More Farewells - Monday, November 29, 2010

All day at work I wanted to do this or that, but everything was something I wanted to show Sister Schoeny. So I put things in a pile for training purposes. I have my desk manual done with the major things going on at my desk, but there is so much little stuff that can't be written down. I hope we can get through it all before we have to leave. Elder Kroff feels the same about the small stuff at his desk.

Since President Gulbrandsen was gone all last week, we were looking forward to him coming to the office today. Everyone had questions or things for him to sign. Elder Paz and the President were going to meet with Lucila to sign the contract for the apartment next to us. That was his main reason for checking in. When they went to the appointment, they were missing some paper, so the signing had to be put off until tomorrow.

It was near the time to go home, so the President suggested he drive Rich and me home so he could come up and see the apartment the Schoenys were going to stay in temporarily. He was impressed with the size and new condition of it and right away thought it might be something the Schoenys would want to stay in permanently since it had two bedrooms. He felt they should have the option if they could afford the higher rent which only amounts to $150 more. Rich and I would have preferred a two bedroom apartment, but one was not available at the time.

Then he looked at our apartment and thought it was plenty large enough for the elders, even to bed down extra people when needed. Well. . . maybe two or three extra, but not six like they had last transfer. But that was rare. So we'll see what the Schoenys think.

Two sweet sister missionaries came by the office so I snapped their picture. Hermana Serrudo on the left is new as of last transfer and is from Argentina. We know her trainer, Hermana Rivera (Chile), really well as we worked with her when she was serving in Tigre. She speaks good English so it is easy for me to communicate with her. Yeah!

On our agenda for the evening was to pay a visit to the Guipponi family and tell them goodbye. Rich contacted Carla on facebook and said we wanted to stop by. We were with Elders Coria and Paz a couple times as they were teaching Carla and she was baptized. So we feel a closeness to her. Her mother, Mirta, is a member. Sadly, both have stopped coming to church because Carla's husband is not a member and she feels a need to be with him on Sundays as that is his only day off.

Carla's brothers, Matias and Franco, were also baptized with her and Franco has remained active. Carla's children, Guillermina and Alex, are darling children and were so happy to see us.

Guillermina is the cutest little girl. She talked my head off, and I would just nod like I knew what she was saying. We hit it off great! Alex is will be eight years old this week so Elder Kroff gave him eight spankings. He didn't know what to think of that. In Argentina for their birthdays they pull their ears for each year of their life.

We were soooo glad we decided to go see Mirta and Carla. They were so grateful we came and we wanted them to know we came as friends and not just representatives of the church. Carla said her goal is to have a marriage like ours. In thinking about this family, we decided that they need good home teachers like Ezequiel or Gabriel who can befriend them and fellowship them. They and their wives are more Carla's age and she just needs a friend at church.

We took a remise back home and did the finishing touches on the apartment. We put yogurts, juice, chocolate milk, eggs, cheese, and ham slices in the fridge, and bought some bananas, apples, and mandarinas, and bread for them to munch on.

So far we haven't heard that the Schoenys are stuck in California trying to get their visas, so they should be here on schedule tomorrow -- after all this waiting. Wow!