Week Forty-six…Scored Some Last Minute Tix!

We learned some great things this week. Here’s some of them…

We headed into the library Monday morning and it was about the same as it has been… slow. I worked on French training and Mom on last minute plans for the Christmas social. Then in the afternoon I was asked to help this young couple with their Family Tree in Kazakhstan. You may have already guessed, but there are not many records for Kazakhstan. I learned by going to the Wiki page for Kazakhstan that their best bet would be to contact the records archive there and ask for information. It made me sad that I couldn’t really help them. We stayed later to cover for our Zone leaders and then headed home, where I learned that my Christmas socks had arrived. I’m sure you remember me mentioning that I didn’t bring my Christmas socks with me, so I decided to order some. I like! They are fun colors and designs and fit well. Wahoo! So I put some on and we headed off to the Mission Devotional, which was put on by the Elijah Choir (the mission choir). They did a nice program entitled The Joy of Christmas. All the songs and speaking parts were centered around the theme of joy. 

Afterwards we walked home and Mom had to take another picture with the lights here on the Conference Center plaza. I have learned that Mom really likes lights. I keep asking her if we should get a Christmas tree, but she says that her garland lights on top of the kitchen cabinets are enough. At least she also has these lights to see every night as we walk home from the library or the COB. We made it home in time to be part of the family Christmas story-time. Wahoo!

Tuesday morning I FINALLY got up and went to the gym to workout. It felt good. But I forgot that we had switched and had the 10-6 shift, not our usual 12-8 shift, because of the Hale Center musical that night. So I hurried home and then found out that they were doing a practice for the French song that some of the missionaries are performing for the Christmas social and Mom asked me to join because they needed more male voices. So I quickly showered and changed and ran off to the Church History Museum auditorium for that. We are singing Noël nouvelet. It is a traditional French carol and we learned it is even in the French version of the hymn book. Many moons ago someone created an English version of the carol called Sing We Now of Christmas, but it is not a direct translation of the French lyrics. Since we are the International Zone we of course are singing it in French. Wow, my brain leapt back to those days in high school French and my teacher trying to get us to say the words with a French accent. Oui, oui!

Our shift seemed to fly by pretty quick, even though it was still slow in the library. We finished up and we headed off to see Elf the Musical. I thought it was pretty good. Mom wasn’t as impressed. They of course did a lot of what is in the movie, but added songs and changed some parts of the storyline. The guy that played Buddy did a good job, but (and I can’t believe I’m saying this because I don’t like him much as an actor) he just wasn’t Will Ferrell. Ferrell did such a good job, it’s hard to do it better. They did have some fun stuff they did with the set as usual. One of the things they did were these cool lights.

Wednesday we slept in a bit, then Mom got started on Santa Lucia buns. I headed off to Costco and learned that I had waited too long. It was a zoo! I can’t believe how many people were there on a Wednesday morning. I got gas and then went to find a parking spot. It took me awhile to find one, and that was in the back-lot part of the parking. I was able to find everything on Mom’s list, plus a half gallon of eggnog, and went to stand in the lines for the checkout. It took awhile, but I finally made it out of there and headed home. I learned long ago that I really don’t like shopping. Ugh!

When I got home Mom had the Santa Lucia buns made and used the powdered sugar I had bought to make the icing. We then vegged and watched another Hallmark Christmas movie. I was going to go ride the exercise bike in the gym, but my right knee was a little swollen for some reason, so I just relaxed on the couch. We made some dinner and then filled the wagon with Mom’s buns (the Santa Lucia buns that is) and headed out to give them to all of the missionaries in our apartments. We of course stopped to talk to many of them and learned more about many of our fellow missionaries. Some chats were longer than others and some folks weren’t home and we just left theirs by their door…Mom put them in individual packages…but we were barely able to make it back to our apartment for the 8pm family Christmas story-time. Wynne read the story about the boys buying shoes for their dad. They had traced his feet on brown paper. I like that story. Good memories!

Thursday was a hectic day in the library. It wasn’t too busy, but I had a lot of things to do, including taking a group through the Escape Room.When I got there I learned that they were owners of an escape room here in the valley and had been asked by the library staff to come do our room and give us some feedback on what we could do to make ours better. They were 3 adults and a boy and didn’t quite make it in time. Just about a minute shy of completing it. I then went down to our floor and was floor lead. Mom asked me to do the 3pm prayer meeting so she could help train Sister Karapetyan as a steward. So I went and did that and totally forgot I was supposed to be at a meeting. Oops! Well we finished our shift and headed to the temple. We did an endowment session and then came out and actually remembered to take a picture. We asked the sisters with us if they would like to stop for dinner and they both said they were fine with eating at home. So we just headed home. After dropping them off Mom said she was actually hungry and didn’t want to cook and wished we had gone out, so I just turned around and we headed down to Crown Burger and got dinner and brought it home just in time to eat it while listening to 

Roxy do the family Christmas story-time book called Merry Christmas Strega Nona. I had never heard of Strega Nona books and learned that they are pretty good. I liked the story. I especially liked how the whole town got involved in the surprise for Strega Nona. It was their way of showing their thanks and love for all that she had done for them through the many years. What a great theme for Christmas! It is so fun to try to surprise people with thoughtful gifts and find ways to show them thanks for all they have done for us. This Christmas we haven’t been able to be around everyone very much to learn what you would want or need, so as you know we just asked what you and the grandkids want and have just ordered using Amazon, so that we can have the gifts shipped to you, since we aren’t all going to be together. Not my favorite way of doing it, but it works. 

Friday morning after working out at the gym we came home to relax and clean the house. When we got to the library we learned that it had been a little busier in there that day than it has been the past few weeks. That was fun! But we were only there for a few hours so we didn’t really get to do much. Mom was steward and I did the little in service training lesson for the afternoon prayer meeting. It was about church member migration in the late 1800’s. We learned there is this cool website, Saints By Sea, that lists most of the immigrants who came to the Salt Lake valley from across the ocean. There were about 50,000 members that came from the British Isles, 20,000 from Scandinavia and 10,000 from other countries. I looked on the site and found grandpa Segerstedt’s family listed there. I learned that the site also includes journal entries from the passengers, but unfortunately no one on their ship kept a journal. Sadness.

Saturday we went in at our usual hour and learned pretty quickly that it was going to be a busier day. There were people coming in at a more normal rate and we were kept pretty busy. Mom helped a lady with Italian research…twice…and was able to help her find what she was looking for both times. Go Mom! I was asked to help a lady with Norway research. When I got to her station I learned that she was more qualified to help me than I her. She had a pile of Norwegian farm books (Bygdeboke) and about 8 windows open on her computer. What I learned that she needed was to know if there were any more volumes of the one set of farm books that she was using. I was able to verify that we only had two of the volumes, for some weird reason, and she was out of luck. Sadness. My last few experiences have been to tell people we don’t have what they need. In the afternoon I was asked to go up to the main floor to help someone with Czechia research. Oh joy, another country I know nothing about and will probably have to say, “Sorry, I can’t help you.” Well I got up

there and learned that he was looking for a grandfather that had come from Czechia. He had a US Census record that gave an age (so we had an approximate birth year) and the name of his wife and children (who it stated the children had been born in the US), but it also said his last name was Mikhala and his FamilySearch tree said his last name was Rossi. So we looked through some other records and learned that another individual had incorrectly put the Rossi name there, mixing him up with the father-in-law of his daughter. So we corrected that name. Then I thought we ought to see if we could find an immigration record for him, since the census record also stated he had immigrated in 1903. So we went looking and found his naturalization application which stated that he was from Poland and his wife was from Czechia. Wahoo! But I don’t know how to search Polish records, but I did know we had a sister missionary on our floor that did. So I told him I would get her and ran down to find Evelyn. She was up with him the rest of  the evening, so I am pretty sure they were able to find more info. Wahoo! Finally a successful guest visit. 

We closed our floors and headed home to get ready for Christmas with the Tabernacle Choir. We put our name in for the lottery to get tickets and were informed a couple of weeks ago that we unfortunately were not chosen to receive tickets. Sadness. But Wednesday I got a text from the Watsons, who were in the MTC with us, saying they had extra tickets and would we like some? Score! We got to the Conference Center and there were tons of young sister missionaries ushering. We passed this sister

who had a flower in her hair so I said Aloha. She responded back with Aloha, so I asked her where she was from. She said, “Hawaii. The Big Island!” Well we talked for a bit and learned she was from Kona Stake, the other side of the island from where we were, but that her name was Sister Aholelei. I said, “Wait, I had an Aholelei in my Zoom institute class during COVID. Do you have a brother?” She has 3. Her middle brother, Tanner was my student. So we took this pic and I sent I to her brother who I am

friends with in FB. Small world! 

The concert was amazing! So much pageantry and lighting and effects. We learned that it was being filmed for next year’s PBS specials. So if you ever watch it you can listen for our applause. We really enjoyed Michael Maliakel‘s voice. He is a currently playing. Aladdin on Broadway and we learned he is of Indian-American descent. He had such a pure tone! The other famous guest was Lesley Nicol who plays Mrs. Patmore on Dowton Abbey. She just did some narration. The whole program took almost an hour and a half and went by pretty quick. It really was marvelous.

Today we walked to church in the 30° weather. It wasn’t too bad since the sun was out, but it’s not out anymore. We had a semi good day at church. Mom taught her first primary lesson and said it didn’t go as well as she hoped it would. I am sure it was fine. As we walked home there was a bit of a haze that had developed and it was a bit colder. As the day has gone along it has turned more and more like this pic. Foggy and cold. Brrrrr. We are glad that we don’t have anywhere we have to go tonight, so we can just stay cozy and warm here in the apartment.

Now we just have to figure out which Christmas movie we want to watch. It won’t be Miracle on 34th Street since I watched that one Friday night. Maybe it will be White Christmas, but we will see. Mom keeps saying no to that one because she watched it back when she was sick and doesn’t want to watch it again. Stay tuned!

Love you all. 

BE GOOD!

Elder and Sister Dad and Mom