"It's Your Mission"

The first time we met with our Branch President, this is what he told us:  "It's your mission, make it what you want it to be."  We are coming up on six months and have been reviewing what we are doing.  We try each week to serve.  We are busy each day, yet when I try to document what we've done, I think, "Well, what HAVE we done???"

So, along those lines, here are a FEW things we've done the past several days.

I went with Stacey a couple of times of Lafayette.  On one of those trips she wanted to stop at an Oriental Market.  We found some great buys.

And who wouldn't want these?

Yes, these are peanuts in soy sauce.  And finally....

I think there are a lot of Asian kids at Perdue.  Hence a store that caters to them.

On Saturday, I was working in the garden at Robert Wagner's house.  I turned over some earth with a pitchfork and bent down to pull a weed, when a swarm of ground hornets exploded out of the ground and one of them stung me.  Look closely and see all the little yellow spots.  

This is what my arm looked like almost immediately.

I tell you, it hurt like the dickens!!

On Monday, we went out to the Morrisons.  Kim wanted Craig to give him and his brothers some safety pointers about shooting guns - specifically pistols.  After all, he is the expert.

Here is Craig watching the men shoot skeet.

After shooting we went to Kim's son's house for lunch.  His house is amazing!  I took lots of pictures.

This is the back deck.  Kim built all this furniture!!

Here are two views looking out from his deck.  

Then inside the house, down in the basement, he has a movie studio.  

You can see that the movie screen is huge!!

AND you should see their dog.  It's as big as a horse.

But he does tricks.  So cute.

He loved Craig.

I had to take a picture of this billboard.  Guess what it is advertising.

On Thursday, Craig and I went to a Cubs game in Chicago.  We went with our neighbors, Stacey and Theresa.  We parked in an off-site parking lot and were shuttled to the stadium on school busses.  Stacey is on the left.

We got dropped off right outside the entrance.  We walked across the street to the clothing store to buy T shirts.  Craig ended up with a hat and Stacey bought a shirt.  This is the view from across the street.  We counted 6 people in orange vests trying to direct traffic at this one intersection.

We had great seats.  The Cubs were playing the Giants.

You can see that it wasn't very crowded.  

Then, after the game, we all stopped at the restrooms before the 2 hour trip home.  Craig ran into someone from his old Ward in San Jose:  David Forbes.  Over 30,000 people at the stadium and he was visiting Chicago.  What are the odds of that???  The weirdest thing is, they both immediately recognized each other.

Finally, I need someone to tell me what this is?  They are all over here, along the fields.  Hmmm????

We have church tomorrow.  Craig is now in the Elder's Quorum presidency.  My little Primary class had grown from 2 children (that's how many were there my very first week) to 10 children.  It's time to think about dividing the class!!  Woo Hoo

Tomorrow we have MCM at 8:15 AM, then church 9 - 12, then Branch Council 12:30 - 1:30.  It's a long day, BUT the Trusty family is feeding us dinner.  YAY!!!

We are grateful for another week here in Indiana.  We love these people.

Cupcakes and Chocolate (and missionary stuff too)

Last Sunday, after our block, we had our Linger Longer.  Everyone brings a dish and we all have a wonderful meal together.

 Craig took this picture standing at the podium and looking across the main room.  The Brother in the black suit at the front table is our Stake President, President Cameron.  We love these people!!!

We spent a good portion of last week in the car.  Our neighbor, Stacey, came over on Monday and couldn't move her arm.  Her shoulder was hurting.  We offered to take her to her doctor in Lafayette.  (57 miles south).  Her shoulder was so inflamed, the doctor could not diagnose it.  He gave her steroids (hope I got that right) and told her to come back next week (today, in fact).  While we were waiting for her, we found this cute little park.

It's literally about 1/2 block away.  Can you see Craig hiding???

On Tuesday, we had to take Rob to the hospital in Lebanon (77 miles) for shoulder surgery.  His wife was out of town at a conference for work.  We left our house at 7 AM and didn't get home until about 5:30.  It was a VERY long day.  Rob's son, Daniel, went with us.  He was VERY well behaved.

We haven't had a good rain for at least three weeks.  That means we have to water our lawn.

 We have to fill up the watering can 10 - 15 times to get the lawn good and wet.  It's tedious.

Rob had to go BACK to the doctor on Friday to have his bandage changed.  This time, I drove with him and Craig stayed home with Daniel.  After visiting with the doctor, Rob wanted to go to Donaldson's Chocolates.  I guess they are very famous here in Indiana.  His family has been going there since he was a boy.

Yummy!!!  It wasn't cheap, but it was worth it.

On Saturday, Craig and I visited Brother Obringer's daughter.  She is getting ready to move and needed some help with different things.  I wanted everyone to see this beautiful home.  This is the back view of her home.

This is looking across her back yard.

This is a view of her front yard from the street.

And right across the street, is a forest.  Literally.

You feel like you are in a James Fenimore Cooper novel.

Craig and the elders are putting in a hardwood floor for her.  He was there all day Wednesday and Friday as well.  They finally finished the floor a few days ago.

They popped off all the floor boards and Rose stripped off the white paint and stained them to match.

Craig really is VERY GOOD at what he does.  It turned out beautifully.

Saturday night was pizza night.  Again.  Brian makes all the dough from scratch.  Stacey has all the fixings ready and we load up.

The sisters got in on the act as well.

Good enough to eat.

Sunday evening, we picked up Rob's wife from the airport in Indianapolis (108 miles).  He was still not feeling well.  We had a good visit with her on the way home.  She is super nice.

Monday afternoon was Zone Activity.  We don't usually go to these, but it was a talent show and the Zone leaders asked Craig and I to be judges.  We bought candy for the winners. 

 Before the show, we had a picnic lunch in the foyer.  Here are some of the sisters kicking back.

Acts included an a capella hymn in Samoan.

A scene from "Newsies"

A yoga workout for pregnant mothers.  Craig videoed the scene, but all you can hear is him laughing.

These two Sisters did the cup-slap-clap thing and sang.  Very cute.

Two Sisters doing a very "hip" hula.

A rapping Elder.

This Elder had the audience involved in doing some kind of Haka, clap chant.

These Sisters imitated bagpipes.  Original and funny.

This Sister juggled baked potatoes.

Elder Tate lassoed a deer's head from a rocking horse.

This Sister said her talent was letter writing.  As a result she was the recipient of some great letters.  She read some of them.  Funny.

 This Elder's talent was finding obscure passages in the scriptures.

 These two Elders did a scene from Les Mis.

Here are four of the Sisters watching the show.  

On the way home from the talent show, the sisters convinced us to stop at the Cupcake Shop in 

Val Paraiso.  It is so cute.

 The inside is as cute as the outside.  Here are our Sisters.  Craig is in the background looking at his choices.

 The cupcakes were $4 each.  Mine was a chocolate cupcake, fudge in the center, chocolate mousse on top, with a chocolate shell topping and crushed up Heath bar on the very top.  I could only eat about 1/2 of it.  It was GOOD!!!  Just very rich.

One last picture.. We really have beautiful skies here.

So, our official title is "Member and Leadership Support" missionaries.  That's what we do each day.  Each day we wake up and ask, Who can we serve today?  We love that we have this time to totally serve the Branch, the people, and the Lord.  We are enjoying every minute.  We know that our "call" was inspired by the Lord.  We are in exactly the right place for us.