Week of December 22 to 30

Sunday

I will start posting for my blog on Monday's now, so two Sundays are included in this post. All the details are in this weeks letter, so I'm just going to do a short blog.

I am trying to change habits! I was so good at taking pictures for the blog, but now there is so much I am doing that I don't take pictures of. I will try and remember to take more pictures this week.

Last Sunday we finally got to go to church and it was wonderful. I taught all the children in the older primary, which were 3 girls, and we brought 2 of them. So it is a much smaller primary than you kids go to. There are 3 children in the younger primary and 2 children in the nursery.

I will try and take a picture of the church house for next week.

This is a beautiful house just around the corner from where we live.

This is an old school on the corner. Now it is apartments, but it is very well kept.

The view out our kitchen window. The snow has melted, but notice all the moss on the branches of the tree and green grass. 

Our green grass - almost looks like spring!

Christmas Eve

It was hard to take a picture, but there are paper sacks with lighted candles in them all up and down both sides of our street. It was amazing to see. The whole street looked so beautiful. We really live in a very Christian community. There are 4 churches within just a few blocks of where we are.

The view of Albany from one of the homes we were Christmas caroling at. It just doesn't capture the beauty. See my weekly letter for the details of what we did and the yummy Danish food we ate. Prepared by Sister Gibson's sister-in-law who flew in from Denmark along with her family.

Merry Christmas to One and All

This is the church where we spent most of the day on Christmas. It was a wonderful experience and so fun to feed people a Christmas dinner. See our weekly letter for more details.

 I sent this picture to Ellen and Mike and they sent me one the tree at home.

On our way to Catskill we saw this bulldozer with reindeer and Santa. We just couldn't pass it up, so on the way home we stopped and took a picture of it. 

Hope all our grandkids who love trucks and cars like it! 

We love you all very much. A mission is certainly a growing experience. I will try and take more pictures for next week's post.

Happy New Year

Oh my, I remember all the goal setting we did at New Year's time during our interviews on Sunday. There is a lot to be said, though, about reflecting and recommitting to the important things in life. 

May we spend time in setting not only temporal goals, but also spiritual goals.

Think about a goal of personally rereading the Book of Mormon this year. 

Week of December 15, 2013

Sunday to Monday (and some of Saturday night)

Since Joe & Tesha left Saturday about noon to go home, but got a flat tire about 45 minutes away. By the time the tire got fixed it was dark, so they came back and stayed until Monday. It was great. (Not that they got a flat tire, but that we got more time with them.

I wasn't going to get a tree, but since I knew they were coming back we got a small one to set up.

Zach, Tesha, and Ben

 I was in a hurry and didn't read the box. I didn't know it was white until we opened it, but oh well, it's still pretty.

Opening a puzzle so we will have something to do.

More stories!

Where am I on this pillow?

Sunday, church was cancelled because of the snow. Our branch covers a lot of area. In traveling in it, I feel like we are up in Park City or something. It feels like the tops of the mountains, but the elevation isn't very high. We are just in what looks like the mountains.

We got a lot of snow, so we took pictures on Monday morning.

It's not like at home where people only have a few miles to get to church. Many of the members would have over 20 miles to go on little country roads. Come to find out, though, Joe & Tesha's church was cancelled also. It was a lot of snow everywhere.

Zach helping Dad shovel

Ben's turn

So deep!

Tesha helping Zach

More snuggle time

Zach loves "Do as I'm Doing"

Tuesday

After we go to the library or the post office, we turn down this road. It runs right along the Hudson River and there is a park there. Dad said the Indian name for it means, "The river where water goes two ways." Sometimes it is flowing in one direction and sometimes the other depending on the tide of the ocean.

Wednesday - Saturday

It seems like all the days blend in to each other. We visited a nice brother, Walter Kruppenbacher, with the Elders. He is about 85, and while the Elders shoveled his walk, we visited. He said he wished he could go to a Family History Center before he dies. He knows so little about his family, not even all his siblings for sure, never name grandparents. We asked him for the names of his parents. This was on Thursday, so on Friday we went to the library. (I am missing my internet almost as much as my food storage.) Oh, we had so much fun. Dad looked on his mom's line and I looked on his dad's line. I found his parents and grandparents in the census records with their families. The most excited was finding a passport application of his grandfather. It gave so much information. It even had a picture of him! I can't wait to take all the information to him tomorrow (Sunday). It will be so wonderful to give him the gift of his family. He has a strong testimony, he just can't get around much, so we will go and see him.

Catskill downtown. I love the feeling of 'old' that exists everywhere. 

I love you all very much. Hopefully by Christmas or the day after I will have everything figured out with the phone. I think I downloaded something from Skype so I can use my phone for Skype. I'm afraid we would be quite the disturbance here at the library trying to Skype everyone. 

Tomorrow we get to go to church for the first time and that will be good. 

We took around plates of goodies to our neighbors today and that felt good. We really do have some nice neighbors. Our landlords said they had a good respect for our church and loved listening to the Tabernacle Choir Christmas program. They are very nice people.

I can't believe Christmas is next week. If I can't see you, I will talk to everyone. 

Remember, we are serving Christmas Dinner with Christ's Church on Christmas from 11-5:30.

Call when it is convenient for you, or we will call you that day or the next. 

I sent my weekly letter off today also.

Week of 8 Dec 2013, NEW YORK!

Sunday
We went to church at Independence, Missouri. It was good to not spend the day in the car. We were ready for Sunday. Sacrament meeting was all about Joseph Smith, including the talks. It made a difference because of where we were. Just being here brings to memory all the suffering and the faithfulness of the saints. We had dinner with Randall (Pete & Tammy's friend). We had a nice visit, did a little sight seeing and then went to Janice, U. Bill's daughter, to stay with her. Billy was there also and all their children. They each have 4 children and about the same ages and they were having so much fun. We got there just in time to watch the Christmas devotional. They got so excited when they saw their Grandpa on TV! It was so good to see and visit with them.
Chloe (Bill's) Sarah (Janice's), Bella (Bill's) and Jamie (Janice's) 

Jessica, William, Bill, and Janice

After prayers - It almost reminded me of our gathering, but not quite as noisy.

Mississippi River

Monday

We traveled up to Aurora, Illinois to stay with Lars. We wanted to see what we could see in Springfield, but we didn't have much luck. This is the capitol at Springfield, but we didn't see much of anything with Lincoln which is what we wanted to see.

We got to Lars, my brother Paul's youngest son, and LeAnn's house shortly after 6:00. We had a wonderful evening. After dinner LeAnn wanted to hear about Capener genealogy. We visited and told stories from our Grandparent's book. I gave them a digital copy. They loved it so much. They know about Ellen's family, but not Paul's side. They especially loved the story of William Capener making the rocking chair to fit the woman who sat in the snowbank so he could get the right size. We talked for over 2 hours. 

I forgot to taker pictures of the kids. Their oldest daughter is Kazia is on a mission in Washington, Anja is a Senior, Leif is a freshman, and Kai (below) is in 5th grade. 

Tuesday
We drove to Kirtland. It took us longer than we thought and the visitor's center would have been closed by the time we got there.

Wednesday
We went to Kirtland. I could hardly believe I was here. We went to the LDS visitor's center first and went to Newel K. Whitney's store. I felt the spirit so strong. In the room where the Prophet Joseph Smith received so many revelations. There was also the room where the first school of the prophets was held. There was just such a spirit. It was all a witness to me again of the truthfulness of the restoration of the gospel. The sister missionaries also told us the Kirtland Temple had never been 'undedicated.' It was interesting to think of that. The guide also told about when Pres. Monson had come to see the temple. He had wanted to sit up in the seat where Joseph Smith would have sat. He said, "You are the prophet! you can sit wherever you want." I thought that was cool since he is not a member of the LDS church. He was really a good tour guide. You could feel the love and reverence he had for the Temple.
There was a beautiful display of international Christmas nativity scenes. I took the picture for
Sheila, so I should put it on Facebook.

Revelation Room

School of the Prophets. It was much smaller than I thought. This is all the rows there are.

Front of the School of the Prophets

Joseph and Emma's room

Kitchen

The Kirtland Temple

We traveled to about 30 min. outside of Palmyra. Here we are stopped in traffic. We were stopped on the freeway for over 1/2 an hour. It was very slow traveling. They closed the road on the other side. It finally got a little better and we got to the motel about 7:30 instead of 5:30.

Thursday

We woke up early and headed for Palmyra. We were only 30 min. away, so we got there before the visitor’s center was open. We drove up to the Hill Cumorah. There was a wind, so it was freezing, but so neat to see. It was good to just think for awhile what my life would be like without the gospel and the Book of Mormon.

We then drove to the Palmyra Temple to do a session there. There is a large window after you enter in on the other side and you see the sacred grove from that window in the temple. It was wonderful to just pause for a while and ponder about where we were.

Palmyra Temple

After the temple, we went to the Joseph Smith’s log house and then the farm house. It was like walking back in time. People worked so hard on the farm. Their whole family gave so much. The pictures will tell the story.

Joseph Smith Log House Kitchen

Bedroom where the Angel Moroni came (not necessarily Joseph's bed - there were 2)

 From the outside

Fences - they would split the logs, stack them this way and then they could move them without too much trouble.

Hearth in the Joseph Smith frame house where he hid the golden plates one night.

 Kitchen in the Joseph Smith frame house.

 The Frame House

Tree they believe was planted at the death of Joseph Smith's older brother, Alvin

 Hollow tree logs where grain & things were stored.

Up in the loft where Joseph hid the plates one time. He first hid them in the floor boards, went in the house and then felt they needed to be moved. He went out to the barn, got them and put them in the loft. When the mob came, they tore up the floor boards looking for them, but never looked in the loft.

We then went to the sacred grove. The tour guide ended and we went into the grove ourselves. We were the only people there, so we had it to ourselves. We were each able to pray out loud in the grove. My heart was filled with gratitude and desire to serve Heavenly Father. I know He and His Son appeared to Joseph Smith. I know the restoration of the gospel came through Joseph Smith and this is His church today. This burns in my heart and I know it is true. I know the Book of Mormon is true and it has and does continue to be my guide in life. I am so thankful and blessed to be living in this exciting time. I want to be a part of His latter-day work. I love you all very much. You and your happiness is very important to me. Remember, we may be a ways away in distance, but not in contact. We still need and want to be a support to you.

Meeting the Mission President and arriving at our new home!

Yeah!!! Joe & Tesha and boysJ

There was always a sense of relief when you sent me the picture taken of you and the mission president and I knew you had arrived safely.

We got a few more supplies and drove to our new home:

7 A Elm Street

Coxsackie, New York 10251

A few hours latter - Joe & Tesha & boys came. It was wonderful!

Enjoy the pictures (notice the apartment in the background)

and enjoy them at Christmas Time. We will sure miss you all!

Our kitchen in the background - This is a newly remodeled dentist office, so we are the first to live in it. It is way bigger than I would ever thought.

Oh, it was so good to see Joe & Family

Poor Joe, we needed blinds put up throughout the apartment, so he did it for us.
Our bedroom

Spare bedroom

Eating area - Zach and Ben waiting for the blessing.

Singing before going to bed - "Do as I'm Doing"

 Brushing teeth - Notice little Leah is getting bigger

 Rest of the bathroom and washer and dryer

 Bedtime!

View of our backyard out the kitchen window. It is amazing. The Hudson River is just beyond a little way. We had fun watching the squirrels.

They celebrated a partial Christmas so they didn't need to take it all out to Utah

Christmas ornaments that Tesha made from shells they gathered - so creative and beautiful

They loved the scarves you kids finger crocheted for them!

Joe and Tesha practiced the song they are singing at church tomorrow. However, they just called with a flat tire and it may take a bit of time to fix it. They may be back tonight!

View from our front door looking across the street.

I love you all so much. We need to go. We are picking up the young elders and they are going to show us around. I'm going to write a letter, but it will have to wait until tomorrow.

I wish somehow I could transfer the spirit we felt in Palmyra to all of you. The pageant is next summer!