November 24 2013 Weekly Letter

Australia Sun Nov 24, 2013

Dear Family and Friends,

We have had an interesting week weather wise.  It started raining last Sunday night and we had thunder and lightening with it.  It rained until Tuesday afternoon, then cleared and warmed up until Thursday evening when it started raining again and continued until this morning.  Everything is so nice and green now, we really needed the moisture.  We were only able to walk to work Wednesday and Thursday.  We have used our umbrella more the past 2 weeks than we have since we got here.  We keep one at the office and one in the car.  It has still been pretty warm even with the rain.

Last Monday night was Family Home Evening and the Feils had the dinner, baked ziti casserole and salad.  It was yummy!  The Tanner’s had the lesson and we watched a new video about the life of Christ that BYU has put out.  It was very good.  It was filmed in Goshen.  They also showed a short clip of a talk by Ezra Taft Benson that was very good also.  They served a chocolate fruit cake with ice cream for dessert.  We had a lot of fun.

Tuesday evening we went to the grocery store right after work to get things for the week.  They do not have milk in gallons, a little bigger than a half gallon so we have to get milk every week.  Also we need fruit and potatoes so we go once a week.  Wish the prices would come down. 

The rest of the week we just came home after work and worked on writing talks, did indexing, fixed dinner, and I worked on my afghan, and Dad worked on the computer with his pictures.  We did go walking on Wednesday, the only good day we had. 

Thursday for lunch we ran across the street and tried kabobs.  They are cooked chicken with tomatoes and 3 different kinds of salad, coleslaw, lettuce and some other kind in a tortilla soft shell, with sauce (we had barbecue) and then warmed up in a warmer.   They were very good.  We will definitely have those again.  We just had the children’s size and that was plenty.

Saturday after cleaning and washing the sheets we ran to the office so Dad could submit some indexing that was going to expire today.  We then came home and made the bed, and left for Taree.  It is about a 3 ½ drive, but we decided to take a little side trip and see a light house.  It only added about a hour.  It started raining about a ½ hour into the trip and rained all the way to the light house.  We have never seen such hard rain as we had in some places, and the thunder was right on top of the lightening.  Pretty scary for me but Dad said we were as safe as anywhere.  That made me feel better??  When we got to the parking lot it was raining pretty good, so Dad left me in the car and he went up and took pictures.  I was really disappointed but it was quite a hike he said.  We left and went to Taree and got to a place after traveling about a ½ hour where the police had the road closed for the triathlon that was being held, so we backtracked to the other road.  We found a little roadside café and went in for lunch about 3.  It was Chinese, and was very good.  It was raining but we ate out on a patio in the back and Dad saw a little garden so he went and checked it out.  That is some of the fresh things they use in their food.  It was very good.  Going back to the main road we had some of the hardest rain we have ever, ever had.  Dad said it was coming down in buckets.  We could not see the road and the wipers could not keep up with all the water.  Dad just went really slow, crawling along until it let up a little.  There were 2 trees blown down across the road so we just had to go around them.  We got to Taree about 5 and checked into the River View Motel.  It was raining pretty hard so we left the things in the car and went for a ride.  We found the Church about 2 blocks away and then road out into the country.  We got back to our room and it was only sprinkling so we took everything in and studied our talks.  We could see the river from our window, and we watched rabbits eating the grass from our window.  We watched some football on tv, totally different than our football, they use a round ball and throw it to team mates to score.  We also watched some cricket, kind of like Baseball with a wide bat.  We never did figure that game out.

This morning the motel had a continental breakfast, the first we have seen in Australia, so we went down to it and then got ready for Church.  We got to Church early so we could call home but we had no internet on Vonage at all.  The Branch is very small, about 20 people, and 2 little boys in Primary, one in nursery, and one is 4.  They have no young men or young women.  Everyone was so nice, we really enjoyed being there.  The new talks went well.  The High Councilman came in and he works at the Temple on Tuesday nights so we have visited with him.  He travels 2-3 hrs to visit his branches he is assigned to.  He said Taree is only 2 hours away.  He said he had 2 missionary companions from Brigham City and he served in Germany.  I asked him their names and one was Kevin Christensen (his wife is Karin) and he is a dentist.  The other one is Kay Christensen, he couldn’t remember his wife’s name, but he is a judge.  Bob, do you know either of them?  Also they announced in Relief Society that they are going to start meeting once a month at 10 in the morning and assign a sister to tell about herself.  They want life stories with pictures, a slide show or whatever.  I thought that sounded fun.  Most of the sisters are older, in fact most of the branch are retiree’s with 2 or 3 in their 40’s.  The 2 little boys that were there come with their grandma.   We left right after Church was over and got home just before 6.  At least we didn’t have any rain today, but we are supposed to get more this week.  They had a lot of flooding in the Sydney area and in the Blue Mountains.  Glad we didn’t have to go that direction.  There was a small tornado sighted about 4 hours away from where we were.  Coffs Harbor, where we were a couple of months ago had flooding from all the rain.

The grounds crew have really been working hard on the lights for Christmas and the Nativity set, it opens next Sunday on the 1^st.  They also have an art show at Buckland House that they say hundreds come to see.  The Sr. missionaries are assigned a night with 2 sets of Elders and 2 sets of Sisters on busy nights, and only 1 set each on the other nights.  Our assignment is on the 11^th, 17^th, and 20^th.  We have to be there at 7 until about 10:30.  We just walk around and answer questions and visit.  It should be fun, we are excited to do it.  They even open on Christmas evening because so many people come.  That is the last night, they are open 7 days a week.

Tomorrow morning we are meeting for the Christmas Dinner with the committee right after the Devotional.  We are having the Devotional’s in the birthday room because the art will be set up in the usual room.  That is also where we will have the dinner so we are going to figure the lay out.  It is going to be so much fun.  They keep adding people invited so now we are up to 70.  It is on the 11^th so I have got to figure how much potato salad to make for that many.

The Temple opens Tuesday and we are really glad.  We have really missed going.

Friday the Mission President is having a Sr. missionary couple’s conference.  We will meet at his house at his house at noon, we will eat lunch before going over.  About 5 we will walk to an Italian Restaurant for dinner, we have no idea where it is, then back to their home for dessert.  We will have to get the shuttle down to the mail room in the morning.  This Friday we sent in 20,000 images, a very good week.  We are now officially 1/3 of the way through the cards.  Tuesday we brought 6 boxes from the storeroom off the new pallet.  Dad opened the box and 50% of the cards have information on both sides.  A very, very interesting card this week, a 22 year old man passed away in Jerusalem and is buried at the Mount of Olives.  There was a plaque in the cemetery where he was from with the information on it.

Last but not least important, probably most important we have a beautiful felt Christmas Tree hanging on our wall (thanks Tina) and ornaments hanging on it from 6 of our families.  They are so cute with their pictures looking at us.  Now we just need the ornaments from the other 6 families.  The tree is half bare, so get them to us please.  It is fun to see what each family did to create theirs.  We appreciate all you do for us.  Tina, Dad says thanks for sending the binoculars and lens for his camera.  We also have a package with the 12 days of Christmas we have to wait until Dec 14^th to start.  That will be fun.

Have a Happy Thanksgiving this week where ever you are, we are so blessed in our lives.  I did find a turkey breast at the meat market across the street, $40.00.  I think we will just have chicken on Sunday.

Guess I will end for tonight and if I think of anything else I will add it before sending it in the morning.

Prayers and Love go to all of you!

Mum and Dad

                   Little girl's birthday party, the one with the orange shoes.

Roberts, Williams, Moore's, Archibald's    Middle Pic:  Produce at Parklea Market

November 17 2013 Weekly Letter

Australia Sunday Nov 17, 2013

Dear Family and Friends:

Here it is the middle of November, where is the time going?  I guess when you keep busy the time goes by fast, and we do keep busy.  On Tuesday morning we had a devotional piped in from the service center in Auckland, New Zealand.  The speaker was Elder Hallstrom of the Seventies and his wife.  They gave excellent talks and we really enjoyed it.  As we were waiting for it to begin, we were watching the people come in and I mentioned to Sister Williams one gentleman looked like Paul Gray from our service center.  We both decided it did look like him but probably wasn’t.  LeeAnn came in and sat behind us and said there is Paul.  A few of the finance people from our center were over there for meetings.  The talks were great, they have lived in Asia for several years, and now he is over the Pacific region.  We had a fairly quiet week as far as meetings and such.  We sent in 17000 images on Friday.  It helps to have a couple of over 4000 days. One of the cards this week said that a man was on a boat and he died and was buried under a breadfruit tree on an island.  It did not tell the island, but told the name of the boat.  Dad looked it up and it said a lady died during child birth and is also buried on an island.  Interesting things.

It rained last Sunday night, Monday and Tues until late afternoon.  We drove to work those two days.  Tues, Wed and Thurs. afternoon’s we walked up to a field just west of the Temple and walked around it.  Four times around is a mile.  I haven’t made the mile yet but I will.  Of course Dad does very easily.  I could blame Loren and Tami because they sent me Kim’s new book and I wanted to finish it so I took it with me and sat on the bench and read after walking around once.  Friday after work we walked up to the mall to get a few things.  It was sprinkling when we walked home.  Friday night I marked and cut off the 2 skirts I needed to hem up, and last night I got the sewing machine working and hemmed them.  We will take the machine back tomorrow.  The Australians never have manuals for anything.  When we moved into this flat with a new dryer, washer, dishwasher and oven and no manuals.  Sister Williams looked them up on line and copied off how to work the dishwasher and oven. I was surprised I got the sewing machine threaded on the 2^nd time of trying.  We don’t use the dishwasher, it is easier to just wash our few dishes after each meal.  It rained off and on all night Friday and yesterday.  We took Elder and Sister Moore, and Elder and Sister Archibald to Parklea.  Dad drove and Elder Williams drove.  That is the huge indoor flea market.  We really didn’t need anything so we looked around and bought a few souvenirs, and some grapes and green beans.  We had the beans today and they are not as good as the ones we have been getting at the market.  The grapes are delicious however.  Dad took some pictures of the different stands, we will try to get them posted tomorrow.  We ate lunch there, they have about anything you want.  We had Hawaiian burgers with sautéed onions and pineapple.  They were super good.  Some of the others had pizza and others had wraps.  After lunch it had cleared up a little, still cloudy so we took the new missionaries over to Windsor, walking through the Historic district.  We went in some really cute shops.  If I had a lot of money I would have bought a lot.  When we got down to the water wheel a group of little girls all dressed up in their Sunday best, came over eating ice cream cones.  We talked to one of the mothers and took pictures of them for her.  She said they were celebrating her daughters 8^th birthday and had been to high tea, and then to get ice cream.  Made me a little homesick for my grandkids.  Okay, a lot homesick.  We got home around 5.

Tomorrow is FHE, the Feils are in charge of dinner, and the Tanners the lesson and dessert.  Elder Tanner posted on Mormon Times Friday an article stating that the bush fires in the Blue Mountains are the worst they have had in a decade, and told about all the members that helped out.  It was a great article.  He is in public affairs.  Tomorrow afternoon we have a meeting for the Christmas Social.  We have decided not to have it catered because they were not going to do what we wanted so we are going to do it.  We will make salads and buy and cook the meat.  It is only for about 60 people so we should be able to handle that.  We are probably going to start meeting weekly to make sure it is completely planned.  It is going to be so fun. 

Friday Mark sent some pictures from Africa.  One of a lion, an alligator, and hippo’s taken out from his Hotel back door.  They were great pictures.

We talked to Loren today to see how Krey’s football game went.  It was the championship game in region I believe.  They won really big so this is their 2^nd undefeated season.  Congratulations to Krey and your team. 

It rained most of last night and most of today.  

The rain is so needed so know one feels bad about it.  I am amazed at how things are greening up with just the rain last week, so this is a bonus.  The grounds crew have been putting the Christmas lights in the trees this week with a cherry picker.  It is going to be so pretty.  They have to replace a lot of the lights each year because the birds eat the wires.  Someone asked why they don’t take them down and they said that is too much work???

We have had a quiet Sunday afternoon.  We are both writing new talks for next weekend at Taree.  We haven’t decided if we will stay overnight or drive up Sunday morning.  Their meeting doesn’t start until 10 AM but that is a lot of sitting in the car as it is just over 3 hour drive.  We will see.

A Happy Birthday to Amberlie today, or tomorrow at your house.  31 years ago your birth made us grandparents for the first time, and now you have made us great grandparents.

Prayers and Hugs for all of you:

Mum and Dad

Polo Match on Sat. and the Church Building in Orange NSW

November 10 2013 Weekly Letter

Australia Sunday Nov 10, 2013

Dear Family and Friends:

This has really been a full and rewarding week.  Starting with Monday, FHE was a big success, the sandwiches and salad turned out great.  We were a little short on numbers, the Sheen’s weren’t there, Pres and Sister Barr (the Temple President and Matron) are in the States visiting family, and Sister Archibald was in Korea taking a missionary home.  We had fun though.  Now we are through until Feb.  It is nice to have a lot of couples to take their turns.

Tuesday was the last night for the Temple as they closed this week for cleaning for 2 weeks.  We are really going to miss it.  When we came out about 8:30 the YW from one of the Wards had put hearts and candy on the cars.  Our hearts said “Contention is of the devil”, “The key to freedom is obedience” and “Therefore let your light so shine before men that they may see your good works and glorify you Father which is in Heaven.”  All the hearts were of different colors.  What a great surprise.

Monday afternoon we got an email from one of the employees that said she was in the mood for a “sausage sizzle” and to celebrate Melbourne days so she would buy the sausages and bread and meet everyone on the courtyard at 12:30 Tuesday.  Another couple of employees brought some drinks and a couple more brought ice cream.  One man cooked the sausages on the grill.  We were all to bring napkins and silverware.  It was a lot of fun and we got to meet some more of the employees.  She had 110 sausages, and just a few left. 

A couple of weeks ago a teacher from the Carlingford Primary School called and asked if she could bring 100 students to learn about the Church.  Sister Moore said of course so it was set up for Tuesday morning.  They met in front of the Temple and walked over to Buckland House.  With the teachers there was 108 people.  Sister Moore had arranged for 4 Elders and 2 Sister missionaries to talk to them.  Sister Bambrough started off by speaking some mandarin Chinese and then asked how many understood her.  About a third of the students raised their hands.  They were very surprised that a girl from the States could speak their language.  The missionaries showed some videos of some Australian athletes, one a professional rugby player who is serving a mission now, and a professional skateboarder, and at the end of their stories they announced that they are a Mormon.  They also showed “The First Vision.”  Then the sister missionaries had them all stand and play “head, shoulders, knees and toes.”  They liked that because they knew it.  Then they had the children ask questions and the missionaries answered them.  They really asked some deep questions.  It was fun to be there, Dad took pictures and videos.  They were all so quiet and polite, and they were so cute in their uniforms.  I am a great believer of uniforms, the kids are not competing with others because they all look alike.  At the end all of the missionaries, old and young sang “I Am a Child of God”.  What a great experience to be a part of.  They then went out to the courtyard where they got a biscuit (cookie), and water.  The teacher had asked for some information the kids could take home so they got a packet with a Friend, Articles of Faith, Family Search card, book mark that said “I Am a Child of God”.

Thursday morning the builder came to our flat before we left for work and looked at the spots on the carpet.  He said he was going to have someone come and clean them and if that didn’t work they would replace the carpet so now we just wait.  When we got to the office there was a bouquet of beautiful flowers on the desk with a card and candy from the Williams.  They are so sweet.  That made my birthday here in Australia.  Dad said we would run across the street for lunch so as we were getting ready Mark said to come to lunch in the boardroom.  There was a birthday tablecloth on the table, a birthday cake, sandwiches, chips, and a coke for me.  Mark had asked Sister Williams to organize it.  We just couldn’t work with any better people anywhere.  We are so blessed.  That night we went with the Williams down to Parametta (where we used to live) to “Rumps and Ribs” for dinner.  We had ribs and steak and it was soo good.  That is only the second time we have had a sit down dinner out since we have been here.  Most of the eating places are “take away”.  It was a great day.  I also talked to most of the kids so that was of course wonderful.

Friday we sent of 15,000 images to Salt Lake, the second week in a row with 15,000.  That has never happened before.  As you can see we didn’t get much done on Tues, and we have days like that which is ok.

Yesterday we packed, cleaned the flat, and left with the Williams, we followed them, to watch Polo matches.  Never in this world did we expect to see live Polo.  It was so much fun, and the horses are beautiful.  Elder Williams said a lot of them were race horses that were not quite fast enough.  We really enjoyed it, learning how they play etc.  We just took camp chairs and sat next to the field.  The Feils came after the first match.  They ended about 12:30 so we all went into Windsor for fish and chips, then Dad and I took off to go to Orange to speak.  It is about 3 ½ hour drive through the Blue Mountains.  The drive was very different from a month ago when there was so many fires and smoke.  Very clear this time.  Orange is a beautiful town in the hills.  It was really cool when we got there about 6 and really cool this morning, in fact one man told us they expected frost.  They get quite a bit of rain there so the fields were really green and nice.  The Church is really nice and one of the larger ones we have been to for a Branch.  The Branch President was very nice, and his son is his counselor.  There were about 25 people there counting us and 2 sets of Elders.  One Elder played the piano, 2 Elders prepared the Sacrament, and one Elder with a new convert passed.  We were the only speakers.  There was only one other Priesthood holder there.  They have no YM or YW, and 7 Primary children.  Pres. James son taught Sunday School, and Pres James taught Priesthood and Relief Society combined.  All the members are so kind and loving, we really enjoy it.  We left right after meeting and had rain most of the way home, and in the mountains we had fog.  We still enjoyed the trip, but it was really good to get home.  I fixed dinner and we just finished eating.  It is really cloudy outside but very little rain here where we need it so bad.  Hopefully it will rain in the night and be dry tomorrow so we can walk to work.

Mark left Saturday for South Africa for meetings and will be gone the rest of the month.  He was pretty excited to go and we told him to get lots of pictures.  He said he would try and send some periodically. 

This week we had watermelon (from the Williams) and we bought a musk melon (cantaloupe) and they were so good.  We will definitely buy more.

I borrowed the sewing machine from Buckland House, it is for the Sr. Missionaries.  I have a couple of skirts to shorten that I have bought at Vinnys.  That is my goal this week.  Hopefully I can remember how to sew, and figure out how to thread this thing.  I think Sister Tanner knows how if I can’t figure it out.  Thank you family for all the birthday gifts, I love them all and feel so loved.

Prayers and Love go with you this week.

Mum and Pop

Surprise Birthday luncheon, Mark Kelly, Paul, Ruth, Sister Williams, Elder Williams. These guys are the BEST1

                                  Happy birthday Sister Roberts from Elder & Sister Williams

108 students and teachers visited yesterday to find out about the Church.  It was so fun to see them and watch the missionaries explain the Church to them.  The questions they asked after the presentation were very good questions. We ended with the missionaries singing ( 4 Elders, 2 Sisters and 6 Sr's) "I Am A Child of God"

November 3 2013 Weekly Letter

Dear Family and Friends:

Here we are on Sunday afternoon in our flat.  It is good to stay home for a weekend after traveling 2 weekends in a row.  It is so fun to see new areas and meet new people, but it is nice not to be driving home on Sunday afternoon.  It was good to be back in the Oatlands Ward again after missing 3 weeks.  There are now 6 sets of missionaries in the 2 wards that meet in our building.  The Chinese sisters have an investigator who is being baptized this Saturday.  He speaks pretty good English.  The other set of sister missionaries have a young investigator who is being baptized on the 23^rd.  One set of Elders had an investigator there also but we didn't get to meet him.  We found out today that the mission decided to put Elders in our old flats, a set in ours and Jorgensen’s and use the Williams for storage.  We met a couple who have just been married a few months that live downstairs from us here.  She was so excited to find out we were all here, when I told her there were 3 other sets of Sr missionaries, and one more coming in Jan.  They were supposed to be here in Dec but they are on visa delay, as well as some young missionaries.

Thursday after Deven helped Elder Williams with his computer, thanks Deven, the 4 of us went to Costco.  It is about 20 min away and was bigger than Layton’s Target.  There were so many people there you could hardly get around.  We got paper towels and laundry products and a ham that we cut into 4 pieces to freeze.  We then stopped at Hungry Jacks for a hamburger, they are exactly the same as Burger King.  The Williams drove because we had planned to go, so we rode home with them.  We decided we don’t need to go there again, the traffic is bad also.  We will just get what we need at the grocery store.

Yesterday after we cleaned the flat, we went with the Williams.  They guys dropped Sister Williams and myself at Vinny’s, and they went to Bunnings, a hardware store to get a rod and shower curtain.  The glass on the shower is not   big enough to keep the water in and I am tired of mopping water up every morning.  We are sure whoever designed it never took a shower in it.  The curtain works wonderful, no water outside the tub this morning.  I got a couple of shirts and 3 Santa Clause figurines.  They were only $2.00 each.  Dad also wanted some containers to put his plants in to hold the water, so I got a couple of plastic bowls for $2.00.  They picked us up and we drove to Elizabeth Farm not too far away.  This is Australia’s oldest surviving homestead.  Yesterday was a free day so we didn’t have to pay anything.  The farm was established in 1793 as a sheep ranch.  It was established by the Macquarie family.  At one time he had 2,000 sheep.  He had 9 daughters and 1 son and would leave and go to England and sell the wool and was involved in politics there.  He would be gone for months at a time, and his wife and daughters would run the farm.  When his son was old enough for school he took him to England where he said he would get a better education, and his mother never saw him again.  The house was decorated in the period, and we could go see everything from climbing a latter to see the original shingles in the ceiling, and going in the cellar and tasting homemade sauerkraut, that they were making there, homemade peach jams and homemade rhubarb jam on little pieces of bread.  In the garden you could see where they had cut the rhubarb off the plants.  There were huge cabbages growing.  It was fun to see the history and read the signs they had prepared.  The grounds were beautiful with huge trees and shrubs.  They also had a little kitchen where you could have tea outside.  We drove over to another old farm but didn’t want to pay $6.00 to see about what we had just seen.  We drove to Harry’s for a pie with peas and potatoes and gravy.  The Williams had a fireside in the afternoon for Temple workers so Dad put up the shower rod and curtain and then drove to Salvos to take some things we didn’t need.  They are so happy with every donation.  Dad found a couple of golf shirts, and we drove to Target and got a little red fleece blanket for the love seat.  It needed a little color over there and if the air conditioning gets too cold for me I can wrap up in it.  We also shopped for FHE tomorrow night.  We got the buns for the roast beef sandwiches and chips. Now we don’t have to go tomorrow.

This morning I put cashew chicken in the crockpot and we had it with rice and fresh beans.  There was enough to make lunch for tomorrow and one other meal.  It was very good.  Of course anything with cashews is good.  Last night we had parmesan crusted fish and baked potatoes.  That was really good also.  I am still trying to try at least one new recipe a week.  Tonight I am going to make fiesta ranch salad, slice the dill pickles, and make the sauce to go on the meat. We just finished the salad.  I was going to tell you they do not have black beans here, just kidney and garbanzo.  Thanks Tina for the dressing mix.  I did look it up on line and it looks pretty easy to make if I can find all the ingredients.  We will have to borrow the Williams crockpot for the roasts.  The meat is cooked with balsamic vinaigrette salad dressing mix, onion soup, (thanks Amberlie for the soup mix) and Italian seasoning.  Hope it is good.  We will go to Buckland House early in the morning to take everything and then go over right after work to put it all together.  It is a lot of work to take everything from here but it is so worth it when it is all over.  We have 2 bags by the door to take and I don’t even have the dishes I need ready yet.  I am also going to make bread pudding tonight for a treat and if it turns out we will probably take some to the Williams, Archibalds and Moores.  We will see.  The bread pudding came out of the oven just perfect, so while I was making the sauce to go over it Dad went next door to see if the Moore’s were home.  They were, with Elder Archibald so we took 3 plus 2 for us and ate with them, then were going to take some up to the Williams.  Just as we were finishing, the Williams came down with plates of watermelon for us and the Moores, so we gave them 2.  We told them all we wanted to share the calories.  Sister Archibald is on her way to Korea taking home an Elder from the South Mission.  She is a nurse so they asked her to accompany him.  She will be back Wednesday.  The watermelon looks very yummy, we will have some later.  We bought a cantaloupe yesterday to have for breakfast.

This week we have the Christmas committee meeting tomorrow and a devotional on Tues morning from the area presidency.  We are staying at the Temple late Tuesday night to do sealings.  Hopefully the end of the week we will get a lot of cards captured.  We will be a third of the way through the cards, by the end of the week if we can do 3 boxes.  We are still finding some very interesting things on the cards.  We are surprised at how many young men lost their lives in France in WW1 and also WW2.

It was fun to talk to Logan on Friday and he was very surprised it was his birthday here, and Halloween there. Thanks to all those who posted Halloween pictures, it is so fun to see the kids, other than Andy!  We also called Ann for her birthday and Dan was very surprised to hear Dad’s voice.

It is 8:00 and I should have time to do some indexing before getting the rest of the things ready for morning.

We just got to the office after taking everything to Buckland House and starting the crockpots.  It took 6 cloth bags and 2 crockpots to get it all there, but it will be so worth it.

Love you all and pray for you.

Mum and Pop