May 15, 2016

Our 2nd week in the North Carolina Charlotte Mission allowed us, as you remember from the previous post, to be able to stay in Mt. Airy for the weekend.  On Monday morning we headed over to Gene's to get some ground steak sandwiches for later.  And to see my cousin, Freddy Hiatt!!

When we arrived in our hotel later in the day, our little cleaning lady had left us a sweet note.  She is the sweetest thing.  I made a little crochet heart for her....with my own note!!

We absolutely LOVE having 'cousin time' whenever we can get it.  Monday night was one of those times.  These are GOINS cousins.  Linda on the far right, beside of me, and Richard on the far left (with his wife Linda next to Wayne).  We went to the Cracker Barrel.  We had so much fun.  Surely love our family!!!

On Tuesday morning we headed back down to the Charlotte area.  On our way we decided to stop at the BETHABARA Moravian settlement just outside of Winston-Salem.  Since I have ancestors who were Moravian, I like to learn all I can about them.  In fact, it was my Great-Great Grandfather and Great-Great Grandmother (Dr. James Dickerson Dean and Esther Hiatt Dean) who were Moravian before joining the Mormon Church in Mt. Airy, N.C. in 1882!!!  How cool is that.  While we were visiting this quaint little village, there was a large school group on a field trip.  It was fun to watch them.  We happened to be in the gift shop area when the teacher gave instructions for their eating lunch.  She told the students that they would go in an orderly line to the bus, get their lunch and sit in the picnic area and wait until everyone was there.  They were NOT to begin eating their lunch until everyone was there and the blessing on the food had been said!!!!  WHOA!!!  I thought to myself....I couldn't believe my ears when she told them that.  ONLY in the south would you find that being said!!!  I LOVE IT!!!!  I LOVE being in the south.  That direction would NEVER, EVER fly anywhere else I do believe!!!

When we left Winston-Salem, we headed on down to Charlotte.  We decided to take a few minutes a visit Billy Graham!!  Well, at least his 'library' as it is called.  It is quite impressive and very friendly folks.  This barn-looking building is the library.

As we toured around, we came to this room.  This is a podium that Billy Graham used for many, many, many of his sermons.  He would carry it around with him on his travels.  I felt like I should begin preaching!  

I was able to finish this doily one evening in one of our hotel stays.  I kind of like this one.  It is NOT perfect....but I still like it.

Elder/Dr. Allgaier does such a GREAT job with his power point presentations to the missionaries in Zone Conference.  A lot of great advice....if only they would listen....AND remember these instructions.  Oh well...

While in Zone Conference in Greensboro, I decided to call Norm and Linda Lindsay.  I knew they lived close by.  Turns out they were less than a mile from the church!  They were excited we were there and slipped over for a few minutes!!  SO good to see them again.  They are life-long friends from way back in Maryland days when they used to live there.  Their kids and our kids basically grew up together.  Some of them remain friends to this day.

President and Sister Alexander are such wonderful leaders in the Charlotte Mission.  We feel we have developed such great friendships with them.  They have invited us to come to their home when they finish their mission!!  We just may do that!

Now, this is the most UNIQUE 'car czar' outfit I have personally seen in all 9 of our missions.  And why not wear your bathrobe!!  Elder Garlick says it cuts down on the laundering of his suits.  I thought it was just so cute.

When we finished Zone Conference on Friday, we drove part way down the road toward our trip back to Peachtree City.  We actually stayed in a little town of Shelby, N.C.  It is about 5 miles from the Kings Mountain National Park.  We have driven past these 'brown signs' a GAZILLION times.  This time....we STOPPED.  It was a great visit here.  Glad we finally got to see it.

Not far down the I-85 is our FAMOUS peach water tower.  We LOVE this peach.  

AND...we know that right by the PEACH is our most favorite Ice Cream place.  I got black walnut again!  I love that....

Sister Mason is our mission nurse here in the Georgia Atlanta Mission.  I made her a doily and gave it to her at church today.  We both got the 'yellow' memo!!!

Our District Leader, Elder Orellana and his companion, Elder Black asked if they come come visit us this afternoon.  Sure, we said.  We love our missionaries!!  They are so sweet.  They will be helping us move in 1 1/2 weeks......or at least loading the truck for us.

They actually wanted to come visit us last Sunday, Mother's Day.  When they called, we told them they were welcomed to come see us but that they would have to go through 3 missions to get to where we were....Mt. Airy, N.C.  They said they should probably not do that.  I told them to keep the roses alive and they could give them to me today.  And, they surely did.  They are barely alive....but they are alive!  

Well, that concludes yet one more round of Zone Conferences.  We have Zone Conferences again this week in the Georgia Macon Mission.  We are going to miss our mission so much!!  What will we ever do!!  We love the support each of you, our family, has shown us.  Your love and support have meant the world to us.  Thank you!!  We feel very blessed indeed!

Sunday, May 10, 2016

And a HAPPY MOTHER'S DAY to our wonderful daughter and daughters-in-law!   As I recap the week, I wanted to start out with that little (BIG) thought!

We were so glad with the Elders came over to our apartment to catch up a minute before we took off again for another week of travel.  We LOVE our missionaries.....and especially those that live close by!

Dad got quite the surprise in the mail this week!!!  He got a GOLDMINE!  These are letters from 50 years ago when he served as a young missionary in Finland.  He had written these to his Mission President, President Asplund and his wife.  Weekly letters!  Actually handwritten since computers had not been invented then.  Sister Asplund had been saving them all these years and decided it was time to return them to the rightful missionary!  We are so thankful she had been keeping them...what a treasure.

Not only is it going to be hard to leave Lucy and Blackie behind when we go home, but Tiger as well.  They all seem to love hanging out with us.

On Wednesday we headed out for the North Carolina Charlotte Mission where we would spend 2 weeks.  I have my traveling shoes on and ready to go.

Meet Sister Hill (L) and Sister Alexander (R), Mission President's wife.  We love our mission and all of the great people we get to work with.  Sister Hill is really close to one of the gals that works for Becky.  Small world in the church.

Most of my yarn has been packed in boxes.  However, I can't just sit and do nothin'!  SO, I have kept the smaller type of yarn out because it is easier to pack around.  I was able to finish this doily in the hotel during one of our stays this week.

We get to see a LOT of luncheon provided by LOTS of Relief Society sisters.  I am always amazed at how unique the decorations are.  They want to make the lunch-time-experience so nice for the missionaries.  I found this one to be very festive....Cinco de Mayo theme going on with this one.

The Stake Relief Society had an activity one evening where the sisters wrote their testimonies in a Book of Mormon.  As a result, they had a LOT of Books of Mormon ready for the missionaries to deliver to investigators.  Very impressive.  That is a LOT of Books of Mormon right there.

Rather than drive 7 hours back to PTC for the weekend, we decided to drive 2 hours up to Mt. Airy.  We love that this is part of our mission.  And we decided to walk around the base of the KNOB of Pilot Mountain.  As a young gal, I walked ON TOP of the knob.  That is no longer possible because it is not allowed.  BUT you can walk around the base.  Very neat walk.  Next time any of you are there, it is an easy walk and you need to do that.  We'll do it with you!!  :-)  The views are amazing.

Naturally, a trip to Mt. Airy would NOT be the same without going to Jean's for that fantastic GROUND STEAK SANDWICH!!!  Oh my heavens, it was so good!!

We got to go to dinner with Sharon and Lester on Saturday evening.  Somehow we got to talking about PEANUT BUTTER and the fact that Sharon is stocking up on it!!  It seemed funny at the time....Lester even made a sign for Sharon to hold up "Will work for Peanut Butter"!!  We sure love getting cousin time when we can.

Have no fear.....I 'found' another pattern I am working on!!

MOTHER'S DAY TENDER MERCY!!  Sharon found some old fotos she was going through.  This one was labeled on the back "Mother's Day 1999"!  This would have been my mother's last Mother's Day because she passed away 6 months later.  I told Sharon that it would be so cool for she and I to try and recreate this foto of our mother's!  We decided we would do that after church on Sunday.  We knew we would not have a round table to sit at but we would figure it out.......

........It was announced at the end of Sacrament Meeting that the Relief Society sisters and young women would meet together in the cultural hall instead of in the Relief Society Room.  We thought that to be 'interesting' but, oh well.  As we entered the cultural hall we were so surprised to find the round tables set up with table cloths and napkins on the tables!  There were our round tables.....just like our mother's had sat at back in 1999!!!  SO....we were able to recreate the foto of our mothers after all.  We may not have had drinking glasses but we had deseret cups.  Notice how closely the colors are to what our mother's were wearing!  We both felt our mothers had had a little hand in our Mother's Day Tender Mercy.....17 years later.

 Ara Jean Hiatt is one of many cousins in the ward.  Sh was a Visiting Teacher to both of our mothers.  She is getting up in age.  We decided we wanted a foto with her.  So glad we got it.  She is such a great lady!!

After church I wanted to drive to the cemetery where my great-great grandparents are buried.  I wanted a foto of me at their tombstones.  It is not that far outside of Mt. Airy.  Dr. James Dickerson Dean and Esther Hiatt Dean.  They are the first ones of my family to join the church in Mt. Airy in 1872.

And since today is MOTHER'S DAY, I wanted to do a little layout so I could remember it.  It has been a good day.  I have either talked to or heard from each of our children!  I feel so blessed to have our eternal family.  Are we perfect?  Absolutely not!  No one is perfect.  Are we trying?  I surely hope so.  I can not imagine any of us not being able to be together for all eternity.  I am grateful for the Gospel and the hope that that brings to us that we CAN be together forever.....if only we keep trying, repenting, and trying some more.  We need to love and support each other....and lift each other up.  That is what the Savior did....that is what we need to do.  Live by HIS example.

I love each of you.  Our mission is drawing to a close in just 3 short weeks.  Are we ready to go home....yes, and no.  But, here we come anyway!  BUT...we still have work to do in our last 3 weeks....so we need to stay focused!  Love y'all....have a GREAT week!

Sunday, May 1, 2016

ANOTHER full week.....and it will NOT be slowing down for us our last 4 weeks in the mission field!  Thank goodness....we don't want it to.  We still have toooooo much to get done!

We were off to Tennessee Nashville Mission this week.  Lucy is not sure we wants to let us go or either she wanted to go with us!

We had just been through this same area 2 weeks ago when we were in the GREAT Kentucky Louisville Mission!  It is beautiful through here.  (By The Way.....the GREAT KENTUCKY LOUISVILLE MISSION was thus called by President Hinckley a number of years ago.  When he was visiting there he started calling it the GREAT Kentucky Louisville Mission and it has stuck ever since....as told to us by the mission President, President Brough!)  SO, we call it the GKLM!

It was fun to check into our Hampton Inn Hotel when we got to Hopkinsville, KY and recognized our check-in person and he recognized us!!!  He remembered that we like those delicious candy bars made in Kentucky.  He gave us ONE of each kind!!!  Now, I call that GREAT service!!!

Even though we were in Kentucky, this is a part of the Tennessee Nashville Mission.  We love Elder and Sister Logan.  They are serving as Military Relations Missionaries here.  They are from Mt. Airy, N.C. in our ward there!!  Small world in the church.

As we left Hopkinsville, we realized there was a Jefferson Davis Monument that we would drive past on our way back down to Nashville.  We just had to stop, of course.  It is so similar to the Washington Monument in D.C......only not as tall, about 2/3 the size.  Very cool.  And, YES, we rode the elevator to the top.

Tuesday night we got the foto below from President Brough, Kentucky Louisville Mission of one of his elders who had a bike accident.  He was in the ER and President Brough was concerned.  His arm was broken and not sure about head injuries.  We told President Brough we were in Nashville and that we would come up the next day instead of going to Zone Conference.  That is just the kind of thing we do when situations like this come up.  This Elder said we could share this.....to maybe help other people avoid bike accidents!

The Elder was doing much better and found to have no head trauma....just superficial injuries.  Here Elder/Dr. Allgaier is cleaning up the swollen eye a little bit.  He felt right at 'home' taking care of him'.  I knew he was itching to do that!!!

And.....I just sat in the corner patiently waiting to find out when the surgery on his broken wrist was going to take place.  We finally made it back down to Nashville about midnight.  Ready for Zone Conference the next morning.

 These cute sisters asked for a selfie.....and I had to oblige!!  (This was actually taken that morning prior to our taking off for the hospital in Louisville!)

 When we hand our camera/phone to any missionaries to take fotos of us, we always have to expect a few selfies!!!  We LOVE seeing those fotos at the end of the day when we go through our fotos!

And here is the foto of President and Sister Andersen that they took for us.  We love the Andersen's.  We will surely miss them....they also finish their mission and will be headed home the end of June.

At the end of the week of Zone Conferences we headed back down toward Georgia where we would stay for the night....longer drive than we wanted to do at night to drive all the way back to the PTC!  This is sunset over the Tennessee River.

Look was so happy to have us back home......LUCY and the Sister Missionaries.  They all made a visit to us Friday afternoon.

On Saturday we decided to slip up to the Atlanta Temple.  This is probably our last time to be able to come here before we head home because of the travels we will be doing between now and the end of the month.

We got a text from President and Sister Foote (Georgia Atlanta Mission) inviting the Senior Missionaries to the mission home for a potluck dinner and games on Saturday evening.  Why not, so we bagged the packing, etc. and spent the evening there.  It was fun.  Again, we gave my iPhone camera to the AP's and asked them to take a foto of the group....and we got a bonus foto of them!!!  LOVE IT!!  Elders Dimanche and Leavitt.

It is a nice group foto of some of the senior couples and President and Sister Foote (far left) in the mission home after a fun evening.

We decided to attend church in the Franklin Branch today.  The last time we attended it was a Group! They are growing.  How fun to be back here.  And, they bought a house and are using that as their church building for now.  They originally met in a members home.....they outgrew that quickly.

Tonight for dinner, we were invited over to Nancy and Aaron Allen's home.  They are a great family.  We first met them in Kingsport, TN when we attended church there.  We have gotten to be good friends with them.  

This is Nancy and Aaron.  The dinner was great....chicken tacos and a strawberry torte for dessert!

 And, thus, we have ended yet another week......fast paced at that.  And now we are headed up to our beloved North Carolina on Tuesday morning.  We LOVE our mission!!!  Love y'all....and thank you SO much for your love and support!