Missionary Journal

England (December Weeks 3-4 2009)

December Week 3

Monday started out with sunshine and we got dressed in our jeans, picked up President Chasteauneuf, and found our way over to Sister Bev Webb’s new house. She wants to move in just after Christmas and most of the house needs painting. This is Bev standing on the ladder and working on her bedroom.

This is Bev’s youngest son, Robbie, who is home waiting to go on his mission. If you can’t tell from the paint on his shirt, he is a big “football” (soccer) fan and red is the team’s color. By this time he had put two coats of paint on some of his walls.

Carol Dadds had been helping since early morning (we didn’t get there until about 10:30 am).

This is President Chasteauneuf (he’s 84) in what he calls “his supervisor’s coat. He is absolutely intrepid and will get up on ladders and try to do just about anything.

Here he is – up on the ladder edging the walls.

Of course, no painting party would be complete without Elder Reimers. Don’t get me wrong… I didn’t just take pictures, I painted at least two big walls (at least as far as I could reach). Then Walt did the rest (about a foot).

By the time we left Bev’s in the late after-noon everything was painted with the exception of the stairwell wall (two stories high) and it was raining. It seems to be the pattern: sunshine in the morning, dark and dreary in the afternoon, and then rain in the evening.

Monday evening I finished my journal and posted it to the blog. This gives me a record of what we did so I can do my weekly report to President Shamo.

Tuesday was District Meeting in Poole with missionary interviews in the afternoon. It’s now 4:15 and I’m sitting in front of my laptop writing this and waiting for our interview. This evening I am going to make another dozen snowflake cookies so we can head out to Bridport tomorrow. Walt has already set up appointments with those sisters out that way that we need to warn we are coming.

Wednesday morning I worked on my Gospel Doctrine lesson and, in the afternoon, we had wonderful appointments with our widows. I can’t believe how close we’ve come to these sisters in this last year. They don’t get many visitors and are so happy to talk about the Gospel with us. Of course, bringing cookies doesn’t hurt one little bit!! After we visited our three widows (Sister Joyce Nash in Portesham, Sister Norma Dean in Burton Bradstock, and then Sister Iris Campbell in Bridport) we visited the rest of the families in Bridport and then caught the remaining folks in Dorchester on the way back home. It was a great day.

Thursday morning Walt baked more of his cookies and in the afternoon we were out in Weymouth visiting.

Friday we were in Weymouth again (lots of members in Weymouth). We only have a dozen more plates of cookies to deliver to make our Christmas goal of cookies to all the Weymouth Branch members. We have had so much fun baking and delivering. I just can’t tell you. As I was finishing up the Senior Missionary Newsletter I was asked to facilitate I put in an editorial titled “The Efficacy of Cookies” extolling the wonder of taking cookies to less-actives. It really is hard for someone to brush you off the doorstep when you have cookies in hand. Giving cookies (especially homemade) is not something regularly done here, so it is a novelty.

Friday evening was the Branch Christmas Social. We have looked forward to it since our Activities Director (Paul Dadds) is a commercial artist by trade and education, and he is really creative. The schedule starting tonight is busy. The Social is a time for games and Santa. Sunday (20 December) will be our Christmas Sacrament Program with lots of music and narrators. On Wednesday, 23 December, we have the Christmas Carol Service. It gathers a crowd as we invite everybody (actives, less-actives, and the neighborhood around). The Carol Service is less serious than Sacrament but more serious than the Social. I’m reading a story, there are several others reading various pieces of Christmas writings, and then the Primary is doing a Nativity with songs. It looks like it will be great.

Let’s get back to the Social… As we walked in there was a beautifully decorated Christmas tree in the lobby. On the left you can see the elf welcoming people to the party. On the right, the table is covered by Christmas cards. Instead of mailing, the members bring cards to church and put them on the table. It certainly saves on stamps.

For a few minutes we visited with each other and then Sister Fiona Payne started us off with games. The first thing we did was a “Forfeit.” She had wrapped a cylinder of something with several wrappings of newsprint. Some of the layers had a forfeit taped on. We sat in a circle and passed the parcel around. When the music stopped, whoever had the parcel had to unwrap a layer and do whatever was noted. Here you can see Nathan Walker is cracking the audience up as he does his forfeit.

Here is Daniel Dadds who got the prize at the end.

Next up, we played balloon relay races. You can see the winning team passing the balloon from knee to knee.

Aren’t the decorations cute?

Then they played a game where each vertical row (looking at the picture) was a name in a nonsensical Christmas story. As Fiona told a Christmas story and said whatever name that row might be, they had to get out of their chair and run around the horizontal row and back to their chair. As I remember it, John Dadds (who is seen here trying to make it back to his chair) was a reindeer.

Last they played musical chairs (although I don’t think they call it that in England). It was cut-throat, serious play. Here they are as they were starting (left to right on the row closest to me: Jerome Trueman [red and black shirt], Steve [an investigator], Rosie Walker, Elder Trevisan, Elder Marchione, Tim Hutchings, and Michael Dixon).

After the games were over, Paul Dadds called all the children over to the doors dividing the chapel and the overflow room (i.e., Relief Society Room). Of course, when he opened the doors, there was Santa Claus on his throne with the tree and a tableful of food.

This is a close-up view of Santa’s throne. I was especially taken with the snowflakes. Santa talked to all the children (some a bit older than others) and gave them a gift. I have no idea what the gift was.

Here you can see Adam Kagi and Jerome Trueman getting a picture with Santa. You can tell it’s modern since they were using his cell phone to take the picture.

Here are Elders Trevisan and Marchione getting their gifts.

Here you can see Santa turning to say hello to Sister Reimers as she takes his picture. You can also see a portion of the food on the table. We had pick-up foods (sweets and savories).

A close-up view of the Christmas tree and the presents under the tree.

This picture is of Mervyn and Peggy Dadds who are the “grand old couple” of Weymouth Branch. He has been both Branch President and Stake President.

Saturday, I worked on my Gospel Doctrine Lesson in the morning while Walt baked another batch of Oatmeal Raisin cookies, and then we visited four more families. That means we have eight left for next week. In the evening I did the handouts for my Gospel Doctrine class and the bulletin for tomorrow.

On Sunday we did the Christmas Program I wrote and it was superb – not because I wrote it, but because of the music. Walt did a great solo of O Come, O Come Emmanuel, we had a lovely flute and piano duet of Silent Night, Elders Marchione and Trevisan sang O Holy Night (truly wonderful), and the Primary sang Away in a Manger in between numerous congregational Christmas hymns. Of course, all this music was carefully positioned within speaking parts done by three narrators.

To top off this amazing week, we had four less-actives in church today, not to mention the less-active that was there last week (whose husband and son are now investigating the church and getting the lessons from the Elders). One of our young men came up and thanked me for getting his mother out to church (we visited them Saturday). Hallelujah!! Our Christmas gift; just what we wanted.

By the time we got home on Sunday, I was flat out exhausted and went to bed at 7:00 pm.

December Week 4
First thing Monday morning, I made up 200 little (quarter page) flyers for the Elders to give out to the neighbors around the church for the Christmas Carol Service on Wednesday. Walt took them over to the Elders and they are going out today and as much tomorrow as they can, knocking on doors and giving flyers out.

I still need to make another batch of snowflake cookies so we can get out and about tomorrow after District Meeting. We are doing flat checks tomorrow and Wednesday and bringing the Elders cookies and a book mark I had color copied and then I laminated.

Other than that we are just doing laundry today (“P” Day) and staying warm in the flat. I updated my journal and did my weekly report to President Shamo. Oh, good, I just got one of the presents I got Walt for Christmas – a pair of Union Jack suspenders. You all must remember the selection of suspenders he had at home (flames, John Deere, etc.).

The reason I’m trying to stay warm is that it is cold outside. Earlier last week the temperature was quite low (actually yesterday it was -1.5˚C (about 25˚F).

If you can read this, I downloaded it earlier last week (when it was -0.5˚C) and it says “it feels like 21˚F).

This evening I did make that other batch of snowflake cookies so we can start flat inspections tomorrow. I also received a phone call from Sister Hanson that three of the elders in our zone haven’t yet received Christmas gifts from home. Actually, that’s not true – only two. Elder Marchione received a package but it was delivered to a neighbor (for safe keeping) and was vandalized and the empty box was left out on the driveway. Bah! Humbug! I can’t imagine someone doing that???

Tuesday we had District Meeting and then we inspected the missionary flats in Yeovil and Weymouth. Of course, we came with cookies. How we love these fine young men! They work so hard and sometimes see so little return.

In the evening, I realized that I had done myself a disservice. I let myself in for a triple whammy – I agreed to speak on Sunday with President Chasteauneuf since Walter hadn’t gotten a speaker, I’m doing my usual Gospel Doctrine lesson, and I have responsibility for Primary Sharing Time (I graciously traded weeks with Sister Payne so she could go skiing). Oh, well, no problem. It just takes time. Therefore, I prayed and worked on my lessons.

Wednesday, we were up and out by 8:30 am to inspect the missionary flats in Poole, Bournemouth, and Christchurch. Unfortunately, the weather was NOT good. As we got on the A35 there was a large pile up (20 at two locations) and, of course, we were behind it. We couldn’t understand what was happening. Cars kept moving periodically, but eventually we were behind two cars and two long lines of trucks and could see several police cars ahead. What was happening was the cars were turning around up ahead but no one was telling anybody they could. You just waited until your curiosity and daring got to be enough that you would pull between two lines of trucks (on each side of our two lanes of the four-lane road) and go through. We waited for about ten minutes after seeing the last car go through and then went ourselves. It took us two hours to get to that point. Once we made the turn around, it wasn’t a problem getting to where we needed to go. We managed to get the Poole and Bournemouth elders’ flats inspected and cookies and gifts delivered and asked the Zone Leaders (Bournemouth) to deliver cookies and gifts to Christchurch and do their flat inspection.

After that was completed, we high-tailed it home so that Walt could pick up Brother Hutchings and take him to the hospital in Dorchester for a procedure he needed to have done. While Walt was doing that I finished off my Primary Sharing Time.

Wednesday evening was our Weymouth Branch Carol Service.

For those of you who think they need to see pictures of me, here I am reading my story.

A Christmas Story

It's just a small, white envelope stuck among the branches of our Christmas tree. No name, no identification, no inscription. It has peeked through the branches of our tree for the past 10 years or so.

It all began because my husband Mike hated Christmas---oh, not the true meaning of Christmas, but the commercial aspects of it-overspending...the frantic running around at the last minute to get a tie for Uncle Harry and the dusting powder for Grandma---the gifts given in desperation because you couldn't think of anything else.

Knowing he felt this way, I decided one year to bypass the usual shirts, sweaters, ties and so forth. I reached for something special just for Mike. The inspiration came in an unusual way.

Our son Kevin, who was 12 that year, was wrestling at the junior level at the school he attended; and shortly before Christmas, there was a non-league match against a team sponsored by an inner-city church, mostly black.

These youngsters, dressed in sneakers so ragged that shoestrings seemed to be the only thing holding them together, presented a sharp contrast to our boys in their spiffy blue and gold uniforms and sparkling new wrestling shoes.

As the match began, I was alarmed to see that the other team was wrestling without headgear, a kind of light helmet designed to protect a wrestler's ears.

It was a luxury the ragtag team obviously could not afford. Well, we ended up walloping them. We took every weight class. And as each of their boys got up from the mat, he swaggered around in his tatters with false bravado, a kind of street pride that couldn't acknowledge defeat.

Mike, seated beside me, shook his head sadly, "I wish just one of them could have won," he said. "They have a lot of potential, but losing like this could take the heart right out of them."

Mike loved kids-all kids-and he knew them, having coached little league football, baseball and lacrosse. That's when the idea for his present came.

That afternoon, I went to a local sporting goods store and bought an assortment of wrestling headgear and shoes and sent them anonymously to the inner-city church.

On Christmas Eve, I placed the envelope on the tree, the note inside telling Mike what I had done and that this was his gift from me.

His smile was the brightest thing about Christmas that year and in succeeding years.

For each Christmas, I followed the tradition---one year sending a group of mentally handicapped youngsters to a hockey game, another year a check to a pair of elderly brothers whose home had burned to the ground the week before Christmas, and on and on.

The envelope became the highlight of our Christmas. It was always the last thing opened on Christmas morning and our children, ignoring their new toys, would stand with wide-eyed anticipation as their dad lifted the envelope from the tree to reveal its contents.

As the children grew, the toys gave way to more practical presents, but the envelope never lost its allure. The story doesn't end there.

You see, we lost Mike last year due to dreaded cancer. When Christmas rolled around, I was still so wrapped in grief that I barely got the tree up. But Christmas Eve found me placing an envelope on the tree, and in the morning, it was joined by three more. Each of our children, unbeknownst to the others, had placed an envelope on the tree for their dad.

The tradition has grown and someday will expand even further with our grandchildren standing around the tree with wide-eyed anticipation watching as their fathers take down the envelope. Mike's spirit, like the Christmas spirit, will always be with us.

May we all remember each other, and the Real reason for the season, and His true spirit this year and always. God bless---pass this along to your friends and loved ones.

--- Copyright © 1982 Nancy W. Gavin

Interestingly enough as I Goggled the story, I found the following: “The story first appeared in Woman's Day magazine in 1982. My mom had sent the story in as a contest entry in which she subsequently won first place. Unfortunately, she passed away from cancer two years after the story was published. Our family still keeps the tradition started by her and my father and we have passed it on to our children. Feel free to use the story. It gives me and my sisters great joy to know that it lives on and has hopefully inspired others to reach out in a way that truly honors the spirit of Christmas.” --- Kevin Gavin

We arrived at the church at 5:30 with our ironing board and iron so I could help iron the costumes for the children in the Primary Nativity part of the program. After that was done, we started dressing children. Then John Dadds dropped in and asked me if I could run the PowerPoint presentation for the program since he was also doing the lights and they were in two entirely different places in the chapel.

For those of you who don’t remember, the chapel is built to also be a multi-purpose room. The pulpit and everything up there is moveable, as you can see from this picture. The boards about one-third of the way from the bottom are where the pulpit sits. The program this year is in two parts: The home scene (on the right with a fireplace, tree, table, and over-stuffed chair). The Nativity is there with a manger and Bethlehem scene. The children just moved from one area to another.

Here is our Primary – they were on that stage for the best part of 1.5 hours and were so unbelievably good. As you can see, we had shepherds, one sheep, wise men, angels, and, of course, Mary and Joseph. The lady in the background (Sister Val Chasteauneuf) sat in the chair and read a Christmas story titled “Two Naughty Mice.” A little later in the program she read the Christmas story from the scriptures as the Nativity was being performed and sung by the Primary. It was lovely.

The PowerPoint presentation showed the words for the carols sung by the audience and pictures for the story about the mice. It wasn’t hard, but just took some concentration and focus to make sure you were on the correct slide.

Of course, the piece de resistance was the Elders singing O Holy Night. The program noted that “they were brought back by popular demand” after the “Dadds Brothers” (John and Paul) heard them on Sunday during the Christmas Sacrament Program. They were so good – I would have recorded them, but Walt had the camera while I was doing the PowerPoint.

Today is Thursday and, of course, Christmas Eve. I updated my Word documents and sent the flat inspection forms into the Mission Office. Walt went to the chapel to see if he could get the computer working – it could make for a mess if we can’t get the tithing settlement and checks written out into the system before year-end. We received two special Christmas cards today: The first was just lovely, with red velvet paper and stand-out ornaments. The second was more humble but the thought was wonderful: “When at times you feel you are getting nowhere, know that the love you have shown has made a difference.” At one of the first Zone Conferences we had in England we were asked to introduce ourselves, say where we were from, where we were serving, who we were serving with, and what we wanted to have said about us when we left the mission field. What I said I wanted to be said of me was “She loved us.”

Tonight our Elders will be here for dinner at 6:00 pm. They have been told not to go out after that tonight so people can be with their families. We will eat and then play the First Presidency Christmas Devotional.

Well, we had Kung Po Chicken, egg rolls, rice, noodles, and salad for dinner with Magnum Ice Cream Bars for dessert. Walt says they are just like home, but I do miss the almonds on the outside. Just as they were arriving, we had two more visitors: John and Liz Dadds came with a bouquet of roses for me and a box of tangerines for the Elders. How wonderful to be surrounded so close by people with a common goal and knowledge of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Weymouth is much like a large, extended family.

This morning is Christmas. Walt opened his gifts: His suspenders and webcam with built-in microphone were well received. We are going shopping next week for my gifts (Dee wasn’t here to take him shopping). This should be interesting. Here is Walt in his new Union Jack suspenders (braces here). They are really stretchy tight and pulled his pants up so far his belt kept slipping down.

The Elders brought over their gift last evening and we opened it this morning. What special young men – it’s no wonder we love them so much.

The top one is a magnet for the refrigerator and now we have two sets of missionaries to remember every time we look around the house. If you don’t remember, that’s Elder Trevisan on the left and Elder Marchione on the right – our two very good-looking and dedicated Italian missionaries).

To explain what I meant by that last comment: Last Christmas Elders Ellsworth and Böng gave us a framed picture of them and we have had it up on our bookshelves for the last year. We have this picture on the stand at the right of my chair.

Since it was hailing yesterday, Walt decided we might very well have a white Christmas. Unfortunately, this is England where you can’t ever predict the weather. Today dawned bright and sunny and warmer. Here you can see the bright blue sky and a little bit of the ocean looking out toward Portland Island as we got into the car preparatory to going to Chasteauneuf’s for dinner.

This afternoon we had Christmas Dinner with President and Sister Val Chasteauneuf. They had also invited Malcolm Mckay (pronounced McKai) and Esther Shikongo (she has the loveliest smile).

It was a great dinner and Val had worked hard to prepare so many different foods. I took a picture of the dinner table before we sat down to eat.

Here is a picture of President and Walt. You can see Val’s decorations. They really celebrate Christmas in England.

This is Val looking for a resting place after preparing and us eating all that wonderful food. Note the crown on her head. That is from the crackers that were one the table. They were the long shiny things on the table (above) tied with a ribbon at both ends. They pop when you pull them and usually have a small gift, a crown, and these had corny riddles. My riddle was hysterical (especially if you live in England): “Who looks after Father Christmas when he’s ill?” The Answer: “The National Elf Service.” Of course, the National Health Service (NHS) is the medical services most everyone uses.

We left at 4:30 to make it home so we could talk to the children for Christmas. Leigh set up a Web-conference and we spoke with Delight, Charles, Justin, Christine, and Leigh and Allie for a little over two hours. It was fun because we each brought up pictures of the families, etc., and talked about them. I am so very, very happy for technology. It makes home seem a lot closer than it really is. We love them all so very much and I do miss seeing my grandchildren grow up. However, a great Christmas was had by all.

I’ve got my Gospel Doctrine lesson and Primary Sharing Time prepared, now I just have to decide what I will talk about on Sunday. I asked President today what he was speaking on and he still doesn’t know either. It could be a very interesting Sacrament Meeting.

Today (Saturday) is Boxing Day: “Boxing Day is a bank and public holiday in the England. The name derives from the tradition of giving seasonal gifts, on the day after Christmas, to less wealthy people and social inferiors, which was later extended to various workpeople such as laborers and servants.

“The traditional recorded celebration of Boxing Day has long included giving money and other gifts to charitable institutions, the needy and people in service positions. The European tradition has been dated to the Middle Ages, but the exact origin is unknown and there are some claims that it goes back to the late Roman/early Christian era.

“In England it certainly became a custom of the nineteenth century Victorians for tradesmen to collect their 'Christmas boxes' or gifts in return for good and reliable service throughout the year on the day after Christmas” (Wikipedia: Boxing Day).

Since Boxing Day this year is a Saturday, nothing (including the grocery stores) is open from Friday (25 December) through Monday (28 December). Everything opens up with a vengeance on Tuesday (29 December) for all the Post-Christmas sales. Last year Boxing Day was on Friday and then everything opened up Saturday, but not this year. Fortunately, when we were at ASDA (“A Member of the Wal-Mart Family”) on Thursday I saw the notice that they wouldn’t be open for the next few days and bought extra food to tide us over the holidays.

I have been working on my talk for tomorrow. It took a while to get exactly what I wanted to say on paper, but I am speaking on Inertia. I used that term with the missionaries at District Meeting last week and they all looked extremely perplexed. They had no idea what Inertia meant.

I explained that inertia is based on Newton’s First Law of Motion: “In the absence of force, a body either is at rest or moves in a straight line with constant speed.” To put it simply, an object at rest tends to remain at rest and a moving object tends to remain moving unless affected by an outside force. Therefore, if we are to make the most of our lives we must have a desire to do so and must work hard at it. Inertia is why investigators don’t get out to church unless they are being affected by an outside force (i.e., the missionaries with daily contact).

One of these days, tomorrow will be too late. Tomorrow will eventually be today or yesterday, and we will sorrow at how much potential we have lost and cannot regain.

We must know who we are. We must recognize that we are spiritual children of our Father in heaven and that we are here on earth to be tested and to prove ourselves. I for one, feel I must not be content to just go through life and put in my time. Our time on earth is short, and no matter who we are, we pass through this life just once. Unless we put purpose into our living, the hours can slip by and get away from us without our having very much to show for them.

Today is the day to resolve to make the most of our lives, to live the gospel to the fullest, to keep all the commandments, and to set the proper examples for our family, friends, and all with whom we come in contact.

I found a poem that pretty much sums up inertia and procrastination titled “Tomorrow” to end with:

He was going to be all that a mortal should be, Tomorrow.
No one would be kinder and braver than he, Tomorrow.
A friend who was troubled and weary he knew,
Who’d be glad for a lift and who needed it, too.
On him he would call and see what he could do, Tomorrow.
And thought of the folks he would fill with delight, Tomorrow.
It was too bad, indeed, he was busy today
And hadn’t a minute to stop on his way.
More time he would have to give others, he’d say, Tomorrow.
The greatest of workers this man would have been, Tomorrow.
The world would have known him had he ever seen Tomorrow.
But the fact is he died and he faded from view,
And all that he left here when living was through
Was a mountain of things he intended to do, Tomorrow.

Now I think I will do the bulletin and then rest for a “little season.”

Church went well on Sunday. It wasn’t too bad speaking, teaching Gospel Doctrine, and then doing a 20-minute Sharing Time in Primary (I've done it before). Actually, Sharing Time was fun. The topic was The Second Coming. I used PowerPoint and talked about the crucifixion, resurrection, and ascension. Then I asked if they would like to see Jesus again. I showed the video clip “The Ten Young Women” from the New Testament Gospel Doctrine DVD. The ending of the DVD tells of many ways you can fill you lamps so you are ready for the Second Coming. President Kimball taught, “In our lives the oil of preparedness is accumulated drop by drop in righteous living. Attendance at sacrament meetings adds oil to our lamps, drop by drop over the years. Fasting, family prayer , … control of bodily appetites, preaching the gospel, studying the scriptures—each act of dedication and obedience is a drop added to our store. Deeds of kindness, payment of offerings and tithes, chaste thoughts and actions, marriage in the covenant for eternity—these, too, contribute importantly to the oil with which we can at midnight refuel our exhausted lamps” (Faith Precedes the Miracle). Then we spoke for a few minutes of ways they could fill their lamps.


The only issue on Sunday was that the church computer has crashed hard. Nothing is happening and Walt has to get it working so that Tithing Settlement and disbursed checks can get into the official Church system. He is expecting a call from the IT geeks at Solihull (England’s Church Headquarters) that are very close to the Preston England Temple in the north.

By for now, I will put the remainder of December into the first week of January 2010, remembering that the 31st is the end of the decade. More next week. Love, Jackie