April 7, 2014

Monday started with cleaning, laundry and shopping as usual.  I made cookies for FHE that evening and Elder Lewis got the oil changed in the car.  We hope our good little Toyota Corolla will stay healthy throughout our mission.  The amount of pot holes here is unbelievable, and some times we don't see them in time, so we are keeping our fingers crossed.  

In the afternoon Elder White and Elder Latu called to see if they could come over and burn some CD's on our computer.  We of course said okay.  A little while after, the other two showed up, Elders Yardley and  Zwahlen.  It's always good to see them and they enjoyed sampling the newly baked cookies.  Around 5:00 we asked them if they had dinner appointments and they did not. I really didn't have anything I could fix in a hurry, so we decided on french toast with bacon and sausage, juice and milk.  It was a hit!  I think we cooked up about one and a half loaves of bread.  It's fun to see those boys eat. They are always very polite and grateful.  

Wednesday all the senior couples went to Annapolis to tour the Naval Academy.  We decided not to go since we had been there before with Jackie and Bryan.  Instead we drove to downtown Baltimore to visit a friend in the hospital who had open heart surgery; we had accompanied her to the temple for her first time a week earlier.  She was doing well and we enjoyed the visit with her and her husband.  

At 4:00 pm we met with all the other senior couples in the mission home in Ellicott City for dinner.  President and Sister Richards are always so gracious and welcoming.  They served smoked salmon, rice, broccoli, salad and a wonderful cake.  Yum!  (Yes, like Royce always says, in the Lewis family it's all about the food.  It's probably from the Danish side.)  Anyway,  I can't even express the wonderful feelings of friendship and togetherness we feel when we are all together.  We love these people so much and shiver to think that we never would have known them if we had not accepted this call.  Our testimonies of the gospel burn in our hearts and we have so much in common because of that.  

After the dinner we drove to the Brooklyn Park Branch to participate in "Family Fun Night."   Families from the branch and the neighborhood came and played ping-pong, foosball, and many other games.  It was really well attended and everyone had a good time. Many nonmembers came.  We will continue to do that every Friday night and may even start having Zumba classes and crafts.
  
What a wonderful general conference this past weekend.  We feel uplifted and renewed, ready to go and do.   We stayed at home on Saturday to watch it, but on Sunday we drove to the Glen Burnie chapel to watch conference there.  We had a large pot-luck lunch between sessions and it was a lot of fun to socialize.