Dix and Ruth in Australia: May 2014

Sunday, May 25, 2014

May 25 2014 Weekly Letter

Australia Sunday May 25, 2014

Dear Family & Friends:

What a full week and it really went by fast. We are settled in our new office, we got set up on Monday morning and even worked in there in the afternoon. The sunlight is a little different so we have had to put paper up on the blinds in a couple of places so the sun doesn’t come in on our table. It is working really good. We left work at 3:30 to get ready for the rugby game because they all wanted to leave at 4 to beat the traffic. The Allen’s, Archibald’s, Killebrew’s and Elder Feil went in the mission van, and we went with the Smith’s. It did take us about an hour to get there, and climbed the stairs up to the box. We had our own little waiter to get us anything we needed. They had a chicken dish over rice, green salad, rolls, potato chips, chips and dip, and soft drinks and water. Then at half time they brought little meat pies and sausage rolls with catsup (they call it tomato sauce). It was so fun to watch the game from there. Lyn’s husband had sent us an email with the rules and how they play that we all read before we went so we could understand the game a little better. The Manly Sea Eagles played the Newcastle Knights. The knights were ahead 14-0 at halftime, and with 5 minutes to play the game the eagles scored, and scored, and scored again and had it tied, then with 3 seconds manly kicked a field goal and they won by 1 point 15-14. It was so exciting, the whole stadium was yelling including us. After the game when the players had left, some people held up a banner that said “kids play.” Dale and Lyn told us that after every game they let the kids go out on the field and play for about a half hour, and they run through the banner to get there. What memories for those kids. It was such great fun!!

Tuesday afternoon Robin came over and moved our work computers to our new office. I have a long table against one wall for my computer, and it is also where we can put the boxes to put the cards away. Dad has another smaller table on the other wall for his computer. We will take pictures so you can see.

Wednesday we copied a 1,000 cards and left for the airport to get Kailee, the intern that will be working in our office for 4 months. We have never driven to the city before so Dad was a little nervous, but we made it and parked and waited about 15 minutes for her to come out. Mark told us to pay for parking and get her some groceries to last her about a week and he would make out a voucher to get us paid back. We got a little lost leaving the airport, Tilley doesn’t work well in the city, or any gps with all the tall buildings. We finally got on the road home and went right to the mall. We had lunch and got her some groceries then took her to Temple Housing where she will be staying. It is about ¾ of a mile there. The rooms are really nice, she has a queen bed and a twin bed, bathroom and a small kitchen. The main kitchen on each floor is where you can cook, etc. We left her there and told her to get some rest and we would pick her up at 7:45 Thursday morning. I showed her around the office until Mark came and trained her for the day. Robin came over in the afternoon and got her computer up and running. She got her key for the buildings and had a couple of training sessions via Skype. We didn’t pay attention to what she is doing, we were working. Mark asked us if we would pick her up and take her home if it is raining, otherwise she is walking. As soon as we got to the office Thursday, Dad called Salt Lake to have them take some data off our computer. While he was talking to the dcam support guy he said he had just got word that our 4 missing shuttles had just arrived. Two of them were lost for 4 weeks and two for 2 weeks. No one knows where they have been, we were just glad they arrived. They said they would have some of the audits done by Friday. That was such good news. Now we can put away about 37,000 cards. Friday we had 3 audits so we are missing 2, hopefully they will be there tomorrow. We did put the cards away we had the audits for.

Saturday we cleaned the flat and left for Mudgee, about a 3 1/2 -4 hour trip. We stopped in Lithgow to walk around, and then got to Mudgee around 2. We found a place to have lunch called the “Butcher Shop” and had hamburgers and chips. We asked several people at the service center what there is to see in Mudgee and they said it is a beautiful drive, and a beautiful little town with lots of wineries, then they would laugh. There definitely were lots of wineries all giving out samples so their signs said. After lunch we found our motel and checked in, took our bags in and then left to find the Church. It was about 5 minutes away on Putta Bucca Road. As we were driving we found the sign for Putta Bucca Road and it went 2 directions, straight or turn. We turned and there was the Church, a darling little house on 5 acres of grass and trees. It was beautiful. We then went for a ride and found farms with lots of alfalfa, some grain and irrigated with circles and pumps. Of course there were grapes everywhere. It is winter so the grapes are all brown and cut back. We went back to our room to freshen up before going to dinner at the branch president’s home. He lives about 2 blocks from where we were staying. He is Tongan and she is Greek. They have 2 boys at home, a 16 and an 11 year old, and their daughter is 18 and in Sydney living with her grandma, working and will be going to Uni. They were so much fun and it was great to get to know them.

Church this morning was at 9:30, we got there about 9 and the full time missionaries were there, an Elder from Canada and one from Layton, an Elder Taylor. He lives above highway 89. Mudgee is in the South Mission. There were about 15 people there including us and the 2 elders. They were great people and a lot of fun. The Branch President taught Sunday School, and the Relief Society President taught the combined Relief Society and Priesthood. Lots of good discussion. We took some pictures after and left for home, not stopping until we got here about 5:30.

After sitting for so long I decided to make some cupcakes I have been wanting to make and had fresh lemons for, lemon poppy seed with mousse topping. They turned out great so we took them around to the Moore’s, Archibald’s, and Killebrew’s. We will take them to the office tomorrow for the Feil’s, Smith’s and Allen’s and Kailee. We want to share the calories.

A little about the weather, this month is going down as the warmest in history for this time of year, averaging 6 above normal every day. We are not complaining.

Here it is 10 and another day is gone so I will close for now.

A Happy Birthday to Sarah tomorrow, Will on Thursday and Kelvin on Saturday. We wish all you a very happy day.

In closing I want to leave you with one of our favorite hymns and one you should all know, even the Children.

1- I am a child of God,

And he has sent me here,

Has given me an earthly home

With parents kind and dear.

2- I am a child of God,

And so my needs are great;

Help me to understand his words

Before it grows too late.

3- I am a child of God.

Rich blessings are in store;

If I but learn to do his will,

I’ll live with him once more.

4- I am a child of God.

His promises are sure;

Celestial glory shall be mine

If I but can endure.

Chorus:

Lead me, guide me, walk beside me,

Help me find the way.

Teach me all that I must do

To live with him someday.

Love you!!

Mum and Dad

Sunday, May 18, 2014

May 18 2014 Weekly Letter

Australia Sunday May 18, 2014

Dear Family and Friends,

This has been a pretty full week. I will start with last Monday. Right after work we went over to Buckland House and helped set up the tables and help Sister Archibald get dinner ready. There were 24 of us for dinner counting Elder and Sister Haleck of the second quorum of Seventy and 1^st counselor in the Area Presidency, President and Sister Howes, 5 Sr. couples from the city, Elder Dick was not feeling well so he didn’t come. Sister Feil is in Arizona with a new grandson so she also was absent. The dinner was sweet and sour chicken over rice, tossed salad, and rolls. Elder Haleck and Sister Haleck went around to every couple to find out where they were serving and their assignments. The Smith’s had dessert and the lesson. They served raspberry shortcake and he gave a short lesson on Mother’s and showed the video the Church put out for Mother’s Day. Then Sister Haleck spoke, she was raised in Orem and they met at BYU. He spoke and told about himself. He was born in Samoa, but was raised in the states. After they finished their education at the Y they returned to Samoa where they raised their family. Dad took a group picture after it was over. It was a fun evening.

We are moving our office into the other office where the Williams were and the Smiley’s will be. Glen called Thursday to tell us they would move us Friday night and Saturday. Mark was out of the office Wed on, he went to Tasmania. Thursday we left for the Normanhurst Chapel at 9:30 to help with the luncheon for zone conference. They had 3 conferences this week, Tuesday in Port Macquarie for the missionaries up north, then another one at Baulkenhills on Wednesday and at Normanhurst on Thursday. Sister Archibald went to the one on Tuesday with the Killebrews. She had made taco soup on Monday while she was fixing dinner for FHE. Tuesday night she got sick so the Killebrews and Terry Cox did the Wednesday lunch, and Terry and us did Thursday. We also fixed salad’s, had rolls, cut up watermelon and put everything out. We fed about 70 and it was so fun to see the young missionaries. A table of Sister Missionaries saved Dad and me a place to eat with them. It was nice to see the Haleck’s again. We got back to the office about 2:30 and got 1500 cards captured.

Friday morning we went to the office at 7:30 to call Salt Lake because we haven’t had an audit and they told Dad the shuttle last week had arrived on Tuesday. He talked to Troy Ogden and he looked on the computer and our audit had gone to another project so he sent it to us. Then he looked for the 2 shuttles we sent last Friday and he said they were not there but he would check further and send us an email. We got word from him about an hour later that they were not in Salt Lake. Now they are missing 4 shuttles we sent last month and this month. Hopefully they are found or we will have to do another resend. We told Patrick in the mail room he could not take any more vacations while we are still here. Before we left on Friday we had moved everything from our work tables to our desks.

Wednesday I checked my email as we were getting ready to go home and had an email from Robert McKinley. He is in our ward in Layton and is going to be in Sydney with a co-worker on Saturday. We told him we could meet them at the quays and show them around. We decided on 9 as that would give them time to get to their hotel to leave their luggage and walk to the quays. We left home at 7:20 and caught the 7:55 ferry. We waited about 10 minutes for them to come. It was so good to see someone from home. His co-worker is Ron Hubbard and he lives in Clinton. We took them over to the pylon and they went to the top. We then walked back to the ferry’s and caught the 11:01 rivercat back to Rydelmere and went to Parametta to see the bats. They were pretty impressed. Then we parked the car and walked to the RSL Club for lunch. We watched lawn bowling while we ate. Then we came up to the Temple so they could get pictures and we showed them our office. Everything is moved so now tomorrow we will spend the day getting it moved and set up again. We will have Robin come and move our computers after we have talked to you. We then took them back to Rydlemere and put them on the 3:55 ferry. It was so fun having them here. They left this morning for Perth to work for a couple of weeks.

A couple of funny names on cards this week was Christmas John Owens, born Dec 25, 1901 and lived to 65 years of age. Then a name of a man that was born in Spain, maybe Loren can pronounce it. The last name is “Urlonabarranechea”. Then we found about a 100 4x6 cards that were marriages and baptisms. All of the baptisms were from St Mark’s Church of England on Darling Point and were all from 1840-1870. The marriages were from St David’s Church of England at Hobart, Tasmania. The information was the bridegroom and bride’s names, ages, date of either banns or marriage, and about half of them had either the groom or bride as free, or convict, or both convicts. Really interesting. If they were convicts it also told which ship they came over on. The dates on these cards was 1800-1840.

Today at Church there were really a lot of people. The Councilman talked about family history and it was really good.

Friday we got an email from Lyn about what colors to wear to the game tomorrow and what not to wear. Her husband also told the rules of the game so we would know more what is going on. It is going to be so fun. Next weekend we travel to Mudgee to speak, it is a little over 3 hour drive and the Branch President has invited us to his home for dinner Saturday night.

Happy Birthday this week to Breanna and Thomas on Thursday the 22^nd, and Addison on Saturday the 24^th.

Our Love and Prayers are with each of you.

Mum and Dad

Sunday, May 11, 2014

May 11 2014 Weekly Letter

Australia Sunday May 11, 2014

Dear Family and Friends:

HAPPY MOTHER’S DAY, Tina, Michelle, Sarah, Tami, Danna, Onalie, Mandy, Amberlie, Tifanie, Megan, Jessica and Kaylee. Was really hard knowing you were at the Brunch yesterday (today) and I was missing it. I was really good this morning going to Church until I was checking Facebook before Church started and I came across the pictures from the brunch of the girls. Then the tears were going until after the Sacrament, then I was fine.

This has been a really interesting week, and we are hoping we don’t have any more like it. I will explain in a few minutes. Last Monday was Family Home Evening and the dinner went great. Everyone wanted the recipe for the soup and salad, and there was enough left of two recipes for our lunch on Tuesday. The Feil’s had dessert, sticky date pudding with whipped cream, and the lesson. They had everyone put two things on papers that no one else would know about you, then they passed them out and we read one thing and had to guess who it was. We learned a lot about everyone.

Tuesday when we got to the office we still didn’t have an audit from Salt Lake for 2 weeks. We send the hard drive in on Friday, they get it in Salt Lake on Tues, and we usually have an audit by Thursday or Friday. I emailed them and asked them what was going on, of course they had gone home by the time we sent it, so didn’t get an answer until Wed morning. They said they had not gotten any shuttles since Apr 15^th, so they were missing the 2 that were sent on Thursday the 17^th and 24^th because Friday was a holiday those weeks. They had just received the one sent on May 2^nd. We checked with our mail room and she said they went in the shuttles both those weeks, and Salt Lake mail room said our shuttle was not in the pouch. We had 11,100 images on one, and 10,500 on the other one. After emailing back and forth between about 6-8 people it was decided we would put them on another blank hard drive we have and send it this week. We can’t resend anything without an order from Salt Lake. Thursday morning I was just getting to calibrate to start copying when a popup came on the computer that says
are we there”. I had Dad answer and he said he wanted to take control of the computer and get those files transferred. It was 5 in the afternoon in Salt Lake and he said he was working late. Dad hooked up the new hard drive and they started transferring and it took 3 ½ hours. I did indexing and Dad did Family History. When he finished he said to plug back in the hard drive we had been using but it would give us a new media number, so Friday we sent 2 shuttles with 4 media numbers. We will be anxious to know that they make it this week.

We went to the Temple Tuesday night and stayed late to do other things and didn’t get out until after 8 and as we were getting in the car Dad noticed something on our windshield, or window screen over here. It was a little bag of candy with a note that said “Thank you for serving the Lord!” from the Oatlands Ward Young Women. We also went back to the Temple Wednesday night as the Temple will be closed for 2 weeks for maintenance.

Mark was out of the office Tues, Wed, and Thurs. morning. He was working with Mike Higgins from New Zealand. They brought lunch in Thursday afternoon, Kabab’s and they were really good. Friday we sent 12,000 images in which was pretty good for all the interruptions this week.

Yesterday we decided to take a ride up to Morisset Hospital, a little over an hour drive to feed the kangaroo’s. It was a beautiful drive, a little cloudy but no rain. When we pulled up to where we saw a bunch of roo’s, a couple came right over to us. Dad got some great pictures we will post when we have time. We then drove on up the coast and went to the The Entrance, a little town where the Tuggerah Lake on one side, and Pacific Ocean on the other. It was beautiful. We found a place to pull over by the beach and watched some surfers for a while and picked up shells along the beach. Then we walked up to our car and drove around the town looking for a place to eat. We found a cute little place and had fish and chips and salad, and then Dad had a slice of triple chocolate cheesecake with ice cream, and I had a peppermint bar, chocolate crust, peppermint, and a hard chocolate shell on top with whipped cream. They were both yummy. We decided to have dessert because we had split the fish and chips. No wonder we can’t lose any weight over here. We got back in the car and drove on up the coast to another beach where there were some surfers and we picked up more shells. There were a lot of younger kids with boards trying to surf. It was fun watching them. We got home about 6 just after dark. We had dinner and we were both indexing when there was a knock on our door and Sister Archibald came in with a beautiful corsage for Mother’s Day she had made. That was so sweet, made me cry again. I have been teary all week with Jerry Sargent’s death and Mother’s Day.

Today at Church as we went in the Chapel I got a card and Mars bar from the Elders, then a little candy bar and a pen with a flower on the top from the Young Women, then when I went into Relief Society a counselor in the presidency put a big candy necklace around my neck. It probably has at least 20 little candy bars on it, and I have no idea who made it. Only a handful of sisters had them. Then as we were leaving another sister handed me a chocolate rose. As we were getting into the elevator the Moore’s were getting out and she handed me a little bag of Mothers Day Candy that said, Caring, Loving, Kind, Friend. We probably have enough candy to last us until we go home as often as we eat candy.

After dinner tonight I was in the mood to bake so I made cookies, ginger snaps. That is Tyson’s fault because he said a month or so ago he had made some and I have wanted some ever since. We delivered them to the Archibald’s, Moore’s and Killebrew’s, and we have 2 plates to take to the Smith’s and Allen’s tomorrow.

We got an exciting email on Thursday and the subject was “Interested in attending a Rugby League Game in a corporate box????” The email said “Due to my husband’s employment we have been given an opportunity to use the corporate box at Brookvale Oval on Monday 19thMay for the 7pm Rugby League game between the Manly Sea Eagles and the Newcastle Knights. I know this is Family Home Evening but if you would be interested in joining by small family that night to watch the football (light meal and drinks included) we would be more than delighted. The game will start at 7pm and it takes around 45 minutes to an hour to get there. We can arrive anytime from about 5:30 onwards. It is a fun night and if you are wondering about what Rugby League really is, here is the opportunity to see a game for free and out of the cold. It is a great way to experience some Aussie culture at the grass roots level (well not quite this is the up market way to see a footy game—sorry but I don’t go any other way.) Let me know if you would be interested and I can coordinate tickets etc.

Lyn Hunt, Human Resource Manager

We are so excited to go. We are going with the Smith’s, and the Archibald’s and Allen’s are going together. We are glad Family Home Evening is changed to tomorrow night with Elder Halek.

This next week is going to be busy also, we are moving offices. Mark is moving us into the office with the other couple, they are coming on Jun 4^th, because we are getting an intern and 2 service missionaries, young men who have returned from their missions and want to train in the Family History Office. It will be interesting with 3 young people here.

Guess I had better close and get to bed, it is almost 11.

Happy Birthday to Jaxon tomorrow, or Monday for you.

We love you and you are all always in our prayers!

Mum and Dad

Sunday, May 4, 2014

May 4 2014 Weekly Letter

Australia Sun May 4, 2014

Dear Family and Friends:

Look at that, another new month!! The time is going by so fast. You are all going into summer and we are going into winter, and we really felt it the last 3 days. The news Friday night said that this is the coldest it has been for this time of the year in 6 years. We have not got out of the 50’s for 3 days. We had rain Friday, and yesterday, and WIND yesterday and today. Oh well, we don’t have snow, although they did get it at the higher elevations in the Blue Mountains.

Monday for Dad’s birthday, they announced it at the devotional in the morning, we ate lunch at the mall, and in the afternoon Elder Killebrew brought in a birthday cake. We invited the couples to go to LaBotte’s for pizza at night but only the Smith’s could go so we had the cake there.

Tuesday at 10:30 Mark, Melinda, and Mark Allen came into our office with a cake for morning tea to celebrate the birthday. The cake was marble and it was very good. That night when we got home from the Temple there was a bag on our door with cookies from Sister Archibald.

Wednesday, Thursday and Friday were very quiet because Mark was out of the office, and he will be in on Monday, tomorrow, and gone the rest of the week. We did get a lot done this week, averaging 4,000 cards a day.

Yesterday because the weather was bad we went to Vinny’s and Salvo’s, and didn’t buy anything except 3 cereal bowls. Then we went shopping because we have the dinner tomorrow night for Family Home Evening. It is 9:00 and we just finished making 2 batches of cheeseburger soup, and 2 grape salads. Tomorrow afternoon we will put out cheese and crackers. We will just have to turn the crockpots on afternoon to heat the soup. It is going to take us about 4 trips to get everything to the car though. Good thing we have an elevator and our car is right next to it.

Yesterday at the store I broke down and bought “Frozen” and we watched it last night and really enjoyed it. We took it up to Archibald’s tonight and she said she almost bought it yesterday also. We came back with apple crisp and ice cream. They were just getting ready to bring it down to us. After we put the groceries away we went over to North Rocks for lunch. We were trying to find something different. It was good.

This week we got an email from Mark Allen about President Lew, President of the Sydney South Mission. He is from Lehi and had a brain bleed a couple of weeks ago and is still in intensive care. He was released on Wednesday night and will return to the US as soon as it is safe for him to travel on a medical transport plane. They were very sad to be released. The interim mission president is Mark Palmer. He is from New Zealand originally, and his wife from England but they reside in the US. They were in NZ on business so they came right over. We were all asked to keep President Lew in our prayers. He and his wife are so cute, they will really be missed.

Exciting news we got also on Thursday was that Elder Haleck, first counselor in the district presidency and a Seventy is going to visit all the missionaries in our mission the week of the 12^th and wants to come to our Family Home Evening. We will have to change from the 19^th and have it 2 weeks in a row. The email said that because of Elder Haleck’s General Authority status that the men should wear suit coats that night, and we should act our best. We are really excited to meet him. The missionaries are having 2 zone conferences to meet him that week, Tues and Wed. We will be helping with lunch on Tuesday the 13^th.

We got a package from Loren and Tami and kids this week with lots of goodies, package mixes and a scarf for me and a tie for Dad for Mother’s and Father’s day. We also got a letter from each one in the family. We also got a letter and family update from Aunt Mimi, and birthday cards from Ann and Dan and a letter. Yes Ann, the cards came on his birthday. Now I have got to find time to write letters.

Time to go to bed, we have a busy week.

Happy Birthday Lydia on Wednesday.

We love you all and you are all in our Prayers.

Mum and Dad