Tuesday, October 24, 2017

Sunday, 22 Oct 2017

Monday, 9 Oct - Time for Margaret to go declutter one of the sister's houses.  While she was decluttering, Mike did the grocery shopping and some other errands.  Margaret worked on making shorts for the Christmas shoe box charity project later in the day.  A slow day for Elder Haley; although he did some more yard work late afternoon.

Tuesday, 10 Oct - Margaret worked on sewing more shorts.  She also made a mercy "taxi" run for one of the sisters.  Mike studied the scriptures quite a bit today.  We both went to the Primary activity in the afternoon and helped with memorizing some of the 13 Articles of Faith.  Then Mike worked on cutting up more of the yard waste while dinner was being prepared.  Margaret worked more on sewing shorts again into the evening.

NOTE - It is getting harder to keep up with the blog.  Missionary work comes first and that is taking a toll on the blog, plus the internet is slower than molasses in July (remember we are in Australia) for the past 2 weeks.  I was not made to be a journal keeping/blog keeping person.

Wednesday, 11 Oct - Talked with my mum this morning.  She still has Pauline as a house guest, but hopefully that will change next week.  It is really grand and generous of mum to take Pauline in, but they both need their space and have different life styles.   We met with Joseph & Decklin and read some more of the Book of Mormon with them.  They are really super great young men.  Elder Gibb & Elder Corpany came over for dinner and then we held DTM with the Coffs Harbour Elders via the phone.  The lesson portion was about what we learned/remembered from General Conference - a good thing to review.

Thursday, 12 Oct - Today was Heather & Kevin's anniversary.  We had a Branch Presidency meeting this evening and then Sister Haley & I met with the YW & YM.

Friday, 13 Oct - Friday the thirteenth - not the best of days, but not the worst.  We had to run one of the sisters to some appointments and I totally forgot that I was to be at the meetinghouse at 10am for a cleaning assignment - sheesh, what a dummy I am.  I got a text from the others and then zoomed (50 kph) over to meet them and get the work done. Tonight was branch movie night and we watched "The RM" which was a bit hokey, but I survived.

Saturday, 14 Oct - I administered a driver's test to a new missionary.  Margaret worked with the RS to finish stuffing shoe boxes for a local Samaritan Child Christmas charity project.  The Sisters filled 75 shoeboxes with clothes, school supplies, snack, health items - wow it was quite an amazing thing.  We joined in the transfer call that night, but all of us in Grafton stayed in Grafton.

Sunday, 15 Oct - We had District President Alfred and his wife as speakers in sacrament.  After the 3 hour block the branch had a pitch-in luncheon.  We dropped off our food and then climbed in the car (1 pm) and drove to Rhonda Crosbie's in Rouse Hill (Sydney suburb). We went down to Sydney for the Lems' farewell Family Home Evening at the Mission Home to be held the next day. We made good time  and arrived at Rhonda's around 830 or 9 pm.  It is about a 700 km drive.  The drive was nice and without anything exciting (accident ???) happening.

Monday, 16 Oct -  We took the bus into Sydney with Rhonda.  We hustled over to Costello's Discovery Opal to have Jamie Costello take pictures of Mike's opal cuff links since Jamie forgot to do that earlier.  It was good to see him again.  Then Margaret & I walked over to the Opera House and Royal Botanical Gardens where we spent a few hours waiting for our time to meet with Cristina de Godos for lunch at 1 pm.  Cristina told us that her temp job had been changed into a permanent position (Yay).  She is also dating a Spaniard that has lived in Sydney for a few years.  We had a nice talkative lunch and then we had to leave so Cristina could go back to work and we could meet with Avril Shen for a quick catch up on life before meeting Rhonda  and heading back to her place.  Avril also had good news for us - She passed her PTE English test with flying colours.  She has also taken a translation test and hopes to hear back on the results by 27 Oct.   Then she can apply for a position at one of the banks in Sydney.  Caught the bus back to Rhonda's.  Got to Rhonda's and climbed in our car to go to the Mission Home.  We had a good time at the FHE and were able to talk with the Lems and others. Then back to Rhonda's and crashed for the night.

Tuesday, 17 Oct - We took Rhonda to the Mission Home complex where she was having an intern interview with LDSSA.  Margaret and I  met with Sister Barr and Sister Cox to deliver things and catch up on what is going on at HQ.  Then we picked up several things from the Distribution Centre and met Rhonda.  She looked like a deer in headlights.  We found out that she had gone in for a no-pay internship interview and ended up with a paying job offer - that was a BIG shock for her.  We are so happy for her.  We then went to Costco to pick up some supplies for us and the Branch.  Then back to Rhonda's for dinner and letting Margaret/Rhonda gasbag for a looooooooooooonnnnnnnnnnngggggg time.

Wednesday, 18 Oct - We left Rhonda's at 9 am and drove back to Grafton.  We did stop at Heahterbrae's pies for a meat pie & a blueberry/apple pie. Then back on the road.  We made a stop at Coffs Harbour to check out their mall to see if they had any 5 kg dumbbells, but they did not have any that we found affordable. We also ate dinner in the food court. We got home around 7 pm, unloaded the car and went to bed.

Thursday, 19 Oct - Called and talked with Mike's mum via Skype - a day late since we were on the road the normal talk day.  Worked around the house and then Margaret with with the RS President and finished up the shoe box project.  At around 4 or 5, we got a call from the YW president, who is pregnant, and asked if we could cover YW as she could not stand up straight.  So, we had a crash course via lds.org website on YW Personal Progress so we could work with the YW later that night.

Friday, 20 Oct - Ran some errands for the branch and looked into the approval to cut down some sizable limbs on a tree for one of the sisters.  Made arrangments to administer another driver's test to one of the Coffs elders the next day.  We also call the Mackie's in Coffs to ensure that they were expecting some of our YM to spend Saturday night with them since we all would be in Coffs for District Conference.

Saturday, 21 Oct - We picked up Joseph & Decklin at noon and drove down to Coffs.  We got to the District meeting house at 1:30pm  - just in time for me to give the driver's test.  Then at 230 pm the boys and I attended a priesthood meeting while Margaret went over to the mall with one of the senior sisters.  They were back by 5 pm when we had a general member meeting.  Boy the presentations were good, uplifting ad educational  - just as good as General conference. Margaret and I drove (1+ hour) back to Grafton for the night.

Sunday, 22 Oct - We were supposed to bring a sister from Grafton with us to the Sunday session of District Conference, but she did not make it. The talks were great and, again, spiritually uplifting.  We had a pitch-in lunch with all the other attendees.  We then met with the CES (Church Educational System) person for our area and were updated on Seminary (religious education for the teens).  Then we climbed in the car and headed for home. The Swains (senior couple from Port Macquarie) followed us home.  We stopped on Turf Street and took a zillion pictures of the Jacaranda trees, before we got back to our place.  We changed clothes and walked down to the Clarence river while dinner was cooking. After dinner we talked and finally decided we should go to bed so we would get up at a decent hour on Monday.  The Swains are really a nice couple and we enjoyed talking with them.

 Spring is here and so are the Jacaranda trees - lots of them here in Grafton

 Cleaning up the back yard and trimming bushes that have not been touched in years
The tree in our front yard.  It was green and then the leaves turned purple.  later they turned a yellow and are now going back to green.  A non-electric, electric show

Sundown - love the sunsets here

 Jacaranda trees in bloom

more sunset

more clean up of the bushes in the back yard

Shorts that Margaret made for the Samaritan Christmas shoe box charity drive.

The master seamstress at work on the shorts

Jacaranda

And Jacaranda

Margaret at Sydney Harbour.  Down in Sydney for the Lems' farewell

It must be spring as the cruise ships are coming back

The Opera House

Opera House & Harbour bridge

Elder Haley

Margaret with fig tree - lots of roots and several roots in the air on their way to the ground

Sydney harbour

Flower garden - Royal Botanical Garden

Avril Shen with lobster cocktail

Sister Ko - Farewell

Elder & Sister Lems - Farewell

Lems, Merrils Sister Cox, Ko, McSweeney, Elder Haley

Margaret & Koala at Costco

Tabasco at Costco - large economy size

Rhonda Crosbie's new house being put together

Cake in its own sauce -  first try, but we will do better next time

Jillaroo pie and blueberry/apple pie

Jacaranda

More Jacaranda

this tree is really gorgeous

on the back road from home to meeting house

honey bee in back yard

Oppys Gully on the way to Coffs Harbour (wind screen is a bit dirty)

No excuses - read your scriptures

Jacaranda on Turf Street, Grafton

More

Spring in all its glory - purple, yellow & red



Tuesday, October 10, 2017

Sunday, 8 Oct 2017

Monday, 2 Oct - Margaret was off to help declutter one of the sister's homes - this is a weekly (every Mondya) event and will probably last until we are released from our mission😀 This afternoon Howard & Helen Jeffree stopped by on their way up to Queensland.  It was good to see them for a few hours.  Then we left for the Jones' for dinner.  We were able to see one of their "pet" kangaroos as we pulled up to the house.  They have a few wild kangaroos that come to the house in the evening for hand outs.

Tuesday, 3 Oct - I took the flat tyre into the shop for repair.  We went out visiting for a bit in the afternoon.  I got a call from the tyre place that the tyre was not fixable - we ran too long on a low pressure and the side wall was broken up on the inside of the tyre.  At 8 pm we got a call from one of the sisters asking for some food/nappy assistance and it could not wait until the next day - the nappies were the issue.  So I put on my tie and we took off to meet the sister.  The grocery stores close at 9 pm, so we just had enough time to meet them and get the needed supplies.  We find that many welfare cases tend to call late in the day or need the assistance "now", rather than plan ahead 1 or 2 days.  With guidance from the branch president,  we are trying to teach them that they need to plan ahead and work within a reasonable schedule - and more importantly to become self sufficient as much as they can. In their defense, the welfare cases are not too bad and are not a weekly occurrence, so they are able to fend for themselves most often.

Wednesday, 4 Oct - We made visits out of the city today.  We went to Maclean first (45 minutes out of town) and visited with one of the sisters there. She is in assisted living and visiting with her is a fun time - she has a great sense of humor. Then we went to Iluka (on the ocean and 30 minutes from Maclean)) and visited another sister.  This was our first visit and we learned a lot from her.  Then we drove back home.  The visits were about 180 km total (2 to 2 1/2 hours drive).  That makes the trip from Newbury Park to the Oak Park chapel a walk in the park.  Ah, but we did get to take the ferries across the Clarence River, so we enjoyed the drive. (PS - Happy 94th Birthday Mom )

Thursday, 5 Oct - Today we drove to Newcastle for a Missionary Zone Conference to be held tomorrow. The drive is 6 hours one way.  We stayed in a hotel over a local pub and restaurant - pretty typical of a number of hotels in Australia.

Friday 6 Oct - Zone Conference.   We arrived at the Charlestown meeting house just before 9 am.  We were able to hear from President Checketts, Australia Sydney North Mission President. He talked on why the LDS Church is different from other Churches and the benefits we get from being members of the LDS Church.  His talk was prompted by questions that he gets from some of the missionaries in their weekly letter to him.  Then the senior missionaries left the meeting and held flat inspection review meetings.  The missionaries had to clean and then inspect/grade their flats; and then share the results with us.  This was interesting and we found that most of the missionaries graded themselves harder than we would have. We then had lunch and left the meeting early so we could be on the road and reach home before it was too late.  We did get home around 7:30pm and found that the electricity was out in our neighborhood.  It did not come back on until about 9:30 am the next day.

Saturday & Sunday, 7-8 Oct - we ran the downloaded videos of the General Conference on Saturday and Sunday.  Boy there were a lot of warm fuzzy feelings during the talks as the Spirit touched our hearts to confirm that what was being said was true and what we needed to hear.  We are told that during General Conference that some of the talks will be just for us - BUT it seemed that EVERY talk had things just for us.  The spiritual feelings were really outstanding during this conference.

One of the Jone's neighbors coming in to borrow a slice of bread

They make it a family affair and bring the kids too

Spring is here and flowering plants are all over the place

The Ulmarra ferry

One of the walk on passengers waiting for the ferry to land

The Ulmarra ferry coming into the load/unload point

Sunset over the bay at Charlestown


Sister Haley looking out over the Charlestown bay

A house near the hotel where we stayed.  The house is overlooking the bay

Needless to say - the Big Banana.  This is a small fun/theme park in Coffs Harbour.  It was closed when we drove through Coffs at 6:30 pm

Elder & Sister Haley

Candle light dinner.  It would have been more romantic if the electricity was on and we had just turned out the lights.  Electricity was out for 14 hours.

Rainbow Lorikeet in the bottle brush bush outside our computer room.  They have all the colours of the rainbow and are really pretty.

A field on the way to Church covered with cockatoos.  Not the Sulpher crested ones - just plain cockatoos

One of the first Jacaranda trees to bloom. In the roundabout on Jacaranda Avenue (of course)

Trimming and cleaning out the bushes in the back yard so the neighbor is happy and knows that we do care about our garden (not food garden).  Now the work continues as the clippings are cut into smaller pieces so they can be put into the green/organic rubbish bin.

No idea what this tree is, but it is in our front yard.  It was green a few days ago but the leaves have turned a pink/purple.  It is kind of pretty.

Love the sunsets here in Grafton.  The sun is almost below the horizon

A few minutes later.  The sun is now below the horizon, but shining up in the clouds.