Sunday, October 25, 2015

Another AMAZING week.  How does this happen every single week!!!  We LOVE it!

Monday morning we had a 'training' meeting at the North Carolina Charlotte Mission Office.  We were to train the new mission nurse who had just arrived in the mission field one week prior to our meeting with her.  Sister Garlick will be great and the missionaries will love her.  Elder Garlick will be working with the mission car fleet.

Sister Alexander, the Mission President's wife, joined us for part of the training.  It is truly a team effort in taking care of the medical needs of the missionaries!

After the meeting we headed back to the Atlanta area.  One of our favorite places to stop is in Gaffney, S.C.  Strawberry Hills Farms.  For their delicious hand-dipped ice cream!  We were not disappointed this time.

We stayed the night in a Hampton Inn in Alpharetta, GA, north Atlanta.  We had a Zone Conference there on Tuesday and it was easier to stay there than to drive an extra 3-4 hours to Peachtree City and back the next morning.  We have a nice view out our 5th floor hotel room.

And look what we found as we arrived at Zone Conference.....checking those cars first thing before the meeting even starts.

Sister Bennion, the Mission President's wife, always has a missionary choir sing during the conference.  And they only get to practice for about 45 minutes prior to the conference starting.  They are actually pretty good too!

Lunchtime is perfect time for those Zone Conference fotos.  Before any food is served.

Elder/Dr. Allgaier sees 'patients' during the lunch hour.  Here the elders line up and wait for their turn to see the Doctor and eat their food while they wait!  They don't seem to mind the wait with a plate of food!!

On Friday we had our regular oil change at the Nalley Honda in Jonesboro, GA.  Not too far from our apartment in Peachtree City.  The folks are used to seeing us come in.  Elder/Dr. always sets up his 'portable office' and can get a lot accomplished while we are there....usually takes at least 1 1/2 hours....because they always wash and clean the inside of our car as well as the oil change.  Thank goodness this is a nice service they provide because our car surely needs it!  Notice the beautiful orchard on the table!

Janette is the sweet gal who works in sales at Nalley who put the plant on the table.  She felt that we come there enough that we should have a little decoration!  Why not!!

Saturday morning it was back up to North Carolina.  This time NO Zone Conferences.  We were going to attend the Goins Family Reunion.  We love having so much family in our mission.

This is the 'road' leading down to the pottery studio where we were going to pick up a couple of Pilot Mountain pottery that Sylvia Lawson made for us.  We had NOT expected to find the studio in such a remote mountain place.

 This is Sylvia's log cabin home.  Our directions were to walk across the back patio and over to the studio where we would find her working on the 2nd floor.  We were told to just head that direction!  And so we did......

And there is the studio.....2nd floor.....really a cool place, tucked back in the deep woods!!!!  Reminded us of the 'Swiss Family Robinson' home!!!

This is Sylvia Lawson and her studio.  We love her pottery.  It has a Pilot Mountain scene on it.

As we were traveling around some of the back-country roads, we found these tobacco fields.....ready to harvest!  They were numerous in the ones we saw.....kind of like the cotton fields in the south-south!

Saturday night we got to meet a cousin, Sharon Perdue and her husband, Lester, for dinner at the Sagebrush Steak House.  This gorgeous tree was to the side of the restaurant.  Couldn't resist picking a few leaves!

We always enjoy getting together with cousins whenever we can.  One of the great blessings of serving our mission here in 'my country'!!

After dinner we drove downtown Mt. Airy (also known as Mayberry), parked our car on one end and walked up and down Main Street to get our walk in for the day.  We are almost at the 46 miles for Jonathan goal for the month....celebrating what would have been Jonathan's 46th birthday.  AND this was his actual Birthday....October 24th!!

Sunday, after attending church in the Mt. Airy Ward we headed to Francisco to the Goins Reunion.  Chelsa and her little daughter were there to greet us!!  We haven't seen her in a few years.  It was fun to catch up with her for a minute.

Wayne was in charge of the GOINS FAMILY TREE CHART!!!  Everyone always enjoys this little 'activity' and finding out who belongs to who and how we all fit in.  It is GREAT.

We headed over to the Frederick Goins grave site with a few of the cousins.  This was my great-great grandfather.  And his wife Mary.  Left to right are:  Danny Goins, Me, Mary Wall, Hazel (Mary and Hazel are sisters and Danny is Mary's son) and Richard Goins.

We then went to visit my grandma Knight's gravesite located not too far from the first grave yard.

As we were headed out of Mt. Airy, N.C. we drove down to Jonesville, N.C. where we will spend 2 nights in the Hampton Inn.  These gorgeous fall colors were waiting to greet us.

There you have it.....another week completed!  Mercy, we just keep going like the little Ever-ready Bunnies that we think we are but are getting too old for this fast pace!  Well, we don't have time to think about that because there are just too many things to do.  We LOVE our mission.  We are working hard while we are doing these things that we call the 'blessings' are serving a mission.....Have a great week everyone!

October 18, 2015

WOWZER......WHAT A WEEK!!!!  Did we really get this much done this past week?  I think I am pooped!

To end up last Sunday night, October 11th, Elder/Dr. Allgaier has been having problems with his office chair in 'his office' in our apartment.  Elder Norland and Elder Parkin dropped by tonight to see what they could do.  Lookie there.....they got it fixed!!!  Way to g Elders!

Monday morning early, it was off to NORTH CAROLINA RALEIGH MISSION!!!  This will be our first Zone Conferences with the new Mission President and his wife.....President and Sister James.

We LOVE being with our missionaries.  This is Sister Olive!  She is great.  We knew her cousin, Elder Olive, in the Georgia Atlanta Mission.  He recently finished his mission and returned home.  She had me post this foto on Facebook since Elder Olive and I are 'friends'.  He saw it and got the message of 'HELLO' from Sister Olive.  I love our mission!!  Sister Olive had to have emergency surgery almost a year ago.  We drove up to the hospital to visit her and spent 2 nights in Dunn, N.C. where she was.  We wanted to make sure she was doing ok.  She had to go home for recovery when she was able to but she came right back out as soon as she was cleared!  SO good to see her doing well.

The North Carolina Raleigh Mission got 'black boxes' this week....it was quite the process!!!  This makes a total of 4 of our 9 missions so far to get them.

One of the Zone Conferences this week was held at the chapel right next to the Raleigh Temple.  We LOVE when we get to come here.  Unfortunately, the temple was closed this day so we didn't get to do any proxy work.  At least we got to be there.

YES, there are cotton fields in North Carolina as well as Georgia and South Carolina.  We absolutely LOVE the cotton fields in the south.  And this is the perfect harvest time when the soft cotton balls are just ripe and easy to see!!!

When we finished our Zone Conferences on Thursday, we headed to our Hampton Inn hotel in Jonesville, N.C. which is west of Winston Salem.  This little town is in the middle of absolutely NOWHERE!!!  And this Hampton Inn is the GEM of the area!!!  We could not believe how amazing the fall decorations were both inside and outside.  This is just a little sample of what they had.  They really outdid themselves!  They are the #1 in our books!!

On Friday, we drove over to Winston-Salem to visit the Old Salem.  I had grown up with always visiting Winston-Salem because my grandma and grandpa Knight lived there.  I was used to seeing the Wachovia Building....a real landmark for the area.  Today it was standing there looking pretty!!

We also thoroughly enjoyed our visit to Old Salem.....Dad found an old map of Savannah, of all places!  He was thrilled!!!  And especially since they gave it to him for a real bargain price!!  Made him even happier.

They have a bakery in Old Salem!!  AND guess what they had.....yupper!  Sugar Cake!!!  LOVE it.  We were hungry so we sat a minute and munched away at it.  Call it lunch and call it good!!

 On Saturday morning we drove from Jonesville to Boone, N.C. so we could visit with my cousin Gary Willard and his wife Gail.  The fall foliage was at it's PEAK as we pulled into Boone.....

Once we got to their home we hopped in their car and we headed to a festival called the Valle Cruces Festival.  It was a fairly big festival and a gazillion people were there.  And it was a gorgeous day.  And it was C.O.L.D.!!!  Wayne borrowed a coat from Gary and Gail's son that was at their home.

We thoroughly enjoyed the Valle Cruces Festival held.....in the VALLEY!  Thousands of people were there to enjoy the day with us on this Gorgeous Fall Day.

We found some BRUNSWICK STEW being served right there.  It was pretty good.  They even had a semi-recipe for it!!

When we finished at the festival we drove around the area some so we could see more foliage.  We drove up on the Skyline Drive to the Moses Cone Lookout.  WOW was that THE place to go for a great view.  The foto just doesn't do it justice but it will give a good idea.  Again, note the gorgeous day!

This is the Moses Cone House that we visited inside with lots of local artisan goodies.  Gail and I stayed inside to do a little shopping!

Wayne and Gary decided to come back outside and sit and wait for us.  They really didn't like the shopping thing!

Gary and Gail's home sits on a golf course and a beautiful little pond.  With gorgeous trees....such as this one.  Notice Gary's birdhouse in the foreground.

What a GREAT Restaurant this was......and a cute name at that!

 Gail and Gary made dinner reservations at the Over Yonder Restaurant in Valle Cruses, neighboring to Boone.  Oh my goodness was it ever good.  We all four had the meatloaf with butter beans and sweet potato casserole.  I want to go back again and have the same thing.  DELICIOUS!

This restaurant home dates back to 1861.  Somehow it survived through the Civil War.  Cool place with a lot of history!

Back at Gary and Gail's home......we spent the night there.  That was great because we got to spend time visiting.  Wayne, of course, had to work.  The 'connection' was a little spotty.  BUT, he found a 'spot' in the middle of the living room floor.  Hence, he sat his 'office' up there so he could 'connect'!!  You have to do what you have to do....sometimes.

Sunday morning we noticed the gorgeous view as the sun was rising over the mountain.  Notice the frost on the ground and the Canadian geese in the field with the reflection in the pond.

It was COLD but we climbed through a fence to get where we could have a selfie and a gorgeous view of that sunrise!  Worth it.

The leaves were falling like snowflakes!  Fall is definitely here in the mountains!

We attended the Boone Ward.  It was a great meeting.  Very friendly folks.  We hope we can come back here again.

The sister missionaries to my right and Katie to my left....a sweet gal who came to church for the first time here.  The Bishop is foto-bombing in the background!

And now we are back in Charlotte for meetings tomorrow in the N.C. Charlotte Mission Office.  We need to train a new mission nurse with the Mission President's wife being a part of the training.  

We surely love what we do on our mission.  It is very rewarding for us.  We are pooped but we are missionaries and we are supposed to be pooped!  Have a great week everyone....love you all!