A Missionary Thanksgiving

This week definitely got off to a windy and rainy start!!!  Welcome to the coast in winter!!  Well, perhaps winter is not officially here, but this certainly felt like it!  We had a steady wind of about 20 to 30 mph with gusts up there at 60 to 80 mph!  Our trailer was really rocking!!!  Luckily, Monday was our P-day so we stayed inside and did a whole lot of cleaning, studying and reading.  Tuesday was bad enough that we didn’t venture out much.  An umbrella wouldn’t stand a chance out there in the wind!  The trailer two spaces down from ours lost the awning that comes out with the slide out.  That made us happy we chose not to get those automatic awnings on our trailer. We sure didn’t get much sleep Monday or Tuesday night.  Holy Cow, Toto, are we still in Bandon?

We did head out at 5:00 p.m. Tuesday evening to work at the E.A.T. program at the Barn.  We surely thought not many would show up in that kind of wind and rain but what a nice surprise.  The Barn was packed with people hungry for dinner.  The lady pastor who is in charge of the welcome asked Elder Wels to bless the meal.  I do believe that is an honor that she recognizes his spirituality.  And, he gets a good introduction as “Elder Wels from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.”  Cool!  It is very enjoyable to serve and clean with such a great group of people.

Wednesday we made lots of calls to go see people….. but everyone was either gone for the holiday, enjoying visiting relatives or home working in the kitchen to get ready for Thanksgiving.  Bless Lynda Sessions….. she was happy to welcome us.  In fact she called us!  She was working out a problem and wanted Elder Wels’ input as to how to best handle it.  She really has taken a liking to him and has great trust in his wisdom.  He is sure it is the white hair that leads people to mistakenly think he is so wise.  However, I do believe his advice was very helpful.  We also visited with our lovely friend, Ida Cluff.  We had received her Church records. Armed with her member number and her confirmation date we were able to get her up and running on the Church websites, especially new.familysearch.com.  We hope she has lots of fun and success with that one.

President Stockford and his lovely wife, Marita invited us to join their family for Thanksgiving dinner.  When I asked what I could contribute to the dinner…there was just a request for a forgotten jar of dill pickles and for us to pick up James Ornsby and bring him along to the dinner.  That sure called for a lot of work on my part, didn’t it?  What a lovely time we had.  We got to meet their son Shaun, his wife, Kelley and their children Parker and Lauren.

Parker is 16 and he made the cheesecake for dessert (there were also pumpkin pies and an apple pie) Very impressive Parker! And there was a special gluten-free Cheesecake from the Bandon Bakery for me.  Thanks President Stockford for the special trip to town just for me.  So much fabulous food!  Turkey, tri-tip roast, stuffing, mashed potatoes, gravy, green beans, macaroni & cheese, Cranberry apple salad, relish tray, deviled eggs, sweet potatoes, and homemade rolls.  Then add all those desserts!  No one left hungry but we did leave with a big plate of leftovers!  We also enjoyed the 5 dogs!

There was Conway and Bogart, the English bull dogs; Xylo, a King Charles spaniel and beagle mix;  Cassie, a pit bull mix; and Drover, a English sheep dog who is as big as a horse! And he is absolutely gorgeous! We enjoyed the whole lot of them!  Thanks Stockford family!

We sure did miss our own family this Thanksgiving!  Though I am not sure they even thought about us.  Would you think of your parents if you were touring the Caribbean on a catamaran?  Well, that is where you will find the Skillmans this holiday.  Would you miss your parents if you were spending your very first Thanksgiving with the adorable “love of your life” new husband?  Yea, don’t think Steff thought about us either.  And, the Shumways had a house full of people to celebrate with.  Steve and Barbara Jenkins drove 12 hours from Utah to be with them, all the while knowing I would not be in town.  Luckily they are forgiven as they gave me a promise that they would come back when I am back in town.  And, I will hold them to it!  I can see the Shumways had quite a feed.  Just look what it did to Scott!!!

Newly engaged Kerry and Chris came down to Medford and we weren’t there either.  Hope they had a great time visiting with Todd, Amy, and Mary!  And I hope all of them missed us as much as we missed all of them.  

We did a few visits on Friday and Saturday, but for the most part it was just Elder and Sister Wels enjoying the comfort and coziness of our trailer and each other.  Sunday was a Spiritual Feast at the little Bandon Branch.  We got to sit with our recent reactivated friends, Connie and Ida.  It was so good to have them with us again.  It was Fast and Testimony Sunday as next week is Stake Conference in Coos Bay.  They may be few, but they have such strong testimonies!  Our Gospel Doctrine teacher, Pam Hansen, is so knowledgeable and delivered a powerful lesson from The Revelation of St. John the Divine!  She actually made me want to cheer at the end of it!  She definitely helped me to want to be a better person.  Stephanie Reed taught the Relief Society class a lesson about the Final Judgment.  Just wish we really could applaud at the end!  Thank goodness the Book of Life is written in pencil and each of us has the opportunity to use the Atoning sacrifice of our Savior to do a little eraser work in that book.  I just hope my book comes with a BIG eraser and a willingness to recognize my need for the Savior.

Okay….. from the thrill of a little more victory over the cunning of satan…. To the agony of having an old brain with a very short memory!  In the blink of a brain burp!  While I was typing this I was hearing a strange noise… it was water but not a normal sound.  A quick glance toward the bathroom confirmed the horror of an overflowing toilet.  Guess who forgot to open the valve again as he was running water into the black water tank?  Hmmmm?  And now guess who gets to go back to the laundry room to, for the second time today, wash all the throw rugs and towels?  Oh the joys of P-day!!!!

Zone Conference

Tuesday morning, before heading off to Eugene for Zone Conference, we gathered up sweet Ida Cluff and took her on a special private tour of the Bandon Branch building.  We want her to feel comfortable when she comes to Church on Sunday.  The last room in the building we entered was the Chapel.  We stood there in silence for a while and then I asked: “Ida, do you feel it?”  She said; “Yea, the Spirit is here!”  Cool.  I asked her;  “How long have you  been inactive?”  I was blown away by her answer…. 45 years!  Welcome home Ida!

Since Zone Conference was to start at 8:00 a.m. on Wednesday, we decided to do the three hour drive from Bandon on Tuesday afternoon.  Once in Eugene, the first stop was Costco!  M & M’s, Muffins, and Cookies…. And you were thinking we were there for real food!  Next stop…… The Outback Restaurant for gluten free baby back ribs and some Chocolate Thunder from Down Under!  Thank you Outback for that delicious gluten free dessert!  There are joys in a big city!

Zone Conference was totally awesome!  It was District Meeting times 6! Here we had 53 beautiful Elders and Sisters! 

President Young is such a dedicated Mission President.  He is our cheering squad!  You can’t help coming away wanting so badly to be a more dedicated and spiritual missionary.  Such inspirational talks!  We took pages of notes!

Lunch time was fun time!  Great meal provided by one of the local wards.  After lunch we have some fun.  Each district got to write their own original song.  Elder Johnson wrote the one for our Pacific District.  Yea Elder Johnson.  But then we had to sing our song for the group.  We were a pretty sad as a choir. But everyone cheered for us and for each of the other groups.  So try singing our song to the tune of “God be with you till we meet again”….

Pacific District Song

--Elder Johnson

Baptisms are scarce here on the coast
We can’t find people to teach
It rains every single day
It’s always cloudy, always gray

Chorus:
But we won’t get down
We won’t show a frown
We will keep our spirits up
We will “Stand up Tall”
Because “P” Young knows all
We’re happy to be serving on the coast

We are ten Elders who love to teach
Even crazy hippie druggies
We will baptize young & oldies
And bring every one unto the fold

Chorus:
But we won’t get down
We won’t show a frown
We will keep our spirits up
We will “Stand up Tall”
Because “P” Young knows all
We’re happy to be serving on the coast!

Believe it or not….. we took second place with that one!  They also had been inspecting the mission cars and gave out awards for the cleanest cars.  The winner got a golden license plate frame put on their car!  It was just a time of fun and laughter!  Those young missionary Elders and Sisters are just delightful to hang around with!

Then it was back into the Chapel for more spiritual feeding and testimony time.  We ended at about 4:45 p.m.  and, it was already getting dark and raining.   It was a long 3 hour drive back to Bandon in the rain and wind with windshield wipers that did not work so well.  It was a miserable trip, especially for Elder Wels, since he was driving.  Note to self… if it is that kind of weather come our next Zone Conference in February….. we will stay over another night.  Sad to admit it, but we are getting older and prefer the day time driving!

We received our very first referral from the mission office!  Apparently it was a referral from Temple Square in Salt Lake.  So what to do first?  Okay…. Rule #1… contact them within 24 hours of receiving the referral!  You want to contact them while the “iron is still hot!”  The referral was to deliver a Book of Mormon.  Zoom!  We were on it!  We called Leo and Allen Lewandowski and set up an appointment to see them the next evening.  Leo and Allen?....  A cause for worry?  Not when we got to meet Leo and Ellen!  A lovely couple who had been to Temple Square LAST spring!  The iron was definitely cool already!  But we had a lovely visit and did give them a Book of Mormon with our testimony and picture in it and a written invitation to read certain parts of it combined with prayer.  We will check back with them after Thanksgiving.

We made a lot of visits to members and non-members this week.  So sweet of everyone to welcome us and say that having senior missionaries is a treat for them.  We had a lovely evening with Fred and Kim Yates and their adorable daughter, Cassidy.  Kim is the sister of Cynthia Wright, wife of our Central Point Stake President Wright.  Kim is an absolute hoot!  She certainly tells some fascinating family stories.

We worked at the Family History Library Thursday night and two of the three computers are now up and running!  It was very exciting.  We hear through the “grape vine” of Pam Hansen, the Library director that we are going to be called to work a set schedule in the Library.  It will give us an opportunity to work with the community through family history work.  We are excited about that!

Our week ended with a smile! The sun was shining today after days of rain!  And, Ida Cluff came to Church today!  She was so warmly welcomed by our branch members.  She got to meet her new Home Teacher/Visiting Teacher couple, President and Marita Stockford.  We definitely got her the best.  She is a lovely lady and deserves the best.  May this be the first of many Sundays we find her in attendance!  Can I also wish that the sun keeps shining?

Two More Talks and Two More Visitors

A busy week in a certain trailer parked in Bandon, Oregon!  

We had two talks to give this week.  A 7 minute talk at Thursdays District Meeting in Coos Bay.  Elder Wels’ subject was Good Works and mine was on Love of Family and Family History Work.  I loved this quote by President Spencer W. Kimball;

“I hope to see us dissolve the artificial boundary line we so often place between missionary work and temple and genealogical work, because it is the same great redemptive work!”  

Those talks written, we then could start on our talks to be given in Sacrament for Invitation Sunday.  Lee’s subject there was Eternal Families and mine was The Plan of Salvation.  Elder Wels and I both struggle with talks.  It is definitely uncomfortable territory for both of us.  Though me thinks we are going to get plenty of practice here so perhaps we will eventually become more at ease with the process.  Remember, I am just talking about the writing part of a talk……. the actual giving part of the talk is a whole other matter!  I will deal with that later.

District Mtg. attendees: Elder Plumb & Elder Carlson, District Leaders:

(Elder Plumb is my Mitchell look-alike!)

 

Elder Jones & Elder Johnson, Zone Leaders:

Elder Jones & Elder Johnson, Zone Leaders

But first, we started our week by helping out and speaking at Corbit Stuart’s funeral.  His wife was in attendance but she was not quite grasping the situation.  It was so sad.  Her oldest son, Greg, was on the stand to deliver the eulogy.  The two other sons were with their Mom to try to comfort and calm her.  She was not crying…. She was angry!  At one point during the funeral she yelled out; “This is not real and I want to go home!” At the end of the funeral she wanted to see her husband and when they opened the coffin she told him to stop this nonsense and to get out of that box  and take her home.  This has been a very rough time for her.  I know that if she knew the Gospel, she would have felt some peace from that knowledge.  We will go check on her soon.

I was so happy to read about Brycie’s (Opps, I mean… Elder Shumway’s) great week.  There is such a sweet spirit of happiness when a missionary has success in bringing someone to Christ.  We got a little taste of that sweetness this week.   I went to visit with the Ida Cluff, the lady I met in the RV Park office last week.  I don’t think she has been to Church in a very long time.  She and her husband were a long haul truck driving couple.  She has certainly seen this great country of ours.  But her husband was a non-member and they drove every day of the week.  Her records are no doubt in the “dead letter file” somewhere in Salt Lake.  She has one daughter and several grandchildren who are all active in the Church.  She is very proud that her daughter is a seminary teacher.  So after visiting a while I said to her; “Ida, you know the Lord sent me right here to the Bandon RV Park to find you and bring you back to him, don’t you?”  She smiled and said “Yes”.  She told me she didn’t know why she asked me about which church I belonged to.  She said it just popped out of her mouth.  By the end of our visit she told me she would come back to Church and she gave me all the needed information so we can send to Salt Lake at get her records sent here to Bandon.  I made an appointment with her to take her down to the Bandon Chapel and give her a very private tour of it.  I know that when she stands in the Chapel with the quiet surrounding her, her heart will be touched and she will know that she is returning home.  I left her house feeling so light and happy.  Thank you, Heavenly Father for this sweet moment.

This week we had some really good visits with Branch members.  We had a lovely visit with President Stockford and his wife, Marita and their adult daughter, Jill.  Talk about a talented family!  He makes furniture and pet beds.  Marita quilts and carves cypress knees into beautiful figurines.  And their Daughter, Jill has a beautiful talent to paint and do ink drawings.  This has to be the most talented family ever!  It was a lovely visit.  Likewise, we enjoyed Ron and Kathy Lecce.  He is the Elders Quorum President and she is the Relief Society President.  She also plays the piano for Primary and is the Seminary teacher.  Talk about triple duty!  The joys of a small branch!   Friday night we spent the evening with Tammy and Gerry Greer, our new non-member friends who were once the neighbors of our fab friends, Bob & Rita Phair.  We played Pictionary and both Elder Wels and I actually enjoyed it.  We gave them an invitation to Invitation Sunday also.  

We also had opportunities to serve… Tuesday night at the Barn and Thursday evening at the Family History Library.  Friday we helped Linda Sessions move all the furniture in her living room so she could vacuum it.  Elder Wels actually did the vacuuming!  Then he scrubbed all her floors .  I dusted and swept off her deck and washed the things up on top of her refrigerator.  We also cleaned a bit in the yard and burned her garbage in a burn pile.  She has quite a lovely 1 ½ acre property there.  She took us to lunch with her non-member friends to thank us and so we could meet them and extend an invitation to them. 

Saturday we helped the Cyr family clean the condo they had just moved out of and then helped the Brother Salt move a great big headboard bed thing out so he could put his new sleep number bed into the bedroom.

Last Sunday after Church I felt impressed to go back and visit with non-active Connie Jones and give her our little thought about the Atonement.  She needed to know that she had done all she could to forgive someone who had offended her at Church.  It was time now to hand that offense over to the Savior and let His healing spirit heal her.  Later in the week she called us and asked Elder Wels to go give her friend Neana Bergeret a blessing.  She had back surgery and she was really hurting.  Connie came with us and afterwards told me that she was going to come to Church on Sunday.  Yea Connie!

Neana Bergeret, on the other hand, is a completely different story.  That story is impossible to tell at the moment.  Our prayers are with her and we will check in with her soon.   We also went around to all the less active members that we had met and gave them a special invitation to attend our “Invitation Sunday” Sacrament Meeting. 

Wednesday we went to the Bandon Baking Company in Old Town and let the Powell’s serve us lunch.  I had mentioned to a Branch member that I did not want to take advantage of the sweet invitation from the Powell’s to come and have lunch every day.  When asked if we had gone yet, I told her no.  She said we had better get down there or Sister Powell would have her feelings hurt. That is her way of serving missionary work.  Guess we had better go once in a while.  Elder Wels had a lovely meat wrap and soup and I had her delicious baked potato soup and one of her most fabulous cheesecake things in a muffin paper.  Oh, my goodness.  That dessert could make me go every day!  She is so sweet to do this for us.

Scott’s company, Cropper Medical/Bio Skin has a yearly planning meeting for the heads of all their departments.  They usually go somewhere for the week.  They plan out their next year’s goal, working Monday through Thursday.  Their wives come on Thursday night and they play on Friday and Saturday.  This year…… months ago before our mission was even a thought… they rented a house in Bandon!  How cool is that?  So Saturday late afternoon Scott and Wendy came to visit and spend the night with us.  We went to Old Town and Scott bought dinner for us at the Minute Café.  We spent a fun evening with them back at the trailer.  Scott gave us a most excellent teaching moment on bringing the Spirit into our lessons with less-active members and non-members.  Wendy took great notes for us!  Thanks Scott and Wendy!  They spent the night with us, sleeping on our fold down but not too level couch.

Invitation Sunday was a success!  There were ten less active or non-member people there!  Way to go Bandon Branch!  You really worked on giving out those invitations!  And, Connie was there!  The entire Sacrament meeting was turned over to Elder Wels and me.  We chose the speakers, knowing that 2 of them HAD to be us!  We chose Liz Olive to be our 3rd speaker.  Such a good choice!  Liz and Elder Wels spoke on the importance of family.  And I was in the middle with a talk on the Plan of Salvation.  Liz gave such a superb talk.  She is an elementary school principal so how could her talk not be great?  The actual giving of a talk up at the podium and microphone is very intimidating to us.  Both of us were so nervous.  We both worked very hard on writing our talks, wanting to say just the right things.  We so wanted our talks to reach out and touch hearts.  When I finished my talk and sat down, I looked at Wendy and she gave me a big smile.  Then I looked at our Stake Mission Leader, Brother Olive, and he gave me a big smile and an “okay sign”.  Thanks, you both made me feel so much better! Elder Wels gave a great talk too!  We also chose the music.  “I believe in Christ” for the opening song.  Does that not just sing that Mormons are actually Christians?  Our Sacrament hymn was “As now we take the Sacrament”.  We had a rest hymn in between my talk and Elder Wels talk on family…”Families can be together Forever” and the closing song was “Teach me to Walk.”  Thankfully we got a “job well done” from our Branch President and from some of the members of the Branch.  We are happy it was successful.    Elder Wels and Elder Shumway went after Church to take the Sacrament to Brother and Sister Roufs and to give them both a blessing. Bro. Roufs  called President Stockford and asked specifically that it be Elder Wels who would come and serve him. How cool is that?  Wendy and I stayed behind to have a lovely visit with Kim Yates, Cynthia Wright’s sister.  Wendy was enthralled with her family story.  Then home to warm up dinner for our boys.  A short visit and they were on the road back to Ashland and we were off to a Stake Mission Leadership Training meeting in Coos Bay.

We are definitely taking ALL OF MONDAY for P-day!  And there is definitely a NAP on Monday’s schedule!

Paying it Forward

This week we began to feel like we are definitely in Bandon by the Sea.  On P-day, after all the chores were done, we went for a walk on several beaches in search of the perfect shell for a little parable on the Atonement we want to leave with those we visit and it was cold and windy. Brrrr!  Welcome to winter in Bandon.  Alas, there was no perfect shell to be found on the beaches of Bandon!  Luckily our perfect shell needed to be a perfectly imperfect shell.  Elder Wels found just the right one, which was good because by then I was frozen.  I literally ran back to the car!  Whoever invented heated car seats get a big hug from me!!

Tuesday we got a call in the afternoon from a member named Greg Muzzy who lives in Ontario, California.  His non-member mother and step-father live here in Bandon.  He told us his step-father had just passed away that morning and his mother was alone with no other family in town.  He was very much worried about her and would we go check on her to see if she was doing okay.  Instantly memories of needing help for my own mother flashed through my mind.  My father was in ICU at the Fallbrook hospital in Southern California.  My mother was on oxygen 24/7 and was legally blind because of Macular Degeneration so she could not drive.  Nurses at the hospital could not give her any information over the phone.  And, I lived in Oregon.  I wanted to go down to help her but she wanted me to wait until she thought she would really need me.  So knowing how great and loving LDS members can be, I called my Bishop to get the name and phone number of the Bishop in Fallbrook.  I gave him a call explaining her situation and he said he would call some members that lived near my Mom. I called my Mom back and was telling her that someone would call or come by the next day when her doorbell rang and a sweet couple who lived down the street was there to help her now.  “Pay it forward!”   We immediately went to find his mother.  We found the most adorable little lady being cared for by two of her sweet neighbors.  Mom seemed to be doing fine though I think the events of the day had not completely engulfed her yet.  She was certainly a character and a real hoot to visit.  When I told her we were from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and that her loving and worried son had asked us to check on her, she immediately said, “Oh, I love your church!”  She then turned to her neighbors and told them how the Church had cared for her son in his time of need.  She was so grateful that we would come to check on her.  We had a lovely visit and were able to report back to her son that she was doing fine and was well cared for.  Greg arrived in town on Wednesday and by Thursday the funeral had been planned for Monday.  Yes, one of the great strengths of LDS people is that we are there for one another in times of need.   Elder Wels was asked to give a talk about the Plan of Salvation at the funeral.  Luckily, I was just asked to give the opening prayer.  I can do that.  Lee is now busy working on his talk.  I give my sweet companion big high fives for so quickly and sweetly agreeing to give this talk.  I know it takes him way out of his comfort zone.

I went into the RV park office to pay our November rent and met a new lady substituting in the office by the name of Ida Cluff.  We had a sweet little chat.  She introduced me to her beloved dog, copper and told me she is a recent widow.  As I was about to go out the door she suddenly asked me what Church I was affiliated with.  I told her I attended the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.  She said, “I thought so, you look like a Mormon”.  What does a Mormon look like?  Turns out she was once a Mormon but she has not gone to Church in a long time because she gave 24/7 care to her cancer stricken husband.  We got interrupted by a phone call and a gentlemen walking in the door.   I think Ida and I are going to become friends and I am going to do what I can to bring her back into the fold.  Perhaps she is the one we were sent here to find.

We had more fun get-acquainted visits with active and non-active members this week.  We went back to visit with Brian Vorwaller, the chain saw artist because we saw that his wife and kids were down at his studio.  We enjoyed our visit and talked more about having his eight year old daughter baptized.  He now has a web site up and running.  Check him out at artistbrianvorwaller.com.  Good family.

Friday morning we helped Elwin and Julie Bissell move into their new place in town.  And then in the afternoon Todd, Amy and Mary arrived for a visit!  We went for a fun walk with them on the docks near Old Town and got to watch people crabbing.  Those little critters are ugly!  Some were having great success and some were getting skunked!  We ended up at La Fiesta for a Mexican dinner and then went back to the Inn at Face Rock to watch Mary swim in their indoor pool.  She is a little fish!  She can dog paddle clear across the pool the long way! 

Saturday we went to Cranberry Sweets (see I said it would be my very favorite store) and toured a little of Old Town.  Then it was off to the beach down at the Jetty.  Not the most beautiful day.  It spit rain off and on all day.  But Mary loves the beach.  She is very wary of the waves.  She has been knocked off her feet several times and Oregon waves are not warm!  These are definitely not your Southern California beaches!  But you can have fun building castles in the sand.  We also went to the Bandon Lighthouse to walk a bit on that beach.  Then it was nap time for everyone!  In the evening they came to our trailer for dinner and a little early birthday party for Mary.  We can’t believe that she is turning 4 years old on the 9th.  We so enjoyed their visit.  Come back soon!!!

It was our first Fast and Testimony Sunday in the Bandon branch.  In a small branch I thought there would be a lot of quiet time when no one was getting up to bear a testimony.  Thankfully today I was wrong.  We heard some great testimonies and the hour just flew by!  Yes, Elder Wels and I both bore our testimonies.  Our little branch needed to know how much we appreciated their loving welcome and how we, just like them, love the Lord.  We are most grateful for the blessings of belonging to His true Church.

Some Family, Some Friends, and a Lot of Service

Sunday, October 23, we attended our first Branch Council Meeting at 8:45 a.m..  We learned that this was primarily a missionary meeting…we had better be a bit more prepared to take control of most of the meeting.  We are learning “Line upon line”.  We went to meet Karsten & Yiena Salin, an inactive couple in the afternoon.  He is Dutch and she is from Hong Kong.  They are a very delightful couple.  He is much older than she is and could probably run circles around all of us.

Monday we got our laundry and ironing done and headed for Central Point to swap out the truck for the much better gas mileage car.  We also had a list of things to get from the house.  Things that never dawned on us until we were in Bandon and found a need for them…like propane bottles.  We brought the little BBQ but forgot the propane.  It is all part of our learning experience.  We wondered how we would feel going back to our little house.  Strangely, or perhaps miraculously, we felt nothing.  It felt like Gentry’s house not ours.  That was a good thing.

We had dinner with our good friends Byron & Nova Johnson and Bob & Rita Phair at a Mexican restaurant in Phoenix.  Another note to self…No ground beef, it is not gluten-free!  It was nice to do our Monday Family Home Evening dinner again.  We miss our friends.

Then it was off to the Shumway’s to help Tanner celebrate his big #16th birthday.  Tanner, you are getting too tall! We can’t wait to hear that you passed your driver’s test on the 8th!   We had a delightful time with the Shums and the Skill’s.  My favorite part of the evening  was “Favorite Day”, I love that part of hearing about everyone’s day and then having family prayer.  Thanks family!

Tuesday we ran errands in and around Medford and then headed back to Bandon to be here in time to work at The Barn serving dinner.  Such sweet people there!  We used our travel time to home and back to study Preach My Gospel.  We hope someday soon we feel ready to do that!

Wednesday the Zone Leaders (Elder Jones and Elder Johnson) came to our Branch to go over our Area Book and answer any questions that we had.  Picture these two adorable 20 year old Elders teaching this 60+ year old missionary couple.  And taught us they did!  We invited them back to the trailer for lunch and had a delightful visit with them.  Elder Jones is a real cowboy!  He works on his Grandfather’s million acre cattle ranch!  He was even wearing cowboy boots!  He wants to take over the ranch some day.  Elder Jones wants to be a landscaper when his mission is over.  He loves being outdoors and working with plants.  Whatever they do, they will be successful.  You can just tell that by getting to know them.  In the afternoon we went to several inactive member homes and met with little success.  But we are getting to know the town better.  We called Tom and Lizzy Olive to see if we could see them in the evening  (we had an ulterior motive) and got an invitation to come for dinner.  Tom BBQ’d us a wonderful  steak dinner with his famous mashed potatoes.  We waited until after dinner to ask Sister Olive to talk with us at Sacrament on the 13th.  She said she would “be thrilled” to do that.  You just gotta love members that are so willing to do whatever is asked of them.  They are an amazing couple.  She has only been a member of the Church for 4 years but has the testimony that seems so much wiser than that.  It was a fun evening!

On an interesting side note...Brother and Sister Olive have three children: The oldest is a boy named Scott.  Next is a girl named Stephanie. and youngest is a daughter named Stacee.  We had a good laugh over that one!

Thursday we went to our second District Meeting.  I tried to take my new “role playing” attitude with me.  Again the meeting was conducted by Elder Plumb (my Mitchell look-alike).  The absolutely worst part of the meeting for me is at the very beginning when everyone arrives.  Those cutie-pie Elders go around and they each just give the other a big back slapping hug.  Elder Wels even gets a hug from each one of them.  Oh, how this Gramma missionary loves hugs… but DARN….. they can’t hug me and I just get handshakes!  Unamerican and just not fair!!  But mission rules are rules and I completely understand though I do not have to like it.

After the marvelously instructive meeting we ran our errands at WalMart and Bi-Mart. Just inside the door at WalMart I came face to face with these bags!

Nightmares from my past engulfed me.  When I moved to Oregon and went to the bank for the first time I was greeted by not one, but two doors to pass through to enter the lobby!  Two doors!!  I knew what that meant!  It gets cold in Oregon!  No building had two doors in So. California!  I was not ready then for the cold of Oregon.  Now I was looking at another nightmare!  Bags for wet umbrellas!  We don’t even have those in our part of Oregon!!!  So what does that say about being here in Bandon?  I don’t even want to go there yet!

On the way home we had time to go visit with Sharon Nazer , a lovely older member who is the only active member of her family.  She definitely sets a good example for them by having her son bring her to church every week.

Then it was home in time to meet Bob and Rita Phair.  How cool that one of our best friends is the PFR (Physical Facilities Rep) for the Church in this area.  Of course, he had to inspect the Bandon building!  And Rita got to come too.  We had so much fun with them!  In the evening we went with them to visit their ex-neighbors, Tammy and Jerry Greer, who had moved to Bandon earlier this year.  We had an enjoyable visit with them and their goldendoodle, Macie, and her 9 puppies.  How cute they were!

Friday morning we took Bob and Rita on a tour of Bandon beaches and the “Face Rock” right near their hotel, the Inn at Face Rock.  We literally had to point out to Bob the features of the rock that gave it its name.  Can you see it looks like a face in the picture?

 If not, Bob can explain it to you.  We did up Old Town Bandon with our first stop at Cranberry Sweets for chocolate samples.  I had best not go in that store very often!  We had lunch at the Minute Café in Old Town.  Bob & Rita got their fish & chips and Bob got some clam chowder.  Lee was content with a hamburger and I got a delightful hash brown, vegetable and cheese breakfast platter.  The fish lovers, the fish avoid-er and the celiac were all very happy.  And, then the Phairs had to leave and get back to their Church building inspections.  Bye Phairs, we love you, can’t wait until the next inspection tour!

In the afternoon we worked on our calendar, made lots of calls for appointments, and worked on our talks for Sunday.  In the evening we went back to the Olive’s on the pretext of checking on the progress of Sister Olive’s talk for Sunday.  But if we are honest here…. It was also the night that Extreme Home Makeover was doing their story about the McPhail Family in Medford.  We were so involved with all the happenings while the show was being filmed that we really wanted to see the end result.   Sister Olive, as an elementary principal of a Grants Pass school several years ago and a participant in the Sparrow Program, knew the McPhail family.  It was fun to have her commentary on the family during the show.


Saturday we had a 10:00 am appointment to meet with Lynda Sessions.  She was the first name I had in my head when we arrived in Bandon.  She works at the Temple 3 days each month.  One of those days is the very same day that Byron and Nova work at the Temple.  So Byron had told me that she would be leading the music in Sacrament and there she was!  We had a lovely chat with her that lasted for 3 hours.  She has 3 inactive sisters on her visiting teaching route and she gave us the scoop on each one of them.  Armed with info maybe when we visit them we can touch their hearts.  In the afternoon we met with more disappointments as all our calls were met with “you can’t visit us right now excuses”.  So we did some good exercise and worked to polish up our talks.

Today at Church I recognized a few more faces and could even put some names on them.  That felt good.  Bro. and Sis. Cooper talked on fasting today.  They were both excellent.  Lee gave a very good talk on the power of one in missionary work in the Priesthood/Relief Society meeting.  He far outshined me!  I was so pleased for him.  And, so happy that is behind us.  I am afraid that in this small branch we are going to have ample opportunity to talk……  Someone  out there want to please send me some of their “talking talents”!!!!!

A Full Week

Hello Everyone!

Sunday afternoon we had a visit with Bro. & Sis. Salt.  She could not be at Church as she has had recent hip surgery and she wanted to meet us.  She is very active in the community of Bandon.  It didn’t take her long to get us to volunteer to help out at The Barn!  The Barn is the name of the community center here in Bandon.  Not surprising, it is a building remodeled from an old barn.  Every Tuesday  E.A.T. (Everyone at the Table) serves a dinner to those in need.  We arrived on Tuesday at 5:00 pm to help serve the meal and then to clean up afterwards.  We got home about 8:00 pm feeling very tired and every inch the senior couple!

Monday was our “P-day” and true to the missionary schedule we got our laundry done.   Note to self… stock up on quarters!  We studied Preach my Gospel between loads.  In the afternoon we met with Pres. Stockford to go over the Branch Member list.  In fact we met with him at our tiny branch 3 days this week for that purpose.  It is always nice to know something about our Branch members when we meet with them.

Then it was off to the Post office, bank and the Chamber of Commerce to get the low-down on Bandon.  That’s the personal errands part of “P-day”.  Old Town Bandon was close by so of course we had stop at Cranberry Sweets to stock up on chocolate. 

That place is dangerous!  So many samples just sitting there to tempt us!  And we did partake! 

We drove to the Bandon Light House and walked a bit on the beach.  Nice afternoon and beautiful weather. 

We stopped by Norris the Tailor to get a pair of Lee’s dress slacks shortened.  He noticed our name tags and told us he was once a member of the Church.  We had a nice little discussion with him.  Two days later we stopped by to pick up our slacks and we gave him a Book of Mormon and a pamphlet and an invitation to come to Church.  Yea, one Book of Mormon down and countless numbers to go!

Brother Olive is a member of our branch and the Stake Mission Leader.  It was important for Elder Wels, in his new capacity as Branch Mission Leader, to meet with him this week.  He owns Woods of the West, a myrtlewood factory and store. 

We got the royal tour and got to see his computer laser machine in operation.  Very impressive.  He sweetly gave us a laser cut plaque of the Prophets of the Church. Pretty cool, huh?

We tried to divide our visits between active and non –active members.  The Hansen’s (a part member family) live right on the beach with a glorious view of the ocean.  I just parked myself at the window! Who could get tired of that view? 

Brother Ornsby lives in a small apartment and has the biggest fish lure collection!  The Shaw’s own Coastal Mist a chocolate and sandwich place in Old Town.  Bro. Shaw is a chocolatier!  His chocolates were fancy and unusual. 

The Powell’s own the Bandon Baking Co. in Old Town.  They love to feed the missionaries so they said lunch was on them whenever we wanted it.  I told her I was a Celiac and that a bread place was not really for me until she introduced me to her Cheesecake that is gluten-free!  She is my new best friend!  The invitation was sweet but we will use it sparingly.  

Bro. Vorwaller is a chainsaw artist!  A really talented man who is just getting started in the craft he loves.  Last may he took  4th place in a 4 day chainsaw carving contest in Reedsport.  They gave him a big piece of wood and he had to design and carve it.  The shark piece is his winning design. 

The Roufs live south of town.  He was adopted but just found his biological family through the television show, The Locator.  We had a brief visit with his wife as part of his family was there to visit.  We can’t wait to hear the whole story.  Every family has a story and every story is fascinating!  We have met some truly lovely people!

We attended our first District Meeting in Coos Bay. 

We met with 8 wonderful Elders from Coos Bay, North Bend, Coquille, and Reedsport.  Elder Johnson, the missionary from Klamath Falls who was with us during our hospital duty with Sister Cox last week, has been transferred to Coos Bay and is now our Zone leader!  It was nice to recognize a friendly face there.  He took us under his wing.  Thank goodness, because District Meeting is “role play” torture!  When I told them I did not particularly like to role play, they tended to pick on me even more!  If they weren’t so darn cute and knowledgeable, we might think of skipping that meeting next week.  Guess I am going to learn to role play!  I am going for the Oscar!

Here we are with President Stockford:

Have a great week!

Our New Home in Bandon!

On Friday October 14th we traveled up to the Mission President's home in Eugene for a wee bit of an orientation and a good "get-to-know-you" chat.  President Young is a very loving and dedicated man.  He asked lots of questions about us and then he threw out the curve ball by saying..

"Sister Wels can you tell me what happened in 1820?" 

Gulp!  It was at that exact moment that I truly felt like a green missionary!!!  Can't remember a thing I said but I must have passed.... he did not fire me!  He was using me as an example of letting the spirit guide what I said.  Lesson learned.  Stay close to the Spirit so the Spirit will stay close to me.

The two Mission Assistants then took us to the mission office where we were greeted by office staff headed by Elder and Sister Watts from Grants Pass.  They were once our Baptismal Coordinators at the Medford Temple so it was fun to see them in a missionary setting.  We were given our new name tags and now we look at bit more official.  Plus we were given a lot of materials to read and all of the missionary handouts.  We have a lot of homework to do!  The truck was definitely a few pounds heavier going home.

Saturday about 10:30 we pulled away from our house and towed our home on wheels to its new location in the Bandon By the Sea RV Park.  The afternoon and evening were spent getting us settled.  About 8:00 pm we called the Bandon Branch President and reported for duty.  Oh boy, our first meeting would be in his office at 9:00 am.

Oh my goodness.... cultural shock hit this morning.  Tiny branch!!  Tiny building!!  There was a whopping 32 people at  the 10am Sacrament Meeting this morning.  Both of us were invited to speak at Sacrament this morning.  We just jumped into this mission with both feet and then some today!  

We met with the Branch President Stockford during Sunday School time.  He gave us a newly printed ward list.  We only had time to go over the first page of 8 pages of ward members.  14 families on that first page and 12 of them are inactive!  Do you suppose we have some work to do?  Elder Wels was immediately made the Ward Mission Leader!  And we now have 5 meetings to attend before next Sunday.  I think we are going to be busy. 

There were 12 ladies in Relief Society this morning.  12 strong sisters!  I met President Wright's sister in law.  She is a hoot! Cynthia Wright said I would enjoy her sister.  I think she is right!  

Elder Wels said there were 5 men in the High Priest group.  They may be few in numbers but they are really good members.  We felt loved and wanted but a bit overwhelmed.  I was feeling swamped until Heavenly Father reminded me that I could eat an elephant if I just did it one bite at a time.  Please pass the salt!

The Power of Prayer--Our First Zone Conference

We got to attend our first Zone Conference last Friday, and boy, as amazing as it was, we certainly hope that it will not be what normal Zone Conferences are going to be like, for sure!!!!

President Young was coming down for a Zone Conference and he called and invited us to attend so that we could meet and get a little orientation.  And since we are not going to the Missionary Training Center, we need all the help we can get!!!!  Little did we know that we were about to see the gospel in action when that Zone Conference took a scarey turn just before they were going to break for dinner.

The theme of the conference was Prayer, specifically the effectiveness of a missionary's personal prayers and helping investigators learn how to pray.  It is hard for me to imagine that there are people out there who have never ever prayed before.  But that is a fact.

During the conference we enjoyed beautiful talks by the Mission President, his wife, a visiting area seventy, and his wife,  and also our very own Stake President, who called us to serve our mission.  Near the end of the talks, the Area Seventy asked the missionaries to choose one missionary from each companionship to come forward and bear a one minute testimony.  After about six Elders had shared their testimonies,  a Sister of an Elderly Senior couple, who was sitting on the front row, suddenly gasped for air and fell over! Oh my goodness it was a frightful moment.

All of us were immediately asked to leave the chapel and gather in the cultural hall while a few stayed behind to help and call for medical attention.  As the rest of us were entering the cultural hall one of the Elders spontaneously began to sing "Nearer my God to Thee".  Thoughts of the Titantic immediately came to my mind and the tears began to flow!  As the missionaries came out of the chapel, they all joined in the song.  There had to be at least 60 of us.  When the song was over the entire group spontaneously fell to their knees and one of the Elders gave the most glorious heart-felt prayer asking for assistance for this sweet senior sister missionary.  It was so amazing.  It was a prayer you could feel... you could almost touch.  It was so tangible!

After the sister was rushed by ambulance to the hospital, one of the Assistants to the President had us all gather into the Relief Society Room.  Once in there one of the Elders took it upon himself to play beautifully spiritual hymns on the piano while the rest of us quietly sent up our own personal prayers on her behalf.  The Mission President soon came and got Grampa Bear and I and asked us to go to the hospital with Elder Cox (the husband, as the ambulance had taken Sister Cox away already).

We stayed at the hospital with Elder Cox until late in the evening (he is 81 years young and just so sweet and adorable and was so worried about his wife).  Elder Cox visited with his wife, and then came to report to us that she did not recognize who he was and was having trouble understanding where she was.  He then went back to stay with his wife at her bedside.  After about 2 hrs Elder Cox came and got us and had us go with him to his wife's room.  And she was perfectly fine!!!!!  As if nothing had ever happened.  And so cute!  They kept her overnight and ran tests on her and was given a clean bill of health.

She was so apologetic for causing such a comotion and for interupting Zone Conference.  Know what I told her?  I told her that after a marvelous lesson on prayer, she blessed all of us missionaires to know first hand what a heartfelt prayer can do!  It was the prayers of all those beautiful young Elders and Sisters that Heavenly Father just had to answer.  Sister Cox went home from the hospital doing just fine yesterday.  It was sure a testimony builder for me!

But if that is what Zone Conference is going to be like..... I may skip them!  Just kidding!  I gotta say that it was very emotional yet very amazing!

Set Apart!

It's official! Tonight Lee & Pat were set apart as full-time missionaries for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.  They will head up to the Oregon Eugene Mission office before setting up their permanent residence for the next year in Bandon Oregon.  All of us back home are so inspired by their faith and willingness to leave everything behind and make this commitment to serve the Lord.  We look forward to their letters home, which will be posted here, as they share with us the many experiences that await them in the mission field.

The new missionaries with their Stake President, President Wright

 A few of the grand kids savoring every last minute 

with their "Gramma and Grampa Bear"

Connor, Madeline, Chloe, & Janelle

Lee and Pat with Lee's son Todd

G&G Bear with Pat's Son Scott, Scott's wife Wendy,

and two of their six kids, Madeline and Janelle.

G&G Bear with Pat's oldest daughter Stacy, 

Stacy's husband Mark, two of their four kids, Connor and Chloe.

 Lee & Pat with their longtime friends Fred & Donna Clark

Lee & Pat with Ken and Debbie Barber

Lee & Pat with Byron, Nova, and Gentry