An portion of an e-mail sent to me (LeAndrea) on October 23. I had asked mom several questions. These are her answers.
We have been very busy right now just cleaning this apartment and
we are not finished yet. There has been no one here for about a year so
it has been very dusty. Plus you know how missionaries clean!
Everything in the kitchen had several layers of grease on it. You know Elder Garrett is the fix-it man. The vacuum cleaner was filthy and the filter
had never been changed, so he spent hours taking that apart and we went
and bought a new filter. The fan in the bathroom in the ceiling was
barely running and was filthy so he took that apart and fixed it. The
leg on the couch was broken so went to the store to get glue and a clamp
to fix it. There is a big storage room here and we went thru all of
that and organized it. There was just about everything in the kitchen
that you needed. Of course I brought my stuff, so used some of the
stuff that was here and part of my things. I have about 3 boxes of my
things I am not using. I kept my dishes packed up. But on Sunday the
Relief Society President invited us to dinner but she has dogs so we
invited them to come here. She made lasagne and I made a salad. There
were five of them so we brought the table from the Relief Society Room
in here and I got my dishes out because there are only four plates in
the apartment that I am using. We had a good time visiting and they
stayed til almost 8:00. I think they enjoyed it!!! The husband is in
the bishopric but has been a little less active. I think it was good
for him. He told Elder Garrett when they were leaving that he has not been very
active. Elder Garrett said "that's o.k. we'll just go forward from here." You
know how he can be very kind and gentle.
We are thousand miles from the stake. The church will fly us to
Edmonton twice a year for stake conference. The branch is very small
here and we are the only missionaries. I think the mission president
has in mind sending a couple of Elders in a little while. The branch
president was out of town when we got here and only got back last
weekend and the 1st Counselor was in and out of town so to this point we
haven't even gotten a ward list! We got a list from the R.S. president
but it didn't even have addresses on it. So Elder Garrett has been getting a
little restless about being able to start contacting in-actives. We did
make up a letter we wanted to drop off to in-actives but there was no
toner in the copy machine and no paper! There has been no v.t. or h.t.
here for quite a while. I know in R.S. it has been a year or more. The
R.S. president is a fairly new member and just doesn't know how to get
started. Elder Garrett is actually meeting with the branch president right now to
get a branch list and go over it. So hopefully we will be able to move
on from here. There seems to be some problems here and I guess we will
find out. One good thing is a new family of five just moved in from
the SLC area so that will help some. This Sunday for Sacrament meeting
we will be able to see the new Calgary Temple dedication so we're
looking forward to that.
.JPG) |
| There are four stakes in Edmonton. Yellowknife is in the Edmonton Alberta North Stake. Yellowknife is over 1300 miles away. When stake leaders visit they fly here. They are very concerned about the branch and someone comes here every other month. Brother Durham is on the high council in charge of Yellowknife. He usually comes but the stake president, Pres. Garside will come next month and in December the Stake Patriarch will come. We met with Bro. Durham for about two hours on Saturday and then again on Sunday morning. We are making plans to help the branch here grow. We will be doing some home teaching and visiting teaching and visiting in-actives. We had a new family of five move in, we had 22 people on Sunday! |
When you see the
temperature here that is celsius so it has actually been above freezing.
I love to go somewhere in the car each day so I can see what the
temperature is in fahrenheit!!! But don't let that fool you, this is
only the beginning. We have had flurries all week and the temperature
has dropped some. We are on the middle floor in this apartment and have
not had the heat on since we got here. In fact I have on sandals and
light clothes and we still get hot sometimes when we are really busy -
even Dad!! So I don't think we will have to worry about getting cold in
the apartment.
They say you can see the
northern lights on clear days quite often. Think you have to go to
certain places though. We'll find out. Of course that won't be for
quite a while yet. The grocery actually has a huge produce section.
Groceries are quite expensive but they seem to have something on sale
all the time. Clementines were on sale for $ 3.98 the first week for a
big box. They were not as flavorful as the ones we get at home. We are
still eating on them! We got prune plums on sale and they were good.
Roma tomatoes were not too expensive and you know I love my tomatoes!
Lettuce and cabbage were not too high. But overall the milk products
are way expensive, almost $ 5.00 for a gallon of milk and a block of
cream cheese is $ 3.28. A roasted chicken was $ 10.00 so probably will
make tortilla soup with canned chicken. I brought a stack of that with
me!!
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