BeReal and Happy Mother's Day!

Standing beside our church so Jena can stand on a rock and we can take a selfie for a BeReal project we are doing.

Temple Trip to Bentonville Temple

On Thursday, we were privileged to head up to Bentonville with our young adults to do some baptisms for the dead in the temple.

Back:  Elder Keller, Elder Crabtree, boyfriend from Alma, Kevin
Front: Jena, Karina, Melanie (her first time), friend from Alma, Sally, Lizzy

Our zone BeReal photo that evening....

The missionaries with Melanie

This is a sweet temple and the baptistry is beautiful with large striking pieces of art on the walls and natural light coming though the stained glass windows.  We will miss it when we return home. 

Tornado Warnings and Watches

Over the past few weeks, we have had several watches and a couple of warnings with one touchdown in a remote area about 20 miles south of us. This is the skies to the west of us at sundown on Wednesday night during a tornado watch...the clouds were just starting to roll in from Oklahoma where they had some significant weather--hail and some tornados.

It past by us with just a lot of nighttime rain.

Skies are just a bonus part of life!
 

Pizza Bagels at Institute

We had game night to celebrate the end of the semester in Ft. Smith and since our time was more flexible, I decided to have stuff to make bagel pizzas.  It was a big hit--it reminded me that young adults are in that in-between stage of life and sometimes it is good to appeal to their "child" side.  Making bagel pizza brought memories back for many of them and they loved it!

And although we did play several rounds of Color Brain, we mostly talked AND that is a good way to spend time together as well!

Rainy Season

The next round of wild flowers are starting to bloom and things are green everywhere....

Since I don't have a garden of flowers changing with the season, it is nice to watch the wild flowers come and go as the weather and the seasons change.

 

MLC Review-May 2024

We were lucky to have the APS (Assistants to the President) and President Beutler to our MLC Review last Monday.  The APs participated in a role play and did great.

We headed outside for our zone picture this time....

With the APS
Elder Cebollero and Elder Shields

Even if the topics covered aren't related to our actual work, I love being with the young missionaries and being taught by them, and feeling their spirit.  They are some of the best of the best of the young people in the world today and they are allowing Christ to lead their lives and their service--May it always be so for each of them.
 

Changes in the YSA

The last week of April the YSA branch presidency was released and President Anderton was put in as the branch president.  (No counselors yet.)  We had met the Andertons back in September as they were volunteers on the train ride from Van Buren to Winslow.  We loved the Carters, Workman, and Logan, but I am sure we will grow to love the Andertons as well.

On the first Sunday in May, we were having Break the Fast at a local park.....we decided to use it as a good bye and thank you to the previous branch presidency.

And this was the weather before Church....and it only got worse throughout the day.

Changing of the branch presidency isn't the only change.  School is ending and students are returning home.  Kylie Hulse who has been attending at Carl Albert State College in Poteau graduated with her Associates and will not be returning in the fall.  She got a scholarship to wrestle in South Dakota and will be spending her next two years there.  She has served in the RS presidency here and we will miss her sweet and friendly spirit and her insights in the gospel.

Sally and Kylie

Despite the rain, we all headed over the Springhill Park and Pavilion where we had a BBQ with hamburgers, hot dogs, baked beans, potato salad, and all of the trimmings.

President and Sister Carter
saying goodbye

Jack had found a turtle and Sister Witt loved it!

Karina and Sage with James in the back ground

A great Pavilion with a serving area built in
We were able to grill under the other
pavilion which worked great even with the rain

Sally and Karina climbed around the playground...because that is what you can do in the rain.

On a second trip to the playground, we had convinced Karina it was okay to go down the slide.  She wanted to but didn't want to get our car wet.  She did it and it made us all smile!!

Sister Julie Carter and Jena

Logan, Carters, and us

Julie with Karina

Changes are hard and good and everything in between.  It was a good learning moment for Karina as we had the opportunity to talk about callings and releases and how that happens within the Church.  I love Karina's zeal to understand everything about the Church and her good questions.

 Thank you to Carters, Workmans, and Logan Asplin for your service to the branch over the past years..

Heading Home From Prairie Grove

Gone are most of the red flowers in the fields and roadsides and now yellow flowers of different kinds fill the fields....

And sometimes you drive past something that you just have to go back and get a picture--I noticed the imitation Stonehenge and Gary noticed the flying saucer---it is worth a picture for sure.

It was a beautiful day so we headed back to the Devil's Den State Park to visit the small picnic area we found before--but didn't stop.

We were able to get a picture of the bridge over Lee's Creek

And got to enjoy the honking of the Canadian geese across the creek.

On the map, it showed a short mile hike to a nearby dam and waterfall.  Dressed in our missionary clothes and shoes, we decided to save that for another day, but Gary was able to find the waterfall by driving to a close by parking lot.

Jena is getting into taking pictures as well.

This is another project done during the 1930s to put people to work and to do some federal work projects.

The sound of waterfalls is one of my top "20" sounds!

After that busy day and drives, we went home and Gary and I took a nap!  It had been a busy week.