January 12, 2014

Another week has gone by.  I just realized yesterday that in a week from today, we hit our 5 month mark.  It really goes quickly!

News of the week….we learned that the Hatch’s got their mission call to Nauvoo, Illinois, which is what they were hoping for.  They will be great there!  They both are great performers and singers.   They start their 18 month mission in April.

Monday, for Senior Family Home Evening, the President and his wife had too busy of a day to plan on dinner that night, so we went out to eat at Buca di Beppo, an Italian restaurant, instead.   It was nice, but since we were in a restaurant, we didn’t do the Family Home Evening activity that we had worked on......a Jeopardy type game.  We will do it another time.

Yesterday, we took a drive to 2 apartments. One, to drop off an MSF card for an Elder (he had lost his other one), and also in that vicinity, stopped at a sisters’ apartment because they had a smell in their drain, so we dropped off something to hopefully help with that.  We had planned on taking a drive to see some areas I hadn't seen yet, so we just added the two apartments to the drive.  We drove over to Livermore, which I had never been to before.  We also went to the movie Frozen yesterday afternoon. It was a cute movie!  Some of the grand-kids have talked of watching it, so it was nice to see what they were talking about.  Ayla is always singing the song from it too.

Today in Church, we got our Vietnamese outfits for Tet on Feb. 8^th......Tet is the Vietnamese New Year.   We hadn’t realized that Gary was getting an outfit too.  His is like a long dress, but has slits, so he wears pants under it.  Mine is a top and pants.  Both are red.  They came from Vietnam. One person had a family member that just made a trip there and picked them up while there.  I will post pictures when we wear them, and of the celebration.

We have another baptism in the branch next Saturday…..Sister Ly.  It is going to be at 5:30, and I am bringing a main dish this time.  We always have a party after a baptism in the branch.  It is great seeing so many baptisms starting to happen in this little branch!  But, I need to start eating less!!

Hope and Kelley have booked a trip out to visit us in February.  They will arrive Friday, Feb. 28^th and leave Monday, March 3^rd.  So they will be able to experience our church meetings and also some mission experiences, as we have the outgoing devotional that Sunday evening.

We face timed with Shelley this afternoon.  Emi kept waving at us when she saw us, and jabbered away.  She sure is growing up fast!

Today, the temperature was around 60.  This week, we have a forecast of temps around 70!  Temperatures for the the week are to be near record highs for this time of year.  I sure will enjoy it!   I will have to make a point to step outside during the day to get some sun!

This week is the week the AP’s and President work on transfers, which are next week.  Next Sunday is outgoing devotional.  Doesn’t it seem like it was just the other day??  6 weeks go fast!  So, the pace will pick up the next few weeks in the office work.  Also, next Sunday is my lesson in Relief Society, so I will be working on it this week.

Oh, a sad note of the week:  the plane that disappeared Dec. 1st in the central Idaho mountains, on a trip from Oregon to Montana, was finally found.  No survivors.  But, at least now the families will be able to have closure.  The pilot was from San Jose, and in fact is from the ward that the Crawford's live in (the Crawford's are the couple we replaced).  On board was his son and son's wife, and daughter, and daughter's fiance.  

Well, that's it for this week! 

January 5, 2014.....a funny this week!

It has been nice here the last few days.  We have heard from the locals that it isn’t usually this warm or this dry for winter.  I know they need/want rain, but it has been enjoyable for us.  Yesterday, we did some shopping for the week, and while we were out, we stopped at President Shelton’s house (our Branch President from the Bayshore Branch).  It was kind of funny, because I had my capris and sandals on, Gary and I both in short sleeved shirts, and he had on a flannel shirt!  So, for the locals it feels cold I guess. We are just enjoying the warmth, especially when we read how cold it is back home, and in other parts of the country.

We visited the flea market yesterday that is just down the road from our apartment.  It is busy every day of the week, so I wanted to walk around and check it out.  I guess if you love flea markets, you would love it, but I doubt we will go back.  Looked like a big yard sale to me, and nothing that appealed to either of us.  Of course, we don’t have room for much in our apartment anyway.  So, that is one thing checked off our list…..checking out the local flea market.

Friday at the office was the Zone Leader and Sister Training Leader meeting that is held I think every 4 weeks.  Well, the Clayton’s were leaving Friday morning for Idaho for the baptism of 3 of their grandchildren.  The one turned 8 a couple of months ago I think they said, and the other 2 just turned 8, so the families had decided to do a combo baptism and have their parents make 1 trip back.  It was in Boise, so they didn’t have too far to fly.  Anyway, Sister Clayton got Sister Withers to replace her for the day.  Sister Withers used to work in the office, and she had trained Sister Clayton for the mission secretary position.  I was glad to have her, because when missionaries are in the office, it is hard for me if I am alone to answer the phones and also do my financial job.  Well, the day turned out crazy, so for sure it was good she was there!  First off, when the mail came (it was a substitute mail man as our usual one, Cesar, was off for the Christmas holiday to be with his kids who were off from school), there was a card that Sister Withers noticed in the mail bundle that was a signature card for a package being delivered.  The package wasn’t there.  She caught the mailman and asked about it, and he said he wouldn’t be able to get back to the office to get it till next week, so Sister Withers said she better go and get it, since someone obviously paid for faster delivery.  And, with the missionaries in the office, it meant it could be delivered to whoever it was for (and it turned out that the person it was for was there that day at the meeting).  Then, just before lunch time, Sister Withers learned that the person who was over the luncheon had overslept and forgotten about doing the luncheon, so we had lots of hungry missionaries and no food!  So, it was decided that I should call Costco to order pizzas as she and Gary headed out to pick them up.  Lunch turned out to be just a little later than it should have.  And, the last weird thing of the day……a mother of one of our sister missionaries called because she had found out that there was some fraud being done on her daughters account.  She had called the FBI, and was told to cancel her daughters personal debit card that she had with her out here, she needed to cancel her Facebook account and her personal email account.  She called me to ask if it was possible for her daughter to get online and cancel the FB account, because she had tried and couldn’t do it.  She wanted her daughter to know that the debit card was cancelled and she would be sending her another one soon.  So, I called the daughter and relayed the message.  The young sister missionary asked if she had permission to get on FB to take care of it, and since I had to make a fast decision (the President was in meetings with the missionaries in the office), I said, yes, just get on and take care of this and then get off, as your mom said this was urgent and couldn’t wait even until the next P-day.  The young sister said she could have access to a computer that evening at a member’s house, and would do it then. I told her to also send her mom a quick email at that time to say it was done, or if she couldn’t get it done, to let her know that.  Then I called her mom back and told what we had decided.  A little later in the day, the mother called back again.  She said she got to thinking about her daughters cell phone that was put away at home, and that she ought to cancel that too.  She was just afraid of the fraud stuff and didn’t know how much the person who had accessed her daughter’s information and account had taken possession of.  Well, she was looking for the phone, and couldn’t find it!  She started asking her young son about it, and he said, oh, I found it and have charged it up and have been using it to play free games on!  Well, turns out, he was the culprit to accessing her account!  The “free” games amounted to $500.00!  So, the mom tells me to call her daughter back and tell her that the problem isn’t as bad as they at first thought. No one was stealing her identity.  She could just change the passwords on her FB and email accounts, but didn’t need to close them.   So, even though the family now has a bill for $500.00 to take care of, it was a relief to them to find out it wasn’t identity theft or something that they had to deal with!  I laughed and told that story to the others in the office!  Gotta beware of the little brothers at home!!

Tomorrow night is Senior Family Home Evening, and Gary and I are over the activity.  We are doing a Jeopardy type of game, and worked on it yesterday.

Well, that is about it for this post!  Love to you all!

A New Year!!

January 1, 2014

A new year!  Today has been a nice quiet day….well, except for football games being on TV!  I did some laundry, paid some bills, and went for a walk.  Gary watched some football, and some more football!

I had no intention of staying up to welcome in the New Year…..I just can’t get off schedule anymore, or have a hard time getting through the day.  If I take a long nap to catch up on a day off, then I have a hard time going to sleep that night and then have a hard time getting through the next day….vicious cycle, so it’s better to sort of stick to my bedtime.  Anyway, I went to bed at fairly close to my usual bedtime, but got woken up at midnight to sounds of fireworks and people outside.  So, there you go…..so much for good intentions of getting a good sleep!

We have been on our mission now for 4 ½ months, which makes it about ¼ of the way through our 18 month mission.  I can’t believe how fast the time goes!  I don’t know if it seems fast to the kids and grandkids, but it does for us.  Of course, when we see the kids and how much they are growing up, that gets scary too for how fast they ARE growing up!  Emilie is getting ready to crawl.  Last time we were with them, she was about 3 weeks old, and now she is almost 11 months old.  By the time this mission is over, she will be 2.

When we arrived here, the Clayton’s had just barely passed their halfway mark….they had a poster on the wall sent from their kids and grandkids celebrating their “hump day”.  Now, their mission is drawing to a close very quickly….they are done in April.  President and Sister Watkins, our mission president, finish up their 3 years the end of June/1^st of July.  Then we will meet a new mission president.  In April, 5 seniors are leaving:  Sister Chambers, who works in the employment office (her replacement arrives in March), Elder and Sister Hallman, who came on a 6 month mission will be done, and Elder and Sister Clayton.  It will be strange saying good-bye again to friends we are making.  The Clayton’s live in Idaho Falls, but when they get home, they plan on selling their home and moving to St. George as soon as they can.  They don’t want to be so cold in the winter any more.  Sounds good to me!  I have enjoyed not being so cold this winter.  Don’t know if Gary wants to give up winters, though.  He says he needs to be where snow is so he can use the 4-wheeler to clean out people’s driveways!

It was good reading Christmas cards and letters from everyone!  I hope everyone is okay with just reading about us on our blog.  It is too hard to write to everyone!  We miss and love you, but know that we are doing the Lord’s work at this time in our lives in this mission.  It is busy, but being busy, we realize how important it is for senior couples to serve to help the missionary program move forward.  There is a lot involved in the office.  We (the office couples) talk how it is so much busier than we ever imagined, and that no one would ever be able to comprehend how busy it is unless you are here.  Of course, maybe some missions aren’t as busy.  And this one may start to be less busy, as we have heard we are getting a couple of single sisters to work in the office this spring, so that will make it less stressful for all, I think. 

We love working with the people we work with.  We love getting to know the young Elders and Sisters.  We will love it when some of them come to see us in Idaho when we are all finished with our missions.  And, we know of at least one Elder who is planning on playing football in Utah when he is done with his mission, so we hope to go to some of his games! (Elder Pekipaki)

So, we now want to wish everyone a Happy New Year!  May the Lord’s blessings be with you this year.  And remember, if you have done things in the past you regret, just push the reset button…..make changes for the better now!  We can’t change the past, but we can change the present.

Love to you all!

The Yearsley’s