This has been a wonderful week. Most weeks when we are invited to eat with members are wonderful. This week the ward had dinner appointments lined up early and everyone was really great, it started with the bishop of the ward and his family. What a wonderful family and so welcoming and anxious to discuss the Gospel with us. We also attended a confirmation of a young lady who was baptized on Saturday. We attended two ward council meetings following our missionary correlation meeting early that morning. We attended one sacrament meeting then took some time in the afternoon to visit a family we are assigned for home teaching. They have a daughter on a mission and four children at home. We always enjoy our visits to their home. Later in the evening we met again with the family from Mexico with the sisters and had a discussion on family history. They had been exposed to some basics of family history but we hope they learned some things from our lesson.
We recently accepted a request to be on an advisory board for our local Senior Citizen center. Our first meeting was on Monday afternoon following our morning meeting with our sisters and the other senior couple in the area. Just before our dinner we had one other discussion with a fellow we have been trying to help return to church activity. Tuesday is our preparation day and sometimes we have some time to do some things around the house. George had a dental appointment in the afternoon and then we had a meal with a wonderful couple who unfortunately are planning to move from our area. In the evening we met with the young men and young women from our neighboring ward. They have designed a mini-mission for these young people. The youth were divided into three groups and rotated through three stations to hear the missionary discussion on the Restoration. We presented the discussion using the pamphlet, the full-time sisters and young men presidency also presented the same discussion in a different format. The evening was well attended and the young people were really attentive during our presentation. We enjoyed a wonderful spirit and felt very uplifted by the spirit the young people brought to the meeting. They really are outstanding youth!
Wednesday we had our district meeting then went to Smithfield and made a visit to the mother of a young man we are working with. We had scanned some pictures to enter into Family Search, we returned those to her and picked up some more pictures for scanning.
On Thursday we took some time in the afternoon and enjoyed a session at the temple and then went to the ward mission leader's home for dinner. They have three of the most enjoyable children that are full of questions and are anxious to hear our message. The children feel comfortable with us and called us grandma and grandpa. Later that evening we met a family at our stake family history center. The sister found a lot of information on Family Search and found she is related to three modern day prophets. Another sister at the center gave her boys a little tutoring on Family Search and found some names that need temple work. It seemed to be fun for the whole family.
We have a new assignment to inspect apartments. We went Friday morning on our first visit and learned a few things about this process. Our daughter is being sealed to her husband next month so we brought her to our home and helped send out some invitations to family for her sealing.
Friday evening was a wonderful experience. Following dinner at a members home the brother took us to visit a sister he home teaches. She has had a very trying year and he felt we could help lift her spirits. She had a hip replacement, then fell and broke her femur, during the healing phase she fell and broke the femur again. During her rehabilitation from those problems, her husband filed for divorce and put the house into the bankruptcy so she is facing a move soon. To top off everything, her daughter passed away unexpectedly. So she is just dealing with a myriad of problems. Following a message of hope the home teacher and I gave her a priesthood blessing. What a wonderful spirit we felt in that visit.
Saturday morning we attended the temple for the second time with a sister who was recently baptized. She had entered three names of relatives into Family Tree so she could be baptized for them. Elder Castleton baptized her for her female relative and then five other people. Elder Castleton was then baptized for three of her male family members.
Today was a wonderful beginning to another week. We attended the re dedication of the Ogden Utah Temple. What a wonderful experience to hear the brethren and two sisters remind us of the sacred nature of the temple and the blessings that come from keeping the covenants made there.