HELPING MISSIONARIES, FOOD DRIVE, SPORTS

This is the gift the Relief Society made for the Dad's and men in our ward for Father's Day!  I thought they turned out cute.

We had a couple of opportunities to help out some missionaries with special circumstances this week.  Our District Leader, who is from Japan, had a Tele visit Dr. appointment scheduled. Our Zone Leader asked us if we would be with him to make sure he received the help he needed, since he's never done anything like this before and being from a foreign country.  He's having some anxiety/depression problems that he's been dealing with.  Most young people in this age group haven't dealt with these issues on their own without parental support, so we got to be the "parents".  The appointment went well, and he will be able to get medication to help him.  The missionaries are under a lot of stress, and sometimes they don't know how or aren't able to cope with it on their own.  We're grateful to be here to help out.  

On Friday we got a call from the mission president telling us that our sister missionary from Tonga, Sister Finau, received a phone call from her family that her father passed away.  We got to know Sister Finau when she first came into our mission; she was assigned to our District.  He asked if she could spend the day with us.  He said she needed a day away from missionary work to process her Dad's passing, and since she knows us, he thought that would be a good fit. Stan had committed to helping with a Spanish language practice training at the mission office, so Sister Finau and I spent the morning together.  We had a good talk; she was really close to her Dad; his passing was unexpected.  She seemed at peace, because of the Plan of Salvation that we've been given through Jesus Christ.  The missionaries teach people about this plan, and her knowledge of God's plan was blessing her and bringing her comfort.  One of the things she told me about her Dad was that he loved chocolate; especially chocolate ice cream with peanut butter.  So I texted Stan and asked him to stop at the store on the way home and pick up some ice cream.  After we had dinner, we celebrated her Dad by having a bowl of chocolate peanut butter ice cream.  I think she appreciated it.

After we visited awhile, I asked her if she would like to help me with a project.  We have a Family Reunion coming up in about a month, and one of the craft projects that I want to do is painting the Nativity on rocks.  So we spent some time painting rocks.  You could say it was a good therapy session.

After dinner, Stan played some Hymns on the piano and on his cello, which was some good music therapy.  When we took her back to her apartment in the evening, I think she appreciated being able to take the time away from missionary work and process.  

We signed up to help with a food drive on Thursday morning.  Once a month, a church in Imperial Beach hosts a food drive.  A semi truck full of food was delivered early in the morning from the San Diego Food Bank.  We, along with quite a few volunteers, helped bag up the canned and frozen food items.  We arrived at 7:30 am and there was already a line of people with their rolling cars waiting for the 9 am opening time to get their allotment of food.  It felt good to help out.

We've been waiting our whole mission to be able to go to the Olympic Training Center and see some of the gals in our ward play in a Rubgy game.  Friday morning they had a scrimmage with Canada, so we went to watch them.  The first little bit was a warm-up preparing them for the scrimmage.  Finally, when they started to play, it was fascinating to watch how the game worked.  In fact, I had to come home and watch a YouTube showing how the game works.  What we saw wasn't a full on game, but more of a short scrimmage for practice.  I think their game was on Saturday, but we weren't able to go to that one.  

We were in charge of the Friday night YSA activity, so we set up our Frisbee Golf course.  Lately, Friday nights haven't been well attended, so we made sure and put a post on Facebook early in the week, then Stan decided to get prizes to entice them to come.  Well, it didn't work very well.  The Elders showed up and one young man, Pablo, who said he's coming to all the activities until we leave so he can see us!  The four of us had fun, and everyone took home a prize.  

Today was our last Sacrament meeting with our YSA in our building.  Next Sunday we will be attending a regional YSA Sacrament Meeting.  So, the closing Hymn was "God Be with You 'Til We Meet Again", and they held a Linger Longer after Church to honor us!  We felt honored!  The Bishop and his wife gave us a Charcuterie Board in the shape of the state of California, and all the YSA's signed a card for us.  They have been so welcoming and loving and accepting to us.  It truly is bittersweet to be leaving in just a couple of weeks.  We've loved our experience here, but it's time to get to know our grandkids again and meet our new great granddaughters!