Thanksgiving Week.

After the meeting Monday, November 25th with Elder Hamula, the next few days were quiet at the office, except when practices were held at the church for the upcoming missionary fireside. Before and after the practices, the missionaries drop by for mail or teaching aids. We always enjoy our interactions with these fine young people!

President and Sister Carter met the Smiths (senior couple) when they flew in last Wednesday at 4:45pm. They had been visa waiters for about 3 weeks at home after MTC training. President asked us to remain at the office until their arrival from the airport to meet and welcome the Smiths and then show them to their flat, which we did. They were pretty tired when we dropped them off and helped then unload at 7:00 pm that night.

The Smiths are from the Murray area of Salt Lake City and have a son that lives in our Riverton Utah South Stake. I recognized his picture when she showed me. They have 5 adult children and I think she said 18 grandchildren, three of whom are teenage triplets!

Sister Carter used her last stick of Crisco and her last can of pumpkin and made homemade pumpkin pie to share with the office staff a small portion of the Thanksgiving holiday in the USA. It tasted divine! Truly!

Thursday and Friday, the Smiths hung out with us at the office or went with Whites for flat inspections or other errands. We grabbed Subway for lunch together Thursday, and 6 of us went to the temple Friday night and Barnacle Bills for fish and chips dinner afterward.

Saturday morning after Lee went grocery shopping, we took the Smiths to downtown Adelaide to the Central Market. Sister Salazar recommended it as a destination and we hadn't been there yet. We saw huge produce booths, butcher shop/meat booths, also bakery booths, olive, yogurt, organic items, cheese, souvenir, and other booths, all within a large dark warehouse type building. The food court had over 20 different Asian food booths, and we stood in front of Mimi's Giftware shop to get a good picture for posterity. (My grand kids call me Mimi, FYI.) The meat booths had all kinds of selections, including kangaroo meat, crocodile sausage, and wallaby steaks for our next barbecue. Yum yum!

 

 

This guy was playing a digerydo and she was playing an amplified fiddle or violin.

After Central Market, Carter's took the Smiths to lunch at 1:00, and Lee and I spent the afternoon and evening at home. I made a large pasta salad for Monday's sisters luncheon at Sister Carter's and dessert for Sunday dinner, and cookies for Monday's cookie exchange. 

Sunday, we invited Sister Salazar and the Smiths over for dinner after church. I made beef and chicken enchiladas with lettuce, tomato, sour cream toppings and refried beans. Everyone enjoyed the meal and the company.

Later that evening, we all attended the monthly missionary fireside, but this was a special Christmas edition. Sister Carter and the missionaries had been working on it for a few weeks and it was beyond wonderful! Lasting an hour, the program included a beautiful power point presentation of religious pictures projected on the large screen, narration, and music illustrating the basic teachings of the church.

Large and small missionary groups performed musical numbers. Some tunes were new to me, but all were totally amazing! Sister Moss' fabulous voice was perfect for the song 

"Gethsemane." She was able to portray deep, tender emotion as she described the Savior's suffering in the Garden, and how it relates to us personally. We LOVED that piece. 

A group of 6 Elders sang " How Can I" and referenced mighty prophets as examples to follow and asked the question "How Can I Be Like Them?" It was so well done and we LOVED this piece.

A couple of the musical numbers were old favorites. In addition to the 100 missionaries, approximately 40 youth from the stake stood to sing Called To Serve and a Janice Kapp Perry Medley. We LOVE those two songs!

The three Adelaide stakes were involved in a weekend Missionary Preparation Conference (MPC) for teenagers16 and older who plan to go on a mission. For 3 days, a teenager was matched with a missionary companionship and they were able to 'experience' what missionaries do every day all day. They also were participants in the missionary fireside.

Just after a threesome of Elders left our house Saturday night (one needed his suit pants mended),

3 sisters showed up at our door and asked to come in and teach us a basic lesson. It was fun to see the sisters in action and the teenager participated also. For a job well done, Lee brought out ice cream bars, which were greatly appreciated.

One night last week at 11:59 pm, we were jolted awake by the sound of the smoke alarm beeping continuously every 30 seconds. We stumbled from the bedroom (without my glasses) to check where the beep was coming from and located two smoke alarms. Lee went to find the ladder on the back patio and proceeded to remove both batteries. But still, the beeping continued. Grrrr!

In our befuddled half asleep condition, neither of us could figure out how or why they could still be beeping without the batteries........plus we couldn't tell WHERE the beeping was coming from........so we gave up and returned to the bedroom, shut the door, and I put in earplugs. I had no more trouble sleeping that night but it was STILL beeping when we woke up the next morning!

When I walked to the kitchen for breakfast, I happened to glance at the cabinets and noticed the edge of something small and round sitting flat on top. Who puts a carbon monoxide alarm where it can't be seen?

You must know where this is going by now. Yep, the smoke alarms were fine and the continual beeping was the hidden carbon monoxide alarm waaaaaaaaaaaay up on top of the cabinets. Boy, did we feel dumb AND Lee suffered all night listening to the totally annoying beep!

Anyway, that's our week in a nutshell. In case I haven't stated it strongly enough above, the missionary fireside was outstanding! The talents shared were amazing, the Spirit was felt, the message was clear, and we (all) were blessed by our attendance!  It is a HUGE tender mercy for our lives to be touched by these fabulous young men and women serving as missionaries in Adelaide Australia!