Week of January 15, 2017

Sunday Pres. Tate presented our reading program for the next 13 weeks. It focuses on learning about Christ and is called Christ in You. It includes reading in the New Testament, Jesus the Christ, some selected articles, and listening to good music. We are encouraged not to read intellectually, but to read with the Spirit with the intent to be uplifted and have our testimonies strengthened. The program concludes on Easter Sunday, April 16. I’m looking forward to it.

Monday was a holiday so I spent the day catching up on things in the apartment. In the afternoon we had a pot luck with our zone at Sister Kay’s home. I really enjoy this group of missionaries and I am grateful for the opportunity to work with them and learn from them. Stokes complete their mission the end of this month and two of the group had birthdays so it was fun to be together.

Training Zone B off-duty

Tuesday we started our Capstone classes. The classes went well and Ted did a good job teaching. We finished in time to get to the 12:00 session at the temple, so Ted and I hurried over to find the doors locked. Apparently, the temple is closed for two weeks for cleaning and we were the only ones that didn’t know about it. It was a really strange feeling to be locked out of the temple.

Wednesday after classes I worked at the library for a few hours and got quite a bit done. In the evening I reviewed for my class tomorrow and reviewed my family history notes to see what more needs to be done to clean up some of the records I have. I was really excited to get things organized again, but there is more that need to be done than I had hoped.

Thursday I taught the class on Partners and really enjoyed it. This is a good group, so there was a good amount of participation. I had a couple of people tell me they really appreciated the information. After class I worked at the library to clean up some of the sheets I had. On one I found what appears to be an error on the part of the priest in his reference to a lady in the record. He referred to an entry on a page that refers to someone with her same name, but she is 30 years older than the date on the marriage record. I asked a lady for help and we looked at several things but couldn’t find any record of the family. I couldn’t find the birth record for two of the children I knew about. I did a search in familysearch.org and found 4 more children with birth, marriage, and death records for most and census records for all after they immigrated to the United States. I could not find a death record for the father. I now need to go into the records and clean them up, then go back to Sweden and see what I have there. I must have some record I’m forgetting because I have the husband’s date of birth and the birth dates of the first two children. I also had the emigration date so I need to go back to the family and find where I got the information from.

Friday we stopped between the two classes we were teaching to watch the inauguration address for Pres. Donald Trump. I’m sure he didn’t make his predecessor happy, but I really hope he is able to do the things he said he wanted to do. The big thrust is to put America first instead of everyone else in the world and to restore America’s soundness and greatness. I really hope and pray he can be successful.

I taught attaching external sources. I think it went well. It can be fairly complex, but the class stayed with me for the most part. There were a few system glitches as we went through the processes, but I think it went ok in the end. I spent the afternoon at the library and was able to find most of the records for the family I worked on yesterday. I’m not sure what the difference was in the searching that I did today because I found the information and records right where they should have been when I look before.

The day of the Snow

Saturday we woke up to about 6 inches of snow with more falling heavily. The elders were out shoveling the walks. We finally got our books for the mission reading program Friday, so I was able to read in the book and highlight the things I wanted to. It works better than reading online. They didn’t get enough from the printer when the program was introduced so we have been waiting. It snowed most of the day so I was grateful we didn’t have to go anywhere. I did some more work on the family I’d found the last couple of days. There is so much that needs to be done.

Snow at Garden Apartments

Week of January 8, 2017

This week was a challenge as Ted and I were both somewhat sick. I was just recovering from a cold that began last week and Ted was just catching one. I taught classes three days so I wasn’t able to take the time off, but I did sleep in most days and that felt good. 

We were able to tour the nearly completed Discovery Center in the library. It is an interactive experience where guests can learn about famous people they’re related to and some of the general information about names and world events at time of birth. They have studio rooms for recording audio stories and a photo setting to get pictures taken in front of famous locations. It was a fun experience. They had opened it to missionaries and staff to test run some of the things, so some of it wasn’t working, but it was fun.

My classes went well. I taught Basic IrfanView which is one of my favorites. I had prepared ahead a document that incorporated all the things we’d talked about in the lesson and asked the students to open the file and do what was needed to get the results I put on the screen. The document is a draft card with two pieces—front and back. It was interesting working with the students to help them get to the desired result. They all did well in the end and that is the real test of learning.

Several of our classes have been bumped from the reserved classrooms because we have low priority. Since the Discovery Center is moving to the library there will be more guest classes there which will mean even more difficulty in finding a classroom. We are trying to move our classes to the Joseph Smith Building because that lab will not have as much demand once the Discovery Center is open.

I taught Descendancy Research later in the week. I enjoy this class. I teach it from a different angle than most people and I think it works much better than the norm. After the teaching we helped the students get started doing the research and most were able to get into it and find some good records to clean up, add sources, and even temple work. The general reaction was very positive.

On Saturday I spent almost all day trying to get some of our personal things up to date. I have let things slide for too long so it was a tangle to clean up. At noon we met with members of our social group for lunch and visiting. We haven’t been getting together much, but now we will be split between the two different church branches so it becomes more important to get together to keep our friendships strong. We had 13 people come so that was good. It was fun visiting and just getting out. 

Week of January 1, 2017

Sunday we met together in our new branch for the first time. Our new branch presidency spoke in Sacrament Meeting and we had a joint meeting for Relief Society/Priesthood where Pres. Larson tried to answer the questions we might have about the new organization. It doesn’t seem to be much different. The biggest differences I see are that he will interview for temple recommends, the Relief Society leader (not president) is not responsible for the women as much as just making sure we have teachers and the Hail and Farewell dinner, we won’t home teach, we won’t have our records here, and we might have the opportunity to serve in some of the local wards if needed.

Monday was a holiday. I had a sore throat and didn’t feel swift so I stayed in all day. I did some family history, read some, rested some, and basically felt sick. I reviewed my lessons for the week and felt somewhat prepared to teach.

Tuesday I felt somewhat better but still had the sore throat. We were asked to share some of our enrichment classes with the other half of our zone that trains new missionaries. They are usually tied up with new missionaries, so they are never able to attend our enrichment classes. They have no missionaries this week, so they asked us to teach some classes. I taught Basic IrfanView in the afternoon. I thought they would all have known what I taught, but it was a good experience. I’ll be teaching every day which will be fun.

Wednesday I taught Unique Searches in the morning. It went well. The class is really just a conglomeration of miscellaneous things to consider when searching. It has been a good experience teaching this group of fellow trainers. There are those who pay attention and stay with me so they are able to learn the things I am teaching. There are others who don’t listen or try to go ahead and make choices that take them off the course of what is being taught. They have a hard time staying with the class and I’m not sure whether they are learning or not. It is an interesting group. When we were finished I just went and got in bed.

Thursday I taught Partners in the afternoon. Again I think it went well. Ted taught an enrichment class on Navigation in the library so all the trainers went with him. They figured I had plenty of help if I needed it. I finished fairly quickly so I was in the library just as he was finishing up.

Friday we went to the temple. After we finished I went to the library to do some research. I spent the afternoon entering people I’d found and mostly putting families together. Since most of the baptisms in Finland are indexed, much of what I do is find the records, get the pid numbers for the individuals, and put the families together. Then I need to spend serious time merging and cleaning up the records. I got most of the putting together and merging done, but I still have the clean up to do.

Saturday we had the Swap Meet. It was really cold so I wore my pjs under my clothes, a sweatshirt jacket with furry lining, and a coat and scarf as well as two pairs of gloves, two pairs of socks. It was really bitterly cold, so we let the new missionaries in a couple of minutes early and the old missionaries in about 15 minutes early. We cleaned up early as well. We still ended up with more than we needed, but we got rid of quite a bit of stuff. 

Weeks of December 18 and 25, 2016

Sunday morning we had a special meeting of all the missionaries in the Little Theater of the Conference Center. There were tons of rumors flying for the last two weeks about what was going to happen. It was very interesting. Elder Craig Christensen of the Seventy presided. The change was that our mission name was changed: We will be the Utah Salt Lake City Headquarters Mission. We will have the same mission presidency. As of January 1, 2017, our two branches will be dissolved—we will no longer be organized under the stakes of the city, but we will be organized in branches based on where we serve and under the direction of the mission; the library and guest service areas will be City Creek Branch; Headquarters, Church History, and most behind the scenes services will be the Ensign Peak Branch. Pres. Larson, 1^st Counselor in the mission, will be the Branch President of the City Creek Branch, the one we will belong to. Pres. Hanson, 2^nd Counselor in the mission, will be the Branch President of the Ensign Peak Branch.

Our records will be returned to our home wards and we will make donations to those units instead of our branches here as it is done now. The mission president will be responsible for our interviews and counseling. It makes a lot of sense to me. We will continue as we are now for the next two weeks, then the new branch organization will begin in January. We have new counselors in the branch presidency and a new Relief Society presidency. I’m not sure when the new missionaries will receive their assignments or how they will handle the Hail and Farewell/Aloha dinners, but I’m sure they will have everything worked out. We are the 422^nd mission in the Church and the largest world-wide. The young elders will follow their service areas for branch attendance. It is exciting to be part of history.

Monday we attended the mission devotional. We aren’t teaching any more classes until January, so I spent the day doing family history. It was interesting because as I sat in the library and watched missionaries serve, I noted that these would be the missionaries in our branch. I also reflected on the ones I knew that would no longer be with us. It’s a bitter/sweet change.

Tuesday we had inservice with the Training Zone. A man that works on the Memories module spoke to us about why and how of memories. It was really interesting. Apparently, much of the information we have been given in the past is no longer correct. He indicated that if we tag memories to living people it keeps them unsearchable in the private space. If they are left untagged, they become searchable. His main point was that we need to put into our own memories space the documents and photos we want our children and grandchildren to know about. We need to define ourselves for them—leave them the testimony and wisdom we feel we want to pass to them—rather than letting others do it for us after we are gone.

Wednesday we had another inservice day. We began with Elder Hodges sharing his experience with Elder Jeffrey Holland and his speaking to the young elders. Elder Holland had a lapel microphone so he could walk among the young elders and respond to their questions and shake their hands. The next day he called Elder Hodges to tell him he had been so touched by the experience and the insights and spirit the elders had with them. He said it was one of the most spiritual experiences he’d ever had. We watched a video documentary about the first Christmas during World War I. Apparently the troops had ceased fighting and began singing carols. One man crawled out of the foxholes carrying a Christmas tree that he brought to the other side. Gradually many more of the troops came out and socialized with the “enemy”, eventually sharing food and a game of soccer. Some of the officers were not pleased, but many of them joined in and all enjoyed the day. The peace continued into the next day.

At noon we had a zone pot luck and gift exchange. The food was yummy. We tied a fleece quilt for a service project. We went to the mission conference in the afternoon. That’s when Pres. Tate told us we would need to wear our badges on the left side. I’m not sure why that is important but I will miss wearing it on the right side. In the afternoon it was cold and snowy.

Thursday we were up early and left for Las Vegas. The weather was clear and beautiful so we were grateful for the clear trip ahead. We stopped in Fillmore for a few minutes and there were a few flakes falling from the sky, the first we’d seen on the trip. Someone at the same stop told Ted that they were considering closing the highway in Beaver because the snow was so bad. We weren’t on the road again for very long before the snow became fairly heavy, and stuck to the road. It was melting in some spots, but it looked like it could get bad. We had a prayer for safety and kept going as best as we could. It was quite bad in Beaver and all the way to Cedar City, but it wasn’t bad beyond Cedar. By the time we got to St. George it was raining and rained the rest of the way home.

Friday was Mom’s 100^th birthday so we had a waffle breakfast with trifle for dessert. We had a good visit and played a fun trivia game about Mom that Heather came up with that was fun. We shared a few memories of Mom. It was a fun event. We stayed at Heather’s after the breakfast so I could help with some things. In the evening we went to Summerlin City Center to watch a parade. It consisted of 4 floats with snow machines above and lots of elves and princesses walking around passing out candy to the kids. It was fairly cold so I was glad when it was over.

Family Nativity on Christmas Eve

We enjoyed a wonderful Christmas with family. We each took turns being sick, so we didn’t get to do some of the things we’d planned on. But it was wonderful to be able to be with family and feel the love and fellowship there. We appreciate more each year the blessing of the Savior’s life and atonement and the opportunity He gives us to be together forever as a family.

After returning to Salt Lake I spent a fun afternoon helping a former missionary and her daughter-in-law do some Swedish research. It’s really much different helping someone else do research than doing it myself. It takes some effort to sit back and let them do things their way and just give guidance in what’s available to help them. We spent a morning in the Swap Meet sheds organizing things in preparation for the Swap Meet in January. It was snowing lightly and the temperature was in the 20s. I had to take off at least one glove in order to hang clothes so my hands got really cold. When we were finished, I had frozen hands and toes and was ready for a warm apartment. New Year’s Eve was spent attending the many amazing and varied performances on Temple Square. Our favorite group was Bless4, a Japanese group of young people featured on Meet the Mormons. It is truly amazing what is available so close by. It is truly amazing what is available so close by.

It’s been a good year. It’s had it’s ups and downs, it’s many varied challenges and rewards. I’ve learned so much and been able to have so many wonderful experiences meeting people and sharing what I’ve learned with others. I am grateful for the opportunity to do the family history I’ve been able to do. The fact that I’ve learned so much about Swedish and Finnish research really boggles my mind. It has been a fun adventure. I look forward to the experiences of 2017.