About The Fam
I was born in Rexburg Idaho on January 16th, 1984, and moved to Utah when I was a mere beagle (age four). I lived in my Grandma Hill’s basement for the first little while, then we got a house and that’s where i lived until I got married (but we’ll get to that later). I went to Geneva Elementary from 1989 - 1996, Orem Jr. High from 1996 - 1999. This is where I met a group of friends, Taylor Van Sickle, Jeff Smith, Sio Gali, and Ben Bascom. We were way in to Star Trek, “Trekkies” and we would always have ‘missions’ down in our basements playing Star Trek into the wee hours of the morning.
Taylor and I started a little band in 9th grade called ‘Inspector 9′, which led us into Highschool. From 1999 - 2002, I was a Timberwolf at Timpanogos High School. Taylor and I met some other guys (Richard Taggart, Evan Crockett, Isaac Jensen, Bryan Pitt, and Jeff Anderson) who were also trying to start up a band, so we all got together and started one. We named it Instant Winner, this band–along with friends and school–were our life for the next 3 years. Not only did we meet the guys in our band, but we also met a little group of girls that became quite dear to our hearts, one of them turned out to be my lovely wife Anisha, I just didn’t know it at the time cause she was dating Taylor (be patient we’re getting there).
Graduation came along, and so did my mission call to Belo Horizonte, Brasil where I spent 2 years preaching the good word, and serving the Lord in a completely different language, and a completely different world of which I grew to love so very much. I went there planning on teaching the Gospel to many, I just wasn’t fully aware that I would be making so many eternal friends, and that I’d be leaving a huge chunk of my heart there! haha!
Okay, so here comes the good stuff… Throughout high school, I dated this girl named Angie (on and off so to speak) and as I left for my mission we kind of just left things and so she could date other people, and I could go to work. We still wrote to each other and such, but things slowly started to change. I left for my mission in February, and come September letters were seeming a bit sparse. I figured she probably met someone and was dating and I couldn’t have been happier for her. I just kept on going and working my little tail off figuring she would probably get married, and that the Lord would do the rest.
My first Christmas in the mission field came and went, my 1 year mark came and went. March came and I got a letter! (Laugh) yes, one of “those” letters the kind most missionaries like to call “Dear John” letters. She said that she had been dating this guy since the July before that and that the topic of marriage had come up a couple of times and that she didn’t know what was going to happen, but just wanted me to know about it, I was pretty much expecting this. The letter came, not as a heart breaking end-of-the-world letter, but more of an informative thanks-for-sending-this-to-me letter, kind of like putting the last puzzle piece in on a 6 piece puzzle. (I’d pretty much had it all figured out) I was just fine upon recieving this letter, and for some reason I actually felt relieved about it all. Naturally (I think) I just started thinking about the future and what it had in store for me, (post mission wise) and I frankly I had no idea what would happen in my future, so I just kept at it like I had done before–with a prayer in my heart of course.
April came along and brought with it the long awaited “Hundred and Seventy-Fourth, Annual General Conference of The Church Of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints.” Durring the Sunday morning session there was a talk given by Julie B. Beck entitled, “A Mother Heart.” As I sat there listening to that talk, I was thinking alot about my own mother and how much she fit into the things that Julie Beck was talking about and just how much I loved and missed her. When just then, out of nowhere this thought just kind of appeared in my mind “Anisha,” it said.
As I sat there listening to that talk the thought of Anisha would not leave my mind, I came to realize that Anisha had those qualities that Sister Beck was talking about as well. As a side note: Anisha and I had a really great relationship already, since she had dated my best friend, and I dated hers, we kind of met in the middle a lot to talk to each other about the “inside” stuff of our relationships and as a result, we became really close. We even hung out together quite a bit when we were the only ones that could do anything, but just as friends. We always seemed to have the funnest times together. (We both admit now that we had things going for each other even back then, it just would have been a little wierd considering the circumstances)
General Conference ended and we left feeling uplifted as always, only something strange was about to happen. Within a few weeks of General Conference and that wonderful talk by Sister Beck, I had recieved a letter from Anisha. It was so great to read that letter from an old friend that I hadn’t heard from for a long time but recently had been thinking a lot about. She asked how I was doing, and how the work was, said that she missed me, told me that she was planning on serving a mission and that she was so dang excited about it, bore her testimony and ended the letter.
I remember sitting on the couch in my apartment in my 3rd area, and after reading that letter something just filled my heart and even though she had been talking about serving a mission and how excited she was about that, for some reason I felt that I was going to marry that girl. So just to get that feeling out, I turned to my companion and said “I’m going to marry this girl!” he looked at me like, “are you serious?” And I said yeah, i’m going to…
We wrote back and fourth a couple of times after that, and then this one “p-day” I will never forget. My companion and I were going to check our e-mail and I got one from my family, one from Anisha and one from Angie. I read my family’s first, then wen’t to Angie’s. It was kind of interesting because in her e-mail she had said something kind of sarcasticaly, about how she felt that she didn’t really know my family, but that they liked Anisha and that I should marry her when I got back. rolling my eyes a ittle I opened Anisha’s e-mail.
I was already kind of ‘butterfly tummied’ about reading her email because of these feelings that had been growing inside of me for her. In her e-mail she explained how there was something that had been on her mind for a while that she needed to tell me. She explained that she had feelings about me and that she wanted me to work hard on my mission and stay a worthy Priesthood holder and that she was truly in love with me, but she wasn’t sure about how I felt. So I promptly wrote her back so she could feel the ‘cloud 9′ feeling that I was experiencing that day as well.
I had 5 months of my misison left and where most missionaries are seeing a decrease in letters towards the end of their mission, this was just the beginning for me! Anisha understood that I could only write one day out of the week, (on Preparation Day) but this didn’t stop her from setting a goal for one month to write me one letter every day. Haha!! And she did it! She missed maybe 2 or 3 days out of the month and that’s it.
Mission time wound down and on February 10th of 2005 back home I trotted. The day I arrived was a grand day, it was the 11th (it took a day to get home) which is cool, because it’s the same day that I left to go on my mission 2 years before. I could already tell it was going to be a tough time getting back into the American life. That night I got released and then my dad took me over to Anisha’s house because I wanted to see her. We hugged and smiled and all that gushy stuff, and sat there for a while catching up.
It was a little weird for me in the beginning, first of all because I had just “come off the boat” and second, because I had an instant girlfriend when I hadn’t had one for 2 years, and i knew that she was head over heals in love with me, and I was feeling the same way towards her, but it all felt right. The next monday was Valentine’s Day and we went snowboarding, we had our first kiss the night before after watching Shrek II, and we had a grand ol’ time together that day.
The next saturday my parents and I made it to the temple, and that was where I recieved my confirmation that I should marry Anisha. That night I knew it, my dad knew it, and my mom knew it. The next thing I knew I was out ring shopping and then kneeling down asking Anisha to marry me. we were engagged on February 23, 2005, 12 days after I got home. (BTW, she said yes!) There we were High School sweethearts and we didn’t even know it.
The Hill family was established May 14, 2005 as we were sealed for time and all eternity in the Salt Lake Temple. The next thing we knew we had a little one on the way and yes, it was planned. And that, Brothers and Sisters, is how it ALL began!!!
You can read up about us more on the main blog, or on our other blogs. What ever you do, keep on keepin’ it real!
bradster | 
November 22, 2006 11:59 am
5 Comments
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By rolyat, November 27, 2006 @ 9:42 pm
sweet “a” site dude, and good picture of the little one!!
By Leandro Peixoto, April 28, 2007 @ 7:56 am
Fala HIll!!! Cara parabéns pela filhinha e pelo próximo que virá! sua famÃlia é chic! como tem passado? onde está morando? O blog ficou legal. abraço cara!
By julie snell, October 21, 2007 @ 10:48 pm
I just read this part of your blog again tonight the second night after your beautiful son Gavin has been born and I just want to say you are a beautiful family. And everything I ever hoped for for my Anisha who is so precious to me. I’m so thankful for you Brad and your good family that help out so much with taking care of Cailyn in times of need where I can’t seem to (want to but realize it’s best for her there having fun with the children Bonnie tends rather than being with painful Grandma Julie). Anyway, I’m grateful for a good son in law who keeps such good records and is so good to me and makes me feel at home when I am around. And especially is a good father and husband to my grandkids and my beautiful daughter Anisha. I’m so fortunate. Love mom Julie
By Garmon, August 3, 2008 @ 7:15 pm
Dude!! You got lots of AAAAAAs going on there? What’s that mean?
By bradster, October 20, 2008 @ 12:39 pm
AAAAAAAAAs are fixed…