Week 49

December 24, 2017

Dear Loved Ones,

Christmas Eve!! Wish I was where I could give you all a big hug.  I do miss being with you all, but I am having another kind of special Christmas in seeing outside my own little bubble.  Too much of my life has been turned in to my own world. There is a lot of suffering in the world that we can help in small ways.  I am grateful for the “Light the World” suggestions for ways to reach out to others. I have seen an incredible example of service and generosity demonstrated by some of the women in my Ward, who had the courage to take on Sub for Santa for the Homeless and destitute in Pocatello.

Let me start with the dinner I attended last Sunday night at the home of one of my little Primary class members, Jonas Pierson.  I have the feeling I typed this all before to you, but I didn’t see it in last weeks letter. It was a family of siblings all enjoying each other. They skyped their sister in North Carolina to tell her that rather than giving to each other, they pooled their resources and bought her a ticket to fly out when their parents return from their mission to Taiwan. How happy those parents will be when they see all their children waiting for them at the airport! It was a lovely dinner and I appreciate their letting me be a part of it.

Wednesday, was the big Sub for Santa service project held at the church.  Our sister missionaries helped in the afternoon. In the evening, the elders came and helped carry boxes. The Sub for Santa website allowed you to choose a child or adult by number and fill three wishes. That night the numbers ( 1-120 or more), were on the wall all around the cultural hall, the donated items were set under the numbers and then boxed in family units. If something asked for was not there it was noted on the box and looked for in the Relief Society room where there were many unassigned items donated including beauty products, used coats, new bedding, sleeping bags etc.  As the boxes left the cultural hall, candy and wrapping paper were added. An enormous truck was loaded with everything, including 6 o7 bicycles.

Thursday, we had elders unload everything at the shelter. My Visiting Teacher, Andrea Ford’s family rented the bowling alley in the ISU Student Union Building. A party was planned for the homeless to bowl. Pizza, veggie trays, and goodies were supplied.  Our Elders were invited to bowl with the men. It was an enormous effort to provide Christmas joy for those less fortunate.

Saturday, I had the Sister missionaries that live in my apartment complex over to lunch.  It was fun to visit with them. One Sister is from Gilbert, AZ the other Sister is a convert to the church who was originally from Iowa, but spent her teen years in Falls Church, VA. She ran with a group of Mormon friends.  She went to a Catholic College in the mid-west, but one of her friends wrote her and asked her to read the Book of Mormon they had given her years before. That started her serious study of Mormonism and asking for missionaries. She has a Master’s degree in Secondary Education and is an awesome missionary.

This morning, we had only our Sacrament Service. The Primary children sang, “Away in a Manger” with chimes on the “asleep, asleep,” part.  The Ward choir then sang “O Come, O Come, Emanuel” and “Good Christian Men Rejoice”. Andrea Ford played “Oh, Holy Night” on the violin. Our bishop then gave a profound, poetic talk. He started by thanking us all for showing up and then told how he resented Christmas coming on a Sunday when he was a teenager. He shared not understanding why everyone made so much about the baby Jesus.  Babies are helpless and can’t do anything. The bishop then contrasted those feelings with the birth of his first child. No one has the power to bring greater change to your life than a new baby. The baby changes everything – your schedules, your priorities, your desire to be a better person. On a day in June he discovered what Christmas was all about as he held his first child. He then when on to tell us that Matthew and Luke tell us what happened – John tells us why.  I am not beginning to do this justice, but it was poetic and wonderful!

My visiting teacher, Leslie Koyle, invited me to spend Christmas Eve with her family.  Her sister lives next door and we went there for a musical program and dinner. Their parents are serving a Service mission building housing on a ranch in Kansas. Being service missionaries, they were able to come spend this week with their kids. Its been a fun evening with lots of squealing kids, fabulous food, and some fun games. We started at 3:00 with the musical program.  The kids shared their talents on piano, guitar, and recorder. The Nativity was acted out to “Away in a Manger”. They had a set of chimes and we all participated in playing Christmas carols one chime at a time. They were better than our missionaries were at Zone Conference. And a lot better than our office staff when President Hancock gave us a turn.

I’ve been asleep on the couch – just woke up and saw the wonderful pictures of fun at the Linford house. Hope you are all enjoying similar nights!  I love you all very much!

Love and Hugs,

Grammie/Sister Shill

Week 48

Dear Loved ones,

 

 

Merry Christmas!! Almost.  I have been celebrating all week.  Tuesday and Wednesday, we had Zone Conferences.  We usually divide into three groups for Zone Conference.  This week everyone was divided into two groups. It was more fun for the missionaries to be with a larger group. They so enjoy seeing old companions – there are lots of hugs and back slapping. The sweet Relief Society sisters that prepared our lunches went out of their way to make it Holiday special.  The President organized the morning into typical training sessions, then after lunch, the missionaries put on a talent show. To me it felt like a two-day Christmas party. Especially because Tuesday night was our Ward Party held at the Skating Rink. I had two days of non-stop fun. I will send pictures.  The skating rink would be a great place for our family to have a party -except Tuesday nights is the only time they have private parties.

President Hancock introduced the theme of the Conference with a wonderful quote from Marvin J. Ashton, who is Grandma Inee’s nephew by a different wife. I am going to put the whole quote here so I will have it in the future.  He used different parts of it at different times in his training. I love it!

“Real charity is not something you give away; it is something that you acquire and make a part of yourself.  And when the virtue of charity becomes implanted in your heart, you are never the same again.  It makes the thought of being [critical or verbally abusive] repulsive.”

“Perhaps the greatest charity comes when we are kind to each other, when we don’t judge or categorize someone else, when we simply give each other the benefit of the doubt or remain quiet.  Charity is accepting someone’s differences, weaknesses, and shortcomings; having patience with someone who has let us down; or resisting the impulse to become offended when someone doesn’t handle something the way we might have hoped.  Charity is refusing to take advantage of another’s weakness and being willing to forgive someone who has hurt us. Charity is expecting the best of each other. (Marvin J. Ashton, from Conference Report, April 1992; or Ensign May 1992).

Thursday, I took candy canes for the children who came to the Baptist Food Pantry. I did it last week because it was “Suffer the Little Children” day on the “Light the World” calendar.  It was so much fun, I did it another week.  My Visiting Teachers came after I got home.  One brought a yummy loaf of bread the other a fun battery-powered string of lights that I have strung across my living room window.

Friday, I had my teeth cleaned and had a haircut. Shopped for Sub for Santa. Saturday, I work hard on my Primary lesson only to learn when I got there today that the men where all going to teach Primary so we could go the Relief Society.  I tried not to be bitter that no one told me that ahead of time.  One of my Visiting Teachers, Leslie Koyle insisted on picking me up for church today in her 4-wheel vehicle because it snowed last night.  Everyone is so good to me here! Sister Missionaries gave me a “Heart Attack” on my front door, yesterday. I am going to dinner at the Pierson’s tonight. Jonas Pierson is one of my little CTR classmates. He is the very well behaved one.

I love you all and hope you are enjoying meaningful Christmas activities!

Love and Hugs,

 Grammie/Sister Shill

 

week 47

December 10, 2017

 

Dear Loved Ones,

 

Busy week in the mission!! Monday, I woke up to the first real snowfall of the winter.  It was perfect timing because in the afternoon, the office staff went to President McNabb’s neighbors to have our picture taken in a horse drawn sleigh.  I will try to get a copy of it! It was fun to hear the ring of real sleigh bells as the sleigh came up from the barn.

 

Later that evening was the farewell dinner and fireside for the two sisters and five elders that were going home Tuesday morning. Those farewell testimony meetings are my favorite part of my mission. It was hard to say goodbye to Sister Costa because she had helped with our rice-bag project for Just Serve. She had never used a sewing machine before, she loved learning. She has gone home to Peru and dreams of coming back to BYU Idaho. I will miss her! The other sister served mostly up in the Star Valley area, so I didn’t know her as well. We also lost Elder Ashton! We never got the chance to see if our Ashton lines connected anywhere.  He has gone home to Tucson – maybe the Funks will run into him.  He always said he had 5 generations on a thumb drive and we were always going to check it out – but the time got away from us and it didn’t happen.

Wednesday morning Sister Rasmussen and Sister Robison of the office staff took me to a brunch to celebrate my birthday.  We had to hurry back because we had 12 new missionaries arriving. Shirl came by the office and brought be candy and a poinsettia.  There wasn’t much time to visit with her because we do training with the new missionaries.  After they are welcomed by the President, Sister Hancock, and the AP’s, they have their pictures taken with the Hancocks.  They are then divided into 3 groups and they rotate through our training while the President briefly interviews them one at a time.  When I got back to my desk there were your beautiful flowers.  Thank you for making me feel special. The missionaries then go to the mission home and relax until dinner. After dinner, the Assistants tell them about Idaho and have a little quiz about the church in Idaho.  Sister Hancock has a power point about their family in Winslow and then they are given an envelope which they open and read to discover who their new companion will be and where they will be serving. It is also a fun night to get to know the new ones whose pictures we have been looking at for weeks.

Thursday was hectic – I send emails to all the parents of the new missionaries attaching their picture taken with President and Sister Hancock.

Saturday Morning, I went to the Gateway Rehabilitation Center and read Christmas stories to some of the patients, it was fun!  Afterwards, I took the headbands and gloves that I had collected to give to the Salvation Army when I thought Em and I were going to do dinner for them.  The dinner idea fell through because none of the Salvation Army employees wanted to come to work on Christmas Day.  So now we will go to Gateway and take wassail and sing carols, read stories, play games or whatever.

In the afternoon, I went to a choir concert with the George family.  Sister George is David Linford’s niece. This is a children’s choir connected with Idaho State U.  They are 4^th thru 8^th grade and they sounded like angels. The two oldest George girls, Mariah and Elaine sang solos with their Mom at the piano.  They were amazing!!

I Love and hugs,

Grammie/Sister Shill

Week 46

December 3, 2017

Dear Loved ones!!!

Thank you for coming so far and bringing so many good things to our Thanksgiving feast.  It was so wonderful to see everyone and just sit and chat. I loved the sound of so many happy voices in the background.  Unfortunately, I totally forgot that I wanted to share some thoughts about Thanksgiving and the Book of Mormon.  I bought a new book about Squanto and wanted to share it! His life is a testimony that the Lord has a plan and when hard things happen it is usually the means of saving us.  If Squanto had not been stolen and taken to Europe he would have died like everyone else in his village. If the Franciscan friars in Spain hadn’t freed him from slavery and told him that his best chance to make it home was with the English; if he hadn’t learned English while in England, our pilgrim forefathers would have all died without someone to teach them how to survive in their new country. Divine choreography!! What I wanted to say about the Book of Mormon can be summed up with this quote I heard, “Stay in the Book of Mormon and you will make better decisions!” my life has taught me that is true!! When I am faithfully studying the Book of Mormon, I have made better decisions in all areas of my life. It is the tool the Lord has provided us, so we can survive in these turbulent times.

I am sitting by Christmas tree that Marsi decorated to perfection!! Too bad it didn’t look like this when we took a picture of Liz, Jenni, Ellery, Christian and me together, I later realized we had 4 generations of oldest daughters together. I added it to my Christmas card.

I love the Light the World program.  I was the happy recipient of someone else’s good turn.  I was cold coming out of Wal-Mart, so I went through the McDonald’s drive thru to get a peppermint hot chocolate.  When I was handed my drink, I was told that the car ahead of me had paid my bill.  It made me happy the whole rest of the day imagining a world where these things happen all the time.

It has been a busy week in the mission.  Monday, we were supposed to have a picture of the office staff taken at Pres. McNab’s. It rained and spoiled the chance to hook-up his horse to a real sleigh for our picture. Tomorrow we are going to try again. Unfortunately, it is raining now. I hope the sun comes out tomorrow so we can get our picture taken.

Tuesday night was my public affairs meeting. Our guest speaker was a local news anchor, Brenda Baumgartner, who has spent her life around Mormons though she is not a member. She has recently published a story about her search for the man who wrote love-letters and left them in a suitcase that ended up in Deseret Industries. I think it was published in LDS Living magazine. She used Family Search to find his family.  

Wednesday night, I went with Pres and Sister Hancock and the Rasmussen’s to this cute theater where Cassidy and I saw “Fiddler on the Roof” this summer.  We saw “The Best Christmas Pageant Ever”.  It was darling and reminded me of when Amy Hancock was in a production of that in Logan. I can’t remember if Marsi’s other kids had parts.

Thursday, I took Sister Rasmussen to my “Just Serve” meeting with me.  She seems interested in participating in the program and she can take my place when I leave next July.

Friday, was my turn to work in the office, because it is Missionary Leadership Council.  We have a new Assistant to the President because Elder Slatcher goes home just like Braden will this week. Our new Assistant is Elder Saydee!!! I am so happy.  He is the Elder that let me borrow his key to the church so we could get in for Thanksgiving.  Elizabeth and Glen knew him when he was playing soccer for San Jose State. He will be a strength to the mission.

Well, I didn’t mean to go on so long.  Thanks again for making such a wonderful Thanksgiving for me!! And thanks, Marsi for making Christmas happen in my apartment. We had Messiah playing, ginger cookies in the oven, as she trimmed my tree.

Love and Hugs,

Grammie/Sister Shill