November: Busy & Bright

Week 9 (Nov. 10-16)

The sun was bright enough to get the brilliant reflection

The sun has been shinning again this week which seems to brighten up each day substantially.  The high temperature at the first of the week was in the forties but reached into the fifties by the week-end!

After Church on Sunday, we hurried to the Memorial as we were the only ones to work today.  We had several visitors.  One of them noticed my name tag and said she was related to some Ogdens.  She said they were from Delta.  I said they must be some of Marvin’s family.  She said, do you know Uncle Marvin?  We then had a little take about our relatives.    -  I had one couple with a “Kanosh Fire” sweatshirt.  I ask where they were from?  He ask me to guess where they were from so I said Kanosh is about 15 miles from Fillmore and he was really amazed.   He was a non-member but had been to all the Church History spots except Nauvoo and they were planning to go there soon.  We talked about why he wasn’t a member but didn’t really have a good answer.      -  Some groups are hard to talk too.  Two young member families with 9 kids between them came at closing but with all the kids running around, about all they could do besides chase kids was to look at the Monument.  I felt bad I didn’t have a chance to tell them the history behind the Monument.
 

Elder Gifford Nielsen, Sis. Nielsen, Sis. Ogden, Elder Ogden

This isn't a prayer, just caught Elder Nielsen looking down

With Presiden & Sister Stoker

We had the late shift Tuesday so just stayed at the apartment until time to go.  Not a lot of visitors but had several cars drive through.  Finally, I walked out to meet one of the cars and the man hollered and ask if we were open?  I told him sure and he said the sign by the building said “closed”.  When checking it out, I was told it was too frozen for Elder Osborne to change from closed to Open.   No one said anything so I just assumed it was changed.  We soon took care of that problem. Even with the lack of many visitors, we were pretty much busy as we were getting ready for a Senior Missionary Couples dinner prior to Zone Conference tomorrow.  Osborne’s had arranged for a guy in their ward to come cook an Italian dinner for the group.  I think there were 14 couples including the mission office staff, Mission President Stoker and Elder Gifford Nielsen of the 70.  It was a nice dinner and Rhonda and I ended up setting at the table with Elder Nielsen and his wife.  We enjoyed our time visiting with them.  He could remember seeing me from doing BYU basketball games so we had a good discussion about BYU athletics.  It was a very enjoyable evening!     
  

Elder Dyches & Elder Ogden

Nielsens & Pettingills (Mission office couple)

Elder Skidmore, Chef & wife, Sis. Skidmore

The chef and his wife did bring in a superb Italian dinner!

Nielsens & Johnsons

With Elder Simpkins

Wednesday was the Mission Zone conference at the South Royalton Chapel (our regular Church building).  We went before the meeting and saw some of the missionaries.  We finally got to meet Elder Simkins, Alena’s cousin.  He goes home this next transfer in December so we were looking for him in particular.  We felt bad we couldn’t stay for the meeting but we were on the schedule to open the Memorial so we had to leave.  We talked to Pres. Stoker on our way out so I guess we did the best we could.  Pres. Stoker said he would get us a copy of the material they were discussing so we felt better about it.  We also went back after our morning shift so we caught all of the afternoon Zone Conference.  Elder Nielsen was so dynamic; his talks were very powerful, inspiring, and up-lifting!

On our day off (Thursday), we made an appointment in Norwich, VT to get our car serviced--oil changed.  We also did our usual grocery shopping for the week.

November: Cool and Cloudy

Week 8  (Nov. 3-9)

It has been a slower week at the Visitors Center but the FM workers have been busy putting up Christmas lights--rain or shine.

Wednesday afternoon was actually a beautiful day.  We worked in the morning and then decided to drive to Rutland to see if we could get our car serviced and do a few other errands.  The Subaru place was behind schedule and so they told us they couldn't get to our car today.  We also struck out on some of the other errands, so the trip was more-or-less a wild goose chase.  But it was a beautiful day for a drive!  We drove into one golf course to see if they allowed 9-hole play but they had a sign on the door that said:  "See you next season"!  I guess they knew what they were doing because Thursday it rained and Friday it snowed.

 Saturday morning we were back in the groove with visitors galore.  We had a group of Spanish-speaking missionaries from Lawrence, MA bring a crowd of people with a number of investigators.  We were already giving a tour with 12 people when they came and while they were here we had two more groups of 8.  

 

One of the young Elders had to translate the things we said for the Spanish-speaking tour.

 Saturday evening we had a ward talent night and dinner.  It was a nice experience.  I especially enjoyed Elder & Sister Shefchicks number:  "There's a hole in the bucket, Dear Liza, Dear Liza"
It absolutely fits their personalities!

 

November: Gratitude Galore

Week Seven  (October 27 - November 2)

Ogdens, Sunderlands, Dyches, (friends)

This week marks the beginning of our third month of missionary experience.  In most respects, time has gone by quite fast.  Saturday morning we had the early shift which proved a good thing as before our shift was complete, Rhonda’s high school girl-friend, Radene Howard Sunderland, called and said they would be to see us in a few hours.  They are also friends of the Dyches family (FM missionaries).  We had a good visit at the monument as we went back after our shift to meet them.  From there we all went to Lebanon and had a nice dinner at Applebee’s.  We had a nice time visiting and just reminiscing.  Radene and Edwin also had two of their friends from Tremonton with them so all  four of them ended up staying at our apartment .

Dyches, Ogdens, Johnsons,

            Sunday morning we fixed breakfast for the crew and we all hurried to get to Church on time.  Our guests left after sacrament meeting as they were in hopes to get to Palmyra NY by dark.  After Church, all the missionaries met to have a group picture and since our schedule for the day was the late one, we went back to the apartment for a couple of hours.  By the late shift today, things were quite slow at the Monument.  I only had one tour, a non-member couple from Sweden via North Carolina.  We had a very good tour and in spite of it being the only people I escorted for the day, I feel my time was well spent and worth the day.  We did manage to lock-up a few minutes and go to the Church for a Baptismal Service that the Sister missionaries were having for one of their contacts.—We almost forgot to call Chace on his birthday but finally made contact.  I even got to watch a little of the World Series for a while at the end of the day.

            I guess on Monday we were a little more tired than usual, at least we slep in longer than we usually do.  We are not the best at getting up early anyway but today was worse.  I guess we didn’t feel the pressure as we have the late shift for a couple of days.  The weather is getting colder and business at the Monument is slowing down.  After the usual Monday home-evening, I assisted Elder Johnson in giving a blessing to sister Scott from the ward.  She seemed to be OK all thru fireside but when it was over, she seemed to completely come “un-glued”.  She pretty much got control during the blessing but then lost it again as she was heading home.  Don’t know what her real problem is.  She just had double knee replacement and seemed to be getting along OK until tonight.  When we finally got home, I watched the World Series on TV to spend the rest of the night while Rhonda

 sewed.

            Tuesday we did better on getting up.  Took a walk to the post office and some work on the computer, getting checks, etc. ready to deliver in Utah for kids' Christmas.  One interesting thing happened at the Monument today.  About closing time, there was a car that just drove thru but didn’t exit so I walked outside and saw one lady up by the Monument.  As soon as she saw me she took off on a run so I went back to the office but the car still didn’t exit.  I watched for a while and went back out to where I could see the Monument and then there were four people there.  I walked up and asked if I could take a picture for the four of them.  Response was a quick “no”.  Then one of the Oriental girls asked if it was “free”?  I told them that everything here was free and they could look around as much as they liked.  She said that when she first saw me, she thought I was coming to “kick them out”.  That gave me a chance to talk to them for a few minutes.  Non-members from NH but some had been to SLC so something brought them to see the Monument even though they didn’t want to go through the visitor center.  When we got home, we started putting things together for our trip to Utah after our shift tomorrow.  Rhonda stayed up late to finish sewing the shirts that she is taking home for the kids’ Christmas gifts.

 It snowed in Vermont Wednesday morning, but by the afternoon when it was time to drive to Boston the roads were all clear.

We were interested to see that white stuff on the top peaks of Mt. Nebo Thursday (Oct. 31).  We spent most of the day running errands in Utah County....including our final shots at the A.F. Clinic.  Then we decided to drive to Mona.  LeIla rode along and didn't want to get out of the car because she still has a cast on her foot from surgery.  So it was a quick trip.




On the way back from Mona, we stopped to meet a lady whose family had visited the JSBM a few weeks ago.  Their little 6-year-old girl had left her new winter coat at the visitor center so we brought it back to them.  They live in Lake Shore.

We got back to the cabin just in time to surprise three cute trick-or-treaters.  (They didn't know we were going to be there).  We had such a fun time with Misty's family.  They stayed for pizza, doughnuts, and ice cream and then slept at the cabin!

Paisley stayed with us all day Friday.  We were able to do a little work around the cabin.  Then Randy's family and Rhett's family all came to stay the night so that we could get up early and drive to Kamas for Braxten's Baptism by 9:00 a.m.

 After the Baptism, we went to Misty's for a birthday celebration!