A great day!

Sorry, no pictures again this week. Just haven't had anything worth taking pictures of!
But......I had the best day today. It was the first time in 7 months that I have been in pants the whole day!!!! It felt so good! It was our P-day. We just stayed home today and did things inside so I never did get into my "missionary clothes". This probably won't happen again for another 7 months!

We sent three hours on the phone today with Peggy Ricks reviewing the family cast applications. We had 290 families apply for 130 spots! Awesome families applied - it will be a great pageant again!

The duck and goose hunting season has been going on for awhile. We live close to the river so every morning it sounds like the 4th of July fireworks - the guns are shooting away! I feel sorry for the geese. All fall we have had a great amount of geese around. They are pretty birds. It is also deer hunting season. I don't feel so sorry for the deer. There are so many deer around. They ruin the trees and eat the plants. Almost weekly a missionary hits a deer on the highway. We will be loaning our truck to a missionary couple who hit a deer last week and will be without their car while it is being repaired.

We are very excited for Kevin and Stefanie's visit. They will arrive Monday evening and stay until Friday. We will finally get acquainted with little Sophie!

Hope you enjoy your Thanksgiving!

Another week flew by!

It is hard to believe that another week has gone by! This was our last week to accept family cast applications and we sure had a lot come into the office. There are a lot of procrastinators out there!! The deadline is tomorrow - I am sure we will still have some come in late but we have received the bulk of them.

I have also been busy trying to finalize plans for our mission Thanksgiving dinner. Everytime I think I have things figured out, Sis. Ludwig, our mission president's wife, calls and suggests something else either for the dinner or the program. She is a lady with a lot of ideas - maybe to many!! Thank goodness I have a good committee working with me. My biggest worry is that we will have enough food. We have planned for a few extra because I have been warned that the missionaries often have family come at the last minute. We'll keep our fingers crossed!

We talked to the Cottles this week. They are in Hawaii and having a great time. Glenn gets calls weekly from his fishing buddies telling him about how great the steelhead run is this year. It's a shame that we miss such worldly things so much!!!!

The best is when we talk to the grandkids and they tell us that they miss us! That melts my heart. We sure appreciate all the love and support we feel from our family and friends. You are great!!

In The Right Place at the Right Time

A new single sister missionary arrived in the mission Friday. She is Marcia Geilmann who was the director of our Pageant Family Services the past 4 summers! Friday afternoon, we went to the site post office to get our mail and there was Sister Geilmann, just getting into her car. A lady friend had come out with her because single sister missionaries are not allowed to drive out to the mission unaccompanied. Marcia had checked with the missionary travel department to make sure that she would be allowed to drive her friend to the St. Louis airport to return home on Sunday. When we saw Marcia, she had just had an interview with a member of the mission presidency and had been told that she could not drive to St. Louis because that would require her to return back to Nauvoo alone! (Major problem with communications!) Marcia was quite upset because she had no idea how to get her friend to St. Louis. There are no shuttles from Nauvoo and there are no one -way car rentals available from here. She explained to us her situation. We offered to drive them to St. Louis Saturday afternoon if her friend was willing to spend Sat. night in a motel. It worked out perfectly! Saturday is our P-day so we were free to drive to St. Louis and it solved a big problem for Marcia and her friend. They were most appreciative and we were so glad that we were there to help them out. It makes you feel very humble to know that sometimes Heavenly Father helps others through you.

The temple from our home in the fall! Just in the few days since we took this picture, most of the leaves have now fallen from the tree!

Monday evening we had a special experience of having dinner in the Willard Richards home. It is owned privately, not by the church, but is in the historic area of Nauvoo. The owners use it as a Bed and Breakfast. The lady who manages the bed and breakfast went to Utah for the birth of a grandbaby. Our temple missionary friends, Sister JoAnn and Elder Nathan Howard, were taking care of the Bed and Breakfast for her while she was gone. They had no guests Monday so the Howards invited us and another couple to have dinner with them. After dinner we watched a DVD called "I Witnessed the Carthage Massacre" which was narrated by an actor acting as Willard Richards. Quite a touching experience to see this story in his home.

We had never been in the home so it was a fun experience to get a personal tour! It is decorated very nicely with antique furniture, some artifacts from the early Nauvoo period and many pictures of Joseph, Emma, the temple and other early church people. I would love to spend a night in the home sometime! This picture is of a painting of the Willard Richards home which is hanging in the home.

The Howards are both walking miracles! Sister Howard is a breast cancer survivor and Elder Howard has had a heart transplant. The transplant took place 10+ years ago. They left for their home in Spokane the end of this week. They were serving a 6 month temple mission here in Nauvoo. They are always happy and one of the most kind, loving couples we have met! You have all probably had an experience where you have met someone and have become instant friends. This was the case with the Howards!