Farewell and Welcome

Elder Diaz

Transfer/new missionary arrival week is here again (every 6 weeks). It is an exciting week for the mission. This week brought 30 new Elders and Sisters to the CFM - the absolute best mission in the world!  An amazing coincidence (I don't believe in coincidences) is that one of the new missionaries I talked to was Elder Diaz from Chile. I told him that I had a nephew, Elder Ballantyne, who had served in Chile. He was so excited that he almost jumped out of his chair! He said "I love Elder Ballantyne, he is my friend." This young Elder will be an amazing addition to the CFM. He will be teaching in Spanish, as that is his native tongue, but had to go to the language training for six weeks to learn some English at the MTC.  You can see the light and glow of the gospel in his face. I was asked to go to the mission home and help with some computer work on the new missionaries the night of their welcome dinner at President and Sister Gelwix's home. The missionaries are fed a yummy meal following a detailed etiquette lesson  by Sister G. I was invited to join them for dinner and it was so much fun. Young missionaries who love the Lord have an incredible spirit with them. It was an honor to be with them that night.


Elder Parker/Sister Ure

Before the excitement and joy of welcoming new missionaries comes the farewell to valiant missionaries who are headed home. We had 19 leave this transfer. Tuesday evening was a spiritual feast as we got to hear all 19 bear their testimonies. One was from New Zealand, one from Tonga, and the rest from all over the U.S. Amazing missionaries - all of them. Headed home this transfer were some pillars of the mission - Sister Jamison, one of the Sister Coordinators; Elder Parker, our zone leader; and one of the Assistants to the President. The first split I went on was with Sister Jamison - to Spanish speaking homes. It was an amazing experience of listening to and learning from the spirit.  

Sister Jamison 

We had something going every night this week. Our social life is incredible! And - it's all good! Monday we had our first dinner guests in our new apartment. We invited two of the senior missionary couples in our area for a great dinner of pork roast, mashed potatoes and gravy, salad, green beans and lots of fresh fruit. I forgot to take pictures of the events of the night, but have pictures of the two couples.


The Danley's from Roosevelt, UT

The Aldrich's from New Hampshire

Last Saturday (May 18th) we drove up to Merced which is about an hour north of here and taught a Career Workshop there. When we got back, we went to Sister Ure's uncle's home for dinner in the yard. I saw my first pomegranate tree! Their yard had orange, lemon, mango, pomegranate, apple, palm and lots of evergreen trees. It was so nice to eat outside under the shade of the tree.

Pomegranate blossoms and baby pomegranates!
 

Another of the beauties of this area is the vast amount of produce, fruit, nuts and just about everything else you can imagine growing. I truly believe that Fresno is one of the bread baskets of the world because of the amount of agriculture here. It is beautiful. Everywhere we go there are trees in blossom. The freeways and neighborhoods are lined with walls of oleander in every color imaginable. This is not a very clear picture, but shows a wall of flowers on the way home from work.

 

My companions, Sister Ure and Sister Henrick are great women. Sister Henrick has been sick for over two weeks. We hope she is on the mend now. Please pray for her. Sister Ure is teaching me much about being bold in proclaiming and sharing the gospel. We do not leave a store or meet someone without talking to as many people as we can and giving them a pass-along card. I hope some of her courage rubs off on me. I have given out a few, but missed opportunities also because of fear. We are in the last gathering of the Lord's children and we must be bold in proclaiming and sharing the gospel. I challenge you to keep some pass-along cards in your purse or pocket and speak to every one you see. You never know when the Lord will open the way for you to open your mouth and give someone the gift of the restored gospel.

 

I love serving this mission. I know this is where I am supposed to be and that as I am obedient and listen to the Spirit, I will be an instrument in the Lord's hands in proclaiming his word. I am so very grateful!

We Are a Threesome Now

 

Sister Henrick, Sister Ure and I

SISTER'S CONFERENCE MAY 9, 2013

What a handsome wait staff!

It's truly awesome to be with all these beautiful young sister missionaries. Sister missionaries ROCK the California Fresno Mission.

Moving Day

WOW - where has the time gone? We have had a busy couple of weeks. We moved to our new apartment and we love it! Britta's home was beautiful and had a beautiful yard. Our new home has it's perks too. We got our new companion last Saturday and this necessitated a move to larger quarters. We moved about 7 miles north of where we were to Clovis. We're in a three bedroom, two bath apartment in a gated community. The apartment had been newly painted and carpeted for us to move in. The mission housing missionary spoiled us rotten by furnishing our place comfortably. We had a crew of young, strong Elders who moved out stuff from Britta's and unpacked and assembled furniture here. These are some pictures of the moving crew followed by our new digs.



Elders hard at work
 



Cute Elder Dunford

Elder Williams



Sister Williams and Britta supervising the assembly of our kitchen table and chairs!



The whole moving crew!

We love these Elders. They helped us so much and saved us a ton of work!

This is the finished project - still a work in progress................ The complex has a swimming pool and hot tub, but this body doesn't do bathing suits anymore so I won't be spending any time there. (Of course when it's 115 degrees for a month straight, I reserve the option to change my mind. I solemnly promise that if I do, there won't be any pictures of the sight on this blog!!


Front entrance



I have had some amazing experiences already on this mission which have cemented my testimony that I have a purpose and a true calling from the Lord to be here. Words have literally been put into my heart and came out of my mouth with the Holy Ghost guiding me in how to help people who come in to the Employment Resource Center. I would not even call it prompting by the Holy Ghost,as it was a literal and real experience of being used as an instrument in God's hands to say and do those things to help that individual person in that individual situation. I am grateful to be an instrument in His hands.