Aunt Lynnie comes to PA

Hi to Everybody!! It has been a fun few days with Aunt Lynnie here!  We went to Gettysburg, Amish Country and Hershey – sooo much fun!!!  Poor Lynn – we dragged her all over from day #1 as she struggled with jet lag and her sore back.  She is such a trooper!  We tried to include Elder Abbott, but it seemed different to have him along with us.  As you all know, we usually travel with no husbands, but because of missionary rules that couldn’t happen this time.  What a great husband I have – he drove us all over, stayed on the sidelines, and didn’t seem to hate it too much.  Now we are back in our mission apartment and Lynn is finding out what our little home and branch are like.  Everyone was really happy to meet her and she charmed them all.  Elder Abbott and I spoke in Sacrament Meeting today and it was so nice to see her in the congregation cheering us on.  I can’t remember the last time we went to church together – it was a sweet moment. 

The Simple Life

I am going to really miss our little apartment.  It is humble and flawed, but I love it.  This  blog post is dedicated to our little home, and all the reasons I have been so happy here.  First, it is small – four rooms, white walls, spotted carpet, definitely not a showplace, but it can be cleaned to perfection in about 42 minutes!!  Second, it is very conveniently located about 20 steps from the post office –  with 17 grandchildren to write to each month, being close to the post office has been a real blessing!!   Thirdly, I have a big window right over my kitchen sink where I can see and hear the birds chirping, and where I can hear the neighbor children playing and the neighbor dogs barking.  The bush outside that window has  blossomed, bloomed, and buzzed with bees as spring turned to summer and now it is dropping golden leaves to mark the beginning of Fall.  Now I will take you on a tour of our little place “room by room’.

BATHROOM: talk about convenient!  You could sit on the toilet and do the laundry if you were so inclined!  Best things about our bathroom is there are SEVEN light switches (7!) and a personal floor heater with its own thermostat – I can be as toasty as I want to be and light is never a problem!  Hot water is never an issue, either, and our shower is great!! Our bathroom in Yorba Linda could take some lessons from our well lit, warm and wonderful PA bathroom.

BEDROOM: There is nothing like pure white walls with sunshine streaming in the windows to wake you up each morning!!  Our queen size bed is amazingly comfy, and roomy.  I consider it a miracle or at the very least a “tender mercy” that Elder A and I fit perfectly in this bed with very few struggles over blankets or surface area!!  We have one set of sheets, one blanket and a very cute comforter which makes me happy.  I have my very own dresser – never in my married life have I ever had my very own dresser!!  We each have  our own closet too, and my little window air conditioner is wonderful!

LIVING ROOM: My favorite things in the living room are my area rug (chosen for pizzazz!) and my large potted palm.  The TV is nice too, as well as another window air conditioner.  Elder A has his special chair and I don’t have to share the couch with anyone!

KITCHEN:  On the day we moved in almost 6 months ago, I was delighted with our kitchen.  I already mentioned the big window for watching the world outside, but I also have the cutest, smallest dishwasher ever!  It works great too.  We have a small breakfast bar with our two placemats.  This is where we have our meals, except on Sunday when we get fancy and eat on the nice dining table in the living room.  We have 8 plates, 8 bowls, and 8 glasses.  On day #1  I got to open all the appliances (waffle iron, toaster, crockpot, knife set, pots and pans, mixing bowls and mixer, etc) which made me feel like a new bride again.  It was so much fun – everything was new!!!  My favorite part of the kitchen is not new, however.  It is my red, gingham message board that I brought from home and where I have pictures and memories of family posted for all to see.

So what’s not to love about our little place?  It is small enough that we hardly ever lose anything, and Elder A can usually hear me from anywhere in the apartment!  No screaming up the stairs, and no climbing up the stairs to repeat what I had just screamed up the stairs!!  It is not perfect, but it is precious to me.  Enjoy the pictures and welcome to our little home!   See you all very soon.  Love, Abby and PaPa

Caleb's Baptism

Hi Everyone!  A new week begins and we are fired up to spend the next few weeks working hard and having some great experiences!  Seeing Randy, Sandy and family this weekend was a wonderful way to rediscover our Abby and Papa roles again.  We were so proud of Caleb as he was baptized on Saturday.  He looked so happy and we were so grateful to be present as Randy baptized and confirmed him.  On Sunday, Papa ordained Randy to be a High Priest because he was called to be in the Bishopric of their ward.  Once again, we felt blessed to be a part of it.   I am full of gratitude for all of our children and grandchildren and the great things they do and the great people they are!  There is no greater blessing in life than family.  We love you all and thank you for letting us share in your happy lives!  Enjoy the moments!  We love you.  Abby and Papa 

Happy Birthdays!

Hello to all and Happy Birthday to Dad, Greg, and Tyler!  I am now the mother of seven adult sons!!  Hope you all still need a mom occasionally because I am not quite ready to hang up my wooden spoon yet!!

We had a good week.  We attended District Meeting in Sunbury, which is about an hour drive south of here.  The Sunbury district has no senior couples and our Mission Prez asked us to go occasionally so they know what this Sr Couple thing is all about.   I brought brownies which made them like us right away.  We enjoyed being with a new bunch of Elders – we all went to Subway after the meeting which was fun.  The drive to Sunbury was spectacular – country roads with amazing farms, pastureland, wildflowers,  beautiful green trees with branches overhanging the road, and deer darting out every so often.  When we drove through the town of Nottingham Village it really felt otherworldly. 

Since we drove so far to the District Meeting, we decided to stay overnight and go to the DC Temple which was another three hour drive.  We met our new best friend Sister Neff the next morning (she spent the night with her family which live there) and we rode together to the temple.  She is a talker, so the time went by fast.  The temple was massive and a real contrast to our tiny (but wonderful) Newport Beach Temple.  After the temple, we drove back to Sunbury area and stopped by the little town where Rose Ann spent her childhood.  What a great experience to see first hand what life is like in a very small town.  We stopped by her Nephew Derek’s new property – 14 acres of wooded, grassy land with a big pond for fishing, ice skating, etc.  Then to visit her brother and wife who live high atop a hill overlooking the little town.  Great people, with a very pretty 23 year old daughter that likes younger men, Ty!! We strolled through the cemetery and on the drive there we saw the homes where her uncles and aunts lived.  Many Neff’s are buried in the cemetery and I couldn’t help but envy Rose Ann for the idyllic childhood she must have had – running through the safe streets (not one traffic light, and no police to this day!), playing with cousins, dropping in on relatives and having a perfectly happy childhood.  I kept thinking of the novel To Kill A Mockingbird and Sister Neff is the perfect Scout!

Aaron Hoke asked us to come up with our favorite scripture for our missionary plaque and we chose Ether 12:4.  What do you think?  Now comes the hard part – finding a good picture of both of us.  Dad has to have his eyes open and I have to look young AND thin!  This may take awhile!!

We head to North Carolina next week for Caleb’s baptism.  We will send our email from there next Sunday and include pictures too.  We hope everyone has a great week and  remember we love you,  MOM and DAD 

 

Community Service

We have had plenty of down time on our mission.  Unlike regular Elders, we do not knock doors and/or beat the bushes for someone to teach.   Most of our visiting happens at night.  Senior couples are encouraged to find some volunteer work in the community to keep themselves busy and to put a positive face on the church.  I am very grateful to have been involved in serving in this way – it has been a fun diversion from the frustrations of not having enough to do sometimes.  Our first opportunity for service was the Heisey Historical Museum which is an old home along the waterfront that now serves as the headquarters of the Lock Haven Historical Society.  School groups and the occasional history buff come through for tours.  Elder Abbott helped the grounds keeper and I did some cleaning inside on a weekly basis.   We helped with a charity race which I blogged about many months ago.  Due to budget cuts and mismanagement, the Heisey closed for restructuring, and we were forced to look for something else.  Another museum in town is the Piper Aircraft Museum which was glad to have us to help with some projects: Elder A was asked to come up with a user-friendly brochure for the tourists to read about the airplanes on display, and I got the tedious job of documenting 900 old drawings and layouts accumulated over the past 80 years.  We got to help with the annual “Fly in” which was a neat experience.

The best community service in my opinion was our work at the Millbrook Playhouse.  The Millbrook Theatre has been doing musicals here every summer for almost 75 years.  The theatre is an old barn that has been redesigned with two theatres.  Professional actors come clear to central PA to perform, and all costumes, set design, many actors and behind the scenes crew are young interns learning the ropes in theatre.  We were pleasantly surprised at how talented these young kids are and how polished and professional each of the 8 shows were.   I had the opportunity to help sew costumes for many of the productions, and we got to usher for the Friday night performances and stay for the show.

We also found that wherever we traveled around the state, we often had a chance to talk about the church.  We always wear our name tags and that often generated some conversation.  Community service is generally a fun experience and I hope to do something along that line when the mission is over.  I am open for suggestions!