Australia Sunday Dec 22, 2013
Dear Family and Friends:
A very quiet Sunday afternoon 3 days before Christmas. Where has the year gone we are asking
ourselves. It has certainly been one
filled with many changes. We have been in the Beautiful Country of
Australia for 6 months. We love our
work, the people we associate with and seeing all the new and wonderful things
we are blessed to see. We have 3 new
spirits that have joined our family, Eli came to meet us the day before we left
to join Chase and Megan and Jaxon Cosgrove’s family, Brielle Anna came to
Jessica and Thomas Simon in June, and this past week Rowan James came to Kaylee
and Ezra Castleton. They are all
precious children on loan to us from our Heavenly Father, and we are sure glad
they came to our family. Being
grandparents and great grandparents is the BEST! We are glad Ezra will have 10 days to get to
know his son before going back to the Marine’s for a few months. We wonder what this New Year is in store for
our family with Jessica and Thomas going to be out of state for medical school
and Kaylee and Ezra will be assigned to a base somewhere. Life is about change!
This week has been very busy. Monday night we had Family Home Evening at
the Archibald’s. They are 2 floors above
us and have the same floor plan we do.
We had potato soup and chili, rolls, and salad. Sister Archibald then past out parts of the
poem “Teach the Children the Real Meaning of Christmas” and we were to give a
personal experience relating to the part we had. It was fun to learn more about everyone. We had the Sr. missionaries, Pres. and Sister
Barr there. The Jeff’s didn’t come
because he was not feeling well. We then
went down to the Moore’s for dessert, cheesecake with cherry topping (they do
not have any pie fillings here) so Sister Archibald got a bottle of cherries
and thickened the juice. They also had
chocolate dessert and ice cream. We got
a plate of homemade cookies from the Barr’s, some of them were from different
countries she has lived, a basket of candy from the Archibald’s, a box of
microwave popcorn from the Williams, and we gave our little boxes and some
homemade mints. The Tanner’s gave us a
box of truffles. We have enough candy to
last a few months and we are enjoying every bit of it.
Tuesday we left from our flats at 8:30 to go to the
Christmas Zone Conference at the Baulkenhills Stake Center. They divided the mission in half for the
Christmas conferences so there was over 150 missionaries with the couples
there. We had video clips and talks from
the missionaries, then Sister and President Howes talked. We then went to the cultural hall and watched
“Ephraim’s Rescue”. None of the young
missionaries had seen it so it was fun to see their reaction. We then had lunch prepared and served by
Sister Cox, our Bishop’s wife, the Feil’s, Tanner’s, Archibald’s and Sister
Moore. Elder Moore was sick. It was roast beef, ham, green salad, pasta
salad, hot rolls, baked potatoes with butter, and sour cream, or gravy. Dessert was pavilova with whipped cream,
strawberries and passion fruit glaze, chocolate delight (my name), and several
yummy treats that Sister Howes made, one of which was the little round pretzels
with caramel, she puts a caramel on it on a cookie sheet, sticks them into the
oven just to soften the caramel, then puts a chocolate kiss on it, then dips it
in melted chocolate. Yum! She also made toffee, and a couple of others. Also a fruit bowl, watermelon, cantaloupe,
honey dew and strawberries. Then they
had a talent show of the young missionaries.
It was a wonderful day. We got
home about 4:30 and left about 6:15 for Mark and Melinda Kelly’s home for
dinner. We go with the Williams thank
goodness because they know where they are going. Mark has a beautiful home. We sat on the patio for a few minutes
visiting, then went into dinner at a beautifully set table. A tradition here is to pull open the crackers
that was at each place and put on the little plastic crown for dinner. It also has a little toy, stickers and very
cheesy jokes. The one I kept out from
Dad’s to tell you is “Why did the golfer wear two pairs of trousers?” Those that know can tell us tomorrow on the
conference call or text the answer to us.
We had a delicious dinner of turkey roll with stuffing, baked potatoes,
fresh beans and carrots, green salad, and a sparkling grape drink. Dad asked Mark and Melinda how they met and
so the dinner conversation was that.
They were both raised in Tamworth, but didn’t meet until after high
school, Mark went to a Catholic school.
They dated through the summer then Melinda left for BYU for a year. They kept in contact while she was gone. When she got home they became serious but she
would not marry outside the Church so she said she would investigate the
Catholic Church if he would take the discussions from the missionaries. They went together and he really enjoyed
going to Church with her. He was
baptized and a year later they were married.
His family was very upset with him and his sisters didn’t have anything
to do with them until after they started having children, and now they have
come around to be friends and family.
They have 5 children, 1 married daughter with a baby boy, 2 sons in
Queensland, 1 son at home and one daughter on a mission in New Zealand. They are going to Queensland for Christmas,
the whole family and he won’t be back in the office until the 6th of
January. It was such a fun evening. When we left Melinda gave us a bag of
chocolates and a gift. When we opened it
when we got home it was 2 children’s books (you all know how I love children’s
books) titled “An Aussie Night Before Christmas” and the sequel “Brucie Saves
Christmas!” They are adorable. Of course
I read them before going to bed. We are
excited to bring them home and share them with the family.
We took them a little box and Dad printed a picture he took
of the Temple and framed it. They were
very happy with it.
Wednesday was a day at the office. We went to the mall for lunch as we needed to
pick up a few things. Sister Barr wants a picture of the Temple, she met Dad on
the path the 3 mornings he walked over to take it. He wanted to get the light just right, so
then we needed to get another frame. We
had Kabab’s.
Thursday morning we went to the office for an hour then left
for the Christmas Conference for the other half of the missionaries. It was our turn to fix and serve the
lunch. Sister Tanner bought Christmas
aprons for the ladies, so I bought them for the men. We had the Williams, Dick’s, Sister Cox, and
ourselves. We began chopping, cutting
fruit, cutting ham, whipping cream, and then at noon in comes a leg of cooked
beef, and I mean a leg, it weighed about 80 pounds. A Tongan member cooked it and delivered it,
wrapped in cardboard and foil. It was
really hot, hard to handle. Thank
goodness Elder Williams has cut beef before so he took charge. We all helped and it was so good and
tender. There was really a lot of meat
on it. Towards the bone was the rare
meat, my favorite. We cleaned up and put
the food away for the Pres. and Sister Howes to take it home. Thank goodness they have the assistants and
the fleet elders to help. Deven called
before we left and asked if we could set up google+ on my IPad. We called them and got to meet Rowen, and
talk Kaylee and Ezra. Thanks Deven. We love Technology! When we got home Dad and I got in our car and
went grocery shopping. We don’t want to
go to the stores just before Christmas.
Friday was a day at the office, we got 2,000 images before
lunch which we had in the conference room with Mark, Paul, and the
Williams. Sister Williams had gone over
to the mall and got Subway sandwiches, chips and water. It was nice to only take lunch once this
week. We really get tired of taking
lunches. We sent off 9,000 images which
is pretty good for not being in the office much the past 2 weeks. We did 1,000 in the afternoon that I will
transfer in the morning. Friday night
was our last night to work at the Art Show.
We worked with 2 sisters from South Jordan and Samoa. The Samoan sister has only been here 2
weeks. She is really doing great with
the language. We had 2 sets of Elders, 2
took care of the video and 2 were outside talking to people. It was slower than they expected but we had a
thunder and lightning and rain storm right about 8 that lasted about a half
hour. Last Sunday night over a 1,000
people came and last night the Williams had over a 1,000. I am sure every night now will be busy
including on Christmas. Friday was also
the Birthday Tea, and they had crackers and bread with about 4 different dips,
mixed nuts, homemade brownies with whip cream, and sparkling grape juice.
Yesterday we decided on another slow day because of the busy
week we have had, and the Williams didn’t want to do much because they worked
last night. We went to Vinny’s and
Salvo’s, I got 3 shirts at Salvo’s and Dad got 2. Then we went the Harry de Wheels for lunch. The rest of the day was spent doing
laundry. Dad and I decided to go to “La
Botte” for some pizza and when we got there it was so noisy we just got take
away and came home with pizza and garlic bread.
Friday we got new computers, monitors, keyboards, and mouse
at the office. They change them out
every 4 years. The monitor is larger,
19” and really nice. He just got them
hooked up as we were leaving the office so we haven’t had a chance to work on
them yet. He had to come back after 4:30
as it wouldn’t print in color. He (the
IT guy) got it fixed so we didn’t get home until after 5. That was a really long day but thank goodness
we were home from the Art Show by 11.
Today we went to Church, the program was talks and music by
the audience singing Christmas Carols, the Sister Missionaries sang a beautiful
number, and the YSA in the ward, 6 of them, sang a couple of songs. The last number was a piano and solo. We really enjoyed it and really felt the
Spirit. There were 4 investigators there
with the missionaries, hope they felt it also.
We came home fixed some dinner, sausage stir fry, it was good even
though it doesn’t sound so. We are
trying to use up everything that will not keep while we are gone for 5
days. We are getting so excited to go,
we are going up to the Williams in a few minutes to map out our route. We will leave sometime Thursday morning and
go to Canberra and then go onto the Church ranch on Friday, it is about 4 hrs
from Canberra. We will stay there 3 or 4
nights and just travel around during the day.
We are really enjoying opening the little gifts for the 12
days of Christmas, so far we have only missed one.
We wish all of you a Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!! Be sure to teach your families the real
meaning of Christmas and we challenge all of you to carry the spirit of Christ
throughout the year in all you do and say. We will miss you all and hopefully be able to
talk to you in the middle of the week. I
have no idea when we will be able to write next week, we will see maybe we will
have internet at the ranch.
Happy Birthday Canyon on the 26th,! A big 16 years old, wow, that went fast. Happy Birthday to Dallen and Anaston on Jan 2nd,
15 years and 6 years old. Also Happy Birthday to Andy on the 27th and Tina and
Tyson on the 28th.
Love you all and Pray for you!
Mum and Dad
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