July 26, 2015

Kind of a busy week but not much 'travel' as far as hotels go.  We only have one hotel for 2 nights.  We did, however, a lot of driving back and forth.  Zone Conferences this week were in Georgia Atlanta North Mission.

BUT, before we went to those, we took Monday and drove to yet another part of our mission.....Auburn, Alabama!!  It was a GREAT day trip.  No worries, Elder/Dr. Allgaier was still working as we were driving and walking on campus and around downtown Auburn.  We did enjoy our visit very much.  Had a great little lunch in Toomer's right on the square corner of downtown.  And that was actually one block off campus.

This was an exception foto of the Atlanta Temple hanging in one of the buildings where we met this week.  It was very striking.....and therefore we needed to make a picture of the foto.

As we were driving from the chapel to our hotel, we stopped at a Michael's store.  I needed a 'couple of things'.  We always need to tidy up Becky's products to make sure they look nice and neat for the customers!  Just a little 'mother' thing to do.

 I had made a little cross-stitch Atlanta Temple for a few of the Senior Missionaries that we get to work with in the Atlanta North Mission.....L to R are Me, of course, Sister McKinney (mission nurse), Sister Dixon (office missionary with her husband....and we were actually in the MTC with them!), and Sister Nebeker (mission nurse).

A sweet Sister Missionary came up to me and said 'I met your father in the Provo MTC!'.  She seemed so excited.  However, I KNEW that was not possible since my father passed away back in the late 1990's!  In talking a little more I said 'Was his name President Marion?'  Yes, she exclaimed!  Oh, you mean my UNCLE don't you.  She seemed a little embarrassed but agree that he was my Uncle and not my father.  How fun to have 'connections' in the Church.  The Church is such a small community!  I love it. 

I was able to fix a 'normal' meal this week....at least on one of the nights we were home.  It felt so good....and tasted even better.  We surely get tired of 'eating on the road' so much.

I even had time to make a scarf for Ms. Shen.....David's 'housekeeper' in China.  That was one of the things I picked up at Michael's was the yarn.  I get to do a lot of needlework when we are in hotels.  Wayne works and I do needlework!

On Saturday the Senior Missionaries from the Georgia Atlanta Mission had a trip to the Booth Western Art Museum in Cartersville, GA.  WOW what a fantastic place.  This museum really should be in the west but we are glad it is here in Georgia.  It was just fantastic!

What a BEAUTIFUL collection of western art in many different forms.

We took a group foto in front of one of the statues before we left.....L to R (approximately):  Elder & Sister Parker (office), Elder and Sister Terry (branch/ward couple), Sister Mason (mission nurse), Elder & Sister Fairbanks (ward/branch couple), Elder & Sister Jeffries (new office couple), Elder & Sister Danklef (office couple with 1 week left), Another Senior Sister Missionary (can't remember her name) and Elder/Dr. & Sister Allgaier.

What a fun adventure......what a GREAT week. We will be doing some more traveling this coming week back up to the Georgia Atlanta North Mission.  We LOVE our mission!

July 19, 2015

Another week....full of lots of activity!!  We were suppose to have the Elders over for dinner Monday night.  We got a call that a sister Missionary was headed to a hospital in N.C. and there may be some 'complications' with the hospital and procedure.  We felt we needed to head up that way.....SO, I fixed dinner in the morning and delivered it to them before we left.  They had requested fried chicken.  Along with a rice dish and corn on the cob.  Let's hope they enjoyed it!

We got a face-time phone call from Ele.  She was calling from Litchensutein!  I gave her some money and asked that IF she had time, I would love to have a pin from there to add to my mission hat pin collection.  She wanted to make sure this one was a 'GO'!!!  And, of course, it was!!!  LOVE it!  Kittos Paljon Ele!

 Our trip to the N.C. Raleigh Mission was an over-night, break-up-the-long-trip drive.  We stayed in Gaffney, SC for the night.  We decided that since it was a mile from THE PEACH we were going to go see it up close and personal this time.  We are so used to driving by at about 65 mph and trying to take our fotos.  And, there was a little fruit stand next to the Hotel.  They had HOMEMADE PEACH ICE CREAM!!!  Ok, can NOT pass that up.  We had some on the trip going and on the trip coming back 2 days later!!  Why not!

We got to the Wake Medical Center to see Sister East after she had been checked in.  (Don't worry, she and her companion gave us permission to use the foto of them and put here.  Bless her heart, you would not know that her pain level was about a 5!  She is always smiling.  About 2 minutes after we got there the ER Doctor came in.  Perfect timing for Elder/Dr. Allgaier to talk with him and make sure she was in good hands!!  Total worth the trip by the hospital in Cary, N.C.

From the hospital we drove on over to the N.C. Raleigh Mission Home to meet President and Sister James.  Brand new mission president and his wife.  What great people we get to work with.  Elder and Sister Hardgrave (Area Mental Health Advisors) were there with us as well.

As we left the N.C. Raleigh Mission, we needed to make a house call on a sister missionary in the N.C. Charlotte Mission.  We headed over to the Mission Office.  President Alexander was doing interviews so we got to see some great missionaries.  And they wanted to try out my apple watch with the selfie stick.......not a bad job I would say!

Less the Sister Missionaries be outdone.....they had to get in on the selfie action too!!

Back in PTC, Rodney was over for another visit.  I have started a crocheted afghan for him.  Bella, his dog, has gotten to where she likes me.  Obvious by her sitting on my shoulder and watching me!

We went to a special presentation by the Producer and Director and Set Director of the true story/movie of "Murder in Cowetta County".  It was held at the courthouse in Newnan.  Wayne is always on call and took a phone call just minutes before going in the courthouse.

Left to Right......Set Director (Tom, who is also the set director for The Walking Dead' which is being filmed mostly in Senoia, GA), Producer (Dick) and Director (Gary).  They gave a GREAT presentation.

By the time we left the courthouse it was getting dark and the sun was beginning to set.  Perfect timing for a foto.....

"Lucy" just loves hanging out with us.....and she has gotten to where she likes to lay on the half wall by the front door.  She fell asleep and I thought for sure she was going to fall off the ledge.

I was able to get a few more counted cross stitch Atlanta Temples made for gifts.  I have a list and will need to make more before too long.

Wayne got a new bowtie from Kevin in the mail.  He didn't even know how to tie a bowtie so Kevin sent an email with directions.  Not too bad for the 'first time' bowtie adventure!!

And with that, we finish out yet another week!!!  Oh my heavens how time flies!!  We will be off and headed to the Georgia Atlanta North Mission for the next couple of weeks for Zone Conferences.  We will report on that!  We LOVE our mission!!

Sunday, July 12, 2015

 A new week.....and we just never know what to expect!  Rodney, our next door neighbor, has become very comfortable in coming over to visit with us!  He is a nice guy.  Notice the GECKO on the window screen behind him!!  Got to love our geckos!!  

When I had a minute this week early on, I was able to catch up on a few things here at the PTC apartment.  Feels so good to be on top of things.

And getting a fresh loaf of homemade banana-nut/chocolate chip/pecan bread was a bonus!  Yes, got to have butter with it.  One loaf for us, one loaf for the missionaries who live upstairs from us.

I was able to get a doily made for my good friend, Minna, in Finland.  It is on the way to her.

And I got a sweet note from Toni after she received the afghan I made for her.  So glad she likes it!!

We got a phone call late on Thursday night.  An elder in the N.C. Charlotte Mission got spooked by a wasp while standing on the front porch of an investigator's home.  He is really terrified of wasps and decided to jump off the porch rather than getting stung!!!  Not a real good choice I don't think.  He ended up with a badly broken leg (broke in 2 places) and was taken to the E.R. in Rock Hill, S.C.  When the brand new Mission President's wife called us to talk to Elder/Dr. Allgaier about it, it was decided to move him from the community hospital in S.C. to a larger hospital in the Charlotte, N.C. area to be closer to the mission home.  That decision was made about midnight.  It was obvious to both Wayne and I that we felt we needed to head to Charlotte on Friday morning and be there for this emergency surgery.  President and Sister Alexander were most grateful for that decision.  As we were driving through South Carolina, we always LOVE seeing 'our peach'!  It has recently been renovated and looks GREAT!!

We made a quick 'refreshing' stop at the N.C. state line.

We would spend the next 36 hours in Charlotte helping with the situation.  We feel it was well worth our time to be there.  Elder/Dr. Allgaier and Sister Alexander were able to get some 'training' done while we waited for 'things' to happen.  Elder Leach, with the broken leg, was a real trooper.  Elder Blanco, his companion, was a trooper as well.  He took great care of his companion.

The Carolinas Medical Hospital is a very nice facility.  If one has to be in a hospital, this was not a bad one to be in.  Probably better that he was here rather than a little community hospital in Rock Hill, S.C.

We have come to LOVE the Charlotte skyline!  Just soooooo pretty!

And as we arrived home about 9:15 p.m on Saturday, we were greeted by a beautiful sunset.  Welcoming us back to PTC!

Much to our pleasant surprise, we had a box waiting for us!!!  David and Chelsea sent us some Maui Chips from their visit to Maui this past week!!!  We LOVE these chips and have not had them since we were in Maui a gazillion years ago!!!  Thank you David and Chelsea!!

This coming week is looking to be quite busy again.....we will be headed back to N.C. to the Raleigh Mission.  Stay tuned.....we will see where else we may end up!!!  :-)  We LOVE our mission!

July 7, 2015

What another action-filled week and a half!  Don't know where the time goes, but some how it slips right through our fingers!  I'll try to quickly recap:

We decided to head up to Chattanooga, TN for a couple of days....with our 'office (phone)' in hand!  And computer, of course.  We have passed through this area a gazillion times and have seen things that we have said we would come back and see when we were not in such a hurry.  This was the TIME!!  Elder and Sister Hardgrave joined us this time.  We always have fun traveling with them.  Along our route north, we stopped at this Church historical site.  This is where Joseph Standing, a missionary in the late 1800's, was shot and killed.  We had heard about this site and that the land had been donated to the Church back in the 1950's.  It is maintained by the Church even today.  It is a very remote site, but one with a lot of meaning for members of the church.  So worth the stop!

We got checked into our Hampton Inn Hotel on Monday late afternoon, situated just 5 minutes from the sites that we wanted to see.  On Tuesday, we spent the day seeing 3 areas:

Rock City was just so cool!!!  Worth the trip to the top.

You can see 7 states on a clear day.  It was kind of a cloudy day when we were there.....but just grateful it had stopped thundering and lightening!!  And not raining!!

Lovers Leap was quite the 'height'!  Elder and Sister Hardgrave and we are standing on a ledge (carefully I might add!) with Lovers Leap in the background.

From the Rock City we headed over to Ruby Falls!  It is a part of the same mountain area at Rock City.  Only this is going in a cave inside the mountain.  So neat!!!

The climbing, which is very easy, is about a 30 minute walk to get to the FALLS!!!  Named Ruby Falls because the guy who discovered it back in the early 1900's had a girlfriend whose name was Ruby.  He named it after her.  How sweet.  It was indeed beautiful!

The 3rd part of our touring on this day was to the World's Steepest Incline Train in the World!  It lived up to its name!!!  BUT....duty calls, first of all.  Elder/Dr. Allgaier got a few calls.  Then Sister Hardgrave got a call.  We are never in a hurry where we go because we can always anticipate these phone calls which take priority over anything else that we do or see.  We are, after all, on a mission!  We are NOT tourist.....these are our P-Minutes since we don't get a P-Day!!

There were 2 trains which would run at the same time.  One going up....one going down.  

This was so cool!!!!  I don't really like heights but I was able to do this with no problem.  What a GREAT view from the top.  If anybody comes to visit us and wants to take the time to visit Chattanooga with us, we would totally be up for this trip again!!  Just saying........!!

We went to a Logan's Steak House with the Hardgraves.  We never got our bucket of peanuts at our table, but we took a foto anyway!

We ate at Cracker Barrel for one of our other meals.  Got to love their rocking chairs!  I wanted to bring this one home with us.......but we really don't have room.

 A few months ago we mailed 2 books to Jimmy Carter, former U.S. President, to have him sign them for us (really for Wayne).  We FINALLY got them back in the mail this week.  How fun to have them signed by a U.S. President.  Especially since we had been to one of his Sunday School Classes that he taught himself.  It was an interesting experience.

Our 3 new mission President's and their wives arrived this past week.  We went to 2 of the 'Meet The President' Zone Meetings with the Georgia Atlanta Mission.  President and Sister Foote will be awesome for the missionaries and for us to work with.  We love them already.  Elder Pherson is one of the A.P.'s.  They are setting up for a Zone Foto.

After the meeting, they had the missionaries line up so the Foote's could shake ALL of the missionaries hands.  Great idea!!  Just like a receiving line at a wedding reception!

July 4th was a RAINY day.....but that never stops a good parade in PTC!!!  And the parade went on just as planned.  Lots of umbrellas and lots of soaked participants.

 After the parade was over we headed over to Newnan with Elder and Sister Burnside, N.C. Raleigh Mission.  The Burnsides have become good friends over the course of our mission.  We have had fun doing things with them as we have traveled in that mission.  They just completed their mission and came by to visit us as they began their drive home to Arizona!  That was so sweet of them to do that.  We drove over to Starrs Mill, just south of PTC.  We have fallen in love with it because it is so picturesque!

 The Hardgraves and Burnsides had a light dinner at our apartment with us prior to going to watch the fireworks.  We didn't get a foto of all 6 of us until Sunday evening after a July 4th Patriotic Fireside was held.

YUP.....that would be Lucy-Goosey having just jumped up on top of our cabinet in the kitchen!  That little rascal!

I asked Elder Facey if he would take a foto of the 6 of us.....he was happy to do that, only after taking a few selfies first!  Got to love it when you have your camera/phone to the Elders to have them take fotos for you.  And even Elder/Dr. Allgaier photo bombed their selfie!

Tender Mercy of the day, Sunday, July 5th.  We got a text from Kevin during the Fireside telling us Ele would have a 7-hour layover in Atlanta at the airport on Monday (the next day) as she travels on her way to Europe with about 330 people in a choral group who would be performing all over Europe.  He wanted to know if we were in PTC!  YES....indeed we were.  We stared thinking quickly how we would be able to see her because she was not allowed to leave the secure area.  That meant we needed to figure out how to get PAST security to see her.  Literally as President Corbridge, member of our newly called Stake Presidency, walked off the stand I pointed to him (because Wayne and I were standing in the front) and he saw that 'pointing finger'!  He asked if he could help with something.  I explained our situation with wanting to see Ele and asked where President Kennedy was (he was previously our Bishop in the Whitewater Ward prior to his being called to serve in the new Stake Presidency.  President Kennedy is a Vice-President of Delta!  He told us 'HE IS YOUR MAN'!!!  He gave us his personal email address and phone number.  He was traveling and out of town but we could reach him.  He responded within 20 minutes of our email and within about an hour we had secured our 'security passes' so we could see Ele!!!

What a COOL thing that we were able to see her.  We had a meeting on Monday with one of the new mission presidents and his wife so we were not able to get to the airport until about 3:30 pm but we were still able to spend about 2 hours with her!!!  We love the TENDER MERCIES of our mission.  We feel so blessed.  The timing for ALL of that to happen was impeccable.

When we finished seeing Ele, we needed to make a house call to see an Elder about an hour east of the airport.  President Foote was concerned about him and needed Elder/Dr. to make a visit.  We did, and that, yet, was a tender mercy the way things turned out with that as well!  And President Foote was so grateful we had been able to visit with him.

And, so we continue our week!!!  We are hoping for one 'slower' day this week so we can catch up.  We will see how that pans out.