May 26, 2024

Happy, Happy Birthday to this handsome husband of mine!!! I love you so much and am so grateful for this journey through life we are taking.

Last night to celebrate Jack's birthday we met Tracey & Tom on the Vancouver Waterfront for dinner. Every morning on the Portland news channel they show a shot of Portland from this spot on the Vancouver Waterfront. It includes a picture of this walkway that juts out over the Columbia river. Jack has wanted to find that spot and last night we did!

When Jack described the place to Tracey she knew right where it was and said there was a restauant there that she liked so that is where they took us for dinner. It is called WildFin and we had a nice dinner visiting and then walking along the waterfront. Thank you Tracey & Tom!

Last week when we went to Coos Bay I forgot to tell what happened in the restaurant when we had dinner. I identified a few choices for dinner before we left on our trip. We were close to one of them at dinnertime so we went to check it out. We peeked in the door and looked at the menu outside with the Larson's. It was a Sports Bar and we were not completely comfortable with eating there but in the end we decided to stay. Our server was nice, took our orders, and brought us our meals. Towards the end of our meal she came to check on us and then leaned in closer to get a look at our missionary badges. Then she exclaimed, "Oh, you are Mormons!" Then she proceeded to tell us that she did a Service Corp opportunity in Fiji and was surprised that she ran into several small LDS chapels in the middle of the jungle. Then she told us she had seen the Book of Mormon play. We were not sure where the conversation was going when all of a sudden she said, "You wouldn't by any chance have a Book of Mormon with you?" This is where it paid off to be prepared. Because our District Leader had challenged us in the past to give out a Book of Mormon I did in fact have (2) in the car just for that purpose. She said she would really like to have one because she liked to read out of the "Good" books and this would be great to read too. We got one from the car and gave it to her. I was bold and asked her that if she read it would she pray about it. And if she felt something would she look for those young missionaries around town and have a discussion with them. She agreed and thanked us for the book! It was such an awesome experience!!! We love wearing our missionary badges! It is going to be so hard to take them off (:.

A new MLS couple, the Burgoyne's, arrived in the mission this week. They are from Bountiful. Monday all the office missionaries went out to the Burgoyne's new home in Mill City to help Elder Larson get it ready. We put the dishes away in the cupboards, hung shower curtains, put together furniture, and had a fun time getting out of the office. On the way home we stopped for dinner in Stayton. The Burgoyne's arrived on Tuesday and we enjoyed getting to know them over another dinner that the President took us all to. They are going to be a great assest to the Gates branch where they will be serving.

Last Sunday we had our last District Council with our District Leader, Elder Nielson. It was Transfers this week and Elder Nielson has been transferred. We knew it was going to happen because he has been here since the beginning of January. We love Elder Nielson and are going to miss him. He and I bonded over Caffeine Free Diet Coke. We will continue to see him at Zone Conferences because he still has a year left, but even better than that he is from Sandy so we will see him when he gets home. One of our Social Media Sisters, Sister Jacobsen, was also transferred. She has been here since October or November so we have had her for a long time. We love her too but are glad she is going to finish her mission out proselyting. She goes home the next transfer.

With Transfers also come Departures and New Arrivals. We only had (7) go home and (4) arrive. Our numbers in the mission are down right now but by August we will be back up to our full number of missionaries. The Sisters going home really have a piece of our hearts. We have loved serving with them and learning their stories. Sister Bingham is from Vernon, UT, Sister Winsor from Wisconsin, and Sister Hull from Utah. Sister Price is the only Sister missionary seen wearing false eyelashes and getting away with it. Sister Sponenberg and her companion Sister Simper had trench looking rain coats. Every time Elder Rowan saw them he called them the Secret Agent missionaries. We have Sister Simper for a while longer but Sister Sponenberg went home this transfer too.

After all the cooking for Zone Conference I in particular did not want to cook for the new arrivals. Since there were so few of them we opted to just do pizza and salad. There were only (4) new arrivals but then we have to count their trainers, all the office staff, the Assistants & Social Media missionaries, and then the local missionaries who always show up for a free dinner :). In the end there were 30 of us but we still opted for pizza and salad.

We have been gone the last (3) weekends in a row so we opted to stay home this weekend. Elder Rowan worked for a while in the office on Saturday and I went and got a pedicure. We had a discussion last month with the other Sr missionaries about luxuries. I asked them to name a luxury that they really enjoyed. Elder Bready told us about staying at the Ritz-Carlton with his family (ooh la la). The Larson's talked about all the cruising and traveling they have done. Jack could not come up with anything and I said that getting a pedicure was a luxury for me. For Mother's Day the kids gave me cash for a pedicure so I went and enjoyed that "luxury"! After I took this picture I wanted to ask who those old looking feet belonged to :).

Elder Rowan has had a good birthday today. It was Sunday so we had church and then a baptism to attend. He was able to talk to all the children and heard from many missionaries. They called and sang to him, sent him texts and birthday GIFs, played tricks on him just to get him on the phone, and just generally made him feel loved. Tomorrow is Memorial Day and the President is taking us all out to brunch to celebrate the holiday and Elder Rowan's birthday. What more can you ask for?