WARD REORGANIZATIONS

Two weeks ago, it was announced in church that today the whole stake would meet together for a two-hour sacrament meeting.  Everyone anticipated that there would be one or more wards split so attendance was good.  Even though we arrived a half hour before the meeting was to begin, it was difficult to find very many free seats.  We ended up sitting on the stage.  Those that came after us ended up sitting in overflow rooms around the building.

The Independence Missouri Stake consisted of seven English family wards, a Young Single Adult ward, a Spanish family ward, and an inner-city (Kansas City) branch.  As anticipated, a new ward was created today.  The surprising part was how many of the other wards it affected.  Almost all the English-speaking family wards had their boundaries changed in the reorganization.

One of the counselors in the stake presidency spoke about the challenges and benefits of ward reorganizations.  He acknowledged that some may have mixed feelings about the changes and that change can be hard.  He also noted that discipleship requires more than just having hope and faith, that it also requires action to go and do that which is asked of us.  Following the sustaining of the individual ward leadership changes required by the realignment of ward boundaries, the stake president asked the whole stake membership for a sustaining vote on the reorganization.  Sitting on the stage, I was in a good position to see if some did not raise their hands.  It was impressive to me, and I’m sure gratifying to the stake president, to see the stake members raise their hands in support of the change.

Jessica and her family came and spent a few days with us.  We were able to get Area Presidency approval to travel with them to Nauvoo for two days.  It was nice to see Nauvoo not during a derecho.  Last year, almost to the day, when we visited, there was a tornado warning and we spent time in the basement of the Scovil Bakery.  This year we met in the Red Brick Store one of the sister missionaries who was with us in the basement of the bakery a year ago. It has been wonderful to be with family again.

Jessica and families arrival at the airport. It was pretty miraculous that she was able to make it. They needed to leave for the airport at 10:30 and she went to the ER at 8:30 a.m.

In their rush to get to the airport their IPAD was run over by the car. It still works, despite having treadmarks on the protective cover.

Patriotic parade in Nauvoo.

Russell and I tended the toddler and 6 year old while Jessica and children did baptisms at the temple. 

The boys loved the horses.

From the backyard of Joseph and Emma's home overlooking the Mississippi. 

Grave site for Joseph and Hyrum.

The kids made rope in the living center. Of course they then had to practice tying each other up with it.

This man has only been on his mission for 2 weeks. He had a prosthetic leg put on 2 months prior to us seeing him. He was still getting used to walking on the rocky trail in Nauvoo the day we saw him.

Wagon ride with oxen. We learned the difference between oxen and cows.

Trail of Hope. There are quotations from people who traveled down this road to evacuate Nauvoo and cross the Mississippi.  This quotation is from George Q Cannon who is my (Eileen's) great grandfather. 

We were getting tornado warnings all the way home. It sure was a beautiful sunset. 

Jessica's family are big golfers. This young man won a game at Top Golf. 

Just learning how to play peekaboo while the rest of the family is at the Truman museum.

We celebrated Jessica's birthday. She was concerned about putting the hat on her head so it hovered.

New boundaries being set by the stake presidency. It was a full building. We got there 30 minutes ahead and got the last few seats on the stage.

The family visited our office and of course had some candy from the candy dish.

MOVING ON

This last week was transfers, a three-day process which takes place every six weeks of missionaries going home, new ones arriving, and many of the others getting moved to new locations with different companions. With the arrival of Elder Parker, the role of driving the truck and trailer during the process is no longer my responsibility. This transfer all I (Russell) had to do was be a backseat driver, telling Elder Parker where to go and when to do things. Getting used to not driving will not be a challenge.

Looking back on my last ten months as the vehicle coordinator, I find my self wondering what, if anything, I was supposed to learn from the experience. Or was it just a task that needed to be done and I drew the short straw? My guess is that it is the former, leaving me with the question, did I learn and do what God hoped I would? Frankly, I am not sure. The pace Eileen and I have had on this mission so far has not left a lot of time for reflection.

My estimate on the average weekly hours to do the Vehicle Coordinator role is quite a bit more than to do the Financial Secretary role, perhaps 55 vs. 35.  I have heard Elder Parker comment to both President Sommerfeldt and to the vehicle manager in SLC, that this role is requiring him to work harder than he did before he retired, when he was working full-time.  I wish he would allow me to help him more, but I get the impression he wants to prove that he can do the role on his own.

So, what will I do with my time now that I am no longer on call seven days a week with no scheduled missionary duties on Saturdays? On Tuesday night I was set apart as an ordinance worker in the Kansas City temple. I will be working the Saturday afternoon shift each week beginning in July. It turns out that picking up my white temple jacket and shoes when we took a missionary home to SLC last fall was not a wasted effort.

P.S. (by Eileen) Can I just say how wonderful it is to not have Russell at the office all days of the week and that we only have one person rather two people on call?  It is a pretty great feeling. 

The unhappy saga of feeding the homeless....The senior missionaries had a project of feeding the homeless in KC.  I (Eileen) signed up for veggies knowing they would be simple to do, then Russell suggested we sign up for the main dish.  We were supposed to bring goulash (if I tripled the recipe it would feed 30).  I have never made or tasted goulash. We purchased all the ingredients prior to the evening serving and I cooked all the meat and veggies.  Unfortunately the night it was supposed to be served we had 3 disasters; 1) our two can openers did not work for opening the 16 cans which needed to be opened 2) after we got the cans opened and had all the ingredients in the pan it turned out that our pan had a hole in it.  If you have seen chocolate fountains, we had a tomato fountain going all over our counter and the cupboard.  3) our noodles weren't cooked even though I turned up the heat to 500 degrees.  Needless to say it was one of the more unpleasant experiences of our mission.  I tried though........;  Thank you to the Dennisons for being so supportive when they knew I was so done with goulash.

Our missionaries have been asked to sing The Star Spangled Banner at the KC Royals game in August.  Sister Sheffield, who has produced events on a large scale basis, practiced with the missionaries prior to transfers. She asked the missionaries if anyone had ever sung the song in parts. There were 12 missionaries who responded. It sounded awesome considered they had never practiced together. Next she filled in with the large group below.  Triple awesome!  I am confident that by August they will be really prepared. 

Sister Creer, Sister Dennison and Eileen. I guess we all got the color of the day memo.

Petri disc cultures from a mold test. Not exactly what you want to see in your apartment.  The missionaries have been moved. 

Goulash for the homeless

                                                   Singing practice for the Royals Game

Elder Lowder and Elder Gordon both returned home this transfer. They will be missed.  

The sisters are expecting all of this to get into one car!

The departing missionaries always go to Adam OndiAhman with President and Sister Sommerfeldt. This transfer we had 15 missionaries returning home. 

Only three arrivals this transfers. The incoming missionaries were enthusiastic, confident and happy. I am sure they will be a great addition to our mission.

FATHER'S DAY

This morning in Sacrament meeting, the Blue Mills ward had a wonderful program on fathers and becoming a disciple of Christ.  Rather than the typical rest song performed by the primary kids, about three dozen of the youth took part in a program of talks and musical numbers.  Bishop Winchester led the music.  As I (Russell) listened to the talks, several spoke on the good examples their fathers are to them.  It reminded me that I too have been blessed by a good father and two grandfathers that raised me in the Gospel of Jesus Christ.  I also thought of my multiple generations of great-grandfathers, the most recent being my maternal grandmother’s father, who joined the Church between about 100 and 180 years ago in Europe and then immigrated to Utah.  I have been richly blessed to have the Gospel of Jesus Christ in my life from birth due to their willingness to listen to the missionaries' messages and then act upon the promptings of the Holy Ghost, to be baptized and then teach their posterity the Gospel.  Without them joining the Church, I may well not know of my Father in Heaven or His son Jesus Christ.  I owe everything to a loving Father in Heaven, my Savior Jesus Christ, and generations of loving earthly fathers on who’s figurative shoulders I stand.

I also owe a lot to another father, my father-in-law, Maxwell Cannon for his raising Eileen and being such a big part of my life over the last 40 years prior to his passing while we were in the Philippeans.  He had a great influence on my children and grandchildren.

On Thursday afternoon two of the young elders who live in our apartment complex dropped by to see us with a loaf of bread.  They asked me if I could possibly go to the complex’s gym in the mornings.  They like to go and workout but have to leave if a female comes in and another adult male is not present.  With most of the training of my replacement completed, it was just the push I needed to start working out in the mornings.  I realized I do have time now to do something other than just work, which is really nice.  And leave it to Eileen to start quoting scripture to me about it, she popped off with 2 Nephi 2:11.

Last Monday, at our senior district family home evening, Eileen spoke on some of her experiences with Operation Smile.  She had to cut way back on her hundreds of slides.  With only 30 minutes, she decided to focus on her experiences in Rawanda, the Congo (DRC), Jordan and Ethiopia.  A copy of her PowerPoint presentation will be attached once she figures out how to upload it to blogger. 

Unfortunately I forgot to ask someone to take a photo of me (Eileen) doing my presentation on Operation Smile. My presentation included some of my experiences  and I talked about what a profound impact doing this humanitarian work had on my life. 

How did President and Sister Sommerfeldt get to spend some time with Donny Osmond and his wife?  I thought they should have invited the nurse just in case someone got sick.....

Sister Creer and I went to an excellent lecture by Doris Kearns Goodwin. She has the distinction of being a historian and author of several presidential biographies.  Her husband was a speech writer for John F Kennedy and Lyndon B Johnson. She was humorous and extremely articulate in her presentation. 

Cute Elder Webber made this sour dough bread himself and gave it to us as a thank you gift for the help we have given him. It was a perfect loaf of bread without one air bubble in it. Well done Elder!

Our senior missionary activity on Saturday was to visit the Steamboat Arabia. This boat was a paddle boat which sank in the Missouri River in 1856.  Prior to it's sinking it had carried Some local men (one of whom was at the museum) searched for it until they found it in a cornfield. They dug it up and found lots of supplies which were meant to head to the "frontier".  Rather than selling the supplies they decided to make a museum so that others could get an idea of the kinds of supplies were being utilized in the 1850s.  Many of the items were found in perfect condition once the mud was washed off. Others were being cleaned off by archeologists which we could view while they worked. It was extremely interesting.

Steamboat Arabia painting (above).  Eileen and Russell in front of the hull of the ship which was discovered (below).

Dishes and shoes found in barrels on the steamboat.  One of the men who discovered the find said that he had tasted the bottled pickles found in a barrel and they still tasted good after 150 years of being hidden in mud.

Charles Thompson joined the LDS church and had a book he was planning on printing about Mormonism. The printing plates are shown below.  The destination was Council Bluffs.

Medication in bottles discovered on the boat. 

These maps showed the immigration routes that those heading west took. 

Information about Mormon emigrants and the ships they took. 

Eileen can't resist being in with the pioneers. I look a bit short here. 

A year ago we were on a church history tour and stopped one evening at this Culvers. We decided to have some ice cream at the same Culvers as last year at this time. 

Russell with his father, grandfather and great grandfather.  Russell's father is now 91 years old. 

Eileen with her father. We had gone up into the mountains to go on Heather's side by sides. He was in his 90s at this point and enjoyed the day immensely despite his age. 

The gift for the men in the congregation at church today was homemade cookies and a tie with the words, Families are Forever. 

PASSING ON THE KEYS

It has been a good week.  What I thought would take two weeks, Elder Parker seems to have picked up in one.  We still need to train on trading out old cars for new ones, zone conferences and transfers, but training on those topics must wait until they occur during the next month.  By Friday I (Russell) had turned over the Vehicle Coordinator phone, the mission credit card, keys to the cabinets and the mission truck!  With any luck, I will never need to drive a truck again.Ten months ago, I thought it would be a miracle if I made it 18 months without wreaking the truck while towing the trailer.  Miracles never cease!

For a couple of weeks now, we have been trying to get one of our mission’s VW Tiguans fixed.Its windshield wipers would randomly turn on and off.  I told the elders to take it into the dealership, who after looking at it, told the elders that a rodent (probably one the many squirrels here) had chewed on the wiring and that they would have to schedule a time to come back and get a comprehensive diagnostic test to figure out where all the problems were.  They said the test alone would cost $400 and that parts and labor would likely add up to a lot more.When the elders took the car back for its diagnostic test, I was waiting for their call so that I could pay for it over the phone with a credit card.  The call never came.  It turned out their comprehensive diagnostic test was very good at finding the problem.  It was a defective part, not a chewed wire.  The whole cost will be covered under warranty.  So, the squirrel didn’t do it!  I guess the defenseless rodent just made an easy scapegoat.  As I have thought about the incident, I’ve found myself wondering if I do that too.  Blaming something or someone else for my problems is easier on my self esteem (pride).

Over the last couple months, Eileen and Sister Creer have become good friends and racket ball buddies.  As I have been busy with work, it has been nice to know that Eileen has someone else to hangout with.  However, in the last couple of weeks, injuries to both Sisters have started to occur; first a knee, then a hand, a shoulder hitting a wall that got in the way of getting to the ball, that sort of thing.  On Thursday they had to close our office because the carpets were drying following their cleaning the night before.  Eileen told me she and Sister Creer were going to the pool while I went to take a vehicle into the shop. Afterwards we went to a fine arts museum in Kansas City.  Eileen was limping by the end of our two hours in the museum.  After the museum, Eileen said she was just going to drop in to see someone about her foot.  She came home in a boot, with a probable fracture in her ankle.  It seems when Eileen jumped into the pool, she came down on one foot wrong (an understatement).  As she said, “I guess I need to start acting my age and not my shoe size.”  Perhaps Eileen and Sister Creer need some adult supervision when they play together.

Russell training Elder Parker to do cars. It was Elder Parker's idea to take over cars. 

This ear bud got stuck in a missionaries ear this week. It was pretty tricky to get it out at the urgent care. The missionary had several failed attempts at home to remove it.

The water damage in our apartment getting repaired. The walls and the carpeting were fixed. 

We came back home this week and found this envelope under our door with a brand new $100 bill. We are fairly sure it is for someone else, but we don't know how to find the intended recipient.

We took the Elders out to Chuys this week. Elder Aguirre has been very helpful interpreting for Russell in his interactions with Sister Ramirez.  Elder Olsen leaves for Bolivia on Tuesday. He was in our mission while waiting for his visa. 

Elder Aguirre recommended that we go to the art museum in Kansas City.  He said he doesn't like museums but liked this one. I was very impressed. It was even free!

These suits of armor and stained glass windows were from centuries ago.  It was pretty impressive. 

Sister Creer and Eileen with their injuries.  President Sommerfeldt might tell us we have to stay away from each other from now on.  We aren't quite as resilient as when we were young.

We had 28 senior missionaries go to the temple which I thought was a beautiful experience. Not everyone went out to eat, but even to get a table for 24 was very impressive.

Russell found me (Eileen) after sacrament meeting to tell me Joan Turner was in the foyer. She was there visiting with a tour group. Joan is the one who trained me to be a nurse in the missionary department. She has been on 7 Full-time missions. I asked if she was going on any more. Since she is almost 80 years old she said probably not.  To match her number we only need to do an additional 2 missions in the next 15 years. That is probably doable.