Fleas, Flea Market & Family Home Evening

This has been a busy week but I haven’t been out a lot.  Most of the week I have been in my apartment taking messages/texting/talking to missionaries with coughs, sore throats, body aches, headaches, nausea and vomiting, and other misc medical problems such as a missionary eating some canned tuna that had been open in the fridge for two weeks and suffering nausea and cramps, an infected boil and another who dropped a knife on his big toe giving himself a puncture wound.   The dreaded cold virus and also a stomach virus is playing havoc here.  Guess that comes with winter!!
I was texting a missionary who was receiving flea bites.  I texted them and then after sending, I shortly received the following text:

Goes to show you have to have a sense of humor!

I’ve gone out to missionaries to take them to the doctor (on bikes with no other transportation), to check on the puncture wound and to show them how to pull the wound together with a band aid, to take ginger tea to nausea and vomiting missionaries who couldn’t get to the store, to look at the boil to determine if they needed to see the doctor, and etc.  So I guess I haven’t just sat in my flat after all. There are really no missionaries in Takapuna.  It is a 20-45 minute drive one way to get to most of the missionaries.  To go to Northland is a 1 ½  to 4 ½ hour drive one way so if missionaries there need personal assistance, I call on the senior couples near them to help.

Wednesday I went into the mission office to discuss transfer plans and to arrange transportation for incoming and outgoing missionaries.  Here in the mission,  the senior couples in the office and in the Takapuna area help/provide transportation to and from the airport and around the mission if necessary.  Since I am a single sister I can’t provide transportation for elders but I am taking two senior couples to the airport next week.

We also discussed the next zone conferences and how and when they would take place and our responsibilities with that.

Saturday I went to the Otara Flea Market.  I was taking some medication to a missionary.  The missionaries had set up a booth where people could write on a board what made them happy.  This gave the missionaries an opportunity to explain how the Gospel of Jesus Christ can bring them happiness.  I understand that this approach has been quite successful.

The radishes were huge and some were strangely shaped.
Reminded me of radishes grown in our garden at home

I bought some rhubarb and lemons.  It was a busy place!  It took me 10 minutes in a line of cars to get into the parking lot and about that long again to find a parking place.  My husband, Kay, would have loved it.  He so enjoyed flea markets, swap meets, and garage sales.

Saturday evening I went to the church for a ward game night and dinner.  I didn’t stay too long as I had a couple of calls and needed to get back home to my computer but I did have a cup of squash soup and played a game of Cathedral.  It was fun.

Sunday was a quiet day.  I only got a couple of sick calls and I didn’t go out again after church.  I fear I may be getting a cold.  A slight cough and a headache so I stayed in and took it really easy.  Read and rested.

Monday was Senior Family Home Evening.  We were celebrating the 4th of July and I volunteered to bring a dessert.  My friends, Elder and Sister de Lora from Northland about an hour and a half away stayed the night with be so they wouldn’t have to drive all the way late after our FHE.

This is a sour cream almond cherry cake.  I couldn’t find canned cherry pie filling which makes
this cake a red and white cake.  I bought some canned cherries to make my own pie filling but
the cherries were so dark that it was not a vibrant red but almost a purple color.
Oh well, it’s the thought and intent that counts.

This is a pygmy date palm.  Lots of fruit!  It is also orange and lemon season here.

I am grateful for the Gospel of Jesus Christ and for the opportunity that I have to know my Savior, to be  able to repent, to be baptized and receive the gift of the Holy Ghost.

I love my Savior and my family and friends.