God controls everything

I was going to write about something else for this post but an unexpected event this morning changed that all and I am going to make sure this post gets out today... no procrastination on this post.

It all began a couple months ago. I had called up my sister and said, "Hey Jen, you know what? We haven't had a Thanksgiving as a family together in three years and we won't have one for at least another three years. I wanna come home and surprise the family but wanted to get you in on it." As we talked, we both came to the solution that I couldn't afford it and it wasn't going to happen. Well, she went ahead and bought tickets for my birthday to surprise my family. She wasn't really good at hiding it and was really obvious with it and when she told me on my birthday, I was like, "Jen, I knew a long time ago, you made it so obvious." At the time, I thought she bought the tickets so that I could have a Thanksgiving with my family... Little did I know the Lord wanted me to come home for a different reason.

So I arrive home Tuesday/Wednesday morning at 1 AM and surprise my parents while they are fast asleep and they had no idea what was going on. They were confused out of their minds and really wanted to know what I was doing there. Anyway, Wednesday consisted of a fun day filled with family. I started off playing video games with my brother because I've been looking forward to it for a while and really wanted to play with him. I continued to go to lunch with my family and then went to the movies. While they saw another movie, my brother and I saw Fantastic Beasts. That is such a good movie, I strongly suggest it. Anyway, then my sister took me home while my parents ran errands and my brother went to play tennis. I decided to be the good son and pull some weeds because our hillside was disgustingly covered in weeds. Later on that night, I had the opportunity to see two of my best friends. I went to Jersey Mike's and Yogurtland with my best friend Brennen Eisenhut and his mother Sister Eisenhut. From there, I got to see my other best friend Evelyn Hunter and her parents, George and Julie, and her sister, Miranda. While there, I saw Sam Hostetter, Grace Warren, Kian Khadir, Alexis Guyer, and Alex Villar. So you could say that it was a pretty successful night. I saw more people than I was planning on seeing this break. And it was great seeing those extra faces considering I was supposed to see Alexis before I left over summer but it never worked out. Anyway, all in all, it was a great night and I was so happy to see friends.

Thanksgiving morning was amazing. I woke up and went to play Turkey Bowl with the members of my ward. This is when we get together and play football with all the dudes. It was a fun morning and it was a great time. Anyway, we ran some errands and then came back for Thanksgiving dinner. Well, my cousin Tim, my Uncle Mark and my Grandma Susan, who has terminal cancer, showed up. It was great being able to see them all. I could tell that my grandma was not in good shape and that she wasn't feeling very well. Well, we had our dinner and we hung out and then I said goodbye to all of them. Then later on we went to Orange County to see my Grandma Skaggs. It was a great night visiting with her and then going Black Friday shopping with my mother. It turned out to be a great night and I loved spending my Thanksgiving that way.

Friday we woke up and drove up to Six Flags. It was such a fun day. I was able to ride every ride that I wanted to and we had wristbands that got us in the front of every line on every ride. I was able to spend the day with my family and we had such a blast together. I love spending time with them. We went on almost every ride together and we managed to have fun. We ate at Marie Calendars and boy did it taste good. Then we went back to the park (free shuttle from the hotel) and continued our fun until the park closed. It was a great end to my Thanksgiving break... or so I thought. My flight was supposed to leave today at 1:00 PM and I wasn't supposed to get back into Rexburg until 11 PM. Well... that changed quickly, hence why I got back to Rexburg at 4.

This morning, at 3:30, I was awoken by the frantic sounds of my mother on the phone. Her brother had called her and said that my grandma Susan had passed away. He was there with her as it happened and he was now on his way to the hospital. Not getting into detail, but I will say, it was hard to see my mom the way she was. So we left our hotel room early and headed off to the airport at 5:30 AM. I got to the airport at around 6:15... 7 hours before my flight. My mom had to race down to San Escondido to be able to see her mom. Doing what my parents asked me to do, I walked up to the special services and asked if I could get on an earlier flight. Well, I love Delta airlines because they were able to get me on a 7:20 flight which means I had to quickly get through security and grab breakfast which wasn't too long but because of the situation they didn't charge me extra. That was a huge blessing in my life because I was able to get to SLC earlier. In addition, my parents were able to get me on an earlier shuttle back to Rexburg. So here I am now.

So what is the overall reason for the name of this blog. Well, God does in fact control everything. Back in September, I thought I was going home for Thanksgiving to see my family, but that was not the case. I was going back because the Lord knew that it was time for my grandma to go and he wanted me there to say goodbye. You can call this a coincidence if you want but I know it was the hand of the Lord. My sister didn't know this would happen, I didn't know this would happen, but the Lord knew that this would happen and wanted to give me a chance to say goodbye to a great woman. A woman who every year would buy me the Guinness World Record Book for Christmas. A woman who drove me to so many place. A woman who I could talk to when I needed someone to talk to. A woman that although I fought with and argued with when I was younger, was still always there for me and always loved me. A woman who loved and cared for me all of my life. I am forever grateful that the Lord prompted me to bring up the idea of coming home and prompted my sister to bring me home. I know that this was the plan all along for the Lord. It was also miraculous that it happened the day after Magic Mountain. Although it is heart breaking for my family, the Lord timed it perfectly. He allowed us to enjoy our family time and knew that we needed to have fun as a family before I left. I am forever grateful that families can be together forever and that I will see my grandmother again. I love her so much and can't wait to see her again. Remember that the Lord is in control and he knows what to do with your life.

In loving memory of Lottie Susan Memmott 4/22/45 - 11/26/16

Love you all,

Michael Skaggs

God makes things work out

Hey guys, sorry it's been forever since I've written. First off, college has been amazing and I'm loving it. Actually, I will write about that in this blog. Umm, everything is going great. There is so much to write about in this blog post. I don't even know what to write but like always I'm just going to go for it. Anyway, thanks again for reading.

To start, since this is Michael's Journey to Serving a Mission I want to update everyone that I am 95% sure that I will leave on my  mission in April right after Winter semester. I can leave earlier because I'm not planning on taking any classes and just working up in Rexburg but I want to mature a little bit more and get more life experience.

First part in "God makes things work out" is roommates. So over summer, don't get me wrong I liked my roommates but I didn't have too many friends, I didn't always get along with them, and I wasn't always hanging out with them. I was concerned for Fall semester. However, everything worked out. My roommates Eric Keller, Michael Pierce, Matt Budden, and David Shannon are great people. I love talking to them and they are such great people. But, most importantly, my room roommate Adam Smith is such a genuinely caring and great guy. Every time he walks into the room after a long day of not seeing him, just makes me happy. Kinda like when you haven't seen the girl you like in a couple days and you finally see her again, same feeling except in a no homo way. He is always super kind and we LITERALLY TALK about everything going on in our lives and give each other advice.

Another thing that God has made things work out is friends. So I have managed to hang out with friends almost every night. My sister's best friend is up here and I am able to hang out with them. Ellen Logan is my second sister and she is so nice, forever grateful she met my sister. Then there's Eliza and Savannah who are their roommates and they are amazing girls who are super kind. Laurie I don't know as well but she's super kind. Then there's Tara Pope, who is really sweet. I knew her in my cousins ward back in 2011 and here we are, we meet again. Then there's her friend Veronica who is super nice. From there we have Jenny Walker, who I met my first Wednesday here and we've been close friends since then. I love her to death and don't know what I would do without a friend like her. I absolutely love Julia and Chyna who are also roommates with Jenny, they are such kind people. Chyna is super sweet and is always happy to see me and Julia is one of the funniest people I know and it's always fun to be around her. Apartment 602 is one of my favorite apartments which consist of Summer and Carlie Evans, Brooklin Larsen, Katie O' Donnel, Aubree Nish, and Megan Genmlich. I'm over there literally every single night and they are so kind and nice to hang around. They always make me feel good about myself and are always nice. More friends include Elliot Powers who drives me to Walmart whenever I need a ride and is always there to uplift me; Fernando Nunez or something like that who drove me to the hotel my family stayed at so that I could grab something that I left there; Gavin Olsen by far one of the funniest and craziest people that I have met up here man I love that dude; Angel Gonzalez let me just say his laugh is the greatest thing that you will ever hear; Nefi - he's super nice too and I love being around him; Houston who has also given me rides to Walmart and has driven me to school, he's really funny too; and Brianna Haroldsen, who I met about a month or two ago and she's super sweet, she is also a huge fan of Al Fox, a great convert to the LDS church and a great example. Anyway I want to move on to some more spiritual experiences.

IMMA GIVE GAVIN BROWN HIS OWN PARAGRAPH BECAUSE HE IS A BEAST IN HIS OWN WAYS!! This dude I forgot to add in my blog and so I told him I would include him. He's pretty awesome and super funny. He hurt his knee the other day and still manages to not let it affect him. I heard he's a pretty beast photographer too. Anyway, love you Gavin!!!

God is actually sensitive to your wants and if he wants it to happen he will make your schedule work out. A couple weeks ago, I was coming up on two events in the same night. I was in charge of getting volunteers for an elementary school Halloween Carnival and then I was going to a concert. I was very disappointed because I really wanted to help with the carnival but I had my concert. I was stressed out but you know I knew the Lord had things in store for me. Right when I got to the point that it wasn't going to work out, I found out that they needed help from 3:30 to 7. The concert wasn't until 7:30 so I was able to go to the concert and the Halloween Carnival. I was so happy that the Lord made it work out. He was watching out for me the whole time. I was also stressed out about finding volunteers but I had the perfect amount. You know the Lord just makes things work out.

The last thing has to do with the concert itself. I had a date, then didn't have a date, had a date, no date, had a date, then no date. So here we are a WEEK BEFORE THE CONCERT with no date. Well then here we hit it. Monday evening, in someone's apartment in my ward, and I don't exactly remember how the convo went down but I got myself a date. And I had a blast with her. I think God made everything not work out because quite frankly, he might've wanted me to meet new people. Whatever the reason, I'm glad he made everything work out.

There is a reason to everything!! Nothing is a coincidence. The people you meet, the route you take to school, the family you have, the friends you have, the decisions you make, everything is done by the Lord!!! I know a lot of my friends are not LDS or Christian in any sense so this might be more of a sensitive topic for you. However, I believe that nothing is brought up to you for no reason. And everything you need to work out, I promise that if you spend the time to pray even if you have never prayed before, I do promise you though that with faith and trust that the higher being will help you, you can ask for help for him to make something work out. Not all the time will it work out the way you want it to work out but it will work out somehow.

Thank you all for reading this!!! It means a lot that people actually take time out of their day to read my blog and actually enjoy it. You guys are all the best. Thanks for everything. I love you all
Michael Skaggs