Trees, Branches and Zone Conference

I love this photo of President Nelson, flanked appropriately by Presidents Oaks and Eyring.  Our friend Sister Briggs found this on Pinterest and shared a copy with us.
Bright and early on Memorial Day, we drove to Liberty Jail to water flowers.  Each set of missionaries drove to water flowers at a different site even though we were supposed to have the holiday off.  We want our sites to remain beautiful.
When we returned to Independence, we used our truck to help the "tall" branch elders exchange mattresses with another set of elders so Elder Rowley at 6'8" could have a longer bed where his legs didn't hang off the end.  They did the lifting.  We provided the transportation.  Elder Rowley has been told he can take the bed with him for future transfers so we will probably be enlisted to help again.

After we changed clothes and cleaned up, we decided to visit the World War I Museum in Kansas City.  We felt it was a very appropriate way to remember this veterans who have served our country throughout the years.  We honor them.  It was a scorching hot day, so being in an air conditioned but fairly crowded museum was helpful.  Steve didn't love all the people, but it turned out to be okay.  We were able to view the films and see pretty much everything we wanted to.

We opted not to wait in the rather long line which formed to go up the Liberty tower.  We had a wonderful view of Kansas City from the plaza level.

Note the Kansas City skyline and the railroad depot in the background.  It was very sobering to hear the stories of those who served in WWI.  That war truly changed the traditional European monarchies, and the control of the world by a relatively few colonial powers.  The United States made its place as a world leader.

On display outside of the museum was this helicopter from the Vietnam War.

Monday evening we met with the senior missionary couples at President and Sister Love's home.  Everyone brought delicious food to share.  The testimonies of the seniors who will be returning home within the next 60 days were very touching and faith building.  The new couples introduced themselves.  Some couples have sacrificed much to serve the Lord.

Below is a picture of the group.

Tuesday we began by cutting up and removing trees branches from the Visitor's Center site.  It was a bit more challenging since our chain saws were stolen in the big break-in.  

Fortunately, our boss, Mark still had his chain saw in the truck he takes home each night so we were able to continue on and cut down dead trees at Platte City building and the Maryville chapels.  We spent the rest of the day working with Mark removing trees and hauling them to the big burn pile on his property.

On Wednesday morning, we had a command performance meeting with a couple of the higher-up administrators.  Brother Spilino from Salt Lake City and Jordan Bodily from Nauvoo met with us.  We were told that our historical sites will be under the direction of the Nauvoo FM director, Jordan Bodily.  That transition takes place immediately.  Other changes are yet to come.
Below is a picture of Jordan Bodily, Terry Spilino and Kevin Smith, our departing manager.

We made several trips to Mark's house north of St. Joseph, outside a little town called Amazonia. We switched the trailer to our truck after dropping off the first load and headed to Maryville.  A few minutes later, in Amazonia, we pulled over due to a problem with the trailer.  Somehow the hitch on our truck was missing a pin and no one had noticed.  We were so blessed that nothing serious happened with the heavy trailer and that we were still close to Mark's so he could run home and get another pin to fix the problem.  Whew!  It could have been a disaster.  As missionaries, we feel so blessed and watched over.  Heavenly Father really does answer our prayers.

Our shout out goes to our amazing daughter, Liberty on her 37th birthday, May 30.  We love you, Libbie!

Thursday, we removed trees from the area around the Far West temple site.  Steve and I made a trip into Cameron, a nearby town, to purchase chains for Mark's chain saw.  Later we drove back to Amazonia, to drop of a dump trailer load of trees and branches.  It was a long day but we traveled safely and made it home just in time to drop off the quilt I had been working on for Grandma Ann's 88th birthday at the post office.  We planned to mail it Tuesday but arrived back after the post office had closed.

This tulip quilt is to honor Ann for the many hours of service she has given to others over the years arranging flowers for weddings and special events.  She loves flowers.

On our way home from the shop, the elders texted us and asked if we could include one of their investigators, John Burgeson, for dinner.  By the way, can we pick him up in Kansas City.  Steve quickly cleaned up while I finished the dinner preparations.  Fortunately, I had done quite a bit of the preparation the night before.  He drove to pick up John and I finished the dinner.  

It actually turned out quite well.  I think that John enjoyed the dinner.  It was a good thing that I had cooked country ribs in the instant pot so they were extremely tender and the mashed potato dish and applesauce were easy to eat also because John didn't have any front teeth.

The moon was beautiful as it rose in the evening sky.  The photo of the neighbor's house doesn't even begin to showcase it's beauty.
The next morning we attended zone conference where we were taught many good principles by the young missionaries.  One of our branch elders, Elder Thompson, conducted the meeting.  Here were are before the meeting with Elder and Sister Larsen, and our sister missionaries, Sister Applionio and Sister Franco.  President and Sister Love also give us great counsel and bear strong and wonderful testimonies.

I love it when we sing "Called To Serve" to thank the hosting ward for a lovely lunch.

Saturday morning, we were encouraged by the mission office to attend a local strawberry festival.  The young missionaries assisted in setting up the booths and taking them down again afterward.  We were happy to support the event and enjoyed the arts and crafts booths, the vintage cars, the patriotic band and of course, the yummy strawberry treats.

After checking out the festival, we took our friends, the Briggs to see the Subtropolis, underground business caves.  With over 55,000,000 sq. feet of space, this business complex is amazing.  We saw even more of it than we did on our previous visit.  This time, we also saw the paintball venue.  We didn't go inside, but there were a lot of cars parked around the entrance.

Sunday we took a few photos of our missionaries after church.  The elders are so tall and the sisters are so short.  They are all pretty amazing.

That evening, we hosted several families from our branch for dinner.  Our group included the Roman's with their little boy, originally from Mexico City; the Marchan's, originally from Columbia; the Forsyths, senior missionaries from Riverton, Utah; and the Riley's, a young newly-wed couple from Utah who arrived in Kansas City this week for a 7 week internship.

We enjoyed all of our visitors and had plenty of good food to eat since most everyone brought something to share.  We squeezed around our table and used every dish in our house.  Good times!

 It can be a little stressful at times, preparing food for a large group.  However, we always feel that our efforts are worthwhile. Sharing a meal in someone's home seems to bring folks together.  We hope that it helps people in our branch feel welcome, wanted and needed.

Monday morning our first assignment was to check out the lights and necessary repairs at the Independence Visitor's Center.  Then we go out to the garden to water and tend the flowers.  Michael, a local missionary who has served this site and the temple office for 10 years works along beside us trimming bushes and removing over grown and dead bushes.  Here he finishes removing a particularly difficult low growing evergreen plant that had become woody and unsightly.  Thanks to Michael for his hard work.

Back at the shop, we helped clean out Kevin's car and then delivered it to the mission office to be used by two newly arrived Polynesian senior sisters who will be serving in one of the Independence wards that has a large Polynesian membership.
Then we were off to Far West to remove more dead trees and clean up after a massive wind storm.  We had never seen such a mess of branches, limbs, leaves and sticks all over the place.  We worked on cleaning up and the men worked on fixing issues with the sprinklers.  The Briggs arrived before the rest of us and were overwhelmed by the mess.  Sister Briggs prayed for some ministering angels  to help and right away a couple of mini-vans pulled up with a lot of children.  The kids asked if they could help pick up the branches.  Right after we arrived, some folks from Arkansas stopped.  That sister also offered to help us.  It was amazing how much it did help to have some extra hands and to know that members were willing to follow the Spirit and assist us.  We see many people every day, but this was the first time anyone has offered to help us.  Frankly, it was the first time we really needed help.  We worked hard for several hours to get the site looking nice again.  The short visits with helpers really did make a difference.  It's wonderful that Heavenly Father really listened to Sister Brigg's humble prayer and angels arrived right away.  Missions really help us appreciate our many blessings.