My Mom is famous!

Surely with all of the brushes with fame that my family has had (none come to mind at the moment), this would rank first on the list!  The October Friend contains a story about a girl stealing an apple.  Yes, it was my mother!  It is a true story, with all of the correct names and everything!  I grew up hearing this story, it has become more of a cherished memory than a lesson.  My mother submitted it a woman that writes for the Friend and she rewrote it for the appropriate space allotted....here it is:
http://lds.org/friend/2011/10/the-apple-adventure?lang=eng

However, she recorded the REAL story for her posterity!  Enjoy!

The Apple Adventure

A True Story Related by Donna Grover Foster – May 30, 2008

Growing up on a farm where lots of people were your cousins was so much fun. There was always something to do, and always someone to do it with.  I remember one such night when two of my cousins and I were walking down the country road that joined our two houses.  We were going to have a slumber party at my Aunt Pat’s house.  She was a great aunt.  I loved going there with my cousin Judy.  It was night, but there was plenty of moonlight, and in our little community you always felt safe.  We were laughing and joking when all of a sudden there stood before us Mr. Cook’s apple orchard.

It was dark, and surely Mr. Cook wouldn’t even miss a few of his delicious red apples.  The only problem was there was a barbed-wire fence between the tempting treat and us.  Well, that wasn’t the only problem.  Some of those barbs seemed to be poking in me and saying, “Come on, Donna.  Think about it.  He is your neighbor, and you are going to steal from him.”  However, the fun of the moment and the idea that there were thousands of apples won the argument and through the fence we went.

It was all going well, and then the dreaded happened.  The dogs started barking.  They came unglued!  In an instant it seemed the porch light flooded the night with brightness.  It was a mad scramble to get back through the fence, leaving behind our treasure—or should I say, Mr. Cook’s treasure.  The sound of my pants ripping was as loud as thunder.  The warm sensation of blood running down my leg was the final blow.  I had done wrong and now I had to go tell my mom.

I hated disappointing my mom.  I was surprised that she seemed almost happy that I had to return home to her hurt and bleeding so she could patch me up.  And while patching, she did some teaching of valuable lessons. Was it wrong to take what is not yours?  Would it have been wrong, EVEN IF YOU DIDN’T GET CAUGHT? I could never forget the night that I learned about honesty from my mom.

The story doesn’t quite end there.  Year later when I was a teenager, one day in seminary we studied about the great prophet, Alma, who had a rowdy son that he worried about all the time. In the scriptures it tells how he couldn’t be with his son all the time and control him so he prayed so hard that an angel came and got him on the right path. (Mosiah 27:14)  I had heard my mother pray for me so many times, that I am sure that is what happened the night of the apple adventure.  I have told my chidren this story a thousand times because I want them to know that I don’t always know what they are doing, but the Lord does.  I want them to know that I pray for them constantly and then I know the Lord will help me take care of them.

(On the Sally DeFord website there is a new Mothers’ Day song entitled “An Angel to Watch Over Me.” I just taught our Achievement Day Girls to sing it for Mothers’ Day. One verse says, “and because of the place that I hold in her prayers” I still do believe that God sent an angel to watch over me.  It brought to my mind this story because my angel mom was as real to me as Alma the Younger’s angel.)

Evil Cannot Develop into Good

This morning as I was exercising, I was also listening to a talk by Elder Holland entitled, "Borne Upon Eagle's Wings."  It was a talk given at BYU.  A week prior to this address he gave a commencement address at the Utah State Penitentary, the talk is basically what he learned from that experience.  The entire thing was fascinating.  However, I would like to share one portion that served as a great enlightenment to me:

Then I had a third thought. How grateful I was that, in addition to just being just, God decided, because he is who he is, that he had to be a merciful God also. We don't need to take the time to read all of Alma 42, but you ought to sometime. After Alma had established with Corianton that God had to be just, it was then determined that that same God would have to be merciful as well and that mercy would claim the penitent. Now, the reason that thought was different to me was that I'd just been where they had added i-a-r-y to that word. That thought gave me encouragement. Mercy could claim the penitent. I decided that if those men had to go to the penitentiary to take advantage of the gift of mercy, if somehow by going there they found the gospel of Jesus Christ or the scriptures or the Atonement or any of those things that might lead to the others, then their imprisonment was worth it. Let's go to the penitentiary, or let's go to the bishop, or let's go to the Lord or to those that we've offended or to those that have offended us. Our own little penitentiaries, I suppose, are all around us. If that's what it takes to make us truly penitent, to enable us to lay claim to the gift of mercy, then we have to do it.
I know it isn't easy to go back and to undo and to start again and to make a new beginning, but I believe with all my heart that it is easier and surely more satisfying to begin anew than to go on and try to believe that justice will not take its toll. As Richard L. Evans was fond of saying, "What's the use of running if you're on the wrong road?" A favorite British scholar said, using the same metaphor:
I do not think that all who choose wrong roads perish; but their rescue consists in being put back on the right road. A [mathematical] sum [incorrectly worked] can be put right; but only by going back till you find the error and then working it fresh from that point. [It will] never [be corrected] by simply going on. Evil can be undone, but it cannot "develop" into good, [worlds without end]. Time does not heal it. The spell must be unwound. [C. S. Lewis, The Great Divorce (New York: Macmillan Co., 1973), p. 6]
So God is just, but mercy claimeth the penitent and the evil can be undone.

FALL!

At the slightest scent of smoke in the air, my heart is transported to Ashton.....Perhaps to the HUSKY HUT, watching the football game, listening to Ms. Howe cook hamburgers, and wearing a heavy jacket all at the same time.  Brisk walks with mom and dad on the exactly 2 mile route that encompassed our neighborhood, mom and dad showered ready for the day, Susan and I sporting pajama pants and one of dad's MANY jackets.  Spud Harvest!  Need I say more? 
Although fall is not really the same in Nevada (sometimes, I am not sure fall exists in Nevada), the feelings are the same.  An urgency to make pumpkin chocolate chip cookies, walk around the block as a family, break out the hot chocolate, and (yes you are reading this right) UNLEASH THE CHRISTMAS MUSIC!  I love fall. 
I also love that fall brings General Conference!  Last night I attended the Relief Society General Meeting.  It was pure genius.  President Uchtdorf made me want to live every day like it was my last, Sister Allred (who bears remarkable resemblance to my good friend's mother) makes me want to be kind, Sister Thompson makes me want to be brave because she has borne trials that I have not had to and with sheer grace!  I love her! 
It is Sister Beck, however, that today I want to thank (perhaps I should mail this straight to her). 
Throughout the years of my young motherhood, Sister Beck has spoken directly to my heart.  She has had the courage to say HARD things, many times, I am sure at the expense of her own popularity!  Her quotes rush through my mind at times, "BE BRILLIANT IN THE BASICS,"  "WHAT GOOD HAS MY LIFE DONE ME,"  "MOTHERS WHO KNOW......."  Today I would like to thank her for simply being an instrument that the Lord could use to shape my family's lives in countless ways.  I know what she speaks is TRUTH.  I have taken her "suggestions"  and cultivated them in my life.  They have grown into testimonies of God's love for families.  He has provided the WAY! 
One year as we were vacationing at Bear Lake, Elder L. Tom Perry happened to be our neighbor.  That week my dad went and bought a flat of the ever-popular Bear Lake Raspberries and delivered them to Elder Perry simply saying, "we never get to THANK-YOU for all of the things that you do."  I would like to take a flat of raspberries (electronically speaking) to Sister Beck.  In fact, I would like to thank all of my leaders who are CALLED of God to serve in callings that they did not ask for, but they were willing to take, simply because they love the LORD.  THANK YOU!