Our weather cube this morning said that we were going to enjoy a major storm with rain and strong winds with hurricane force gusts. We thought our drive to Grants Pass was going to be a bit rough but it turned out to be a lovely drive on just a cloudy day. No rain…. No wind…. No problems. Our son Todd and family live in Grants Pass so we made a date to meet Todd and 4 year old cutie-pie granddaughter, Mary for lunch.
We have enjoyed a couple of windy rain storms since we have come to Bandon, but this one was the best so far. I get to add that “so far” part because locals tell me it can get even worse than it was this night. Past storms have made me nervous….. this one actually scared me! It felt like several of those gusts actually picked up the trailer and set it down with a thud! I told Elder Wels after one of those hurricane force gusts; “I don’t think we are in Kansas anymore!” Then along about midnight it grew calm and quiet. Oh thank you!
Look what all that quiet brought us! What a surprise when Elder Wels opened the door to head out for his morning shower at the shower house! I wasn’t dressed to get a picture right then, but I did get this picture of him as he was coming back to the trailer. I was totally taken by surprise. I didn’t think it ever snowed on the Oregon coast but I guess I was wrong on that thought. We must have gotten between 3 and 4 inches of snow.
It seems to have snowed enough to keep the citizens of Bandon from coming to the Family History Center. Elder Wels and I were alone for most of our shift. It gave us time to work on our personal family history. And then I studied and wrote in my Preach my Gospel manual. Long about 11:30 Ron Barnakoff came. Guess we were lucky we got one patron today!
When we returned to our RV Park for lunch we found another surprise! A big branch of a tree was lying smack on top of the Office roof.
Bob, the owner of the RV park said that his insurance was sending out repair crews to remove the limb and repair the damage but if it didn’t get done before December he would just hang Christmas lights on it! I will say the sight of it made me gasp when I opened the office door!
Here are a few more pictures of the beautiful snow: This one was taken looking out the front door of the trailer.
Elder Wels became the officer “mopper” for the E.A.T. program tonight. Lucas, who has mopped floors for them for 8 years, has been become too sick to continue. Allyson couldn’t find anyone to volunteer so my sweet companion has taken over the mop. He washes dishes until everyone has left the dining area and then he grabs the mop. I have always said that he is at his sexiest when he has a mop or a vacuum in his hands!
My sweet companion woke up this Wednesday morning with a blazing headache, scratchy throat, and over all aches and pains. We decided no one needed to have him around in that condition so we got him to rest for most of the day. He was feeling somewhat better so that we could go to the Relief Society Birthday Dinner tonight. Since I am invited to always be at Relief Society events, Elder Wels has been appointed our assigned Priesthood representative. I voted twice for that one! Relief Society turns 170 years old! We had a lovely potato bar dinner. Yum! Who doesn’t love a good potato?! After dinner we rushed over to the Bandon Inn because our sweetest friends, Bob ad Rita Phair were in town. Bob has business in Coos Bay and Port Orford……. Oh goody, Bandon in right in the middle so that is a good place to stop for the night. We so enjoy any time we get to visit with them.
Thursday morning we met for breakfast at the new Café Sunrise on Hwy 101 in town. Service there was the slowest we have ever encountered! Then they brought breakfast to Elder Wels and I but not the Phairs. Maybe 10 minutes later Rita got her breakfast and poor Bob still had another good 5 minutes to wait. The rest of us politely tried to wait until all of us got served but our breakfasts were getting cold. Sorry Bob, it is every man or woman for him or herself! Oh, by the way…… Bob and Rita got treated to another of our lovely wind and rain storms! It blew and sputtered all night and was still going strong when we met for breakfast. Welcome to Bandon! Weather did not stop us from a little tour of Tom Olive’s Woods of the West myrtle wood shop and then the Misty Meadows Jam factory. A trip to Bandon calls for Cranberry Jam! By noon the Phairs were off on their way home and Elder Wels and I were back doing the job for which we were sent to Bandon. We started with a couple of visits and then we got a phone call to go to the Bandon Hospital to give a blessing to Amy Lowe. Did you know you could drink too much water? Poor Amy is suffering from congestion and the flu. She was only trying to flush out her system, but she seems to have flushed out more than just the bugs! She flushed out some much needed nutrients in her body which reduced, in her words…. her body to jello! She couldn’t even stand up on her own! Some good help from the E.R. and a great blessing, followed by a couple a days in bed and she will be as good as new!
Home for dinner and the evening was spent preparing a talk about “Enduring to the End” that we were asked to give at our Missionary District Meeting tomorrow. Scott, you could probably give this talk with no preparation, blindfolded and with one hand tied behind your back. For us…. We labored several hours preparing our talk.
It is now my turn. I awoke with a great headache, scratchy throat and some assorted aches and pains. But Hooray and Hallelujah it is a glorious Friday morning. I had forgotten how beautiful sunshine could be! I didn’t even want to wait until breakfast was over…… And I didn’t care that my head hurt. I just wanted to enjoy the sunshine. So we got out and went for a nice walk around the RV Park before breakfast! We had fun meeting our neighbors who were also giddy about getting out and enjoying the sunshine! Back at the trailer, when our late breakfast was over, we polished our talk and then headed to Coos Bay for the meeting. Our 45 minute drive to the Coos Bay Stake Center was amazing. There were so many downed trees along the road side.
Our District Meeting was moved to Friday this week so that President Young could be in attendance to do interviews. He and his sweet wife are such a great inspirational couple. He started the meeting with a few thoughts to get our hearts and minds in tune with the Lord and then off he went to conduct his interviews leaving the meeting in the capable hands of the Zone Leaders. Seems the Zone Leaders had called each set of missionaries and assigned them a talk for today. Our subjects were: Faith, Repentance, Baptism, Receiving the Holy Ghost, and enduring to the end. Lucky day for us today! Our talk was last and due to interviews, long winded missionaries, and a caring President who yearned to leave us with some words of encouragement, they ran out of time and we did not have to do ours! Yea! But they always say that the preparer learns more than the hearer and I would bet that is very true in our case. We were well fed!
President Young’s parting thought came from the Joseph Smith History, verse 19. After reading in the Bible, 1st James Chapter 1 verse 5 & 6, Joseph, confused by many different religious sects in his day, retired to the nearby woods to literally ask of God which of all the many sects was right. Which should he join? Now; Verse 19: “I was answered that I must join none of them for they were all wrong; …….that those professors were all corrupt; that: ”they draw near to me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me, they teach for doctrines the commandments of men, having a form of godliness, but they deny the power thereof.” President Young called that “Lip Service”. So when we promise to obey the commandments such as keeping the Sabbath Day holy; do we give the Lord “lip service” or do we give him “heart service”? “Six days shalt thou labour, and do all thy work: But the seventh day is the sabbath of the Lord thy God: in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, thy manservant, nor thy maidservant, nor thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates: For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day: wherefore the Lord blessed the sabbath day, and hallowed it” (Ex. 20:8–11). “From the days of the early apostles to the present, the Sabbath has been the first day of the week, the Lord’s Day, in commemoration of the fact that Christ came forth from the grave on Sunday (Acts 20:7).”
“Our observance or nonobservance of the Sabbath is an unerring measure of our attitude toward the Lord personally and toward his suffering in Gethsemane, his death on the cross, and his resurrection from the dead. It is a sign of whether we are Christians in very deed, or whether our conversion is so shallow that commemoration of his atoning sacrifice means little or nothing to us” (“The Sabbath Day”, Elder Mark E. Peterson ” Ensign, May 1975, p.49). Do we use the Sabbath for Spiritual feasting or do we do our feasting in a restaurant somewhere thereby necessitating those employees break the Sabbath to satisfy our hunger? President Young gave us much to ponder in one little thought. Do I pay the Lord “lip service” as I try to live His Gospel? Or do I render unto Him my greatest “heart service”?
No shopping in Coos Bay for us today as my head was still splitting after our meeting. Home, dinner and bed was on my schedule. Saturday was another “call in sick” day, only I don’t have anyone to call when I am sick. But I did call my sweet Sis, Lynda Stevens, to wish her a happy birthday! She holds a special place in my heart. But otherwise, we just stayed home and rested and studied in the Preach my Gospel manual. Wish I could commit to memory that fabulous manual! Maybe tis better to be called on a mission at 19 or 21 when the brain still functions. Well, perhaps I can’t teach from my head the way I would like to be able to do, but I can teach from my heart. Even when my head can’t remember, my heart can still feel.
We also had some more rain and wind and found a little proof of it right here in the RV Park. If that tree had not gotten hung up on the two trees next to it, it would have gone over for sure. Just pulled those roots right up out of the ground!
Last night I enjoyed a wonderful case of pleurisy and did not get much sleep at all. My mother suffered a lot from that so I was feeling very close to her last night as I was awake for most of the night. It hurts! But that did not stop me from going to Church today. I just loaded up on the ibuprofen and off I went. I needed my spiritual feast! And, as usual, I got fed very well. But my very favorite part of Sunday comes after Church when we take the Sacrament into those who were not able to come to church today. Connie Jones & James Ornsby were sick, Kathy Lecce is in the Southern Coos Hospital recuperating from knee replacement surgery, and Fay Quimby’s heart won’t let her walk across a room much less get to Church. For me it is a double blessing. I get to help my fellow Saints and I get to watch my handsome husband as he uses his Priesthood power. We had lovely visits with them and we left a spiritual message with each one of them. If you can’t come to Church…. We try to bring a little Church to them. It was after 4:00 pm by the time we got home. We were tired and hungry, but happy. It is time to give our weary sick bones a rest. Elder Wels is sniffling again tonight. May tomorrow be a healthier day! Hope your week was good!
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