Brittany Jepsen: Making Our Lives a Tribute To Those Who Have Gone Before Us

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Morgan Jones Pearson

Growing up Brittany Jepsen's mom's favorite quote was a creative mess is better than tidy idleness. And maybe that too we have to thank for the beauty Brittany has brought into this world. The interesting thing is whether it's the name of her website the house that Lars built being a subtle nod to her dad, or the fact that her home's remodel, which is soon to be featured on TV and will introduce viewers to the architecture and history of Nauvoo, Britney's life and the way she lives it seems to always be in some way a tribute to those who have gone before her. Brittany Jepsen received a Master's in interior design from the Corcoran College of Art and Design in Washington DC. During her summers, she interned for Jonathan Adler and Celerie Kimball designing products for clients like Tiffany and Co, and Dempsey and Carroll. The House that Lars Built began as a grad school project for one of her interior design classes, but it's become a full fledged creative services studio. She married her husband, Paul, in September of 2010. And the couple began their life together in Paul's home of Copenhagen. They now live in Provo, Utah. This is All In, an LDS Living podcast where we ask the question, what does it really mean to be all in the gospel of Jesus Christ? I'm Morgan Pearson. And I am honored to have Brittany Jepsen, on the line with me today. Brittany, welcome.

Brittany Jepsen

Thank you so much. I'm glad to be here.

Morgan Jones Pearson

Well I have been looking forward to this episode. And I'm so excited to have the chance to chat with you. I told Brittany before we got started that I loved having a an excuse to just spend time on her Instagram feed, because it's so fun. And so beautiful. So congratulations to you on having created such beautiful content.

Brittany Jepsen

I wish that I had the official job of scrolling through people's Instagram. Maybe I'd feel better about my time usage.

Morgan Jones Pearson

No, no, it was awesome. I think that you've done such a good job of creating this beautiful space, but also having humor and like real life in the middle of it. So it doesn't make you feel bad because I'm not a crafty person. So I can very easily look at your page and be like, Man, I am a failure in life. But you do such a good job of making yourself real. So So seriously, hats off to you for that.

Brittany Jepsen

Oh, thanks. Well, I also feel like a failure because I am not making all of those projects. So please, know it's not you.

Morgan Jones Pearson

Well, first of all, I wondered kind of to get us started, if you could tell me a little bit about The House that Lars Built, how it started and how this this thing that you probably never could have imagined being as big as it is has influenced your life.

Unknown Speaker

Yeah, so I started The House that Lars Built in 2008. It was a personal portfolio for school, I went to graduate school for interior design. So I started it for that and kept it up. And all kind of came together for this class project. It wasn't supposed to be a blog. And at that time, blogs weren't really a thing. And it kind of grew back then. I would keep it up for academic purposes. And then I studied abroad in Copenhagen. I did a textile design program there. And I interviewed Scandinavian designers in their homes. And it was just like this project that I did for fun on the side while I went to school. And so I got a bigger audience as time went on. And I graduated, I had met somebody in Denmark. So we got married and I moved to Denmark permanently. And I started blogging about life there mostly because I couldn't get a job for quite a while as my papers were going through to become like an official resident and author that time I began to treat it as a job. And soon over over time, it became a job. So I started getting paid little by little for like guest blogging for something or are contributing to another side and then people started to come back to my so that by the time that we moved to the States in 2013 I began looking for a full time job, my husband was going to be going to school full time so I thought oh, you know, I'll need a real job. And I tried and I got three job offers and for whatever reason, they did not go through. I mean I would get like it would get to the salary negotiation and I would never hear from them again. And it was so bizarre but like one job after the other, like something so weird like that. And then I was like, Okay, well, I'll just keep on going. I'm making money through the house that Lars built, we'll just keep going. And then I kept on going enough that it became a point where it's like, oh, actually, I don't think I'll need to go get a full time job somewhere else. It was actually my dad. He said, It looks like you're doing okay. And it was just like that, that acceptance that I needed to say, Oh, I think this is it. And really looking back on it. Now I can see that each step was kind of guided to do what I do, for whatever reason, because there's no reason why a personal academic or portfolio blog should have turned into a career. And here we are, let's see, 14 years later, whatever it is, and it's not only become a job, but we've supported our family through over the years. And I feel very guided to do what I do. I feel like the Lord was kind of like, no, no, no, no, not this, not this, not this, you will not, you will not do this, you will do this. So I create with The House that Lars Built we make projects, craft projects, design projects, to encourage people to make things with their hands. Because I believe that when you make things with your hands, you become closer to your Maker. And that there's like a healing that comes with making things. So I feel I get really teary eyed when I talk about especially in, in this setting where I can, I don't talk about this publicly, really, because I feel like the strength of it comes, there's a full mission behind it, which is that encouragement to get in touch with the maker inside of you. And I feel like that's one of the most divine things we can do in this life.

Morgan Jones Pearson

So beautifully said. Thank you so much. Okay, so as I prepared for this interview, I watched and listened to a handful of things that you've done in the past. And one thing that I thought was interesting is you said that much of who you are, and the way that you see the world and the desire that you have to make beautiful things or to be drawn to beautiful things stems from your mom and your grandmother. So I wondered if you could maybe tell us a little bit about them and how they planted that passion for beautiful things in you?

Unknown Speaker

Yeah, so I grew up in a family and my mother, my grandmother and her mother, my great grandmother, where beauty and creating beauty was instilled. It wasn't necessarily always said, but it was shown. So my mother grew up as a ballet dancer, she and her sisters were professional dancers and with the New York City Ballet and I saw that as a kid thinking, oh my gosh, my mom was so cool. My aunts were so cool. They left Los Angeles when they were young and went to New York and went to school there and then dance had this wonderful, you know, career. But not only that, they grew up sewing and making art and making crafts and my grandmother was so resourceful. And she grew up during the time of the Depression, and I don't think she would ever label herself resourceful or that's the reason why but but it is. And she had this wonderful sewing room in her home. And when I was a child, she would teach me how to sew clothing for for dolls like the Shirley Temple doll and drawstring bags. When my mom and her sisters were dancing around the world, like they would gather beautiful things like she had this amazing fabric collection and would keep it in her sewing room. And so I grew up like going through her sewing closet and looking at this, these gorgeous fabrics. And I think it wasn't so much as like oh, I want to do that someday. But it was just being like instilled in my brain. And they collected beautiful things. They had beautiful furniture and beautiful decor. And I just remember every time I would visit it was like a beautiful setting and growing up and establishing my own home or my own aesthetic it it's certainly become this, this reference point for me like Oh, my grandmother had this beautiful front door with like, round stained glass that were all on these different colors. And as I'm designing my own house right now, I'm thinking of these references like maybe I need my own stained glass door just like my grandmother or she had this beautiful French satee that would be so beautiful in my head. Oh man, I love bringing back those references because she was so lovely and I really think that beauty and the things we surround ourselves there's a real tangible quality, it's, I don't do it as a surface level thing. It's not like, oh, I need beautiful fabrics, because I need to show people how amazing it is to have these things. I feel like there's a real spirit in how it was designed and how we surround ourselves. And we can feel that when we when we have it.

Morgan Jones Pearson

Well, I do think it's such a gift to be able to make things beautiful, make a space beautiful. And we'll talk more about that later. But one thing I wanted to ask you about is you and I both got married a little bit later by Latter Day Saint standards. And I think that's an important distinction to make. I don't think either one of us for old by any means. But I wondered getting married just a little bit later. How do you feel like having that maybe extra time than you anticipated? On your own help do create a strong sense of who you are? Because I think if anybody scrolls your Instagram, they'll be like, this is somebody who knows who she is, and doesn't try to be something that she's not. And so how do you feel like that time maybe instilled in you this sense of self? And why are you grateful for that, that period of your life?

Brittany Jepsen

I loved my 20s. I loved everything about it. I had such a good time. My husband and I got married when we were 28. I think I was still too young. To be totally frank, I think the the example of my mother and seeing what she got to do in her life, I think from an early age, I was like, I got stuff to do. You know, like, I want to go see the world, I want to go study this, I need to learn as much as I can. And not to say you can't do that once you get married because you certainly can. But I just wanted to go go go go go. I wanted to go to New York, I lived in DC for a while. I had internships, like wonderful internships that really helped shape my career, but also my world viewpoint, I got to serve a mission in Brazil. My prayer when I was submitting my papers, my prayer was like, please don't let anything come in my way. That's exactly what I asked for. And I got it. And I think that's kind of how I've lived my life is don't let anything come in my way. I've got things I want to do. Of course, I'm open to your suggestions. But I really take this scripture seriously when it talks about the desires of your heart, like we should have desires, and we should make those things happen. And I'm pretty sure the Lord is like, you do what you got to do. I'll stop you when it's not right. And that's totally the mentality I've adopted. So it was such a crucial time, like going to college, getting a graduate degree and understanding who I was. But also, I have to, like say that one of my best experiences was my singles ward in Washington DC. I got to live in like a beautiful part of town and walking to school every day and passing these this beautiful historic neighborhood of Georgetown and in Washington, DC. It was just such a formative time to see how people live and what they're working towards. I got to be in this ward. It was like wonderful people doing really cool things. I got to learn so much. I was so out of my comfort zone all the time. I didn't realize it like I had not too much in common as far as like my interests go, we had things in common with the gospel. But I like the guys who I dated, I had nothing in common with looking back like I like art and design and not too many people there did, which is why it was helpful to go to New York and see Oh, you guys also like art design there. But I made wonderful friends who are still my friends today or it's kind of crazy how the friends who I made there, we can connect up professionally now, which is how I kind of need to get out my social life because I work and I have children now. So it's wonderful that the connections I made there have kind of carried me on through over the years. It I just really can't say enough about that time and if anybody asks me, like, please go have wonderful experiences, whether you're married or not, but I really think that getting married is such a personal decision that you should do it when you're the most ready, because I would hate for people to feel pressured to do something, when it's maybe not right for them or the right time, I feel like we need to own our decisions and be comfortable with them. So I think 28 was still too young for me. I feel like I didn't know a lot or didn't recognize exactly who I was. But I think that comes I think that's just how life is right?

Morgan Jones Pearson

Yeah, well, I think we're never totally ready for anything. But your experience in DC resonated so much with me. So I did an internship in DC for church Public Affairs. And I was in the BYU internship program. And the first couple of weeks, I struggled so bad, because I just had a different personality than most of the people there. And they were mostly like Poli Sci majors. And I always just felt like a fish out of water. And a couple of weeks into the program, we went out to get something to eat, and everybody was like bickering back and forth about what they wanted to eat. And finally, I just said, I just need food. So whatever, you guys decide if we could just pick a place, that'd be great. And one of the girls in the program looked at me, and she goes, and that is why we need you here. Because in a place full of reds, you are a blue. And I for the first time, like the color test, I was like, she's right. And then that created like a shift in my mind, of, Oh, I'm just different. I'm a different personality. But my personality is valued here. And so that was a really formative moment for me. And so I resonate with your experience there. So you mentioned that you got married when you were 28. You met your husband in Denmark. Tell me a little bit about what took you there and how you met him.

Brittany Jepsen

Right. So I, like I mentioned I went for this program. It was with the Danish design school. It was a textile design program. And I did it through my graduate school. So I knew it was only going to be a summer but I went and had a ball I learned so much got to see all the Scandinavian countries. And then three weeks before I was gonna go home back to DC to finish my my schooling. I met Paul. There's an Institute building in Copenhagen where it's like close to the temple, and they have family home evening there and Institute classes. And it's like a real kind of community center for the young single adults there and we met a family home evening. And I laugh because it seems like a cliche, but it seems such an un-cliche environment. He took me out proper American dates, which is not how they date in Denmark. So he took me our first date was on to the Royal Danish ballet in this outside amphitheater. And it was so beautiful. And after that first date, I was like, No, we're not a good fit. But he really, I mean, he really did such an amazing job like we went to another ballet on the on the water in the canals of Copenhagen, we went kayaking in Copenhagen, he took me to a lovely restaurant. So of course, I'm going to have my interest piqued with all these amazing things, but their style of dating in Denmark is very different somehow. Somehow, I think they just like get together. I don't actually know what the magical potion is, but they like hang out. And then somehow they're engaged. I'm still trying to figure it out. But he did an amazing job. And so after three weeks, I went back to DC and we dated long distance for about a year before we got married. So in total, I like to calculate it. We spent about three months in person, which I'd recommend longer, but it somehow worked for us.

Morgan Jones Pearson

Yeah. Did you feel like dating long distance and having to (because my husband and I dated long distance for a bit) do you feel like it like, helped you have to talk?

Brittany Jepsen

Absolutely. I was I mean, I was doing my graduate thesis. So I really didn't have too much time. But we would talk for an hour as I was walking to school every day. So it was like the most efficient way of dating and like, efficiency is my love language. So I was like, This is great. I can date and while I'm going to school and then come back and do what I need to do. And then of course like the Danes they have like eight weeks of vacation so he could come over to DC. And then for Christmas break I went over and so we can like do it through to vacations. But I feel like it was such a wonderful way to date because yeah, we were just talking every day for an hour, like a good solid hour.

Morgan Jones Pearson

for sure. So he was originally born in Canada. And he was raised entirely outside of the US. Is that right?

Brittany Jepsen

Yeah, that's right. He was born in British Columbia, where his mom is from and his dad is from Denmark. So actually they spent about three years in Provo while his dad went to school at BYU. And then they moved to Denmark after his schooling was complete. So he did not learn Danish until he lived in Denmark. And he I mean, to learn the language he was put into schools, but he learned by going to refugee language classes. So he was in a class with people from all over the world who came to Denmark as refugees. And then he says that he learned the language through like Calvin and Hobbes and stuff. So I think schooling was a bit tricky for him because it wasn't his first language. So he struggled a bit just to get on the same, same plane as everyone else. But he's now you can't tell now. He teaches Danish at BYU. I think in a lot of ways he's still playing catch up from that time, especially the schooling, the education in Denmark's set up differently. So we came over here to go to BYU, and he's actually getting his master's in creative writing right now at BYU.

Morgan Jones Pearson

Okay. And so I wondered, how does having a husband who grew up internationally, influence or shape the way that the two of you are raising your family?

Brittany Jepsen

Well, I think anytime you marry somebody from another country or a culture, it will play so much into how you structure your marriage, how you structure your family, one of us may never feel at home in the country where we live, which is how I felt when I lived there. We were there for about three years together. And then he doesn't always feel at home here. And so we're constantly evaluating should we live here? Should we live somewhere else? Do we need to move it to a different, like a neutral country where we both don't feel at home? I think marriage is hard. And then I think, culturally, I think we brought in a lot of other hard things. That said, I think it's also given us conversation, talking points where we have to decide how do we want to make this happen. We see a lot of good things about the United States, we also see a lot of negative things about the United States, I see a lot of great things about Denmark, I also see a lot of negative things about Denmark. So together, we're constantly saying, Okay, I like this, I don't like that, I like this, I like that. So we were kind of making up our own system of values and how we want to raise our families. So Jasper is our four year old and we have Felix who's our one year old. So we we really want him to have like an international like, viewpoint or being able to value and accept other cultures, ways of living. So we want him to go back to Denmark to see where his father and his whole family lives. But also knowing that there's other cultures outside of Denmark and the states that are important to see, I think we, as God's children, we have this huge globe that we are maybe see in news, in the news, but we don't really know how it works. And I say that about myself too. I didn't really know what Denmark was like, until I lived there. I know my family came from there, you know, back in the day, and I thought it would be this great welcome, like, my people, you love me because I come from you. I did not get that reception. And it's because their culture is a little bit more closed off until you really get to know them like it takes years to to be invited into their homes and to have these deep relationships. And I can't say that I really broke it too much. And that's honestly one of the reasons why we moved back is because I felt like I was going to take years before I could feel comfortable there. So just that World Viewpoint and realizing that we're all in this together, but we're so different. I think we kind of owe it to each other to explore how these cultures and these people are. So we plan on traveling and living abroad again, we're just trying to figure out how that works and the last few years with COVID haven't really been helpful.

Morgan Jones Pearson

Yeah. Well, I think that's such an important thing to realize and to cultivate in all of us. One of the reasons that I brought you here today is your home is soon to be featured on a television show. And I understand that as you were doing this home renovation, you learn some interesting things about the history of your home, and I wondered if you could share that with us.

Brittany Jepsen

So my husband and I have lived in Provo for a number of years now. And we would always walk by this little street, and there are sycamore trees over this little street is so private and hidden has like these lovely hidden homes. And there's one home that we looked at, we said, if you know, by some miracle, if we could ever buy that house, like that would be such a dream. And during COVID, we were both working full time, I had gotten pregnant with our second child, and we were really expanding out of our apartment. And miraculously, I walked into this home one day, I saw that someone was in it. I knew that had been the kitchen had been taken out I had been like noticing things about this house. And I said, I'm gonna go see if anybody's there. And one day somebody was there. And I said, Hey, what are you doing? And they said, Oh, we're renovating it to sell and I said, stop, stop. Can we buy it. And we hadn't really been looking for a house. So we had some steps we had to put in place in order to do so. And by some miracle, and I kind of see this as the way my life has gone like, this is what you should do make this happen. We bought this house. So it was our dream house. And we had to quickly put in bathrooms because there were none, we had to quickly put in a kitchen in order to move in because I really feel like you need to take your time to design a home that reflects who you are and where you come from. So we did that. And now we're slowly taking our time and before a TV show reached out and said hey, do you want to document your renovations? Inside I said no. In my heart, I was like, No, I need way too much time. I need a huge budget that I can't just upfront in a few months. But somehow we said yes. And so we had to do some research about where this house came from. And we found out that the original owners, they modeled the home after a home in Nauvoo, Illinois, which is where the LDS people come from, or were for quite a bit of time. And this this show that we're on it's about old homes. And so we our home was built in the 90s but it was modeled after one from Nauvoo. And so we did a lot of research and found out especially with like historians from the church, we had a historian from the church come on to the show, which was so cool. Jenny Reeder, she was so wonderful. She grew up in this neighborhood and she has so much to offer our home was exactly the footprint of the Federalist home, which is what they did in Nauvoo in the Nauvoo house, which is what it was modeled after and I had a particular interest in it because my ancestors were lived in Nauvoo, especially if I think about my, my ancestor, Patty Sessions, who was my great, great, great, great grandmother. She was an LDS midwife. She was born in Maine, and was converted and then lived in Nauvoo and then tracked over and delivered hundreds of babies along the way. And she was really instrumental for a lot of reasons. But also she created these, she wrote in her journal every single day. And so the journals that Patty Sessions have been so valuable because they talked about the daily life of what it was like to cross the plains and deliver babies. And so we have like this great record. And so me merging the two like my family history with where I am now it was totally this whole full circle moment. But then I wanted to bring in more into I wanted to bring in my husband's Danish background Scandinavian background. So I view this home as a way to like, bring backand bring into play and focus my efforts on my family and his family and then create our family together in this environment that reflects who we are.

Morgan Jones Pearson

So well said, I wondered—so as I was thinking about your home and kind of this renovation situation, I was thinking about how incredible it is that the saints in Nauvoo created something that someone today with every resource would want to draw upon, like, they had so little available to them, but yet they created beauty. And so I wondered, for someone who really values beautiful things and admires them and knows how much work goes into them. How have you gained a new appreciation for the beauty that the saints created, as they were just starting out in Nauvoo.

Brittany Jepsen

Well, we know that some, some buildings needed to go up fast, because they needed to live there. In fact, I was just reading about in the D&C and reading more about their time in Independence and Independence was put up so quickly, and it was considered like the wild wild west. And it was, like a time where a lot of people didn't feel really settled. So Nauvoo was this like investment into more time where like where they could really they called it the city beautiful. And I think they really approached it that way, is what I'm learning. And they didn't really necessarily have an aesthetic to draw on because it was new. So they drew on what they what they knew from the East Coast, which was more colonial Federalist style. And so they brought that in, but they also as we know, with the LDS temples, they brought in ancient references, right, our temples were, were modeled exactly after the temples described in [The Bible] like Temple of Solomon. So they brought in both, and you can see that and how they laid out their cities. And there's this like merge of ancient with East Coast or, or even going back to England, so colonial or Georgian. And I see that with the way that even when the pioneers left Nauvoo, or were forced to leave, a lot of people stayed to finish up the temple. So there was a lot of investment in time, things take time, especially to do it properly. And I think that's one thing you don't see a lot nowadays, you see a lot of Home Improvement shows where it's like, "And then a weekend, we turned it into this, tada!" Homes cannot take a weekend. Like it's just physically impossible, the quality cannot be there. I mean, it's really fun to see on a TV show, right? Because you're like, are they gonna make it? Ah, I can't believe they're gonna make it before their husband comes home. And it's a big surprise. But even the show that we're on, we did a lot of things really fast. But I had been planning it for months, because I didn't know we were going to do a TV show. Or there's some things that might need to change because it didn't quite work out. But I see the how they laid out their city, and even how they laid out Salt Lake, they had these long, wide streets, I'm taking out my art history degree now, orthogonal city lines, it was like this really straight. I kind of see it as kind of uninteresting, but like, really well thought out like straight lines. And I think we need to approach our homes in the same way. Like let's take our time, you can take your time once you see how the house speaks to you, and how can you bring in your culture and your customs and create a family aesthetic together?

Morgan Jones Pearson

Brittany, one thing that I noticed as I was going through your Instagram is that this is not the first time that it seems like your ancestors have mattered to you. And this is not like a new revelation. That's been something that's been consistently important to you over time. Why do you think that that focus on where you come from and who you come from has always been important to you?

Brittany Jepsen

I mentioned my grandmother, and my great grandmother and they shared with me stories about their grandparents, etc. They had this family history book that was like, four to five inches tall, like family tree style. Like I remember sharing it, they gave my family our own copy. I remember, maybe I was like a huge nerd but I just would go through each page like oh my goodness, this person's from Prussia, what's Prussia, you know, or, oh, this person is from Norway. So I was very intrigued from family history from a young age and I think it was instilled in me I saw pictures I heard stories like I heard about Patty Sessions when I was a kid. And so I thought that I had the coolest family because I had this great great great grandmother, who delivered babies. And I cannot imagine first of all, giving birth, along that type of path, let alone like delivering all these babies and Patty sessions, let me tell you she, because now I've been able to read her journal. There's like a published journal of all of her journals. She was an incredible woman, she kept immaculate notes about her finances, she was an incredible businesswoman, which I totally relate to, not the incredible part but just her mind was as a business woman. She even made weavings and different types of crafts that she would sell throughout her life. But if somebody owed her money, she kept immaculate notes and knew exactly when they were going to give her her money, including her family. She opened up a school, The Patty Sessions Academy in Bountiful when she got here. Women were so empowered back then. And I want to see more of that. And I think learning about who our ancestors are, totally empowers me and empowers the way I want to teach my children to view women and to view each other like we owe it to ourselves to learn about them, because what they did, and what they accomplished was incredible. I mean, I can't imagine that physical exertion that I will never have to go through. Our problems are different but I gained so much strength by learning about my ancestors, especially my, my great grandfather, Harvey Sessions, who loved roses, and I love flowers. It's such a big part of my life. And there's such a magic that comes when we learn who we are and where we come from.

Morgan Jones Pearson

I love that you know that about your grandfather, I think, I don't know I resonated with what you said about the booklet of your family tree. I remember having similar things in our home. And I think, you know, if things like that aren't kept, there's no chance that a kid is going to open it up and want to know more about where they come from. And maybe they won't ever open it, but they might and it should be there just in case. From a gospel perspective. Brittany, we talk a lot about turning the hearts of the children to their fathers. And I wondered how has this experience turned your heart even more to those that have come before you and also your husband's side of the family, how has trying to incorporate his family history as well helped turn your heart to your family's fathers?

Brittany Jepsen

This is one part of the gospel that I absolutely resonate with. I have always loved our emphasis on family history and learning who we are and so this turning of the fathers, I see it in action all the time. And I'm trying to mentally like verbalize it, 'Oh, this is turning out the father's spirit of Elijah, you know, spirit of Elijah moment.' Because once we realize that the scriptures are real, then we can see it in our own lives. I will admit that I'm not the best family history representative because I, I haven't been able to do it so much as an adult, I work, I have children, I want to I think it's maybe not my season of life. But I think the foundation I set as a kid has really been helpful and has instilled this love in me. But I think there's a way to do it where like, even I see my parents, as the keepers of generations before me. My mom knows stories that if I don't write them down, my kids may not know it. And so I'm trying to when I talk with my mom, like ask her questions that I need to know the answers of, we cannot rely on anybody else because who's gonna do it? Like it has to be so there's even times where I feel like I need to like take a recorder and just start recording our conversations, like in a casual way, because she knows so many stories that I just don't remember or like in pictures, like who's this person like writing names down? We've got some incredible family history stories that I want to capture. And that is the spirit of Elijah, the spirit of Elijah continues when we do the work, but we can't do the work unless we have a testimony about it. You know, and I feel the Spirit so much when I learned about these people and I realized my tie to them and I feel like I can identify the characteristics that come from Patti sessions, or that come from my heavenly Angel grandmother. Dorothy Sessions and her husband, Carl, my grandfather. They were like the most angelic people on earth. They were heaven on earth. They were temple workers in Los Angeles, they lived right near it in Westwood. And I feel like this pull to the area and to their home and to the temple there because that is my history. And I feel like it's in my DNA.

Morgan Jones Pearson

Well, I love the kind of practical examples you gave, I think, you know, there's a time and a season, like you said, to dig into indexing and all kinds of stuff. But I agree with you like, that hasn't been my experience with family history. But I have tried to sit down with family members. The one problem that I've run into and I don't know if you feel this way, but my grandma the second I turn on the recorder. She just like, blanks.

Brittany Jepsen

You gotta hide that recorder. Maybe tell her after?

Morgan Jones Pearson

Yeah, there you go. On this show, the last question that we always ask is the same. And so my last question for you is, what does it mean to you to be all in the gospel of Jesus Christ?

Brittany Jepsen

I see so many people who—I think we all have friends and family who are making other choices about the gospel. I see that. I see them, I understand. My testimony comes with my personal relationship with God. There's a lot of things that get distracting. But I, I talk with God all day long. I have conversations with him, like, should I be doing this? You know, my prayers aren't necessarily on my knees all the time. There's some times on the go, because that's how my life is right now. But I know that I would not be who I am, where I am without heavenly parents, without God to guide me to guide our life, I would not be where I am. So all in to me means learning about Jesus. We just had general conference that I feel like the theme was learn about Jesus remember? His whole mission was so revolutionary. And I think we forget like that Jesus had this really expansive view of what love was. All in is complete love. If we do not love God, and love our neighbors, and let other things come in the way, we are not disciples of Jesus Christ. I forget that a lot. I'm super judgmental. I think we all are judgmental but I think I'm super judgmental. So I mean, I just need to remember that God is love and come back to the Sermon on the Mount, I come back to that all the time. I come back to my scripture, mastery verses all the time, which were some of my most pivotal verses that have helped me over the years from from seminary. So that to me, God, Jesus Christ, His life, He did not judge, he treated women so so ahead of his time, and I come back to that, because when I think of things now, I'm like oh but Jesus, He loves everybody. He loved them in a way that we maybe don't understand. He loves people who were not loved. He loves people of other cultures. He loved people who were sick and didn't look like everyone else. So that's what I come back to all the time. That's to me what all in is.

Morgan Jones Pearson

Thank you so much, Brittany, it's been a joy to talk with you and I appreciate you taking the time.

Brittany Jepsen

Thank you so much for having me. It's so nice to be able to talk about the things of my heart in a in a new way.

Morgan Jones Pearson

A big thanks to Brittany Jepsen for joining us on today's episode, be sure to check out Britney's website, Thehousethatlarsbuilt.com or her Instagram by the same name to see all of Brittany's beautiful work. We're grateful to Derek Campbell of Mix at Six studios for his help with this episode and so grateful as always to you for listening. We'll look forward to being with you again next week.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai