. The idea that the earth floats occurs in several Babylonian and Egyptian myths. This was a common belief. What makes the difference between science dealing with the Milesians (Thales) and the Greeks (Homer) and such is that the Milesians 'leave the God's out'. As described in Homer or hesiod they attribute an earthquake or flash of lightning to Zeus or Poseidon, the philosophers exclude any reference to the wills of divine personages; their loves, hates, passions and other quasi-human motives. Also, Homer might focus on one particular earthquake or lightning flash, the Milesians focused on those items in general. They investigated the universal and essential, not the particular and accidental.

     The Milesians paid a good deal of attention to rare or striking phenomena. They had a desire to provide naturalistic explanations for things that were usually considered to be controlled by the Gods.
     The Greek philosophers began at an early stage to reflect on the problems posed by the origin of human race and by man's development from nature to culture. Anaximander held that living creatures are first generated in the 'wet' when this is acted upon by the sun. He believed that animals could be spontanetously generated in certain substances under certain conditions. He also suggested that man was originally born in a different species of animal, that is, apparently, some sort of fish.
      When proposing theories on the very first substance that came to be, Anaximander came up with what he called, the 'Boundless' which was a bit of everything, for he thought, if the first substance was water, how could fire have been created out of water because they destroy each other.
     In Anaximenes view, the primary substance was air. The precipitation of rain illustrates how air condenses to form water, and water in turn condenses to form solid ice, and conversely air is formed by rarefaction from water when it evaporates as it is being boiled. Anaximenes theory referred to the processes that can still be observed at work as natural phenomena.
    The measure of these philosophers' achievement is the advance they made in just trying to grasp certain problems. They rejected the supernatural and appreciated that naturalistic explanations can be given in a wide variety of phenomena: and they took the first tentative steps towards an understanding of the problem of change.


ESSAY #7

       Richard Hooker, in his article states that the basic idea behind empiricism is that knowledge can be derived through careful observation, recording of that observation and experimentation.
      Empiricism developed most rapidly in the field of medicine in ancient Greece, which based its knowledge on empirical observation of the causes and courses of diseases. Hooker uses Aristotle as an example of empiricism. When investigating a subject, Aristotle would catalog everyone's ideas on it, then he would observe phenomena dealing with the subject and derive laws from his observations, and then use those laws against previous authorities.
      Lloyd speaks of the main source of information about early Greek science as being the texts of the Hippocratic Corpus. The Corpus contains texts on branches of medicine such as gynecology or dietics, day-to-day clinical practice, commonplace books and lectures not only on medicine but other subjects as well.
     But Lloyd focuses on the ideas the Hippocrats had in dealing with medicine. The method of treatment mentioned in the Hippocratic Corpus consist of blood-letting surgery, cautery, purgative drugs, and control of regimen. These were just some basic possible cures. 
     Lloyd stresses that the lives of Hippocrats which were mainly medical practitioners were quite different from philosophers, yet in some way they were the same. They made significant contributions to natural science.
     One way they made advances was through using reason, and one writer reasoned about 'the sacred disease', epilepsy. The writer states that 'the people view this disease as being a sacred disease just to cover up their own ignorance'. Sacred, meaning that the people believed that the disease was caused by supernatural agencies, or that the gods are to blame.
     The writer also criticized the people by saying that if the people believed it was inflicted by the gods that they should not bother trying to cure it with various charms and so forth.
     He also gives proof that epilepsy is not sacred by stating that it only affects people which are 'phlegmatic' and not those who are 'billious'.
      He says, "If its origin were divine, all types would be affected alike without this particular distinction."
      I see this particular Hippocrat as being somewhat alike philosophers in the way that he thinks. I see the writer above using the practice of rational criticism and debate very strongly. He questions things, puts them into perspective, and then backs up his ideas with some good points, thus advancing natural science.
     I believe that, yes, the Hippocrats were empiricists and I will use examples to support this.
     The writer has cataloged the people's opinion on a certain subject and will not take the next step to make an observation or experimentation. In Richard Hooker's article, Mr. Hooker also explains observation. It can deal with experimentation. Experience is the parent of all knowledge, and the word experiment is derived from the same word which gives us experience. So we gain knowledge through experience which deals with experimentation.
     Now, going back to the writers next step:
     The writer suggests that an observation be made dealing with the disease. The writer experiments using a goat that has had the same disease and cuts its head open, revealing a foul-smelling brain, wet and full of fluid, proving, because the goat is dead that a deity cannot be involved.
      The writer has investigated, cataloged and made an observation. Now, he uses this proof to come out against 'ignorant believers' of the sacred disease.
      The goat experiment gives an example of an important feature of Hippocratic medicine, which is - the appreciation of the value of carrying out detailed observation when diagnosing a disease. 
      One idea that helped the Hippocrats diagnose diseases was following the 'prognostic' which was a group of guidelines or principles for the examination of a patient.
      Another principle issue which the Hippocrats dwelt on was the general question of the cause of diseases. This was something that many Hippocrats could not seem to agree on. Everyone had their own theory for how diseases were caused. One man believed that transmission through air or breath caused all diseases somehow. There were many contrasting ideas on this subject.
     Also, the problem of the causes of diseases was closely connected with the question of the constituent element of the human body.
    In many ways we see that the Hippocrats were empiricists and not so unlike philosophers, but there is one point that Lloyd brings up that does separate philosophers and Hippocrats. It wasn't in the theory's they presented, or in the method they adopted, but in the underlying motive for which they undertook the inquiry. Lloyd says, "Unlike the philosophers, the doctors had, in the long run, a practical end in view." The treatment of the sick. 

Oh the treasures you find when you decide to clean and purge your house! This one is from my little sister Whitney. She was probably 10 or 11 at the time and given our contentious history as children I am so pleased to have a note of affection and love. Proof that at least some of the time, we did caring things for each other. (I can write this publicly because we both acknowledge we were jerks to each other growing up, but believe me, I was the bigger jerk).



So growing up we had lots of pets, among them, gerbils. One time we bought these two female gerbils from the pet store and one time one of these so called females was acting strangely toward the other female. A little while later four tiny naked baby gerbils were born. They were born in a cardboard box with bedding in it (we had glass fish tanks, I don't remember why we put the pregnant mother in there). The box was carefully placed on a shelf in my closet and the box overhung the shelf by just an inch.

One gerbil was born dead so the mother promptly ate it. Ack! The other three showed great promise of being adorable big gerbils some day soon. My siblings and I watched them with great fascination as they grew and started to wriggle around. One day I walked into my room and to my dismay found a dead baby gerbil on the floor. I couldn't think of how it happened? Upon close inspection of the box I found that mom had chewed a hole in the corner, just big enough for a baby to wriggle through and fall to its death from high up on the shelf. I cried because, cute tiny baby gerbil right? Anyhow, somehow I saved this sweet showing of support from my little sis and I'm so glad I did so I can embarrass her with it now. Love ya Whitney!



POEM TRANSCRIPTION

I'm sorry that your baby gerbil died,
and I'm sorry that sometimes I've lied.
I think that when it's dead,
it means it's baby has just been put to bed.
I liked it so much,
and it felt so soft
just with a touch.
I forgot to say hi,
but now I'll say good-bye
so good-bye!


Today, in the process of organizing and decluttering my home, I went through a box filled with notes and cards from my past. Many things I had forgotten rose to the surface of my memory. One of these things was mail about the publication of a poem I had written. It was one of those vanity press publications where a plethora of poems from many individuals are published in a "deluxe hardbound edition" that they want to charge you an arm and a leg for. I never bought the book and I remember being a bit miffed when I discovered I had submitted my poem to such a website.

Anyhow, I started writing poetry when I was 8 and by the time I was 13, my carefree rhymes about candy and play had shifted to reflect the inner turmoil and self loathing I was going through as a result of deep depression. Though I am no longer in such all consuming darkness I still feel the weight of what I wrote in every piece (there are more than this) created during my teenage years. Though most of my teenage poetry is dark I still value it because going through and overcoming that darkness has molded me into who I am today. I wrote this when I was 13 or 14.


Delusion

The noble chin which held erect
the wrinkling face with faded smile;
like old jeans washed, starched and bleached,
now a thousand memories all removed
clouded as in sorrow filled eyes
swollen a moment, but all you could see
inside a mirror
where reflection hates reality.
Years of use for self annihilation
as you stare back
piercing cold glass to your core
your one friend because it cannot disagree,
and find now what you're looking for
visible only for want of it
this distortion that you love to see.

© Summer Owens 1994