Australia Sunday July 13, 2014
Dear Family and Friends,
This has been a pretty quiet and cold week. We can’t seem to get out of the 50’s and the
wind is blowing most days. Friday it was
63 and no wind during the day. The news
said on Wednesday night that this is the coldest winter in 10 years, and the
ski resorts have more snow in that time period also. This morning at 7 it was 43.
Monday night Dad had his checkup with the skin cancer Dr.
and he said everything looks good until we get home and then he is to see his
Dr. and be checked. That was good
news. We walked down the street in Parramatta
to find something to eat and found a pizza place with wood fire pizza. It was the best pizza we have had since
coming here. The garlic bread was very
good also. Tuesday night after we got
home from the Temple and had eaten, we were both indexing when the fire alarm
went off. Not only is it loud but the
speaker says “evacuate the building immediately” over and over. I grabbed my purse and we went down the
stairs and went outside. The Killebrew’s
were there and the Archibald’s came. The
Moore’s and Smylie’s came from the office and Temple and pulled up in
front. Thank goodness we had grabbed
jackets. People were out there in pajamas,
robes, and blankets. Some of the people
were just on their decks wondering whether to come down or not. 2 fire trucks finally came after about 20
minutes and after walking through all the buildings decided it was someone
cooking or burning something so they let us come back in. We decided we needed a better plan, to grab
the computers and IPad. They were all
right here in the dining area. First
time that has ever happened and hopefully the last.
Monday as Mark was leaving he told us not to bring lunch on
Tuesday. When he got to the office he
said there was a casserole in the refrigerator and some buns and just heat it
up when we were ready to eat. He and
Melinda are in charge of the food for the YSA family home evening and he said
they always cook too much. Around 11:30
Tuesday he had us go in the conference room to see his pictures from New
Zealand. What a beautiful country, now
we are really excited to visit there. He
was in New Zealand to have a conference with all the records preservation
missionaries there and he said it was really good and so he wants to get one
set up for Australia. Hope he gets it
done before we leave. It would also be
for the couple in Tasmania.
On Wednesday Paul was in the office to do some training with
the Smylie’s so we had lunch. It is so
nice not to have to fix lunch some days.
On Friday we went to the mall with the Smylie’s and Kailee for
lunch. We all needed to get some things
from the store.
The Smylie’s and Kailee have been preparing for 2 weeks for
a youth conference yesterday, and 60 youth were there to learn about Family
History and do baptism’s at the Temple.
They said it really turned out great.
The Stakes and Wards here are really pushing Family history and encouraging
the youth to find their ancestor’s.
Dad and I decided we wanted to eat at the Tower in downtown
Sydney. It is the tallest building and
has 2 revolving restaurants. The
Archibald’s went to the Buffet and were not impressed so I called all the
couples and said we were going to the 360 restaurant Saturday night and I would
make reservations for all those interested.
The Moore’s are out of town and the Allen’s had another commitment, and
the Archibald’s couldn’t go so we had the Feil’s, Killebrew’s, Smith’s,
Smylie’s and us. They don’t open until
5:30. We wanted to go for lunch but
settled for night. The Smith’s and
Feil’s drove down and Elder Killebrew took the rest of us in the van. We had to check in at reception, go through
security, and then get in a small elevator that went really fast up. The view was fantastic, Dad got a lot of
pictures. We were hoping we could see
the full moon but it was cloudy. We had
the 3 course meal, and for appetizer 5 of us had kangaroo, 1 had octopus, 2 had
ravioli’s, and 2 had bread sticks with goose liver pate. The kangaroo was really thin strips of meat
that had been braised and served with beet root. It was really good, but I probably wouldn’t
have it again. For the main course 5 of
us had steak and mashed potatoes, 3 had lamb, 1 had salmon, 1 had pork
belly. It was all very good everyone
said. For dessert most of us had some
kind of chocolate things, really good, and there was a rubarb dessert
also. Mine came with salted caramel ice
cream and caramel popcorn, Dad had a snickers chocolate dessert. We were there over 2 hours and the room
rotated about 3 times. We are going to
try and post some pictures tomorrow before Family Home Evening. The past 2
weeks we have been doing cards that are marked miscellaneous on the boxes and
they have been really difficult to do.
They are all deaths, marriages and births from the newspaper, glued on
paper, cards, and hard cardboard. They
do not stack well and take lots of time to separate them. We hope to finish the last box tomorrow, then
we get back to normal cards. We are
hoping this is the last of these.
Yesterday we went to the office to call Deven about a cache
Dad wants to place in the Parramatta Park.
After he talked to him we drove to Parklea as we wanted to get a couple
of things. We had a cup of mango yogurt
before leaving and drove back to Parramatta Park so Dad could place the
cache. We then came home to have a
little lunch before getting ready to go to the Tower. I also wanted to finish laundry because I
knew we would be late. It was sprinkling
in downtown when we got out but it was dry all the way home. There is sure a lot of people in Sydney at
night.
This morning we got up at 6:30 to go to the office and see
Brielle’s 1st birthday party.
It was so very good to see everyone.
Jessica had done a wonderful job of doing a lady bug party. The food looked so good and cute. We watched Brielle open her gifts, and play
in her little cake. She really didn’t eat
much of it. Thanks Deven for inviting us
and setting the call up. We wish Jessica
and Thomas luck on their move to Ohio for medical school.
It is getting late so we will close for now. Have a good week and we are looking forward
to seeing you in the morning. The corn
looks so good that Tyson posted this week, and Deven said the Evanston market
went good Thursday for Tina other than she got rained out the last 2 hours, and
Deven and Dallen did the Ogden market yesterday and said it was good. They both sold all the corn, and popcorn they
took as well as potatoes, onions and zucchini. Another season of harvest and
markets have begun.
Today we sang Dad’s favorite hymn in Church, “For the Beauty
of the Earth”. We are all so blessed to
live on this beautiful earth the Lord has created for us.
We send a special prayer and much love to LuAnne and Bruce
and their families as they go through this hard time. Know that the Lord is aware of you and Loves
you all.
We also send our love and get well wishes to Lon and Mary
and family and pray for a speedy recovery.
Love, Mum and Dad
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