Wow!! This Self Reliance Program is AWESOME!!! and Inspired!

This has been quite a week! 

It started out with a bang as we sat in on our first  of many weekly training sessions on Skype with Elder Johnny Leota,  the Self Reliance Manager, and the 4 Self-Reliance missionary couples from Melbourne and Sydney. We loved "meeting" our future co-horts and hearing some of what  they have been doing.

I absolutely love to learn how these many programs have been developed to help lift and improve the quality of life of the members of the church and anyone else who wants to be involved. There are so many opportunities and more being developed. The newest is the Success in School Begins at Home. This one trains parents to help their children be ready to succeed when they attend school. I understand a new program on how to manage finances is in the works. Most of the booklets comprise 12 weeks of lessons/discussions. And there is a new booklet being prepared to help returned missionaries move forward in their lives after their 1 1/2 to 2 years in the Lord's service. 

Here are some of the current booklets:

My Path to Self-Reliance

My Foundation: Principles, Skills, Habits

My Job Search

Education for Better Work

Starting and Growing My Business

Success in School Begins at Home

Mum's Preschool

English Study Group

Study Buddy Group

Many of these are available to download on lds.org. Look under families and individuals, then self reliance to find the downloads.

There are so many things happening. We are now on the email list and seem to be getting 4-5 emails per day. We are learning so many things about how the self reliance initiative works. I think the idea is that we are to "hit the deck running" once we arrive in Sydney. Still hoping we are up to doing all of this and still very grateful we will be set apart and have the Lord's help when we do "hit the deck".

We managed to finish off a few of our projects. I am a list person and it makes me VERY happy when I can cross something off the list. Still packing boxes and will have another load going into storage  by the end of September. Then probably only one more load to empty the house the end of October so we can move out and clean the house.

Had some help learning a little about desktop publishing. A sister from our ward, Lydia, came yesterday and helped me unravel some mysteries of the programs I have been using and gave me courage to try out some of the options.

Still working on some family history projects and ready to start our writing and scanning projects.

It was lovely to take time out for a quick trip to Kelowna, BC to visit my sister and her husband, June and Dietz Nicolay. We had not seen them for awhile and wanted to touch base and get hugs before we leave the country for 2 years. It was just a short overnight trip but so worth the 4-5 hour drive! 

Update on the effort to become more physically fit: 

Steve's stitches are out and his hand is healing up pretty well. He has begun physical therapy for his hip which seems to help. In fact he has been pain free today :). Maybe he will soon be ready to go walking again. 
My exercise sessions are ongoing but they are HARD!! I have decided I am kind of lazy that way :( But I am more flexible - at least when I am not too sore. 

Hopefully we can get our major writing project competed this week. That would make me very happy.

Wishing you all a great week.

fitness, projects, opposition, continuing to learn, time is quickly passing

The clock is ticking and the days pass so swiftly. We now have only 85 days left until we report to the MTC in Provo, Utah. Some days I worry that we will not have everything finished in time to leave. But we are moving forward. I actually packed  4 more boxes this week in between working on projects.

We were able to check off a few of the little projects on our list and today we will try to outline and calendar some of the remaining items.

It was so nice to take out a little time and visit with our friends Lola and Allen Jensen. Lola has been my friend since high school - well over 50 year ago.

Working  through our preparations we came to the realization that we are not in the best physical shape. It occurred to us that we should be more fit and have more stamina to be most serviceable.  Not much point in going all the way to Australia if we do not have enough energy to do what is needed. So a course correction was in order.

I felt like I needed someone to help me know what to do, like a personal trainer, and signed up for a 12 week class with Anytime Fitness. It is nice to have someone who is kind and patient help me navigate the procedures for the various exercises. I really do not know what I am doing!!! I attended 2 classes last week which was a good experience.  I plan to attend 3 classes a  week until  mid October and then 4 classes per week. I immediately felt improved range of motion in my hips. Wahoo! Hopefully by  the end of my last class in November I will feel more fit and have enough stamina to serve the Lord as needed.

Steve decided that his best bet was to walk. He has had some difficulty with his hip and will soon begin some physical therapy. Sadly as he was walking the other day his feet would not cooperate with the rest of him and he fell. After getting up and walking a few more yards he fell again. That is when he called  me to pick him up. He looked a bit bloody and sad  but he is OK. A blow to his pride, a lesson learned about "not running faster than he could walk", a few stitches in his left hand and random bruises were not the desired result of his effort to be more fit. But with more "wisdom and order" he will move forward and find the best way to improve his stamina so he can feel more fit.

I guess it is to be expected that there will be some opposition along the way of our mission preparation. We certainly have our ups and downs in this process.

Tomorrow will be the first of our Skype training sessions. We received an outline of the various topics. Tomorrow we will discuss a lot of basics to help us prepare: what to bring, living conditions, local culture and customs, etc. We will also be a part of the weekly training  by the self-reliance missionaries in Sydney and Melbourne. A new program called "Success in School begins at Home" is being rolled out. This initiative will help parents learn to be better parents. I look forward to jumping in! This whole self-reliance program is very exciting! The more I learn the more excited I get about being a part of it all.

There is a Sydney Self Reliance group on Facebook. We have also  read a newsletter from the self reliance group. It is so great to learn some of the things that are going on. The success stories of those participating in the self reliance program are inspirational.

I guess one of my responsibilities after we arrive will likely be to prepare the newsletter that is issued every other month. This means I need to put into practice the idea of continuous learning and learn some desk top publishing skills in the next 85 days. Don't know how to do that yet. I found some classes online. Hopefully I can be an effective student. 

On the Facebook page for the Sydney Self Reliance group I found the following quote by Elder David A. Bednar.

"You and I are here upon the earth to prepare for eternity, to learn how to learn, to learn things that are temporally important and eternally essential, and to assist others in learning wisdom and truth (see D&C 97:1).
Understanding who we are, where we came from, and why we are upon the earth places upon each of us a great responsibility both to learn how to learn and to learn to love learning.
Learning to love learning equips us for an ever-changing and unpredictable future. Knowing how to learn prepares us to discern and act upon opportunities that others may not readily recognize. I am confident you will pass the test of learning what to do when you do not know what to do or how to proceed. I pray your love of learning will grow ever deeper, ever richer, and ever more complete."

I love that  there are so many wonderful things that have been said by our church leaders that help us understand what we should be doing. Our future is certainly "every-changing and 

unpredictable".

So, onward and upward. We have much to do this coming week. Wishing you all a great week!

Packing Pause, on to necessary Projects

What a strange feeling it is to walk through the house and see how empty it is getting. A few days ago I had the strange epiphany that "yes, we really are going to move half way across the world to serve the Lord."  That maybe sounds silly because I really have known all along that we are going to go to Australia but somehow as the house empties it just becomes more real.

Yesterday we had some kind folks from Church help us move our second round of packed boxes into storage. It looked like a lot of boxes when they were all stacked in the den but the trailer had room to spare when they were loaded.

Most of the house is now packed. All the pictures are down and packed. The unessential dishes and serving dishes are packed. The folding chairs and tv trays are gone. I think it will take about 2 more times of having help move out our belongings to be done. But before we do too much more packing we will be taking a 'packing pause' to work on some projects.

Most of these projects involve my family history files and binders.  After I receive the rest of the marriage records from Sagard parish for the FREESE surname I need to finish organizing that family before I can pack them away.  I need to scan a lot of old family pictures and get them organized. I need to scan and attach to FamilySearch the source documents that I have for my ancestors. Is there a chance I will find some treasures in the mix? I can only hope. There are many files to be organized before they can be packed. I have a Dropbox account with lots of free space which will save the scans. The photo albums from my mother and Ben and their missions need to be preserved and made available to their posterity. There are the binders I keep with all of the memorabilia from our children, and my many family history binders. It is strange to think of packing away my family history for 2 years since it is such a huge part of my life.

We made a VERY LONG list of things to complete before we are ready to go. I am a list person and it is nice to have things laid out so I can figure when I will accomplish my tasks and not forget anything. Actually I keep remembering more and more items to add to the list. Our finance files need to be purged and our 2016 taxes need to be ready to go. And we need to figure out how to handle some financial matters while we are gone. We hope to be done with all of the projects by the end of September. By the time the projects are complete there will be a whole new set of packed boxes!

Because we misread the email, the training we thought would begin last week will not take place until September. We look forward to really jumping into the material. We miss that we  are not already being trained but realize we already have so much material available to be read and reread. It will be interesting to see how all that we are learning can be implemented into the lives of those with whom we will be working.

As I read more about the "Doctrine of Education" and how it relates to the concept of self-reliance  I marvel at these basic concepts and realize how important it is to help others understand. Here is a quote about education which I really like:

Russell M. Nelson, “Where Is Wisdom?” Ensign. Nov. 1992, 6-8. 

Because of our sacred regard for each human intellect, we consider the obtaining of an education to be a religious responsibility. Yet opportunities and abilities differ. I believe that in the pursuit of education, individual desire is more influential than institution, and personal faith more forceful than faculty. 

Our Creator expects His children everywhere to educate themselves. He issued a commandment: “Seek ye diligently and teach one another words of wisdom; yea, seek ye out of the best books words of wisdom; seek learning, even by study and also by faith.” (D&C 88:118.) And He assures us that knowledge acquired here will be ours forever. (See D&C 130:18–19.) 

Measured by this celestial standard, it is apparent that those who impulsively “drop out” and cut short their education not only disregard divine decree but frustrate the realization of their own potential. 

I love that last part that suggests we can frustrate the realization of our own potential if we do not keep learning. I am excited to help people learn the importance of education in their lives as it relates to their ability to be self-reliant. As they were growing up I tried to teach our children the importance of opening every door and window available to them as they worked through their education.

There is always so much to learn! Until next time...

100 Days and counting!

Today marks 100 days until we report at the MTC in Provo, Utah. This a milestone! Yesterday, the 19th, marked 4 months since we received our mission call. With only 100 days to go the time will fly.

On Wednesday our grandson Ethan Jenkins, now Elder Jenkins, reported to the MTC to begin his training for his mission to the Tahiti Pape'ete Mission. He will spend 6 weeks learning French and then 3 weeks learning Tahitian. So great to read his exuberantly joyful letter detailing his first days in the Mission Training Center. If you are interested to learn about his adventures you can check out his blog at elderethanjenkins.blogspot.com. 

Here he is in front of the Provo Temple the day he entered the MTC. He was and is so excited for this opportunity to serve the Lord. We look forward to sharing our missionary experiences.

We are making progress with our preparations. 

Today we sent off copies of our new drivers licenses. It was necessary for us to wait for our birthdays and then renew our drivers licenses a year early or they would have expired while we were in Australia. Now we can get the correct permissions to drive all the while we are there.

Our final requirements are the 2 hepatitis shots still remaining  but they are already scheduled for September and October.

The walls of our home are so empty! It is such weird feeling to see bare walls. I miss seeing all of our family pictures. I experienced a lot of nostalgia as I took them down. How I love our family! 

The smaller pictures are all packed. Next week we will pack the big ones. So grateful for all the boxes we have been given. Packing boxes are VERY expensive. Hope to get our dishes packed next week as well. It is beginning to feel real.

Monday afternoon at 5PM our time, which will be Tuesday 10AM Sydney time, we will begin weekly training sessions to help us learn our responsibilities and be 'in the loop  with what is happening. We will be on a Skype call for the training with Elder Leota, who is over the self-reliance program in Melbourne and Sydney. Also attending the training meeting will be the  2 Senior Missionary couples who work in the Melbourne Missions, the Senior Missionary couple assigned to the Sydney South Mission and the Senior Missionary couple from the  Sydney North Mission[this couple will soon be finished their service and we will be their replacements]. I am excited but very intimidated to begin this training. I am certain there will be so much to learn and just hope I am able to learn enough to make a difference when we are there.

So grateful for technology. We can accomplish so much more so much easier that it is fantastic! Have a great week! Yes, I will try harder to report weekly.

And the beat goes on...

Its been an  interesting week with lots going on. A big thanks to the several young men from church who came over on Wednesday and helped load up all of our packed boxes into a couple of pickups, a van  and a suburban and put them into storage. Our storage will be at our friends' house who have graciously offered a room for us to store our belongings. With those boxes and our futon out of the house  we now have more room to put more packed boxes ;) It is crazy how many boxes are filled with our bits and pieces. I keep hoping we are packing the things we really want to come home to and discarding the things we really don't need.

I began to pack up the wall decorations and little things on shelves. Funny how those things bring back memories. The string of rocks with holes in the middle- a gift from my cousin- when we went to Denmark where I was born. The holes are caused when organic matter is washed out. What fun it was to find them and also various fossils as we walked along the coast on the Island of Mors. Then the carved wooden love spoon from the museum gift shop in Cardiff, Wales when we were learning about my husband's heritage. And the little picture of a tree with all of the leaves made of small pieces of amber given to me by a friend on the Ilse of Rügen when we explored another of my ancestral homes, and other little things that were gifts from children and grandchildren.

Memories are interesting. My mind was flooded with all kinds of thoughts while packing up the small china tea set that was first my mother's and then mine. The little cream picture that was pieced and glued together long before it was mine, the sugar bowl with the chipped lid, the tea pot and 5 cups and saucers. At one time surely there must have been at least 6 cups and saucers? I remember birthday parties when my friends and I drank Koolaid from those small cups. And that made me think of the birthday cakes with wax paper covered coins randomly secreted under the frosting.

Our little bits and pieces are not of great monetary value but they each represent a small piece of our life.

By the end of August we plan to have almost every non-essential item packed. Bring on the paper plates!

But then there are projects we need to finish before we can really finish packing and move forward:
-A couple of major family history projects to complete.
-Scanning and putting away LOTS and LOTS of family negatives and pictures. How is it possible that we have almost 50 years of photos in boxes and not organized? I just never seemed to have the right equipment or binders or folders and so...
-Writing some more installments for Our Miraculous Journey book which consists of chronological stories of the miracles we have experienced in our lives with our family. We have tried to give our children and grandchildren new stories every year for Christmas but our lives have been so crazy we have skipped the past couple of years so we must write something before we leave on our mission.
-Working in the Vancouver Temple every Friday and trying to attend the temple at least one other day during the week.
-And so on.

When we got our mission call in April it seemed like November 28 was a LONG way off. As is always the case Heavenly Father knows exactly what we need including the best timing. Various things popped up in our life that have required more of our time so it would have been very difficult for us to have left sooner. But I am confident that we will have everything ready for us to leave at our appointed time.

And yes, we are still learning about the Self-Reliance program. It is amazing and can bless so many people's lives. There are so many wonderful things the Church does to help the less fortunate and much of the world does not  really even know about those wonderful things.

Boxes, boxes and more boxes; interesting detours; time out for our reunion...

It has been 3 weeks since I last wrote. I am not exactly sure how so much time passed but pass it did. The days are filled with events that steal our time. We have also experienced a few interesting obstacles. There have been appointments with eye doctors and new glasses ordered, an annoying little tumor that Steve had removed, and a short bout of cellulitis on Liz's arm after a bug bite which was resolved by large quantities of antibiotics. But all is well so on we go.

We have our house full of BOXES!

So grateful for good friends who keep us supplied with so many boxes! Of course our packing is not keeping up with our supply of boxes but we keep at it. The sewing room, the toys, crafts, Christmas decorations are mostly packed. The more we pack the more we see that we still need to pack. Some days are overwhelming but we are getting reacquainted with a lot of items we had not seen in years. A great opportunity to downsize!

But the work goes on with the hope that most of our things will be packed  by the end of August.

We had a great opportunity to Skype with the Pacific Area Education Coordinators a couple of weeks ago. It was wonderful learn more about the way things work so we can prepare to actually be of some help when we arrive in Australia. We were excited to learn more about the Educational Initiative which has been put in place by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints as it relates to the Self -Reliance program. The lives of so many people can be be blessed as these programs teach them to value themselves and improve their circumstances  as they develop a relationship with Jesus Christ.

We also took a time out for a family reunion. Seven of our 10 children and 27 of our 38 grandchildren were able to be with us. It is always a happy time for us when we can be around our family!

Now it is time to get back to work!

Lots of PACKING, lots of TIES, new CLOTHES and stuff

Time flies by and we are trying to keep up. Back in April, November 28 seemed like along way  into the future until we leave but almost half of that time has passed. Our time has been used up with papers to fill out, preparations for our house to be left, our business affairs and family. We are not in panic mode yet but we do realize that our time to prepare is getting shorter. A measured approach is what we hope to accomplish.

We are packing. At first it seemed strange to consider packing everything up when we still had so many months left to go. But we are making progress. We are all but done packing our books and there are a LOT of books. Some we have given away because we will not use them anymore, some were duplicates but most are resting comfortably in approximately 40 heavy boxes. Only a few family history books remain to be packed away but that will be later as I am still using them from time to time.

Next week we will start stripping the walls of our pictures and then the little knickknacks we have around the house. Already it is beginning to seem empty with no books on the shelves. Then we will move on to the dishes we do not use regularly. All along the way we are discarding or giving away items we do not need anymore but we also do not want a huge expense of replacing items when we return home. So there are lots of things to think about.

It is a strange feeling to be packing things up. Memories surface as we come across items we have not handled for a time- like projects not finished. But the good news is that we are finding some things we had not seen for awhile which are now grouped as they should be. I found a bag with several envelopes and old family pictures that had been my mothers. I need to scan those pictures before they are packed.

And that is not to mention the dozens of boxes of photographs and negatives that need to be processed before we leave.  And there are the books of family photos from almost 50 years of marriage. Yes, it is a big job!

My family history is in about 4 dozen binders, 4 drawers of files, other books and folders. And I have my mother's family history. Not to mention all of Steve's binders, books and files. I would imagine that we will have at least 30 boxes with all of that information. It will seem strange to put it all away since working on my family history  is such a big part of my life. But that does not mean I will stop searching for my ancestors. I am grateful for my friends  on Rügen who have helped me find so much information on my German family. I am always hoping there will be a miracle and more records will be found. It has been great to find connections through MyHeritage for both my German and Danish families. I am sure there will be enough down time while we are in Australia for me to keep my hand in the research. But I cannot bring all my books with me so I will have to rely on my computer files.

There is a list of recommended clothing for us to bring on our mission. We are supposed to present a 'professional' image to represent the Church. That means Steve will be in a white shirt and tie and in suits or dress slacks probably 6 days a week. I will be in dresses or skirts or suits as well. So, we have been on the look out for the clothes we need to bring.   I have been finding items along the way as there does not seem to be a specific store that carries everything I would like. The past fews years my clothing purchases have been geared to our goal of serving a mission so everything does not have to be newly purchased. Steve's is somewhat easier since he just needs 2 suits, some slacks, white shirts and ties.

Have you every considered how many days he will need to wear a tie? We will be serving our mission for 23 months. There are 52 weeks in a year so 23 months will be about 100 weeks. If he wears a tie 6 days in every week that means he will wear a tie 600 days! Is there a term "tieology'? So we found a lot of nice ties for him. If he has 12 ties and rotates them regularly he will be wearing each tie 50 times! He may bring more than 12. We will see. At least they are not too heavy to pack. Here are the new ties we just bought.

The reason I said Steve will be in a shirt and tie 6 days a week is because we will have one day each week for shopping, cleaning, recreation, etc. Then we can wear our more casual clothing.

We are learning more about Australia, we are studying more of the materials we have been given. We are grateful for our opportunity to serve. I was thinking one day how important this mission is to us. And yet there are hundreds of other senior couples who have and are serving missions all over the world. So, in this we are not unique but for us this mission is very important. We love the Lord and hope that we can be able to serve Him and those He cares for in a way that will please Him. There will be a learning curve for all we are being asked to do. But I know that with His help we will be able to a accomplish what is required of us.