Mission: New Year, Lots Going On!

Christmas, and the heavy mail, is over.  The day after Thanksgiving the real estate people locked up our building.  The day after Christmas and every other week-day since, no such thing!  Even national holidays seem to not be locked-out days.  No problem.  We are here to work.  There is plenty to do.

Last week we received a new Church Service Missionary.  He will work three days a week in the office and will help Dear One with housing, plus he will handle technology issues.  He will also likely be a housing inspector.  The young missionaries have their apartments checked for health and safety issues every month.  So glad OUR apartment is not checked!  I always have too many projects going...

For example, the dining table still has some Christmas cards sitting on it. I have not gotten to sending them out.  There are leavings from making some birthday cards.  One part of the table has a decorating project, but I think I am just going to toss it. (I had purchased some large pine cones from Joann Fabrics and Crafts and put lots of peppermint fragrance on them to cover up the weak wimpy pumpkin pie fragrance.  Mistake.  Serious mistake.  Fortunately the peppermint oil smell went away within a week, but there they still are: sitting there on a sort of funky looking square wrinkled plate.  Of course, the peppermint smell was nowhere NEAR as difficult to handle as the onion fumes coming up from the apartment below.  Don't get me wrong, I LOVE onions, but they must be chopping TONS of them.  This has been going on for hours now.  Even Dear One's eyes are tearing up from the blast.)

Besides the projects on the table, there are projects on two of the three counters, then there is the desk/table where I am typing.  This is the library, Spanish language drill center, mission binder area so I can deal with requests for blessings at the various hospitals in the area.  Plus the laminator and a pile of laminating plastic are beside the computer.  Yes, there is room to work, just not attractive.

The little side table by the recliner has my mother's knitting bag (or what I think is my mother's bag), my knitting tools bag,   Elizabeth Zimmermann's Knitter's Almanac ( a book with a project every month for knitters to do) and a Barbara Walker Dictionary of Knitting Patterns-actually stitch patterns.  There also are a few newspaper ads for next weekend's specials at the closest grocery stores plus my phone and headset.

So, you can see why I would not want housing inspectors to come here.  It is bad enough with Dear One inspecting!  He does virtually all the cleaning, which is really nice of him since he is probably as tired as I am every night when we get home, especially after walking three miles at lunch time nearly every day.  Right now he is a very happy camper since we are almost three weeks into the "credit card month" and only have $236 on the card.  Impressive, what!!!  I have a good mind to get up early tomorrow morning and go to Winco for a mountain of fresh vegetables....BUT I am still trying to use up all the things we have on hand before getting more.

On the subject of Winco and vegetables,  we watched a lot of "Fat, Sick, and Nearly Dead" the other night, a documentary on NetFlix.  Two different men decided to take a real hand in getting their bodies back in order.  They did a juice fast for more than 60 days.  I like the idea but would have to go the smoothie route, (well, smoothie-for-supper route) since I cannot buy into tossing out all the fiber in the fruits and vegetables when you make juice.  I did make a smoothie yesterday...frozen banana, 6 frozen strawberries,  3/4 cup frozen blueberries, half a cup of leftover oatmeal and raisins breakfast cereal, plus 1-2 cups almond milk. It tasted pretty good and was more like fruity ice cream.  I had two bites.  It was good.  I just had already had my fill of other stuff so didn't eat more.  Dear One ate a big cup full yesterday then finished the rest when he got home from Church today.  That gave me a little while to make some pinto bean chili. (Which, by the way, turned out really tasty!)

Did I mention the Book of Mormon "Answers to Life's Questions" project?  Well, it is going well.  We made many many English stickers and a lot of Spanish ones, too.  Missionaries keep coming back to the office to request more stickers.  We had quite a few cases of Books of Mormon in English, Spanish, and Marshallese.  I started putting the stickers in them, then people in the office offered to help, then another missionary couple came up last week and finished them up.  We get more new cases next week, or the week after!  No problem. It is all the same work: serving wherever we are needed.

We have been here almost five months and love the work.  The tough part is when missionaries need to go home early.  It is so sad to see their sorrow.  We have had several go home lately.  There are health issues which need to be handled at home.  Whatever the reason these wonderful young people feel like failures, even though they gave the work their all for however long they were here.  They definitely were NOT failures.  They touched so many lives and made a difference.  I hope the same will be said of Dear One and me when we go home,  though we are expecting to stay our full 23 months.

It is my hope that everyone who reads these posts knows how much we love Our Savior and are so grateful for the opportunity to serve Him full time for these few months.  Whatever your faith, I hope you are giving it all you have and do your best to serve someone else every single day.  The tiniest smile can be such a boon to a struggling soul. Service is the key to a happy life.  Knowing that you are reading these messages makes me smile with love for you all.