Just Another Day at the Office

         

The new mission office address is 2600 Boyce Plaza Rd. Ste. 101, Upper St. Clair, PA 15241.  That is where we will be getting all of our mail from now on.

Our desks are in the same room along with the AP’s. Rod is always on the phone talking with elders and sisters about their cars.  The phones pretty well manage themselves except for a month-end report.  I take care of the correspondence for new and departing missionaries, travel arrangements, keep track of where everyone is and order and disperse supplies and mail.  Rod says it’s like being at work.  I say, not even close. But, then, his work was putting out fires all day, so I guess it is for him.

        

Elder Jex and Elder Huber are the awesome office elders who are training us to do their jobs. They are hard acts to follow. They really do need to get out in the field proselyting full time.  We have enjoyed going out with them in the evenings to help teach.  Elder Jex and Elder Green got six mission cars ready to go to the auction last week.

                                   

Sister Bowcutt bought two new dining room sets for the mission and gave us one of them. Out apartment will stay as an office couple apartment. The new couples have to pay $100/month extra for furnishings so they are trying to get nicer furnishings.  It’s still used furniture but nicer.  Thankfully, the elders do all the heavy lifting.

We are still having new adventures everyday and enjoying most of them.  We love the Lord and are happy to be serving where ever He calls.

Moving to Pittsburgh

We had our last district meeting with our Wheeling, Wintersville and Washington elders at Greentree with President and Sister Topham.  We will really miss our close association with those elders.

                                   

                  Elders Crandall, King, Copeland, Blake, van der Spek and Neilsen

After a very hectic week, we finally got everything moved out of the house in Wheeling into our new two-bedroom apartment in Bethel Park, a suburb of Pittsburgh. The hardest part was saying good-bye to all of our friends in Wheeling. 

          

The Barkers and Mike Orum were just some of our good friends whom we will miss terribly.  Lots of tears were shed and lots of promises to keep in touch.  They opened their homes and their hearts to us and we really miss being there. 

But on to the next adventure of our mission.  Rod is the fleet coordinator, taking care of 63 cars and all that it entails along with all the telephones in the mission.  It helps that he knows a lot about cars already.  I am the mission secretary and am not making friends with the computer very fast.  I am sure it will all sink in eventually, right?  I take comfort in the promise that the Lord qualifies those he calls.

Our new apartment is much smaller than the house in Wheeling, but it is comfortable and we are getting settled in.  And, yes, I did bring my organ.   

           

We will be serving in the Pittsburgh 2nd Ward and will hopefully have some opportunities to visit and teach. We have gone out twice with the elders this week.

Although this is an entirely different experience, we have faith that the call was from the Lord and he will show us the how and why of it all someday.  We are just happy to be doing it together.

Happy New Year

We ushered in the New Year at the church in Wheeling.  It was a small but lively group and we had fun with active and less-active families.  What surprised me is that I made it to midnight before I noticed it was that late.

           

Rod was in an intense game of Uno.  Allison Carman again decorated the church with streamers and balloons.  All the loose balloons collected on the air intake at one end of the hall.

            

Bishop Skrzyneki had a rousing game of Trivial Pursuit going and the rest of us were playing Pictionary.  We definitely were the rowdiest. 

                                      

Little Emily even made it until midnight.  Probably from her sugar high.

On Friday we went to Pittsburgh and had a Missionary Couples Conference.  We got to meet the new couples who have come in the past few weeks.  We visited, had a nice dinner and program and then President Topham instructed us on the new information he had just received from Elder Smith, the presiding authority.  It was fun to be with other couples.

             

Elder and Sister Kenley from South Jordan and Elder and Sister Mudgett from Layton UT are new MLS couples. (Member and Leader Support)

            

Elder and Sister Jackson from South Jordan are MLS and Elder and Sister Hurren from Weston ID were called as office couple.

             

Elder and Sister Mooney from North Carolina and Elder and Sister Pace from American Fork Utah are the record preservation couples in Wintersville OH.

               

Elder and Sister Brower are the medical support couple for our mission.  He supports 12 missions.  They are living in Chillicothe OH and he is a retired ER physician.  The couples in order in the last picture are the Christensens( mental health support), the Hurrens, the Paces, the Jacksons, the Kenleys, the Browers, the Mooneys, the Bowcutts (another office couple), the Mudgetts, the Marshalls (CES) and the Greens. President and Sister Topham were taking the pictures.

We received a surprise call on Monday from President Topham telling us that he was moving us into the office for our remaining 6 months.  Couples really do get transfers.  He is sending the Hurrens to Wheeling.  We are really sad about leaving Wheeling but we told the President we are willing to go wherever the Lord needs us.  We have already seen many tender mercies from Him with this change. 

Merry Christmas

We took a fun trip the week before Christmas to the Washington DC Temple with Wes, Sara and Payton Walton so they could become an eternal family.  What a blessing for them and what a treat for us to be part of it. 

            

We drove to DC the day before so we could enjoy the LDS Bookstore and see the lights on the temple grounds.  It was 50 degrees and a lovely evening for seeing the lights.  There were 500,000 lights on every bush and tree and were a beautiful addition to the beauty of the temple.

            

             

I especially enjoyed the nativity scenes inside the visitors center and outside on the grounds. 

            

         These two were from Holland and the Philippines, two countries I have been to.

                          

This one intrigued me because someone had taken pictures of their family dressed up in the figures of the nativity and put them on blocks and displayed them as a nativity.  Something my girls would do.  The nativity outside was life-size and beautiful. 

We had a real treat when we met Mike an Debbie Corry at Café Rio for lunch before we went to the temple.  It was a fun time with family and I loved having Café Rio again.

           

It was Wes and Sara’s first time at Café Rio and they loved it too.  Rod even enjoyed his coconut shrimp tacos.

                                       

We had a Christmas party at Institute Thursday evening, a wonderful Christmas Eve dinner with the Carman’s and enjoyed being with the little kids on Christmas Eve while they were tracking Santa’s progression around the world, and a Christmas feast at the Wylie’s with their family after Sacrament meeting.

Our most enjoyable Christmas activity was visiting with family.  It was almost as good as being there.  We love our Savior.  We are happy to be serving Him here in the Pennsylvania Pittsburgh Mission.  We pray we may all put Him first throughout this new year and always.

Union Town

We were invited to speak in the Union Town Branch on Sunday.  Brother and Sister Parker have become good friends in the few times we have gotten to spend with them.  Brother Parker was the Branch President of the Waynesburg Branch for 10 years and when they moved to Union Town a short while ago, he was called to be a counselor in the Branch Presidency there.  Cindy is in the Stake Relief Society Presidency and since she joined the church while living in Moundsville, she takes every opportunity to visit our ward when she is assigned to visit. 

           

Union town is about 1 1/2 hour drive from Wheeling into Pennsylvania.  We left about 0800 Sunday morning incase we had bad roads or got lost.  We spoke to a congregation of about 50 people and stayed for the whole block and got to know them all better.  We had a great time and they made us feel so welcome.  Union Town would love to have some missionaries serving there.  Cindy, very graciously, packed us a lunch to eat on our way home. She is one of those people I felt like I knew already when I first met her.  I’m sure we were good friends in the pre-earth life.

December in West Virginia

This is our first December in West Virginia and so far we have had warm, sunny days and cold, icy days.  We still don’t know what to expect from the weather out here.  I guess we’ll just enjoy what we get.

The Wheeling Ward had it’s Christmas party this week and it was a great success.  We, as missionaries love these ward activities because we get to invite all the less-actives and non-members we know to them and some actually come.  Sister Carman, our RS president did a great job turning our chapel/cultural hall into a Winter Wonderland.  The ward supplied the ham and everyone brought side dishes to go with it. 

               

                                           

We had over 100 people there, including several less-actives and three non-members.  We had a program afterwards of musical numbers and readings put on by various ward members.  I got to accompany Al while he sang “Oh Holy Night” and the mob choir while they sang “Silent Night” which Rod was a part of.  We have some very talented people in this ward and everyone had a great time.  The Primary kids had an activity before the rest of the ward got there about gifts and what the true meaning of Christmas is. We hear it was great too.

Christmas time is a good time to be a missionary.  People are more turned to the Savior and a little more willing to talk religion.  We challenge everyone to talk more to their non-member friends and neighbors and share the good news of the gospel. 

Another baptism

Kamryn Birkhimer turned 9 on Nov 1 and was baptized on Dec 3.  She, with her mother, Sunny, and her brother, Kolton, have started coming back to church the last few months, but we didn’t manage to get Kamryn baptized before she turned 9 so we helped teach her and she is now a member of the Church.  She was fun to teach and so excited to be baptized. 

                       

            

Her less-active dad, Jerry, and her non-member Grandma and Grandpa Birkhimer were at the baptism.  Jerry declined the chance to baptize his daughter, but he acted as a witness for the baptism.  She asked Elder Green to baptize and confirm her.  It was a wonderful event and the Spirit was there so, hopefully, all felt it. 

We are gearing up for the Christmas holidays, not looking forward to being away from family this year.  We had decided not to worry about decorating for Christmas since we don’t want anything more to take home, but we couldn’t help getting a little something.  This is our Christmas tree.

                        

It’s all of 12 inches high but does the job.  We attended a volunteer dinner at Wheeling Hospital and I won the white poinsettia in a drawing and the red one playing bingo.  The table cloth and salt and pepper shakers are Dollar General.  That’s the extent of our decorations for this holiday.  We feel very festive now.  Most of all we are grateful for our Savior who’s birth made the whole Plan of Happiness possible.