Transfer week!

With the country moving to COVID level 2, we were able to have transfers this week.  On Wednesday we received 6 new missionaries and I believe that 7 or 8 finished their missions and departed or will depart this month as soon as flights can be arranged.

Sister Gabut is returning home to the Philippines.
  I was blessed to get a picture with her before she left.

I like transfer day as I get to meet and interview each new missionary.  That is always a delight. We received 3 sisters and 3 elders.  The domino effect when one missionary leaves and another comes always gives the mission president/companion and the assistants a few days of thoughtful prayer and work in assigning and transferring missionaries. 

Thursday I drove to Whangarei to accompany a missionary to a doctor’s appointment. The day was warm, sunny and a great change of pace after being in lock down for 2 weeks.  With the down grade in COVID level, we can again leave our area and travel about the country.  Of course, masks and physical distancing is to be maintained everywhere.

While in Whangarei, I was able to eat dinner with Sisters Kingi and Iobi.

The food was good but WAY too much!  I ate the chicken burger but
couldn’t finish even half the fries.  Should have eaten only half of the burger but……

I was driving so it was difficult to take pictures but I did a few point and shoot pictures on straight road with little traffic so you could see how beautifully green the countryside has become with the winter rains.  With the point and shoot method, I took maybe 100 pictures and then tossed out the ones that were of the rearview mirror or the asphalt.  It was fun editing and deleting.  NOT!

The deciduous trees, and there aren’t many, are beginning to bud.  The pohutukawa trees are evergreen but the new growth is a lighter color.  As I walked to the grocery store this week, I passed this pohutukawa near my flat and enjoyed the changing leaves.  You are probably getting autumn colors by now in reds, yellow and orange.  I am seeing paler shades of spring green.

Next time you see a pic of pohutukawa trees, they will be
“decorated” with red flowers for Christmas

It has been a little warmer and dryer again this week.  Rain in the afternoon, evening and night so our morning beach walks have been occasionally cloudy but nice.

After stormy seas when the tide is out, occasionally we see an uncovered cable.

The cable is encased in ceramic pipes.  You can see in one picture that the pipe is
broken away.  The city or someone covers the bare line with some sort of
really gooey, pliable, water resistant putty.  I call it putty for lack of a better word.
It reminds me of plumber’s putty but it is softer in texture and more sticky. 
I stepped in some before I realized what it was because once the sand starts to cling
to it, it just looks like gray rocks.     Even after some days and the putty is completely
 covered with sand, if you step on it, it is like quick sand sucking you in.  It must take
buckets of goo to cover the pipe.  We saw 3-4 of the unburied lines one morning.

I like drift wood.  I wanted to take this piece home with me but it was too heavy.

When I see the sand rippled like this, it reminds me of how
the roof of my mouth feels against my tongue.

Dogs at the beach are the best!!

Sister Lucas is a true dog lover.  I know she goes to the beach

to see the dogs more than to get exercise!

The dog and people interaction is so entertaining

 
This week in my Come Follow Me studies, I read the chapters in Helaman telling about Samuel, the Lamanite, and his teachings and prophecies.  In thinking about prophets, I thought about how my life and the lives of my family have been blessed and changed by following the advice of prophets.

One specific memory caused me pleasure in thinking about it.  In 1974, my husband, Kay, and I bought a home on an acre of property in Sandy, Utah.  In 1976, President Spencer W. Kimball asked the members of the church to become more self-sufficient.  Since I couldn’t remember, I was curious what President Kimball had specifically said so I looked it up.

He said: “We encourage you to grow all the food that you feasibly can on your own property. Berry bushes, grapevines, fruit trees—plant them if your climate is right for their growth. Grow vegetables and eat them from your own yard. Even those residing in apartments or condominiums can generally grow a little food in pots and planters. Study the best methods of providing your own foods. Make your garden as neat and attractive as well as productive. If there are children in your home, involve them in the process with assigned responsibilities.” (in Conference Report, Apr. 1976, 170–71; or Ensign, May 1976, 124).

Kay took this advice to heart and we worked together to follow the prophet.   Neither of us had really had “raw” land before.  I was raised in the desert in Las Vegas.  My parents always had fruit and nut trees and green lawns but I don’t really remember a garden.  Kay had been raised in the middle of Salt Lake City.  I’m sure they had fruit trees but I don’t know if they had a garden.  If our parents had gardens, we had not been involved.  So the two of us novice gardeners decided to plant about 2/3 of our acre into a garden and to grow our own fruits and vegetables.

Kay researched and found out how to plant and raise various fruits and vegetables.  He was meticulous in measuring and making sure the rows were straight.  We had 90 foot rows spaced 2 ½ to 5-6 feet apart depending on the space needed for a particular plant.  We planted tomatoes, peppers, carrots, broccoli, potatoes, beans, corn, squash, pumpkins, peas, cucumbers, watermelon, cantaloupe, honey dew melons, kohlrabi, cabbage, onion and you name it.  We planted it.

We dug a root cellar in the barn for the carrots and potatoes.  We learned over the years how to garden and I must confess, that I think we became pretty good at it. 

We had chickens for eggs and a cow for milk and beef.  We raised lambs and would have had pigs but zoning wouldn’t allow pigs.  We enjoyed our horses and of course the cats and dogs.  It was a lot of hard work!

We took President Kimball’s advice and also included our children as they came along, in the work of the “farm.”    I fondly remember many days working in the garden with the whole family.  The kids loved irrigation day so that they could play in the ditches.  They didn’t love the planting, weeding, harvesting and the sweat and sometimes tears that accompanied the labor.  They did like the dimes they earned for a day’s labor when we would go to Dan’s Grocery Store where they could spend their dimes on an ice cream cone.  Yes! In those days you could get an ice cream cone for a dime!!! 

This week as I’ve enjoyed the memories, I’ve also appreciated the advice given by the prophet.  In the article where I got President Kimball’s quote, it listed the rewards of home gardening. 

There are many good reasons to have gardens:

Family Unity

Families who work together in a home garden build family unity because they share a common purpose. President Kimball said: “We hope you are making this [gardening project] a family affair, with everyone, even the little ones, assigned to something. There is so much to learn and harvest from your garden, far more than just a crop itself” (in Conference Report, Apr. 1978, 120; or Ensign, May 1978, 79).

(I interject here.  Our garden and working together as a family on the garden, cleaning up after animals, mending fences, working in the yard and the myriad of other jobs we did together did unify and bond our family.  My children and grandchildren continue being “best friends” and they still work and play together often.  That is one of my greatest blessings.)

Appreciation of Work

A home garden helps children learn the value of work. After they have helped the family plant a garden and care for it, they will enjoy seeing the results that come from their hard work.

Self-Sufficiency

Growing a garden helps us develop confidence as we become better prepared to take care of our own needs. We know that if problems come we can meet them because we have preserved fruit, grown a garden, and planted fruit trees and berry bushes. An added blessing is knowing that we can also help others in need.

Instruction and Pleasure

A garden reminds us of the beauties of this world our Heavenly Father created for us, and it can give us hours of instruction and pleasure as we witness the miracle of growth. President Spencer W. Kimball said that gardening will “remind us all of the law of the harvest. … We do reap what we sow. Even if the plot of soil you cultivate, plant, and harvest is a small one, it brings human nature closer to nature as was the case in the beginning with our first parents” (in Conference Report, Apr. 1976, 117; or Ensign, May 1978, 77–78).

Health

The Lord loves us and wants us to be healthy. Growing and eating our own fresh vegetables and fruits will help us maintain good health. Also, food we get from our gardens is usually fresher and better tasting than the food we buy.

Reduced

Home gardening can reduce the cost of living. Eating the food we grow ourselves enables us to save the money we would have spent on food grown by others.

 Today I see that my children have carried on with the things that they learned as participating members of the family.  My children plant their own gardens now and still enjoy the harvest.  It makes me happy to hear of their gardening experiences and how they enjoy the fruits of their labors.  There is nothing like standing in the garden and picking an ear of corn and eating it right then and there.  Or picking a ripe, juicy tomato warm from the sun and licking the juices from your lips as you enjoy the flavor.

Following the words of the prophet bring many blessings both spiritual and temporal.  We sang a hymn, Oh, Holy Words of Truth and Love, during our “bubble” worship on Sunday that I like.  Here are the lyrics:

1. Oh, holy words of truth and love
We hear from day to day,
Revealed to Saints from God above,
To guide in heaven’s way.

[Chorus]
Beautiful words of love
Coming from God above,
How sweet, how dear the words we hear!
They’re beautiful words of love.

2. They’re from Apostles good and true,
Whose names we all revere,
Who daily teach us what to do
In words of love and cheer.

3. They’re from the prophets God inspires,
In counsels oft withstood,
Reproving all our ill desires,
Commending all that’s good.

4. And from each chosen one that speaks
By aid the Spirit gives,
For every sphere of life it seeks,
For everyone that lives.

5. As gems of wisdom, pure and bright,
That glow with lustrous ray,
We’ll seek to gain these words of light,
Their counsels to obey.

 I testify that President Russell M Nelson is our living prophet today.   I am grateful for a prophet who guides, leads, teaches, and testifies of the Savior.

I love my Savior and I love you my family and friends.