Transfered to Beaver

Stacey was transfered to Beaver, Utah the first of March. Here is some of her experiences:
"Beaver is a Bilingual area so I will be teaching in English for the first time and of course Spanish also. My new companion is Hermana Morales who is from Atlanta, GA but was born in Mexico so she is bilingual. We are teaching about 70% in English and 30% in Spanish. Beaver is really smallville where everyone knows everyone....So here you are really active or really less active. There are only a few non-members who are more than likely spanish speaking or from Thailand. We cover the entire Beaver County. Milford, Minnersville, Beaver and a few other spots on the map. This is our basic schedule: Monday P-Day in Beaver, Tuesday drive to Milford, Wed in Milford until dinner. Thur DTM in Panguitch and weekly planning, Friday in Beaver, Sat morning and night in Beaver, afternoon in Minnerville or Milford. Sunday attend one of the english wards and try to make it to the Spanish branch."

Tuesday we got a foot of snow in less than 3 hours. Here's some pictures of my adventures so far:I was so happy I had knee high boots & the snow still got in.

Nice view of the world of Beaver all white...

Our poor car was buried and all we had was a little ice scraper and a broom...

Look I really did drive in a foot of snow. I'm getting pretty good at that.....

The Blizzard at night......

Hna Morales and Me going crazy because of the snow....

Hanging out at the diner in Milford......

Meet my new friend. We sleep in his room in Milford at the Carter's home.....

A full view of the big guy....

The full shot of the room. Sister loved her pretty "fern" rug when she first bought it. But now she knows what it is and hides it in the basement spare room.

We are teaching a cool couple, Karen takes lots of notes and Lester even has a new "uniform" for church. They are getting baptised on Mar 26th if they pass their interviews & stop smoking. We are teaching a lot of less actives and their non-baptised children. And tracking in the trailer parks has been really interesting. We don't go after dark...No worries... The work progresses and we are having an adventure!"

Wedding projects

Wedding bells are in the air and quickly approaching. Mike & Nicole are getting married March 25th in South Carolina and then we are doing an Open house in Tacoma the 10th of April. It just wasn't practical to be able to 'share' decorations in both places so I had the challenge to plan stuff long distance. Thanks to some great helping hands (Debbie & friends thank you, thank you, thank-you) we are getting this figured out. I had to come up with table center pieces that were able to travel well, be inexpensive and simple. I was checking out some crafty places here in Billings and walked into a Party store. As Mike, J & I were browsing the store, the friendliest man came up to us who happened to be the owner & gave me a gazillian ideas, but one particular fit my perameters. They have this little contraption that you can use to make these simple center pieces using foil paper, ribbon and sand and whatever else you want to embellish it with. So I came up with a plan...a nice looking fake rose, some cute fake white flowers and a tassel spriggy thingy. With this plan I had Mike go back to the store with me and we set to work making these centerpieces. It took us all of half an hour to make 13 of them and they ended up being less than $3.00 a piece. Taaaaa... Daaaaa. What do you think?

To each his own.....

Out for a drive around town, we were crusin' the area around near the Rim. We came across these two houses. They actually built their house around the rocks of the Rim. This house added a little patio between the rocks.

Same house... Front of the house.... go figure......

Now this one is just Crazy... again the front of the house...check out the next picture....

Ya gotta be skinny to fit in that front door.......

Pondering

Once again I read through 3 Nephi and am amazed and awed with the event of the Savior's visit to the Nephites and how that experience touched their lives and those that read about it. It was such a incredible experience. You can tell it deeply changed their lives because we read in Fourth Nephi, after the Savior leaves and the disciples go about all the lands teaching and baptizing, "the people were ALL converted unto the Lord." Then for the next 23 verses and throughout two hundred years later "there was no contention in the land, because of the love of God which did dwell in the hearts of the people." I hope at some time we might be able to read more about what took place during those 200 years. What did Nephi and his son Amos and Amos' son, Amos write about? I hope we can read about how these people lived and how they loved each other. It's sad that we only get 23 verses to describe this, but I can imagin it was like spending every day in the temple, the peace felt there in the joy of love and service.
And now on to the saddest part of the Book of Mormon . . . . . . . . . . . . .sigh. . . . . . .

Tony "little camper"

So I realize this is late in coming but Happy Happy birthday to Tony on the 20th of February. I made a trip to Tacoma town to watch the little kiddlies while Debbie & Tony took off to have some fun out camping. (Check out their blog) Tony has always loved to camp. In fact he's a natural camper. Ever since he was little he has loved to be outdoors. He loved to collect things from the outdoors and put them in some peculiar places. We never did the laundry before we checked his pockets first...too many little surprises. He even had a birds nest collection at one time. He caught a frog once and we were going take it to school for show & tell the next day. We placed it in a white bucket of water in the garage over night, went out to get it the next morning and found that the frog had laid a gazillion million eggs in the bucket. Didn't know a frog could lay so many eggs. When ever we got to a new campground Tony would run to find the nearest creek to explore. No matter how many misquitoes found his little face, he still enjoyed it. Yep he's always loved to camp and is sharing that joy with his own little family. May you have many many more outdoor adventures. We love you Tony!!

Look who turned 30

Happy 30th birthday Stacey!! This a picture when she was 4 years old. We lived in Concord, CA where there were two seasons, summer and fall. We use to paint snow pictures on the front window of the house so we could pretend there was a winter with snow. This particular year we made a trip to the Lake Tahoe mountains equipt with snow man making stuff and Stacey made her first snowman. Check out the rain boots and miss matched mittens...

Now our Stacey in a different winter wonder land serving the Lord. She says this is one of her very favorite pictures. She mentioned in one letter, "I can't believe it is my birthday again. A year ago I wasn't even thinking about a mission. And look at me now. Heavenly father puts you where you need to be even if you go kicking and screaming....just kidding. I love it here and the work is going great!" What a beautiful young lady she has become. We Love You Stacey!!

These boots are made for walking

A new pair of boots...YEAH...store clearance....no more double socking my feet...time for a walk in my world.

Going out the front door into the snows of winterland.

Nice little pillar of sunshine near the ending of day

A turn into the alley way...cute little camper...I wonder if a volkswagon Bug tows this little jobber

Crazy ducks....don't they know this IS the north...did they just forget to fly south...or are they just moochin'.

The park turns into a sledding wonderland for all the kids as they get out of school.....wait there are some adults out there too....and a cross country skiier rounding the corner over the hills and through the woods...

Heading down our street, Mike pointing out the depth of the white stuff. Yea for neighbors who shovel or snow blow or plough their sidewalks.

Sadi dog seems to be growing a nice layer of fur...almost looks like a husky. J joining the walk.

Slip sliding along.....layers of ice, snow, ice, snow,ice, snow oh and gravel under there somewhere

And Doug, his idea of a nice walk in his winter world.