Australia November 9, 2014
Dear Family and Friends,
Well, this is the last letter from Australia. Hard to believe that we have been here 17
months. We must say it has been a
wonderful adventure in every way, except being away from family.
This week has been interesting, with no cards to do we have
been indexing at the office and Dad has spent some time organizing his
pictures.
Monday night was Family Home Evening, our last one. That was sad.
Sister Archibald decorated for the November birthdays, Elder Allen on
the 4th, mine on the 7th, and Sister Killebrew on the 19th. Rashika and Sister Archibald fixed the
dinner, taco salad and fruit, and Rashika made a delicious chocolate cake and
had ice cream. The Smith’s had the
program and decided to honor us with 2 agriculture quizzes. The first one was easy, the 2nd
one was pretty hard. She got the
questions from the American Agriculture sight.
We did pretty well, and it was fun.
Then they gave us some going away gifts.
Rashika and Devmini gave us a woven bag and a beautiful wooden jewelry
box from Sri Lanka. The other
missionaries gave us a plate with the Opera House and Bridge on it, a Christmas
Tray, a tea towel with Kookaburra’s on it, a deck of cards to play fish on the
long plane ride home. They are all so
wonderful and we are really going to miss them all. Dad took a final group picture. It was strange not having the Feil’s there.
Tuesday morning Elder Killebrew came in and asked Dad if he
would like to go with him for the morning and they would be back for
lunch. They went out to a Sister’s flat to
fix a washer that had something caught around the ringer. They couldn’t get it out so stopped on the
way back to the office to get another tool.
Elder Killebrew had never fixed a washer so he was glad Dad was
there. He would have just replaced
it. They went and bought one just in
case. The 6 of us went across the street
to lunch, the Smylie’s came also. Before
Dad left again I had him run me home because Sister Archibald said she would
trim my hair. She trimmed about an inch
and it feels so much better. Dad and
Elder Killebrew got back about 5, too late to go to the Temple. He said they had to go get an extender for
the tool he had bought and they got a blouse off the ringer and put it back
together again. Just after dinner a
knock came at the door and it was the Killebrew’s with a going away gift. They had gotten a pewter cheese slicer with a
Kangaroo on the end, and a little pewter spoon with a kangaroo on it, when we
went to Paddington market. She said she
was trying to get me to pick out what I liked, but I liked them all. That was so nice. When I got back from getting my hair trimmed
I cleaned out the pantry.
Wednesday the Smylie’s and us decided to go to lunch at
North Rocks for a change. We had a delicious
lunch outside and the Smylie’s paid for ours.
Everyone is so wonderful here!
That night as we were doing some indexing a loud knock came on the door
so I knew it was Sister Moore. They have
a son and daughter-in-law here from Salt Lake for the week and Rashika had
cooked them dinner and made two desserts so she was getting all the
missionaries to share. It was a
chocolate cheesecake and a pineapple upside down cake, yummy as usual. Fun to visit also. We got back about 9.
Thursday morning Sister Archibald called and invited us to
dinner that night. She fixed a pasta
dish that was delicious, a salad, watermelon, rolls, and apple crisp with ice
cream for dessert. Before we came home
from the office Sister Smith called and asked if we would teach her how to
index so we went over to their office for a couple of hours.
Friday morning at 7:15 there was a knock on the door and it
was Rashika and Devmini with a birthday cake for me and Devmini had drawn a
beautiful picture of a horse for me. The
cake was in the shape of a Christmas Tree because she knows how much I love
Christmas. She had rolled out icing and
wrote on a little banner at the top of the cake, “Happy Birthday Darling Sister
Ruth”. She had also come over about
5:30am and decorated our door with a banner.
After they left we decided to invite all the Sr. couples to come for
cake and ice cream. When we got to the
office a little after 7:30 we couldn’t get into our computers so Dad went over
to Buckland House and Martin called Salt Lake to find out what was going
on. Someone turned them off without
reading the profile that said we were not leaving until November 28th. He got them back on but everything was gone,
all the emails and contacts, etc. What a
mess, we were waiting for the last audit to put the last cards away. We have decided it must have passed so we
will put them away tomorrow. I called
Vaun to wish him a Happy Birthday. It
was good to talk to him for a few minutes.
He was still at work. A couple of
weeks ago Elder Dick invited us to the city to the Hyde Park Chapel to speak at
the Friday Forum for the full-time missionaries, new converts, and
investigators. The Sr. couples fix
lunch, rice with gravy, vegetables, jello salad, bread and butter, and cookies. We
rode the rivercat down and got a taxi to the Chapel. We talked about our project and the
importance of keeping journals and doing family history to connect your
families so you know who they are and where you came from. They asked lots of questions. There were about 20 missionaries and 7
others. Elder Nolan, one of the Sr.
missionaries there has been in the hospital for 3 weeks, Sister Nolan said he
was doing better and hopefully would come home the first of the week. They are from St Louis.
We got back to the office about 3:30 and packed things up
and went to the store to get ice cream.
We ate leftovers for dinner and everyone came at 7. Rashika had put a couple of candles on the
cake that wouldn’t blow out so everyone was laughing. I let her cut the cake. The Smylie’s brought me a darling calendar
from a famous Australian Artist and Author.
I am going to look up his books tomorrow when we get to the office. After everyone left about 9, we were cleaning
up when a knock came on the door, and our little Chinese neighbor couple that
just had the new baby handed me a birthday bag.
In it was two CD’s, one the music from Frozen and a Country Western with
various artists. That was a big
surprise, and so sweet of them.
A few weeks ago Dad was asked to take wedding pictures of a
Chinese couple that were getting married in the Temple yesterday. We were there about 11 and they came out a
little to noon. He was raised in
Australia, and she came over about 3 years ago for school and joined the
Church. She is 24 and just got her 2nd
Masters degree in finance. She also just
got a job at the Service Center in finance to take Graham’s place this week. She is going to be great working there, she
is so cute. He is in the Bishopric of
the Chinese ward, and she is the Relief Society President. They had a little reception and luncheon on
the courtyard of Buckland House so Dad took a few pictures of them cutting the
cake and dancing, then we went with Smylie’s to the mall for lunch, then came
back. The bride and groom were ready to
go to the Temple grounds for more pictures.
He got some really cute shots. He
is going to put the pictures on a thumb drive for them tomorrow.
Today we went to Church at Blacktown Ward, and the Bishop
announced that the Doonside Ward that is in our building, actually it is their
building, was divided today so on the 23rd of November the Blacktown
Ward will begin meeting in another building.
Next week meetings will be the same.
The Moore’s are assigned to the Doonside Ward. We are so going to miss the people!
Tomorrow is our last day in the office and Mark is having
lunch for my Birthday and a farewell. We
are going to pack up all the equipment and clean out our desks, etc. I have already sorted the things I am going
to take home, our personal papers etc. I
just have to put all the accessories in the cupboard. The tables and desks will be taken out after
we leave. Tuesday and Wednesday we are
going to pack and finish cleaning. I
cleaned the utility room yesterday and Dad cleaned off the deck. Now we are hoping we can get everything in
the suitcases and not be overweight. We
will take them to the mission office to be weighed. We will also have a couple of trips to Vinny’s
to donate clothes.
Tuesday night Dad is going to take pictures of our neighbors
and the new baby. We are really
excited. They were really happy we will
do this for them.
We are really looking forward to going to the airport
Thursday morning to pick up Tina and Bob, Loren and Tami, and Onalie and Mike. We
are going to ride the limo that the Church is getting to take the Moore’s and
Archibald’s to the airport at 5:15am.
They are going to a conference. We are going to have so much fun showing them
this beautiful country. We just wish all
the kids could have come but we totally understand as the cost is so much. They will have to enjoy it through
pictures. We are excited to go to New
Zealand and see some of that beautiful country, and the most exciting of all is
to be home in two weeks from today!!!
Love you all and you are in our daily prayers!
Mum and Dad
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