The Palmyra Temple in May. It has been a beautiful spring. The grounds are exquisite and the temple has been filled with patrons. It has been a wonderful week in the temple.

Today, Sunday, we drove to Pen Yann Branch where Elder Lewis and I spoke in sacrament meeting. It was also the first day for the Perkins and Gehrigs to attend their new Branch for the next six months. We spoke on the Holy Ghost and the temple. There are so many wonderful people in these branches. We have met many of them in the temple either as patrons or ordinance workers. They are very faithful people.

On Thursday, our Preparation Day, we drove with the Crookstons down to Watkins Glen and walked through the gorge. It was so beautiful. It is about a mile long and the paths were built by prisoner of war inmates.

Someone had cut this tree to look like a chair. Paul needed a rest.

Our hike was enhanced by meeting up with these people from Canada. They had been on the trail before and gave us lots of information and got us back to the beginning without getting lost.

Here we are with the Crookstons

The gorge is incredible.

On the way home we came across another garage sale and Paul found himself a "little" bike. He gets the best deals $1.

Monday night for FHE the Brethren made a dutch oven dinner for the ladies. Pres. Jones was at the helm. It was a delicious dinner of BBQ port and chicken, dutch oven potatoes, corn bread and three kinds of cobbler. Yum Yum

This is a shot of the 17 couples who make up the 2008 summer missionaries.

Tuesday morning we went with the Hullingers to Mendon where we found the home of John Young. It was in this town that Samuel Smith took the first Book of Mormon and gave it to Phineas Young. We found John Young's home and several other sites. In the near vicinity is the Ganondagan Historical Site which is the home (600 acres) of the Seneca Indian tribe. They have rebuilt a longhouse and have many artifacts from the era. Saturday they had a reenactment of the "Seneca Encourter with LaSalle". They were trying to wipe out the Seneca Indian tribe because they controlled the waterways through Niagara Falls. We were serving in the temple so missed it.

Saturday morning we were able to participate with the Single Adult conference. Pres. & Sister Jones did a workshop on the temple and family history. It's a really great program if you ever have to do something on family history.

Our thought for the week: develop Holy Habits and Righteous Routines

Summer Temple Schedule Begins

This week we were privileged to have our dear friends Greg & Rhonda Huffaker visit us from Oxnard, CA. They met us at the Genesee Singles Branch where we were speaking on the temple for the RS/Priesthood joint meeting.

They attended the temple with us Monday morning and then we drove out to the Whitmer Farm where Sister Pinegar took us on the tour. This is where the Church was organized on April 6, 1830.

Monday night we met at the Siebach's home but were not sure we were going to be able to have it because if you look really close in the corner of this window well you will see a skunk. He fell into the well and the True Green workers found him. Before FHE the dog catcher came and got him out. They put some polls down earlier hoping he would climb out himself. Blow up the picture and you'll see the skunk in the back.

Coming out of the temple one evening we had this beautiful site. My camera doesn't do it justice but it was beautiful. We have been so very busy at the temple this week. Several wards and branches have been coming and it has been great so see so many people receive their blessings from Heavenly Father here in His house.

Thursday evening we had our last batch of summer missionaries for dinner. We have the Thorsteds from Brigham City and the Gehrigs from Colorado. We had a wonderful evening getting to know each other. Elder Thorsted was a history teacher and Elder Gehrig was a helicopter pilot with the reserves.

Friday we drove to Sodus Point with Elder and Sister Jones. They are from South Jordan just across 13 West from our home in South Jordan. Elder Jones was also in education. Sister Jones got us to climb the 52 steps to the top of the light house. The apple orchards are all in bloom and it is beautiful.

We are on our summer schedule at the temple and are working in the office on Monday morning, Tuesday evening and every other Thursday. Wednesday we work the morning and evening shifts with the missionaries. Friday evening and Saturday day we serve with the local temple workers. We were able to go in and go on a session on Tuesday morning and Saturday morning. We are keeping busy.

Saturday evening we were invited to the Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra with the Site missionaries. We all met at the Palmyra Inn and loaded into vans which took us to the Eastman Theater. It was an "All-Gershwin Night and special performance from Jon Nakamatsu on the piano and Doug LaBrecque, tenor. It was a fun evening.

This is Elder & Sister Blackhurst. They arranged the evening for everyone.

Happy Mother's Day to all of you wonderful mothers. We were honored at Church and had some wonderful talks and music. In RS we had a great lesson from Sis. Fuqua on "Mothers Who Know" and then were treated to a nice brunch by the RS Presidency.

For lunch we invited the Temple Presidency. They are wonderful people and we are so blessed to serve with them. Sister Cederlof was not able to attend. She fell at the temple last week and is still recovering.

Be true to the covenants you have made with the Lord. He will bless and direct your every move. We love you.

Time Got Away Last Week

Last week got away from us as far as getting our blog on line. We were very busy. We have been having three of our missionary couples for dinner. Here we have the Archibalds from Brigham City, The Hamiltons from SL, me, and the Pestana's from Provo, previously LA.

While we were out visiting our home teaching families we happened onto a garage sale. This is Paul's big buy, an exercise bike for $3. I told him he has to ride it not me.

This is our home in Palmyra in the spring. This ornamental tree is covered with blooms and the lilacs are coming out. The tulips and daffodils are still going strong.

Last fall I happened onto a place that let you pick your own black walnuts. I got them out of the husks and let them dry but never got them shelled. I decided it was a great treat for the squirrels. The next day they were all gone.

Paul and I are directors of FHE. Monday night at Pres. & Sis. Siebach's home we had Elder and Sister LeRoy speak to us about the construction of the temple. Their good friends The Wilkins were the builders. Their two daughters and granddaughters were visiting with them. The LeRoys are construction missionaries and are here over seeing the construction of the pageant building.

This is another dinner group of missionaries. It has been a fun way to get to know people. We have the Hullingers from Springville, UT, The Crookstons from Harriman, UT and the Clawsons from Hirum, UT.

This is a view of the Hill Cumorah in the spring. It happened over night. In the foreground is the new pageant building.

Paul and I love to walk around the temple. You can see it in the background. This was one of the first days of spring.

The FM Missionaries called for help. They needed to plant 3000 pansies. There are only six FM missionaries so we came out to help. We had a little trouble standing the next day. The temple looks beautiful with color everywhere. The bulbs were already in bloom and the pansies are to fill in.

Here I am, hard at work.

When we got home Paul was busy digging dandelions in our yard. We have hundreds of them. We sprayed and are now digging them out. We were the only yard on the block that had them so we figured we had better get them out. They are so prevalent out here, you look around and there is yellow everywhere.

Last weekend we went to Cooperstown to speak in the Oneonta Branch with the Bruneaus. We love these people. They have the apple orchards and were planting 2000 trees this week.

We spent a short time at the Baseball Hall of Fame on Monday before coming back home.

This picture is for my Grandsons. There are deer everywhere, especially in the Bruneaus apple orchards.

We had dinner Sunday with the Hallists who live in Oneonta and also serve in the temple with us. They served in Nauvoo as site missionaries. There they met a mutual friend of our, Dorthy Giles, from the LA temple. She drew the picture they are standing by. She has also drawn pictures of all the temples. We have copies of them. They are beautiful.

Our thought for the week by Elder John Groberg 2007 about the temple. 1) Go when you go and you'll be blessed. 2) Go when it's a sacrifice and you'll be blessed more while you set the example for your family. 3) Increase your attendance. If you go once a month it's not enough anymore. Satan's power in the world has increased to where you need the temple more to withstand the adversary.

We have had a wonderful week in the temple. Attendance has increased, and all our summer missionaries have arrived. We started work on Friday. It's a wonderful work to be engaged in. It is true and the most important thing we can do is live it every day.

Spring, Spring, Spring

It is so beautiful here. Spring has arrived. These yellow bushes behind me are across the street from our home and are just beautiful. In just one day you can see green on a great many of the trees. We looked out the temple window yesterday and the trees along the walk had green buds on them. It is exactly one year ago this week that we arrived in Palmyra. I wore the same peach jacket to church and they had the same YW Sacrament program. It's is hard to believe 12 months have gone by. We are so excited to meet the new missionaries. They have all arrived. Paul has been the official greeter. He has talked to all of them by phone before they left and has kept tabs on them as they have traveled across country. The whole temple district is excited to have them here. Today we have invited three couples for dinner so we can get better acquainted. We look forward to a wonderful summer and fall.

I did not get a blog written last week. We had a wonderful visit from our dear friends, Gene & LaRay Figueroa and John and Garni Tarazon from Oxnard, CA. It felt so good to see friends from home. There were in the area for a week. They first went to Niagara Falls then over to Kirtland. Here in Palmyra, Gene met up with a air force friend from 30 years ago. Mark and his daughter Chody went to all the church sites with them. We had a great time here in Palmyra.

We took them to the Joseph Smith, Prophet of the Restoration movie at the Hill Visitor Center.

We drove out to the Martin Harris farm and visited the Smith farm. They attended the temple with us, drove out to the Peter Whitmer Farm and saw just about everything there is to see.

It was hard to say good bye, we had such a good time.

Today Paul and I attended the Brockport Ward east of Rochester. Bro. and Sis. Zollweg serve in the temple twice a week with us and Sis. Zollweg was to give a talk in Sacrament meeting today to inspire the ward to do family history and attend the temple. She asked Paul to deliver her talk and add a few words of his own. He was happy to do so. Can't think of a better topic for him.

Sister Payne was serving in the Brockport Ward. It was great to see her. She is being transferred back to the sites on Tuesday. She is a wonderful missionary.

It has been a great couple of weeks. We have been very busy at the temple. Spring has brought people back to the temple. We have had several weddings and lots of youth baptisms. Saturday Paul and I served in the baptistry all day, we had three sessions. The Crookstons came for a session in the morning so we snagged them to help us in the baptistry in the afternoon. Elder and Sister Yancey and Hullingers also helped. Next Thursday we are having 120 youth from Brooklyn, NY and the missionaries will handle three of the sessions so we needed to train a few more people.

The Bishop Storehouse was also busy since it was closed over conference so there was lots to do. Sister Siebach and I went to visit Sister Beaver. Her husband recently passed away and they have lived in the area for a number of years and have been very active in the church here. They live in the stone house that was the school house Oliver Cowdery taught in on Stafford Rd. Really a cute place.

Have a great week. Can't wait to tell you all about our new missionaries and the fun we are having.

April 6th 178 General Conference

This was a beautiful weekend. The weather was wonderful, the sun shining and it was in the 60's. Saturday morning we drove out to Wayne High School to watch Collin Lewis, a seminary student, run in a track meet. Conference didn't start here until 12 pm so we got back in plenty of time and watched it at the Stake Center. We were thrilled to be able to sustain our new Prophet, Thomas S. Monson. What a privilege and blessing. We watched the afternoon session at home at 4 pm. Four sister FM missionaries joined me and we drove to Rochester to watch the operetta, The Merry Widow". The guys all went to the Priesthood session and we had a great time at the Eastman Theater. It is a beautiful place and the performance was great.

Sunday morning we got up and took a wonderful walk through the Sacred Grove. We ended up on a few trails we hadn't been on before. We did find the "Apostle Iron Tree" and also met Elder and Sister Weston, the site director and Elder and Sister Judy, FM missionaries.

The Westons from Bountiful, Utah

Elder & Sister Judy from Idaho Falls area

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The Judy's pointed out the first signs of spring in the Sacred Grove.

On our way out of the grove we met Pres. & Sister Hemingway, Rochester Mission President, who reminded us it was April 6, 2008 and they were headed for Fayette for conference. We decided that was a wonderful idea and hurried home and changed and got out to the Fayette chapel in time for the morning session.

After the session Sister James, site missionary, took us on a wonderful tour of the Whitmer cabin where the church was organized. We heard some wonderful stories of the Whitmers and their important part in the church's organization.

We watched the last session of conference at the Stake Center in Palmyra. On our way out Pres. Siebach invited us over for some dinner and to watch "The Other Side of Heaven" with Sister Siebach. What a wonderful day and great people to spend it with.

Our thought for the week is "listen and obey" the great counsel we have been given this weekend by Prophets of God. How blessed we are. We send our love.