2010 July :: Mormon Wordles

Faithful Friends
President Henry B. Eyring
First Presidency Message – July 2010

President Henry B. Eyring

President Eyring points out the Savior calls those who have been faithful in their service to him “friends” (D&C 84). We can become his friend by serving others.

President Eyring tells us that over the next few days we will each have opportunities to be the Savior’s friend. If we are alert over the next few days, we will see others carrying heavy burdens, or have old friends called to mind we have not seen in years. We need to reach out to these people and lighten their burdens.

Our Savior will bless us to feel what they feel. As we serve them, our love for them will grow. That will give us courage to reach out again to others.

President Eyring also recounted how old friends had reached out to him in the past in his time of need across many miles and years when only Heavenly Father could have told them of his burdens.

Its a great feeling to reach out to old friends in their time of need, and soothing when they do the same for us. May we all follow his counsel and be especially alert this month for these opportunities to grow and to become the Savior’s friends.

A Mormon Wordle of his message is below:

Faithful Friends Mormon Wordle

Wordle.net recently released some new color combinations, among them was Indian Earth, the earthy colors used above. We think it does a nice job of representing the warmth of old friends.

Canaries With Gray on Their Wings
President Thomas S. Monson
First Presidency Message – June 2010

President Thomas S. Monson

President Monson talks of when he was a young bishop, a widow in his ward passed away and left three canaries. Instructions had been left for the two with pretty yellow wings to be given to her friends, but the third, with its yellow wings marred by gray was to be given to President Monson. Her note asked him to give it a home, it is not the prettiest, but its song is the best.

He likened the widow to the canary, “She was not blessed with beauty, gifted with poise, or honored by posterity”, but her “song” (meaning her life), blessed the lives of others and strengthened them in their time of need.

President Monson told us the world is full of canaries with grey on their wings. Only a few have learned to sing. We must develop our capacity to face trouble with courage by gaining a true perspective of who we are (sons and daughters of our heavenly father) so that we too can have a good “song” and bless the lives of others.

A Mormon Wordle of the message is below, along with a description of our efforts in producing it.

Canaries With Gray on Their Wings Mormon Wordle

We spent longer trying to Mormon Wordle this message than any previous post to date. We were trying to overlay it on the photo of some parakeets I took a few years ago below.

Parakeets

We tried to use a white on black image version of the Mormon Wordle above, extract the white text, and overlay it onto the parakeet image. After exhausting the selection tools in Photoshop Elements and Inkscape and never being able to cleanly select the white text, we gave up in the second week of July and posted our efforts.

One of the basic wordle shapes resembles a footprint. We chose it to promote the concept of us walking in the footsteps of the lady who walked in the footsteps of the canary with gray on its wings. Interestingly, on close inspection, you may note the lime green parakeet closest to the camera is actually just a plastic bird. Many of us are like that, we have not reached our potential and are just sitting there like a bump on a log. May we all emulate its song in our lives by lifting the lives of those around us.

Faithful Friends

Canaries With Gray on Their Wings

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