Surprise good-bye

Today after the block of sunday meetings, we were all asked to meet in the Cultural Hall. Unbeknownst to us, the ward had planned a surprise pot-luck/ good-bye party for us! They made a special cake for us:

They gave us presents of all things "Canadian".

and lots of good-bye cards - mostly made by the Primary kids...

Mostly we pretty much cried the whole time. What wonderful people we have been privileged to work with!

Departures

Elder Aubin and Elder Bell were the only two missionaries headed home this time:

Elder Aubin is headed back to France, and Elder Bell is headed back to BYU - in fact will be in classes the next day after getting home - since he's already missed the first week. Wow... talk about
a stressful re-entry!

Mom's birthday

 Today would have been mom's 100th birthday! We decided to honor her by going to Taco Bell in Massena, NY (since they don't have any Taco Bells in Canada that we've found). We told our children to go to a Taco Bell and have a Taco to honor grandma on that day too!

Every Friday after getting her hair done, she wanted to go to Taco Bell for lunch. She would always get one regular taco and a FREE senior drink.
Here are a few photos of some of the kids paying her homage as well:

Top: Layne and Arie and Zach and Mason in Antioch, CA
Bottom: Misty in Redwood City.
Lindsay sent a pic of her taco in Herndon, VA.

This one's for you, mom....  We miss you!

The Amish

We often go shopping at Walmart in Massena, NY. There must be a big Amish community there because we see many of them in their horse and buggys.... Although, I'm not sure how WARM they are in the winter.

Sometimes they will park and put out  a table of their wares and we'll stop and buy a pie, or bread. Very good. Interesting that they don't believe in driving cars or using electricity, but they have no problem shopping at Walmart and buying lunch at the Subway- both very modern, mechanized places.

but, it's definitely something I wanted to remember.

Snow Dogs

We went over to the Merpaws today and as we were leaving we heard a lot of barking dogs. We looked across the street at the park. There were a lot of people practicing with their sled dogs for an upcoming sledding competition. So, we went over to get a closer look.  They were really kind and talked to us about their dogs.  They are so excited to get hooked up to the sled and start running, that you have to attach them one at a time...lead dog first:

They are so anxious to get going that one man almost cannot hold them back...

These dogs are so beautiful. Some are huskies, but most are Malamutes.

Amazing day!  So much fun to learn about and see sledding dogs. And apparently, these dogs aren't just for pulling sleds, everyone there said that they stay inside the house with the family. Amazing since they are really large.... and if you had 4 of those in your home.... wow!  Still, they are beautiful.

New cold snap

It's really getting cold now.  We had freezing rain and it got very cold last night.

So, of course with all the slickness - we had a small accident.  There was alot of snow and they had just come through to plow all the snow out of the parking lot. What we didn't know was that under all that snow in the parking lot, was a lot of ice!

We went out to load some boxes in the car. I got in the passenger seat and Roger was going to put the boxes in the back of the Trailblazer.  He was holding the boxes and trying to open the back tailgate and suddenly I heard a thud. I got out and ran around to the back and found Roger on the ground.  While holding the boxes he tried to open the tailgate and as it started to go up, his feet slipped on the ice and the tailgate hit him in the mouth!  Our first accident of the year!  

Of course, he didn't want to go to the Dr. or hospital, so we just put a couple of butterfly bandages on it... He looked really GOOD!!  But it DID get us out of any work that day. Roger had a pretty bad headache and was a little dizzy - so we stayed home.  A tough way to get a day off.

Our last Zone Conference

Here it is... our LAST Zone Conference... It always seemed so far away....
Here we are with some Elders who are also having their  last zone conference.

                     
Elder Bell - who gave us a box to take home for him!! ha! and Elder Shaver. Both are in the Mandarin program and will be leaving the mission soon as well.

Elder Austin Heder - our zone leader- who lives close to us in Pleasant Grove. He is such a great elder!  AND... he plays football for BYU!!  I knew we liked him for a reason!