Our Hearts are Overflowing with Gratitude
What a fun week this has been. Emily and Jane made Thanksgiving week so special for us.
Monday we went to Cahokia Mounds and climbed the highest one, 160 steps. Emily and Jane went up and down twice. Wanting to outdo her mom, Jane climbed it one more time while the rest of us watched. After that we headed to Eckert's Farm for lunch. I texted Debbie Craig (she works there in finance) to tell her we were in the restaurant and she came out and visited with us for a few minutes. It was fun to introduce her to Emily and Jane. Next we visited the gift shop and market there. They had a fun Elf Scavenger Hunt throughout the shops, so we grabbed a list and went a huntin'. The shop is so cute and we had fun walking around it. Before we left we bought a few things from the bakery! Love their bakery.
Brother Taylor has been wanting to have his wife's temple work done, and not being able to asked for the wards help. The youth were going to the temple on Tuesday, so the Bishop asked us to help him print her name card. (Hui-Chen Taylor) It took us awhile to figure it all out because he couldn't remember his username or password. But we finally got it printed, with a little spit on a connector and a brick on the printer, it worked! After dinner we played some games with the girls and then watched another Christmas Movie!
Tuesday morning we drove across the Mississippi to downtown St. Louis. We had reservations to go up to the top of the ARCH. AMAZING!! Dan was so worried I would get claustrophobia, but I did great. The view from the top was spectacular. After the ride we walked around and took in the various displays and films highlighting St. Louis and Arch as Gateway to the West. We walked from there a couple of blocks and ate at a cute Pizza place right outside of the Cardinal's Baseball field, Bush Stadium. Great Pizza! We were close to the Mission Office so we stopped in, introduced the girls to the office staff, and picked up Pass Along Cards for Fridays Belleville Parade. The Temple is just a few minutes from there so we drove over and walked around it. It was getting late but we still wanted to stop at the St. Louis Zoo. We thought it stayed open later, but when we got there we only had about an hour. So we ran from place to place to see the animals. I think everyone's favorite was the Hippo's swimming! I'd never seen Hippo's swimming under water like that. The Zoo was closing and we were all freezing so we didn't get to see everything we wanted. It was dinner time but no one was very hungry so we decided on Ted Drewe's Custard for dinner! Great choice. It was delicious. When we got home we were all still freezing so we got in our jammies and coddled up and watched a Christmas movie together.
Wednesday was District Council and Emily and Jane went with us. Emily participated in some of the practice teaching. We were so happy for her to meet the elders and sisters . After District Council, Sister Traynor was in need of going to Walmart, so we all took her. She buzzes around the store in their motorized chair and knows where everything is. We bought a little cupcake for Robert, it was his 80th birthday. After we dropped Sister Traynor off we went over to Robert's house and sang Happy Birthday and gave him the cupcake. He was so happy. We had wanted to take the girls to see "The Greatest Christmas Pageant Ever" movie. We had about 1/2 hour before the movie started so we grabbed a few treats and went. We all loved it. I think I loved it more the second time.
Thanksgiving! Jane had asked if we could go see Moana together while she was here. So Thursday morning we went to the movies. After the movie we drove over to the park that's across the street from us. Despite the freezing temp Jane wanted to play, so we sat in the car and watched her. She made some friends with a couple of other girls that were there and had fun playing with them. Madelyn Waidmann and Brother and Sister Waidmann invited us to go out to dinner at the Diamond Mineral Springs Restaurant with them for Thanksgiving Dinner. It was so fun. You order your main dish and then they bring out all the sides and you eat family style. We all order turkey and dressing. Then they brought out mashed potatoes, gravy, green beans, cole slaw, biscuits, cranberry sauce,and pickled beets. For dessert we all had pie. It tasted like a real home cooked meal and it was so fun to be with the Waidmanns. On the way home we stopped at the "Our Lady of the Snow Shrine". They have a huge drive through light show. It was beautiful. I loved it, of course.
Friday was Black Friday and Jane really wanted to go shopping. We went over to the mall right by our apartment for about an hour and shopped. I bought Jane some sweats. Emily needed to finish packing so went home, packed up the car and headed to the airport. It was hard to say good-bye again. I probably cried harder than Jane did. But oh how we loved having them with us! That afternoon we went over and visited with Andrew. He had been sick and not able to come to church, so we hadn't seen him for about a week. On our way home Sister Traynor called and needed us to pick up a prescription for her. So we did and I ran it up to her and said a quick hi.
IT SNOWED SATURDAY!!
Saturday morning we did some planning for the month of December. We have been trying to think of ways to help the Ward get closer to each other. We thought about having a few Ward members over for a Christmas get together, suggest to Ward Council having greeters stand at the doors and welcome people to church, and help the Ward have the missionaries into their homes for dinner. We will slowly and kindly help to make it all happen. The sisters invited us to join in a lesson with Bernard in the afternoon. Just as we started Dan got a phone call from Robert Taylor. He was in tears and asked if we could come over immediately. So we excused our selves from the lesson and left. When we walked in Robert grabbed me and just hugged me and cried for a long time. I wasn't even sure what the problem was but he was in so much pain he didn't know what to do. Dan gave him a blessing and we stayed with him. He was confused about his meds and needed to eat. We helped him with both things and just sat with him. He finally started to settle down and the pain began to lessen. After we left he told us he finally was able to sleep and was doing better.
Sunday, to our surprise Carolyn Heiman came to church. I think it's been 10 years but she knew everyone! She fit right in and I'm hoping she'll come again. After church we made some phone calls checking on people and making some appointments. It was also December 1! We had talked with the girls before they left about when we should open our 12 days of Christmas since we had to sets. We decided to do the 24 days of Christmas and Jane said to start with their gifts first. So they called and we opened our first gift. All their gifts have to do with their favorite things about Christmas, so our first gift was the ELF ON THE SHELF! How fun.
So excited for the month of December. It's going to be the best Christmas ever!
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