We had another week fly by and here is what we learned this week…
Monday started with a devotional in which people who had taken the
Leadership Pattern Journey class shared their experience. We had already put the word out in our zone that there was a class coming up, but when Mom asked Monday morning after this devotional, she got enough people interested in taking the class that we are going to have three classes…Wednesdays, Thursdays and Fridays at lunchtime. Mom and I will facilitate Wednesday and Thursday and we are going to have Sister Pruner do Friday’s class. The hardest part was getting a place in the library where we could hold it, but it looks like we got it and it will begin in September.
We got going in the library and I was helping some missionaries with a couple of different things they were working on and suddenly looked at my watch and realized I was late for my 10am meeting. So I ran off for that meeting and was so discombobulated that I went up to the wrong meeting room, thinking I was supposed to be at a different meeting. I finally made it to the correct place and was able to use some of my
tech skills that I have learned in the library for doing virtual meetings, to get the meetings host’s computer shared with our online participants. After the meeting I was asked to help some guests from the Netherlands. Success! We were able to find records for their family and after how I explained that they could save what we found in a tree that they could access from home, they decided to get a
FamilySearch account and begin a tree, which led to them tying in to an existing tree that went way back. Wahoo! They were happy. After lunch and another meeting I was asked to help a man from France, Damien. He was trying to find an ancestor’s birthdate. I asked what he had looked at so far, and learned that he was very knowledgeable in family history research. He had tried just about every site that I could think of so after doing a quick search of
Ancestry’s immigration records I decided to call
down one of their specialists to see if there was something they knew about that he could locate in US immigration records that might have the location of where he came from in France. They came down and couldn’t find anything either, so I “escalated” it to a specialist on our floor, which turned out to be Kelly, our young specialist. I stayed to watch what she tried with him and found that it was everything he and I had already done. We had, as the genealogists say,
hit a brick wall. At this point there aren’t any records that we are aware of that can give him the answer. He will just have to wait and hope for more records to become available that might have his answer in them.
We came home at 6pm and went to FHE at 7pm. After that we came back to our apartment and decided to watch
Young Woman and the Sea on Disney+. It was pretty good. As I get older I am enjoying more and more movies that are based on real life. This one was done well I think it tells a great story of a remarkable young lady. That kept us up a bit later, but it was Pday the next day and we weren’t too concerned with having to get up early.
Tuesday was Pday as I just said. I decided to go on a longer mountain bike ride instead of road bike. I did the same ride where I crashed last week, but this time didn’t crash. Luckily it rained Monday night and the dirt was more firm on the trail, especially in that corner where I laid it down last time. I turned
Strava on this time and learned that he ride is 11 miles with 1590’ of climbing. That is a decent ride. One thing I did, because I was curious, was put the bike in
trail mode instead of
eco mode on one of the climbs to see
the difference. Oh my, what a difference! Trail mode is almost like not pedaling at all. After my ride I got home to find Mom teaching Erica, the daughter of one of the missionary couples in our apartments, how to make pretzels. She loves to teach! I got cleaned up and read
Mere Christianity, at least that was what I was reading when I wasn’t reading the insides of my eyelids. Mom finished and then went after trimming her tomato plants. She is thinking they have too many branches and are stealing the water and nutrients for those instead of the actual tomatoes, we’ll see if it works and she gets more tomatoes. I had eaten when I got back from my ride so I wasn’t hungry when Mom wanted to go to the COB for lunch, so she went without me. When she was coming out of the building she noticed that they have changed one of the walls in the lobby area. They have added this cool
triptych painting on the wall. I love the way they
took the original painting and broke it up into the three separated paintings side by side. It seems to emphasize each part of the painting separately yet still portray the overall scene. Sometimes things like that just don’t work in my opinion, but in this case I think it does. While Mom was gone I started watching
Alone…Australia. I remember someone telling me that there were some competitors in one of these international versions that were pretty “wimpy”
compared to the regular series competitors and I think I have to agree. I don’t think they were talking about the Australian version, but there were 4 competitors gone by day 3. Granted one got hurt and was pulled out by the medical staff, but wow they were dropping like flies. I have continued to watch the rest of this week and can report that they are down to 2 competitors by day 41, I think it was. These last two look like they may stay awhile though. Fun times.
I then went to work on cleaning my bike chain with my new cleaning tool that I bought on Amazon. My bike has been making noises when I ride and I don’t like it. It sounds like it might be because my chain is dirty, thus the new cleaning tool. Well, it broke not halfway into cleaning my chain. The old saying
You get what you pay for came into my mind. I paid a cheap price because I already have a nice chain cleaning tool, but I forgot to bring it with me on this mission and I didn’t want to buy another one. Ugh. So it was me and a toothbrush and chain cleaner solvent the rest of the way. BTW, I went out on a ride yesterday with the wonderfully clean chain and it still add noise. I think it might be grime in my crank or my pedals. So they are on my list to clean Tuesday morning before my next ride. When Mom saw that I had broken my tool she said, “Return it.” So I contacted Amazon and they said ok. So on my way to giving platelets I dropped it off at the return counter and got my refund. I went to give platelets, but the machine wouldn’t boot up properly…they tried twice. So they moved me to another machine and it worked. But after they stuck me it stopped working. Ugh. So they said sorry and sent me home. I got home for just a brief time and then headed to the airport to pick up Sam. She had gone home to get some dental and eye work done.
Wednesday I worked out and we got to the library at 10am. We weren’t there long when I was asked to help a lady with Netherlands research. I wasn’t with her long, just finding out what she wanted to work on, when Sister Ng came up and saw who I was working with and said that she knew her from the Netherlands. So I told her she ought to take over, which she did. After she finished helping her Sister Ng came and told me that she was Sister Boom, Elder Boom’s wife, and they had been in the same ward together in The
Netherlands and her husband had been their bishop. I was then asked to help a French family. We were able to find birth records for both grandparents from mom and dad’s side, which they thought was pretty cool. Then I was asked to help another person with French research help, but I found that it was really ancestors from France who had lived and married in Louisiana, so I looked for some records there and found a book that she might find some answers in, but ultimately turned her over to a US/Canada missionary. I then worked on some of the people on my own tree…Nathaniel Jenkins and Rebecca Boyden. I found some great circumstantial evidence, but couldn’t find a
good verifying document to prove the relationship. As I was working on that up walked someone next to me asking how he could get some help around this place. I looked up and it was Rick Caulk, from Elk Grove. Fun surprise. Anita was there too and then Mom came back to where we were and we chatted for awhile about girls camp and where their kids are at and when he plans to retire…all those things old people talk about. They are in town for a family gathering and Rick said he would probably come back in the next day to work on his French ancestry side. I told him I have learned some things that I am sure could help him. We left the library at 6pm to go to dinner with
Uncle Keith and Sam and the Stapps, who are the new missionaries on our floor from Rancho Cordova. Elder Stapp went to Argentina the same time Keith did, they even flew home together on the same plane. We took them to
Seven Brothers and I think they liked it. We sat around and talked for about 2 1/2 hours and then walked back to our apartment where Keith planned to sleep overnight. I ran Sam home and when I got back Mom and Keith were watching
The Mentalist. So we all just watched that and didn’t talk much and headed to bed after it was over.
Thursday morning we got up and talked a bit. Keith told us about his seminary class and other things going on with his life these days and then he was off to his meeting with the Maverick mucky mucks. We went into the library and Rick Caulk was there being helped by one of our missionaries. So I joined in and helped explain some things to him about researching in France. He didn’t have a lot of time and so he left not long after I got there. I then worked on zone leader stuff and was asked to help a couple from the Netherlands. Wow, we have had a lot of people from The Netherlands. We had success and they mentioned how amazing it was that we had all of these resources to do this research. It is pretty amazing. We went to the COB for lunch and it was prime rib day. Mom decided it was definitely prime rib day for her and it was a good choice. In the afternoon it was lots more zone leader stuff and then we were off to the temple. We went to the Taylorsville Temple this time to do sealings. Sister Pruner had 3 sisters to seal to their parents and the sealer was agreeable to do
them all at the same time. There was a very strong spirit that came into the room as we did that and I am sure they got to be present for this event. Very cool! Afterwards it was Sister Docherty’s turn to decide what we did after the temple. She decided we needed to go to Walmart because she wanted fruit. I have learned that it is never just about one item when we go to these stores. Even us, who hadn’t planned to get anything, we grabbed some eggs and ice cream sauces. When we were finished we went back to the temple because Sister Docherty left her phone there and then we finally headed home. After dropping the sisters off we came to the apartment. We are having to park a ways away right now because they are refurbishing our carport coverings at the apartment complex. I watched some
American Ninja Warriors and then headed to bed.
Friday was our R&R day from the library staff, so we didn’t need to be in until 11am. We did exactly that…rest and relax. Not much of anything. I did do a little Gospel Doctrine class prep, since I am teaching again this week, and Mom worked on her primary lesson. We got into the library and almost immediately I was asked to help a couple from….what’s your guess???…yup The Netherlands. Again we had success and they were impressed with how much we knew and what was available. He started asking lots of questions about why we do this and how I came to be there. It was fun to tell them about being a
missionary and why we do all of this. They both started a tree and I showed them how to attach sources and memories. Mom brought a loaf of sourdough bread with her to the library to give to Sister Black as a thank you for quilting with her quilting machine the quilts Mom put together for our upcoming new Santana and Johannesson grandbabies. They turned out super cute. (Yes I did unjust use the word
cute. There is a time and a place for that word and although I believe the feminine sex overuses it, it is a good word). Anyway the quilts look mahhhhhhhhvelous and now all Mom has left to do on them is to put the outside binding on them and they will be ready for our grandkids. Our day ended early as it was our T/R day so Mom headed home and I went to give platelets. I had set up a new appointment for Friday to replace the botched one on Tuesday. Everything worked this time and I gave my donation while watching
Worth,
which is a very intriguing movie based on the true story of Kenneth Feinberg and the
September 11th Victim Compensation Fund. It was very interesting to learn about some of the behind-the-scenes things that happened in the government to try to figure out how or if they should give compensation to the victims families. They decided they had to do something or the individual suits that would come from all of the families would bankrupt the airlines industry and also other things and bring the economy to a halt. Feinberg really wanted to help families the best he could, but it was difficult to create a formula that was fair compensation to all of the different families in different circumstances. I didn’t make it to the end, since we don’t have Netflix, so I will have to wait until next time to see how it all turned out. I got some
Lorna Doones and drove off to get gas at Costco. I checked with Mom and also went in and got milk and chocolate milk and apples. I finished the night watching the latest episode of
Alone…Arctic Circle. Saturday morning I went on a road bike ride and then into the library. We began the day with zone leader stuff…the agenda for our next meeting and Mom getting all of the classes for the
Leadership Pattern Journey class getting finalized. I then worked a bit on another ancestor’s line…Anders Larson and Maja Gustafsdotter, but was interrupted to help a couple from….The Netherlands! They were a fun young couple and were just intrigued that they could even do this kind of work. They said they were definitely going to do this when they get home. He told me his aunt had given them a chart with their family line traced back to the 1600’s and he was going to transfer it onto
FamilySearch. I then helped with a French document translation. What? I can barely read French,
but I actually did better than I thought I would. I was asked shortly after that to help another couple from The Netherlands who were just finishing their visit here to the US. They were also impressed with all of the information and websites available to help them search their family. The wife didn’t speak very good English, so my Afrikaans and her husband’s translation helped her to search and begin a family tree. When it connected to her father’s line already completed she was so excited. She just kept smiling and pointing at the names. I showed her how to do the same for her mother’s side and she said she would work on that at home. We closed down the library and came home to rest the rest of the night. But Mom decided to go play pickleball with Sister Nelson. I stayed home and watched more of
Alone…Australia.
Today was church. Both Mom and I had classes to teach. Mom taught about preparing and fortifying and keeping us safe and had her kids build houses and forts and talk about what all of Bose different parts could be today for our families to keep us strong and safe and protected. I asked the members of our class what verses they had read this week that were new or surprising to them. They are not afraid of getting into messy topics and we discussed a lot about the horrors of war and the mess that comes from people that start them. Both lessons went well.
I had a polish dog and Maui sweet onion chips for lunch and wrote this blog post and now I am ready to watch an episode of Chosen.
I hope you had a great week as well. BE GOOD! Love you all.
Sister and Elder Mom and Dad.
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