Week 100 from Mexico

24 July 2011

Hola!  Happy Pioneer day.  Hope you have something fun planned to celebrate.

This is our last greetings from Monterrey. I can't believe how fast this last two years, almost, has gone by.  This has been one of the most wonderful experiences of our lives.  It's been a time of learning, growing, and receiving of great blessings in both our lives and in the lives of our children.  My heart is so full of gratitude to my Heavenly Father for the abundance He has blessed us with.  I know the only way we can thank Him is to continue to be in His service.

Monday was our farewell party with our dear FHE group, the Romney's and Ricardo & Maricarmen.  It was very hard saying goodbye to Ricardo & Maricarmen, since this is probably the very last time we will see them again.  We hope to see our American friends again.  Though several people have said that we need to come back and visit and have said we always have a place to stay, it's very unlikely that we will ever return.  We will miss Ricardo's wonderful steaks and know we will never taste any others quite like his.  As a surprise Maricarmen gave me an apron.  She is such a sweet lady with the most beautiful smile.  We will miss her so much.  Also, as a surprise, Sister Clark presented us with a small notebook full of special notes from people of Monterrey, mostly from the temple and our senior missionary friends.  But, we weren't able to read it yet because she still needed to have more people write in it during the week.  We will get it to keep after Monday, just before we leave. She had started getting it filled over a month ago, two weeks before the break, but had to do it when we weren't around, to make it a surprise.  She said that one of the reasons they took us to the Garcia branch at the end of June was so it could be passed around the Campestre Ward while we were gone but then she forgot to get it to Sister Acosta before we left, so this Sunday it will be going around in Relief Society, a little easier now that we know about it.

This whole week at the temple has been emotionally draining, for me, as we've had to say goodbye to many of the workers for the last time, since some won't be able to come to the Temple Farewell Party on Monday.  Sister Perales will probably be one of them, as she has a doctors appointment in Saltillo and probably won't be able to make it to the Farewell party.  We spent some time just hugging each other and shedding a few tears.  We've become very close as we've worked together. Saturday was especially hard for me since it was our last day at the temple.  I spent a lot of time just sitting and remembering the good experiences we've had.  We had some cards made with our picture on it and a small farewell message that we gave to all the workers at the temple, as well as a few of the patrons that we saw frequently, just as a small token of our love for these people.  They were all so pleased to get it.

I have a great husband.  He has done most of the heavy cleaning of our apartment. Each day during the last couple of weeks doing something.  He's been great and I have grown in my love and appreciation for him.  This mission has brought us much closer together.  This has been a time for us to bond as it's been just the two of us, without other family members around. He has been such a good sport, as we've done a lot of things that are a bit out of his comfort zone, but which have made some great memories.

On Thursday the Meneses invited us to lunch, along with the Clarks. They also had the Huerras as well and we spent a lovely afternoon visiting. They are both couples that we are also going to miss.  They have been very warm and friendly and loving.

After our shift on Friday the Galaviz took us to the Cabo Grill for lunch.  We enjoyed our visit.  They are one couple we are going to miss greatly.  They probably spent almost as much time at the temple as we did.  I will especially miss Sister Galaviz.  She was on shift with me the very first day at the temple and took me under her wing and mentored me along, giving me both moral and spiritual support.  My memory of her will be in my heart forever.

Patty, a young women, who has been coming in about every two weeks for the last year to clean our bathrooms, came on Friday to do the last cleaning. She cleans for our landlady and we were glad to use her, as well, paying her $200 pesos [about $20 US] each time.  

With the temple farewell party on Monday we made some changes to our plans for returning home.  We also have a granddaughter, who is one of three we haven't met yet, who will be having her first birthday on Saturday, the 30th, so we've decided to return in time to attend her party.  We will be leaving Mexico very early Tuesday morning, hopefully by 6:30am.  Keep us in your prayers as we make the exit out of Mexico.  We pray that it will be uneventful and quick.  We are going to visit three temples in Arizona on our way home: the Gila Valley temple on Wednesday evening, the Mesa temple on Thursday late morning and the Snowflake temple for the 10am session on Friday.  Then Friday afternoon we will start our last leg of our journey home, arriving sometime in the afternoon on Saturday.  We are so excited to get home and see family and friends again and meeting three new granddaughters. We look forward to a week long reunion with our family from the 13th through the 20th.  We have some fun things planned and it will be wonderful to have all the family together.

Today after church we went to the Neils so I could help and give some tips to Sister Neil in using Powerpoint and Picasa. We also ate lunch with them.  When we first arrived the Neils weren't home so we went to their church building and found that they had stayed after church for a baptism.  The new convert had asked Brother Neil to baptize him, which proved to be a bit of a challenge because this gentleman was afraid of water.  But it was accomplished after three tries.  We arrived after the baptism had occurred and they were waiting for the men to change. As they were waiting they had some of the members bear their testimony.  They then asked Lynn and I to bear our testimonies.  Lynn did great but I was a bit nervous.  I didn't have my written testimony that I had used to bear it before but decided to give it a try knowing that Lynn could correct me if I made a huge error and probably translate for me when needed.  So I made it through with a little help, though it was a bit rough.

Week 99 from Mexico

17 July 2011

Hola!  Hope you have had a great week.  Ours has been a bit emotional, for me at least, as we said goodbye to some workers at the temple.  We've spent some time sorting and giving away items that we don't need to take with us.  Not a hard job for Lynn, but is a bit of a challenge for me because I have a hard time letting go of things.  But, I did it. We are getting down to what we should be able to take back home in our mini-van.  After our shift at the temple on Saturday we took a lot of things to the Torres' so they can share them with members of the small ward that they work with who live in the Centro Ward and which is located in one of the poorer sections of Monterrey.  Hope that someone can make use of two heaters, a printer, some food items, some craft items, a water jug, a vacumn and misc. other items.

We almost had a catastrophe.  We have been planning a farewell party for us with our FHE senior missionary couples along with Richardo, Maricarmen and the Romeny's for the 18th July for more than a month.  Well, it seems that the temple was also planning a farewell party for us on the same date, only they were trying to keep it a secret so they could surprise us and hadn't check to make sure that we didn't have previous plans.  When Sister Clark found out about it she called us to see if we knew anything about it, and of course we didn't, so it is now no longer a surprise and the temple changed their date to the 25th after we decided that we would wait one more day to leave. So now we will be leaving Monterrey on the 26th.

Today President and Sister Taylor invited the Clarks and us to have lunch at their house after church.  Sister Taylor is a fabulous cook and we had a very enjoyable meal and visit with them.  As we were leaving we showed the Clarks the building where the Campestre Ward were using before their chapel by the temple was built.  It's still owned by the church but not in use right now. President Taylor said that it was built at the same time that many of the other chapels were built here in Monterrey using the same basic floor plan and were designed to be used by one ward and are very small in structure.

Well, I guess that's about it for this week.  In case I forget to mention next week, we can really use your faith and prayers for our exit out of Mexico on the 26th.  We pray that our exit will be as uneventful and smooth as the Shaklees, Olivers, and Halls were.

This is a painting that was painted by Sis. Taylor. The two rings represent Pres. and Sis. Taylor, the eagles represent their two sons and the two butterflies represent their two daughters.  She said that it shows what she hopes from them: to have the freedom to fly but to be encircled in the love of family. 

Week 98 from Mexico

10 July 2011

Hola!  Hope you've had a great week.  Ours was a very busy one.  Between all the other activities this week we spent some time cleaning, starting to pack and going through our collection of paraphernalia we've collected while here.  We spent Monday evening at President and Sister Romney's celebrating the 4th of July.  As we ate President Romney had us share some of our memories of past 4th of July's or our thoughts or feelings about the 4th of July.  We also played a couple of games.  One was where we divided up into two teams and had to write down all the states and their capitals.  It was kind of funny that on the team that Sister Romney was on they forgot two states, on of which, Colorado, was where she was born.  But their team still won.  With the other game we each had to write down 5 or 6 famous people and put the papers into a hat.  Then alternating between teams, the men against the women, each person would take out a paper and, without saying the name, had to describe the person who's name they drew until their team named the person.  They would then continue drawing names until the time was up, at which time it switched to the other team.  We ended up laughing so hard sometimes with some of the descriptions.  To say the least it was a great night.

Tuesday night we went to the wedding reception for the Taylor's daughter, Dalein,  who married Bryant Hoer in the Las Vegas Temple on the 2nd. The reception was held at the Atrium Club Empresarial, which on the top floor of the building where the LDS church's employment center is located and where the Riggs serve.  As we were going up the ramp of the parking we just happened to be right behind the Taylor's car and ended up parking close to them.  As we got out of our car we met most of the grooms family, Steve and Cynthia Hoer and their children, who are from Henderson, Nevada.  It was very unusual to have people greet us in English. It was refreshing. Wow, what a celebration.  Sister Taylor is a Treviño daughter, and they simply don't do things on a small scale.  Sister Taylor had told Sister Clark that they were just inviting a few people, close friends and family.  A few for them was almost 300 people and this was a sit-down dinner with orchestra and dancing, along with fireworks just outside along the windows, and a great view of Monterrey from the circular top of the building with windows on about two-thirds of the sides of the room.

Wednesday Lynn and I took a trip to Saltillo and spent the day with the Flores' visiting the Museo del Desierto, which is a huge museum with displays about the geological and cultural history of the area. There were life size replicas of dinosaurs and animals, along with a small collection of live reptiles and  animals.  Afterwards we treated the Flores to lunch at Sanborns, our way of thanking them for their friendship and having had us to their home for lunch a couple of times.

On Thursday we took a second trip to Saltillo, this time with our FHE group.  They thought we were very good sports to go a second time and share it with them, but, as Lynn said, it took two times to really get everything there was to see.  The Neils, Clarks, and Riggs seldom have the time to sightsee so this was a real treat for them. We ate lunch in the restaurant that was located in the Museum. At first we thought that maybe it wasn't open as there weren't any patrons and they didn't have anything set out. But, as it turned out the food was great and we had a great view of Saltillo as we ate.  As we were finishing up our meal a young man came up and introduced himself.  He was very excited to meet us.  He said that he was a member of the church, of about 3 years, and the only member in his family, at work and at school and feeling very much isolated. When he saw our group and our names in the registration book with where we were from he just had to meet us.  He was born in Reynosa and had moved to Saltillo fairly recently. He is in his first year of law school and expecting a mission call any day now.  It was so fun to meet him.  His goodness and testimony simply radiated from his face.

The Riggs had invited us to see where they serve in the LDS Employment center and to go to lunch with them so we decided to do that on Friday. They gave us a tour of the center, which is one of seven (I think) regional employment center's in Mexico.  They then took us to a local small restaurant that had great food.  It was an enjoyable visit.

Saturday was spent with the Neils. We wanted to visit the Museo del Acero at the Parque Funidora, which used to be a steel factory that went bankrupt in the mid-nineteen eighties and was turned over to the city, which in turn for the last ten years have turned into a large park, Parque Funidora, with many different event centers, such as the Cintermex Convention Centre which is a leading exhibition venue and regularly hosts many of the biggest and most important events in Monterrey, and several displays to see along with a ride attraction similar to Lagoon, but on a smaller scale, called Parque Plaza Sésamo (Sesame Street Amusement Park). This is located at one end of the Paseo de Santa Lucia [the canal ride] that we went on with the Neils several months ago, but the museum was closed on that visit. Both times that Lynn and I have been there the museum has been closed so we decided to go back together.  Sister Neil and Lynn also wanted to go down the zip-line that they have there.  She's a very adventurous lady. We ended up having a tour guide who spoke English and gave us a good tour with a lot of background information of how they manufactured steel.  By being a tour guide at the museum, this young man was completing a requirement that the universities in Mexico have before the students can get a degree which requires that they complete 480 hours of community service.  We've come across several students doing this same kind of thing.  He said that because his field of study is in architecture, he really enjoys doing his service at the museum because of it's background.

Lynn & I also saw the Casa de Loros [House of the Parakeets or bird house] which had several different species of parrots, parakeets, cockatoos and other birds.  They also had a bird show that was going on while we were there which include showing a monkey, small alligator, falcon, and large snake. We missed the first part so they had some other things we didn't see.  The Neils chose not to do this one. It would be too hard for him to walk it.

With several families moving from the ward this past month, amounting to about 30 people, attendance at church today was a little on the low side.  This includes the Treviños who are now serving as mission president in Veraquez;  the Buehlers who moved to Texas; the Taylor's maid, Reyna Martinez, who left this week, ; the Priego's, who moved down by Mexico City, and several others, I think they are counting us in that number.

As you can see we had a busy week.  The temple reopens this week and so we start back on our regular schedule. This week we will be afternoons and next week will be mornings.  That means that each day for the next two weeks will be the last time we will be with most of these workers at the temple.  I expect to be an emotional wreck by the time we leave, with all the goodbyes. It's going to be very hard to leave many of the dear friends we have made here.  Vincent Torres asked us this week when we are going to return to Monterrey and said that we always have a place to stay if we come to visit.  Sister Machuca has said several times that we can go home for six months and then we need to come back and serve again in the temple. It's probably not going to happen but it's a good feeling to know that they would like us to return.

4th of July with the Romney's

Vincent & Palmira with their son and his fiancee.

Us with the Acostas.

Parents of the groom, Steve & Cynthia Hoer, and parents of the bride, Norma &  Daniel Taylor

The happy couple, Dalein & Bryant Hoer

Now I can hear you.

For those who have a hard time hearing.

We've been mounted.

Going to the top of the museum,

Lynn on zip-line

Our landlords, the Peñas with their family