On Labor Day we
decided to stay close to home and just relax.
I pulled up Family Search and was looking at my family tree chart and
pulling up the individual information on the ancestors on my mother's side..
When I got back to 1763, I was excited to discover that from 1625 until 1763 my
ancestors lived in
Maryland.. I
found one family that lived in Calvert, the area we just finished serving in and
2 families that lived in
Ann Arundel
County, where we would be serving
starting on Tuesday.. I also found several that lived in Prince Georges County,
Maryland.. My 9th Great-grandfather James O'Dell was christened on
July 12, 1731 at St. Barnabas Church in Upper
Marlboro.. Which is about 20 minutes north of us.
The church is still serving its congregation
today.
I am so very excited to be able
to research and find out more about the ancestors who lived right here in
Maryland..
Sister Brown and I have a field trip to go on for sure.
St. Barnabas Church
Since Monday was
a holiday and we really didn't feel right calling people for appointments in the
middle of their bar-b-cues and such.. we called on Tuesday morning. Since we don't have the highlighted ward
directory from the relief society president yet, we just started calling the
leaders and the leaders wives to set up appointments. We called 28 names and got three appointments
for Thursday.. We left messages on all the others and were hoping that we would
get some return phone calls.. Since we didn't have any appointments for
Tuesday, we decided to call two of our older senior sisters that we have loved
visiting and see if they were up for a visit.. Sure enough..both Sue and Ethyl
said they would love a visit from us.. We headed south first to visit Sue. She is the lady that lives in an assisted
living apartment and is the artist... We love to listen to her southern drawl
as she shares her life stories with us.. She was so excited to show us pictures
of her grandchildren that her daughter finally sent her. Sue has been asking for some pictures for
almost a year.. It is so sad that her daughter and grandchildren are missing
out on spending time with this amazing woman.
She hasn't ever seen her grandchildren and hasn't seen her daughter in
several years.. She is the sweetest person and always wants to give us food to
take home.. We assure her that we are doing fine. I am so glad we called her and were able to
visit with her..She invited us to attend a special yearly picnic celebration
coming up next month.. We said we would be honored to come as her guests.
Sweet Sue
We then drove
back to visit Ethyl, who lives close to us and she is such a hoot.
When I called her and asked her how she was
doing and she said not good since "they" took us away to another area
to serve. We love her dry sense of humor.
She has so many wonderful stories to share with us about everything from
her time as a high school chemistry & calculus teacher to the time she
served a mission as a senior missionary in
Bolivia.
She spent an hour and a half sharing her fun
stories.. What a fun day we had with these two wonderful sisters.
Ethyl & me
At the temple on
Wednesday I got to see the Rivera family again, I told you all about meeting
them a few weeks ago when they came to the baptistery.
Elder Rivera enters the MTC on Sept. 12th and
then arrives in
"Arizona" the first part of October. He is
so excited to start his mission and he told me yesterday that he was so excited
to meet my family.. His dad was just beaming as I talked to them.. So everyone
is
Arizona keep an eye out for
Elder Rivera and let me know if he shows up in your ward.
We were excited
to start our visits to the sisters in the Bowie
ward this week. Bowie
a little over an hour north of us, so we will be driving a lot each day again.
Our first visit was with Pakayvanh. She is the Primary President in the ward
and such a special lady. She was born in Laos
and her family moved to Virginia
when she was 12 years old. She and her husband have 7 children, 2 in college, 2
in high school and 3 in elementary school.
Her husband works for a non profit agency that fosters relations with
Asian nations. What a joy she was to
visit.. We were invited to their house for dinner on Sunday after church.. This
is a well tuned family... everyone pitches in to get it all done.. The two
older girls were such a help in the kitchen and knew how to do all the tasks
they were asked to do to get dinner ready.
It was a very fun afternoon with a wonderful family.
Pakayvanh
Sharon
was our next visit. She was serving in the stake young women until February
when her husband was put in as the wards bishop. She is now serving in the
nursery and said she loves it..she gets to play with the kids and then their
parents take them home.. They have one daughter who is 15. Sharon
loves to play the piano and teaches piano. It is always so nice to get to know
those in a new ward and Sharon was
a wonderful one to have on our first day.
Sharon
Our last visit
of the day was with Kathy.
She serves as
the secretary in the primary. She has 6 children.. All are out of the house
except the last two. Two of their sons are married and she has 4
grandchildren.
Her oldest daughter is
getting married in December and she loved sharing with us all the things they
have been doing to get ready for the wedding.
It was a fun day filled with great visits.. It is always hard when we
start a new area to get the sisters involved in our program.. once they get to
know us it is easier to make appointments to visit.
Kathy
While we were
driving this week I saw an American Eagle flying right over us. He was amazing and I was so excited to
finally say I saw one. Everyone says
that the area not to far from our apartment that has a lot of eagles.. I have
seen birds flying but couldn't for sure say they were eagles until this week..
Such magnificent birds..
Maria is the mom of 4 and what a fun
visit. We met with her and her two youngest children. She is a Geologist and
works on water and land erosion on land along the Chesapeake Bay
and the rivers at flow nearby. She showed a project that she is working on
now.. re-building a bridge over a river that the entire span goes up and down not just a draw bridge.. Her daughter Addie
is 4 and is a whiz kid and read to us from the scriptures and was counting up
into the 60's.. Her youngest little one is Asher and he is one year old, he was
such a sweetheart. Maria's husband is in the bishopric and works for the
department in DC that reviews the expenditures of the government.
Maria and kids
Addie
Asher
Saturday we had
our final district outing with the Noels who leave for home on Monday. It has been
such a pleasure to work with them for the year they have been out. They served as our District Leaders. We met
the Noels and the other two sisters who are in our district at the temple for a
session and then went to lunch together.
We ate at the Macaroni Grill in Silver Springs.. We were joined by Erin,
who served her mission in North Carolina
when the Noels served there as Mission President. It was such a fun day and one
to remember. Storms were threatening and
we thought we might make it home before they hit.. but no luck.. The skies grew
black and the winds blew and then the rain hit.. and did it rain..OH IT RAINED
SO HARD.. On the weather map when we got home we were in the orange and red
area of the storm.. So glad to be safe and warm in our apartment.
Our district at lunch
Sister Noel & Erin
It was so nice to
see a few faces that we recognized at church today. We had a meeting with the
Relief Society President and also one with the Bishop to discuss the needs of
the sisters in the Bowie Ward. So now we have a great list of sisters to visit
and get to know.
I heard this today and loved it: "Give the Lord a chance".. I do
agree
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