No doubt 2025 is going to be upon us very quickly. It seems that the days in a year get shorter and shorter doesn't it? Wasn't just Christmas yesterday? What happened to our grandchildren? They are graduating from High School soon. Wasn't I just rocking that one to sleep? What have we taught our families about their ancestors? Now that's an important question. It won't be long, before WE are the ancestors so get crackin'!
The more we help others, the more exciting the work becomes. Yes, we still help our ward and we are also Stake Consultants. Of course, we miss the Area calling. We have met so many wonderful people all over the world and you are all dear to our hearts. We are excited to tell you that we have perfected the WARD ANNUAL FAMILY HISTORY PLANNER FOR 2025.
On the TEMPLATE tab - you can Change the Ward Name, the Temple and Family HIstory Leader Name, end of Quarter Dates, all the 5th Sundays, etc You only have to put them in ONCE!
The rest of the workbook will autopopulate those dates for you.
MISSIONARY ACTIVITIES - For each Family History Event that the Relief Society, Elders Quorum, Young Womens, Young Men's or Primary planned, it will ask if the community has been invited. At the end of the year it will total all auxilliary events which lent a hand towards missionary work. How exciting would it be to tell the Stake President that your ward had 11 Missionary Events last year?
TEMPLE AND FAMILY HISTORY LEADER AND WARD MISSION LEADER
In the 2025 version, several emails have been sent to us from various places in the USA as well as Australia, New Zealand and Canada about this topic being added to the sheet. We know you have heard the Prophet say these words:
When we were first Area Advisers in 2016 our leaders at Family Search would give us messages from the First Presidency to give to our Stake Presidents who would take the messages to their Counselor over Family History and the Stake High Councilor who would instruct the Wards. At every meeting they would stress to us, "The Presidency wants all converts to go to the Temple within 60 days with their own names from the day they are baptized."
It wasn't in writing, just a message we were supposed to tell them. We got a lot of pushback saying, "Show it to me in writing." Well, if you were at the Leadership Meeting in 2020 at Rootstech, you could have seen us almost jump out of our chairs with delight when Elder Bednar said, "All converts should go to the Temple within 60 days from the day they are baptiszd with their own names"
Immediately upon return, we started going through the handbook and could see the correlation between these things:
Instruct ward temple and family history consultants. Coordinate their efforts to help members find names of ancestors and perform temple ordinances on their behalf.
Work with the wardmissionleader and the missionaries to help those learning the gospel, new members, and returning members engage in temple and family history work (see 23.2 and 23.3).
Where applicable, assign ward temple and family history consultants to serve in the FamilySearch center (see 25.3.6).
The Ward Mission Leader works with the Mission President and Full Time missionaries. He knows who is being taught, he knows when they are going to be baptized.
The Ward Mission Leader and the Temple and Family History Leader are supposed to be invited to the Ward Coordination meetings. Imagine what they might have to say?
The Temple and Family History Leader assigns a Consultant to do the following:
1. Work with the person being taught to create their own family tree. They can do this in their own Ancestry (partner access) account and export it later when they help a new member open his Family Search Tree and import the data.
2. They can link their findings to Family Search so, when the New Member starts to enter, they will start populating the tree right away.
3. They can print down the pedigree and interesting stories to give to him or her at her baptism
4. The Consultant can help get the appointment arranged with the Bishop for a Single Use Recommend each month.
5. The Consultant can, once the person becomes a member, give them the gift of Partner Access, (Ancestry, Find My Past, My Heritage, Geneanet, Filea, and American Ancestor)
6. The Consultant can teach them how to reserve and print down names.
7. The Consultant and Ministering Brother and Sister continue to friendship and introduce the member to other Ward Activities.
Your Ward Missionaries and Full Time Missionaries will love you....
This is the biggest gift you can give to your missionaries. All they want to do is baptize them and make sure that they are handled tenderly and lovingly. If these things do not occur, imagine how they feel when they find out the person went inactive.
You can make a difference! We had two situations this month where we found out that a brother got baptized AFTER it occurred. We would have loved to go to his Baptism and give him his names. I got in touch with him, we worked together and within 2 days we had over 300 names. He reported back on the 4th day that he had made it to Charlemagne! We are going to go to the Temple with him with 60 days with his own family names.
During Sacrament a recent Sunday I found out that there was a baptism coming up. No one knew the exact name or date but I kept asking until I had what we needed. It was an unusual situation. He was adopted and only knew his birth mother's name. He had information on the wonderful people who raised him, but Ted and I dove right in and worked on the impossible. Not only did Heavenly Father and this young man's Angels help us, but we have 200 records to hand to him along with a picture of his Grandfather and many other amazing stories about his Ancestors who were Knights or US Senators all the way back to 1565. He was blown away. He is so excited to get baptized and is ready to go to the Temple within 60 days with his own names.
YOUR CONSULTANTS ...
ARE THE KEY TO LONGEVITY IN THE GOSPEL OF JESUS CHRIST..
4. The Society President's Counselor can assign a Ministering Sister to the convert to help in the tree. The consultant can teach them both about family history.
5. The Elder's Quorum President's Counselor can do the same for a brother.
They can keep themselves worthy to go to the Temple with the new person EVERY MONTH FOR ONE YEAR.
6. They can be their first friend in the Ward (President Gordon B. Hinckley) and ensure life long membership, keeping them busy enough to stay active all year.
We will be releasing the 2025 ANNUAL FAMILY HISTORY PLANNER next Month, but we want you to finish up the year with an amended 2024 ANNUAL FAMILY HISTORY PLANNER
We also encourage the Temple and Family History Leaders to help keep everyone on the same page by using THE ANY AUX - HELPING PEOPLE TO GO TO THE TEMPLE
What about those Primary Kids entering YW/YM in January of the year they turn 12....who helps them?
It used to be that the Primary Counselor would help the kids learn about Family HIstory, how to research, how to document, how to reserve and print, but now the Handbook states that it is the Parent's Responsibility to make sure they are prepared. The Primary could certainly have a kick off event for them and their parents and give them some tools for success. If you would like to do this, we have tools to help them. Email us and we will send you some tools: naswfamilyhistory@gmail.com or meyerandmeyerconsulting@gmail.com
To every mother, her child is precious. The words to this song were written in awe of what Mary had to accomplish in her life. To take care of a child that was a Gift from God, then eventually give Him back to God so that He could atone for our sins and become glorified in the heavens, was something no mother has ever had to do.
I don't know how she did it. So much faith, yet I am grateful she did.
This picture was taken when my son was only 10 days old in 1978. That afternoon, I had written a poem and thought someday I might write a song to go with the words. It was the night of the Mary Tyler Moore
wrap party as they ended her series. It was at a restaurant from which, Elizabeth Taylor's would order chili and they would fly it to her where ever she was (in the world) in a jet. It was Chasen's in Beverly Hills. I had the opportunity to sing that same evening for an Insurance Company Dinner. I didn't want to leave my son, but my mother was there. What could go wrong? As we were leaving, knowing it was going to be about 3 hours until I returned, I gave her a bottle of warm milk. At that same moment, the two year old, Ginger poured an entire box of fish food into the 1 gallon fish bowl. Mother looked frantic. "It's not enough milk! What if he wants more?" I told her about the stash in the freezer and how to warm it. I had to go out in the world...and part of me just wanted to be with him and his big sister. I'm sure she felt the same way about her son...but she was obedient. I did go. I did sing. It was wonderful and now a wonderful memory to preserve.
How do I qualify for a free embroidered Temple Names bag from kastlekreations.net? PURCHASE 3 GAMES for instant download I’ll ship the bag separately. IN THE BOX WILL BE A BAG WITH YOUR FAVORITE INITIAL EMBROIDERED ON IT.
Purchase 3 Family History Escape Room Plans for 60.00 (ONLINE VERSION - you get all the links the same day and I’ll ship you the bag) USE MY VENMO OR CASH APP FOR THE FEE Game #3 (PEARL1) $20.00
Two Men - One War - One amazing story
Lt. Michael Concannon March 29, 1924 - May 25, 2006
First - let me apologize for the way this is formatted - blogger sometimes is very difficult to edit...
The way Angel’s work…
I thought you would like to know why we feel Douglas’ story of his ancestors was appropriate for Memorial Day. He was guided and led by great patriots who came to this land to escape oppression at the hands of other countries (Russia). They were extremely loyal to this country and true patriots. Otto, his grandfather actually died in Salt Lake City – was he a Church Member? We will find out! There are so many ties between my father and his service to this country and this young man’s family. The spiritual feeling I felt as I researched his tree was not imagined. I felt their guidance.
Here’s the Story.
Dear Readers
I am an author on Amazon and recently finished another adventure in clean reading for any age group. It's a time travel book called, “a Matter of Time”, which is now on Amazon. You can read about the premise on one below in the clean reading section of this page, but for now, I'll just address the part which involves my soldier. One of the characters, an agent, gets transferred from the dungeon in England 1660 to the shores of Hawaii before he became a state. He is so grateful to be out of the dungeon, he asks the Scientist what his assignment is, as he will do anything to keep from going back. She reveals to him that he, indeed is in Hawaii now, but that his assignment will be to help a young man who escapes death while aboard the USS Arizona on December 7, 1941, Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, to heal, write letters to his brother and inspire him to do something great to help others in their lives.
I needed a character to be a survivor who is saved from one disaster only to help others in the future and when I went to the USS Arizona Survivor page, just because I am in Arizona and my father was actually born in Tucson, Arizona), the name of the Ship leaped off the page. Then, of all the survivors, I was drawn to Lt Cmd. Douglas Hein, who was a sharpshooter and his father was a Boxing champion – so was my father. Then I found out that his family was from the Netherlands on his mother’s side. That was just a quirky coincidence. My father in 1945 was in The Philippines and was one of the 11th Airborne 82nd who rescued over 2000 Dutch and Christian missionaries from a Japanese Prison camp on Leyte Island, a secret mission organized by General MacArthur, by parachuting into the camp while the Japanese were doing their exercises from an altitude of only 500 feet at dawn. On the History Channel, the story has been made into a documentary called Raid at Los Banos, Rescue at dawn. Douglas lost his last battle as a pilot over Manila Bay in The Philippines and his name is engraved on a plaque or wall on that island in Manila coincidentally, where my father reported from the jungles of Leyte Island at the end of the war.
It's been 19 years from yesterday, May 25, 2006, that my father, Michael Concannon passed away and while I was investigating this young man’s family, the entire time, I felt like Douglas Hein wanted us to know more about his father, Grandfather and Great Grandfather and the sacrifices they made through their patriotism in leading and protecting our country. Each of them had a distinguished Military career of sorts. The novel aside, the work we do is so precious and priceless and those who have gone beyond the veil are waiting for us to realize this and do more family history for our families. Those choice blessings won’t be seen until we step across, but we can feel the influence of angels when we do this for our kin. I can only pray that Doug’s Grandfather was indeed LDS and that his family is going to work soon on this line. The research I did for them has set it all into play to make it very easy for them to link it to Family Search.
I hope to meet him one day and thank him in person for the gift of his ultimate sacrifice and for protecting our freedom.
~Karen S. Meyer
I hope to meet him one day and thank him in person for the gift of his ultimate sacrifice and for protecting our freedom.
~Karen S. Meyer
I created a free puzzle for you to give out for your kids to do. Or adults may enjoy it. I am not sure it's that simple! Just right-click on the image below and SAVE IMAGE - Then you can print it and play it. If you need a fun YSA activity or Youth activity to teach Patriotism and respect for our Country and the Soldiers who protect us from tyranny and oppression at bay, please consider this Escape Room Activity or you may enjoy one of my other ones. People seem to love them!!!!
To create your own puzzle for your primary or any other class - go to: DiscoveryEducation.com
We have 3 to choose from:
Escape From Crystal Caves, (CRYSTAL1) $20.00
The Ghost of George Alley (Help Sally find her
Great Great Grandfather) (ALLEY1) $20.00
OR CHOICE #3
Escape from Pearl Harbor (PEARL1) $20.00
We will send them to you electronically and you can print them. That way you can also tweak them if you feel you need to change what the locks, bags or boxes look like for the clues.
send me an gmail at: MEYERANDMEYERCONSULTING@GMAIL.COM ask for CRYSTAL1, PEARL1 OR ALLEY1
IF YOU WANT ALL THREE YOU GET A SPECIAL GIFT FROM ME -
A WHITE TEMPLE BAG WITH YOUR INITIAL EMBROIDERED ON IT
FOR YOUR TEMPLE CARDS.
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meyerandmeyerconsulting.BLOGSPOT.COM - MY VENMO AND CASHAPP NAMES ARE:
HOW DO I GET A FREE WHITE SATIN BAG? If you want ALL 3 for $60.00 HERE'S THE EZ BUTTON - IF YOU WANT ME TO GIVE YOU THE LINKS, YOU GET A FREE TEMPLE NAMES BAG FOR SAVING THE SHIPPING - YOU JUST TELL ME WHAT INITIAL - contact me through Venmo today! ADD INITIAL YOU WANT ON BAG in the notes section
The DAR (Daughters of the American Revolution) has a College Scholarship Sally would like to apply for. First, she must prove lineage to someone who served in the Revolutionary War.
They only know that his cryptic messages he has left in the attic
may be the key to either some serious treasure or may even lead them to documentation which could land Sally a College Scholarship, being the Great, Great, Great Granddaughter of a Revolutionary War or Civil War Hero.
Help them uncover the treasure
Complete game plan - laid out in Powerpoint, Word, and all the clues - ready to put on this week if you want. You just supply the various locks and props that are in the script. Loads of fun and without realizing it, the YSA or YW/YM get some lessons in how to research using keywords and valuable life learning tools!
KAREN - WHERE SHOULD WE GET OUR PROPS, LIKE LOCKS AND PUZZLE BOXES?
Ebay and Amazon.com
I searched for locks and lock boxes and puzzle boxes. Then I tried them out on all my kids (we have 12! So that was easy. I asked them to all give these a try and watched how long it took them to open them. One was a Physics Masters Graduate. He finished all three in less than 10 minutes. Everyone else was done in about 20-25. Now my goal is to keep the YSA busy for at least an hour, so I have enough of these twists and turns in my program to do that.
You can use whatever locks you want. You can change the pictures of locks or clues. It's all changeable except the story line.
Each game has over 100 hours of research and dovetailing - It is a lot of effort to work out all the twists and turns so I don't feel guilty charging for my time to create and prepare this for others. Feel free to email me and ask questions.
Karen S Meyer,
MEYERANDMEYERCONSULTING.COM
Here
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GAME #2 (CRYSTAL1)
ESCAPE FROM CRYSTAL CAVES
Escape from the Cabin near Crystal Caves!
This is a fun YSA activity or any group interested in Family History.
It takes place in 1925 and is a real story about Floyd Collins. He loved to explore caves in the Kentucky Mountains and decided to turn one into an Amusement Park. This real life tragedy happened to be the first American Tragedy broadcast on Radio. Every night people sat around the radio to listen and hear if Floyd Collins would escape from the cave where he had fallen and was pinned below ground in between rocks.
All of America listened and prayed. People journeyed from all over the earth to kneel at the cave entrance and pray. It almost turned into a carnival-like atmosphere with thousands holding vigil. As you search for the hidden treasure, you find out more about his life and his family and part of the exercise is to put together a pedigree with the information. Each Lock Box or secret location gets you one clue closer to finishing the pedigree. Before you know it, you've completed 4 generations.
All answers are on Ancestry. I did the research myself and all the documentation requested is there in the file and on Ancestry. This comes with a PowerPoint to use for printing out the clues for the Players, a PowerPoint that shows the Game Master (You!) how to put it together and how to discern any questions about the clues. It comes with a clue and budget sheet to show how much props might be and where you might find them It also comes with some handouts for participants from an Emeritus Seventy
I found locks like this on ebay and Amazon - also Thrifty Drug has 4 and 5 letter locks and number locks which can be adapted.
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Karen - what else do you do? What is clean reading?
Ever see any of your friends on Goodreads and wonder why they are reading novels with horrendous words, pictures, and ideas that pollute your mind? I still do!
I wanted to create something for my family that would let them enjoy the experience of reading adventure and spy novels, but do not have explicit love scenes or foul language. It IS possible to live a provident life without those words and scenes. You don't have to be a Mormon to enjoy a good Spy novel or love story.
I hope you will give my books a chance. Even your family could read these, though, my test group was over 80 and they said, it made their heart race a bit. So if you are faint of heart, steer clear, my LDS characters do get themselves into trouble and occasionally they need to use their weapons to get themselves out.
All of my books are .99 or free on Kindle Unlimited because it is more important to me that the world enjoy "clean" reading (no bad language) than to make money. To have something to hand down to my grandchildren is the best intent for my project.
A Matter of Time
Marietta Hensley is a Forensic Genealogist and Scientist who, using her doctorate is using the only time machine in secret to change the lives of others for good. She uses the lottery to help fund the project rationalizing that sure, she may go forward in history and grab the winning numbers but that money is doing people good.
She looks back in time to find tragedies in which people should not have died. Using her Quantum Entanglement Device, and plotting the exact coordinates in time and space, she programs the vehicle to land in a remote location, cloaks the device with a force field and saves the victim. Doing this ensures that one of their descendants may do something noble for mankind.
However, she wonders what happens if you go back in time to alter a genealogical line, keeping one person from dying in a horrific tragedy in order to save millions by what the descendant will invent in the future, should I? Should I play God?
Marietta has the intel, time machine and funding by U C Berkeley to go back and alter reality for the good of mankind but what she discovers is that you may save one from a tragedy only to lose other generations to another disaster; perhaps one created by a descendant of the person she saved.
One thing she discovers is that it’s no fun playing God all the time. How does she escape the drama? Find out in A Matter Of Time - coming to Amazon books May 30, 2019
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PRIVATE EYE SLOAN
Rex Sloan was bullied in High School, and not just by non-members either. He was driven to pursue his first love of intellectual studies instead of a girlfriend. He sought a career after his Mission to focus on, instead of marriage, which he put on the back burner to percolate. Having trust issues, he has received a 20 year Reunion invitation which causes some anxiety. In addition, his identity has been stolen. He is a multi-millionaire and is having some trouble getting the Beverly Hills Police department to jump in and help him solve the mystery. He does his own sleuth work and through investigating, finds the culprit, but keeps the mystery going as he does not reveal his
true identity.
Enjoy Private Eye Sloan and find the real thief...the one who stole his heart!
Two teens are in their Senior year and planning their lives. They quickly learn that when we plan and are not in symphony with what Heavenly Father has planned for us our destiny becomes Uncharted. They try to get on the path by being more in tune and understanding that Plan B may sometimes just be what He really wanted us to experience. In the meantime, as you get to know both families, you find that one has a dark past involving World War II Stolen Art pieces. The current generations are oblivious to this because the Great Grandfather has not documented his family history. He has it all in his head, hoping to find the clue his cousin left for him to clear the family of any wrongdoing by association.
The book is a great tool for parents of youth getting ready to leave home.
What do they need to know that first year that will help them become positive thinking, assertive young adults?
Andie and Anson are new to the FBI field. Recently graduated, their first mission is in California. The job is to unmask Russian Spies who have infiltrated and stolen plans for the newest Stealth Bomber. The FBI Chief gives the couple a beautiful home across the street from the spy and his family, allowing Anson to carpool with his neighbor to work. Their cover is that they are a newlywed Mormon couple.
Now, if you have ever been a convert, you know how easy it is to misunderstand that "different" vernacular of LDS people. So how would you like to be thrown into an undercover position without a Mormon jargon translation book? This causes some misunderstandings which have actually occurred in convert's lives. The funniest scene is probably trying to have an intelligent discussion with the Bishop. Nothing gets past him.
Katie McMasters lost her brother in an accident. Her father always treated him a little better but not because he didn't like her, it was just easier for him to relate to a boy. Now, the father has lost his testimony, his son, and is badly injured. Their sheep have to go to market in the fall and moving them to the lake pasture for the summer was always Tom and Pa's job. Katie takes on the challenge to take care of them all by herself, with the help of Shep her dog, Pepper her horse and whatever knowledge Ma has imparted all these 13 years. She is alone in a dangerous world, exposed to predators of all kinds and her goal is to make her Father proud.
This is a silly kids book written to teach my children to give to others instead of taking all the time. Hey, it worked. They are all amazing people so maybe Harriet had a hand in that.
Harriet is a Horse who does not hide her talents under a bushel. She is the entertainment of the barnyard. The Farmer does not want her to go off to try to be on Animal Star Search. He decides to give her some perks of the job. That's not good enough. Her friends give her the Farmer's tractor and help her with directions to a little town in California called Newbury Park. She can stay with the Owl's cousin and his family while she auditions. The problem is, she never learned to read. He helps her learn the word N E W so that whenever she sees that, she will stop. She ends up going all over America in search of her goal, but giving service to others and helping them reach their goals instead. It's a rewarding life that she is living and it gives her time to rethink what she really wants to do in this life.
This book teaches others about selfless service - it's not just another silly horse story. Just read it and laugh...then read it to your youth and they will learn.
Living with someone with a big ego is difficult, especially when he is a workaholic. Deke has a big family but he is missing out on their youth because of his passion for his work. It's his turn to plan the family vacation but he is missing out on their youth because of his passion for his work. He decides to make it the "Vacation they will never forget!" and plans a one-day ocean excursion, which turns into a comedy of errors, terror and possibly before the day is over felonies will have been committed. He learns his lesson, but those with the most integrity will decide if the correct choices were made. He has lots of options and chances to right the wrongs and show his kids that he has integrity.
We are all in search of the treasure of our lives of some kind. For Tom, it is the treasure of family and the wish to be reunited with them after a tragic accident. For Summer, it is in finding something that her Great Grandmother left at the property Summer inherited for her when Great Grandma Essie passed away.
Tom and Summer meet in a comedy and adventure of errors and misjudgments and help the police with a sting operation to capture some notorious drug lords. This novel is a fun way to learn how to and how NOT to communicate effectively! It is a Romantic Comedy, but also a Mystery Adventure at the same time.
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Where applicable, assign ward temple and family history consultants to serve in the FamilySearch center (see 25.3.6).
