More holiness give me

Have you ever noticed that when you ask a missionary how long she or he has been out, the answer is usually something like, "About a year" (Unless they're fresh from the MTC).

Missionaries like to celebrate their six-month, one year and year-and-a-half anniversaries. Each is a major milestone. With those milestones come tell tale signs of how long they've been out.

Over the next few days. we'll be looking at some of those signs that show a missionary has been out "about a year." Stay tuned!
 

Tranquility base

Despite all the practice and training, entering the mission field feels like landing on an alien world.  It takes a lot of faith — and includes at least a few minutes of terror!

Today marks the 50th anniversary of the first moon landing. Celebrate wisely. Take an astronaut to lunch... or a space cadet!

Happy anniversary, and stay tuned!

It's the 11th anniversary of Beckstrom Buzz! What a fun adventure it's been so far. I've met a lot of people — both electronically and IRL — and made a few friends. I've had a couple of books published, won a few awards, and —hopefully — scattered a little sunshine all along the way. Thank you for joining me in this journey!

Stay tuned later today as I begin to post my sketch notes from general conference. It's always exciting!

Post-General Conference — and more!

What an amazing General Conference! It's difficult to know where to begin — new apostles, priesthood organization, home teaching and visiting teaching evolving to ministering, and seven new temples! And so much more!

Pres. Nelson recommended we review the talks several times over the next few months. One thing that may help in your review is a copy of my General Conference notes — here's a link to a downloadable PDF on Dropbox.

This General Conference also marks the 10 year anniversary of my blog! It started after listening to Elder Scott's talk from April 2008. Long story there, but let it suffice to say that the Spirit spoke to me during that talk.

To celebrate the 10-year anniversary, we'll be rerunning some of my favorites from the past decade. I think you'll enjoy it.

Thank you for your support, and thanks for coming back! Enjoy!

Star Date: Supplemental

Happy 50th! And may you live long and prosper!

Five-Oh

Caricature has never been my strong suit, but for today's panel I had to try as it's the 50th anniversary of both the assassination of Pres. Kennedy and the debut of Doctor Who. In fact, the premiere episode of Doctor Who ran two days after Kennedy's assassination, which didn't help its ratings very much.

I thought this might be an interesting way to pay tribute to two cultural icons, both of whom found a way to inspire hope and to promote exploration in space.

And just for proof that great minds often think alike -- and so do cartoonists -- here's a link to Arie Van De Graaff's Doctor Who gag (and a much better caricature of No. 11!).

Happy Anniversary!

This marks my fifth year of doing this blog! Some of the gags have been good; some of the gags have been, well, less good -- but they've all come at the same low price!

As usual, I mark this significant milestone with a rerun of the cartoon that started it all -- my first published cartoon that ran in the New Era when I was still in high school.

In celebration of five years, I'm going to rerun some of my favorite cartoons during this week. I hope you like them, too. Thank you for joining me!

Celebration time!

Many of the missionaries featured in my cartoons are representative of real missionaries I have known: companions, my sons' companions, missionaries serving in our area, etc. Most of them are (or were) pretty awesome; others may have inspired awe in one way or another.

Go, missionaries!

Monday sketchbook: Hallmark moments

I'm actually a little surprised that Hallmark set up its headquarters in Kansas City rather than Salt Lake. Think of all the birthdays, anniversaries and other special occasions that had to be celebrated in Brigham Young's household alone!