My hubby

So I have been totally lacking in the blog department lately and seriously need to get motivated to post more, I do have random pictures of our happenings lately but I get so frustrated everytime I try to post them to blogger it takes like a 100 years before the upload is complete. But I will do that soon I promise. In the mean time, I just wanted to paste my husbands letter on our blog. My sister in law Cindy is composing a memory book of "dear Jeff" letters for their family, I asked Josh if he had done one yet and he said he hadn't. So last night he was up late writing one. When I read it this morning, I was reading it while I was power walking pushing wade and delaney in the stroller at the mall and was leaned over my handle reading on my phone while still pushing and was just crying (everyone probably thought I was nuts) but I was amazed at Josh's sweet letter. Anyone who knows Josh knows that he is not a crier, isn't the best at paying compliments and doesn't show emotion that much. After dealing with his brother's loss I have seen a change in him, he still has his sarcastic humor, but he has been more sensitive and sweet in our marriage, family and things going on around us. I am so very thankful for a wonderful husband and love him so much and am grateful for all the sacrifices he makes for our family and for being an amazing daddy, and for his family in raising such wonderful kids. Below is Josh's "Dear Jeff" letter. It is lengthy but its worth the read :)



Dear Jeff, Writing you a letter now just reminds me of what I already know but sometime choose to temporarily forget, that you're gone. I feel grateful for my knowledge of our Heavenly Father's plan of salvation so that I know that you're not gone gone but only gone in a physical sense. That knowledge doesn't make your passing easy to swallow but it does give me some peace that I wouldn't otherwise have. With that being said, let me start from the beginning. Ever since I can remember I have always looked up to you and it wasn't always because of your physical size. Although I remember James, Jeremy, and I wrestling with you when we were younger and the three of us were no match for you in a wrestling match, we could never even get close to turning you over. During your last week you reminded me of that memory and how you didn't think you could take just one of us now in your weakened state. After you had passed and I was struggling trying to help the funeral home people move you I was thinking to myself, "yeah right" to your earlier comment. I was also perplexed that the funeral home only sent two scrawny guys to come get you, didn't they know they would need two guys just to carry your big heart. Sorry, I said I would start at the beginning and jumped to the end. One of your big contributions to me growing up was your love of sports. I think I enjoyed participating in a lot of sports because I saw you participating and excelling. Even now I get great joy over playing and watching sports, I owe that mostly to you. I was always the skinny kid growing up but I don't remember getting teased about it very much because I could always compete well in sports with the "jocks." Or it may have been that everyone knew you were my older brother and they didn't dare mess with and Anderson. I am going to keep telling myself it was because of my athletic abilities but who am I kidding. I remember being a 110 pound sophmore in highschool taking a weightlifting class. The football head coach "taught" (by teaching I mean sitting at a desk drinking coffee) the class and told everyone that the Jeff Anderson listed on the wall for heaviest bench press in school history was my brother. I gained a lot of respect that day from the other students without having to do anything but be your brother. I didn't mind being known as "Jeff's brother", there was a sense of pride in that designation plus it was a break from being known as "Jeremy's brother" for a little while. One of the things I admired most about you was your decision to serve a mission when football prospects were looking promising. I always admired the athletes that are willing to put their athletic lives on hold to do what is right. Because you served a mission, serving one myself was almost a no brainer. I remember one time after your mission you invited Jeremy and I to come stay with you for a week in St. George. I remember feeling so cool getting to hang out with you and your roommates. I appreciated that experience a lot. I also admired your decision to marry in the temple to the right kind of person. I remember you telling me before you got married that Cindy was a good girl who had a strong testimony that you could take to the temple and would make an awesome mother to your future children. Those were some of the same characteristics I looked for when I was looking for someone to marry. We didn't marry into money, like you told me to do, but we definitely married in to wealth of an eternal nature. Jeff, I always felt as if you were a second dad to me even though you were my brother. Just like our dad, you made sure our family was taken care of. I always felt that if you were around that everything would be taken care of and everything would be ok. Family was always tops on your priority list and it showed by how you treated me. You were always so giving with whatever you had. I was always amazed that you would entrust me to use some of your "toys" when you knew that if I were to break something I didn't have a way of paying for repair or replacement. You didn't care though, people were always priority over "stuff." You can't take your physical possessions with you when you pass, although I would be a little disappointed if a part of Moab doesn't make it into heaven with me when I die, where else are we going to ride? I guess I'll fast forward to your last week of life. When you had called me the week before we came to visit you from Ohio I was in total shock. I was expecting good news that everything would be ok and you had beat this cancer. When you started to break down before telling me anything, I already knew what you were going to say. You told me you would like us to visit sometime in the next month so that you could see us before you passed. My wife and I were discussing when to go and I thought it would be best to go two weeks later due to some work concerns over a new project I was starting. At this time I fully expected you to be around for a while longer but I didn't want to risk not seeing you either. You were still planning on going to MD Andersen in Texas for treatment and we found out Cindy had made an appointment for the week we would have come for a visit. We decided that we should just come that same weekend. I made arrangments at work and Jennifer got going on the preparations to take 5 kids in a van for 30 hours straight of driving. It didn't seem like much of a sacrifice for us to see you, I told you we would have made the trip to see you for just 10 minutes if that's what it took. Prior to us leaving for Utah you had sent me a text message saying how you felt bad for me because I had an autistic son and that you were praying for my family. You told me that you would much rather have something be wrong with you than one of your kids. I was really impressed that someone like you who was dying of cancer was praying for my family. When we arrived in Utah I was glad to be surrounded by our great family. Whenever you were around there was always a lot of emotion and tears. I could tell how much you were loved by all of us. I tried to do my best to recount the good times as I wanted your last span of time on this earth to be as enjoyable as possible. I found myself holding back tears on numerous occasions those first few days, later in the week I didn't bother trying to hold back because it was too hard. You had an appoinment with Elder Holland that week where you were to be given a blessing and we all had hoped that an appostle of the Lord would be able to help extend your time with us on the earth. Elder Holland was sick that day and had to cancel the appointment. That night we were all gathered at your house and you asked me to give you a blessing. I was feeling the pressure of trying to play back up to an apostle. As I layed my hands on your head and started the blessing I had no idea what I was going to say other than I wanted so badly to say "be healed." The spirit just wouldn't confirm that for me as much as my heart pleaded for that prompting. I blessed you with peace and comfort, I blessed you that you would be able to find relief from your symptoms. I think I should have clarified to you that passing away wasn't what I intended when I wanted you to have relief. I did notice that your last few days you had obtained inner peace and had accepted your fate much more graciously than the rest of us. I did learn a great lesson from that blessing I gave you though. After I had finished I heard my dad say that it's the same priesthood authority whether you are an apostle or a brother. During priesthood session of conference President Ucthdorf talked about living below our privilege when it comes to the priesthood. I don't think we understand the power that we have been given to act in His name. I want to close by saying how much I love you and was grateful for every moment we were able to share in this life. This life is but a chapter in an eternal book so I will not say "The End" or even "good bye" but "see you soon" (and when I say soon I mean soon in an eternal sense, just to clarify this time) love, your brother forever, Josh