2 years of Blogging

 Its been more then 2 years that I have had this blog, but its been two years with the ariebelleblog.blogspot.com, but about 3 years altogether with the first year with another name.

Blogging is a hobby of mine, Its not like I am internet famous or anything, and I probably view my blog more then anyone else does, but honestly I love sharing things from my life and not know who will see it, with the hope that maybe it was something that helped someone that day, or lifted a spirit or inspired something. 

My blog has about 14,000 views, which is crazy! I am very proud of that number. Because for the longest time it was under 1,000 and then all of a sudden it seems like people randomly started stumbling onto my blog, which I am totally okay with! So much has happened this last year, and I haven't been very good at posting things on my blog lately. 

Lately I've been thinking a lot about death, because my Grandfather on my mothers side is getting to that point where we are expecting it to be soon. He is a great man, who grew up in Greece during WW2 and moved to the U.S at age 19 to become a doctor and start a wonderful family. Every time I speak with him he tells me stories about Greek Gods, The war, and most preciously to me, God and his Faith in Christ. He was baptized into the Mormon Church after going to church for quite along time and after raising his children in the church as well. When his oldest son was coming of age to become baptized himself the Bishop of his ward told him that he should be baptized so he can baptize his own son. After many years of belonging to the LDS church my Grandpa has grown in his testimony and faith, and has shared many of his experiences and thoughts with me as I have grown older. I am so thankful to know from our faith that I will doubtfully see him again in the life to come, and that our families have been sealed together forever. As his time grows closer to an end, I am a little bit sadden, but at the same time he has told me he is tired of life and is just waiting, so in a way I am happy for him to pass along into the next realm and life with our Father in Heaven. 

Death is a tough thing to go through, especially if a child passes away, a friend, or a parent. Death is not the end, I promise, I know it isn't, because it doesn't make sense for us to live and just become dirt. Our bodies are only temporary facades that our spirits inhabit and grow in. Life to me, is a journey where we come to know ourselves better then we could have anywhere else, its a trial, and a test of faith to see whether we come back to God again, to see whether or not we stray away into evil or hold fast to good. We have been given free agency since the beginning of Man-kind. It is all up to us to make our own life choices, every day we make choices, some good and some bad. But at the end of your life will you be happy with what you left behind and everything you did? Or will you be disappointed or even ashamed of it all? In the end God will decide. 

In my faith, which is LDS(Mormon) we do not believe that people who are not baptized go to hell. We believe that everyone who is good-hearted and has tried their best in life will go to heaven. What makes me upset about some other faiths, is the belief that unbaptized children go to "purgatory" but in my church, we know that babies are pure and innocent and have done nothing wrong, so if a new born to a young age child passes away, I know they will be once again in the Heavens, dancing around like little angles and watching the rest of us from above. 

I love learning about other religious points of view on the After life, I find it interesting to hear other peoples perspectives on what happens to us. 

Comment if you want to share your believes on the afterlife! :)

With much love, Arianna