I thought you might like to see what was on the way home, just off the M3. If you can blow it up on your screen, you will see that two of them are going. We assume that they are nuclear power generators. We hope they are safe.

We do seem to keep very busy!! When we get home at night we fix dinner and soon it is time to hit the hay.

The weekdays are pretty much the same, only different missionaries are in and out each day. We are feeling like the job is getting clearer, and that it is now our job. We still travel a great deal. We only have to go to the Stake Center and the airport this weekend. That will be nice. We are looking forward to General Conference. We should see all but one session.

This last weekend we went shopping in the morning on Saturday. The Woods almost always go with us. In the afternoon we decided to see if we could find our way to the airport from the Stake Center, as we have to do that in the dark on Sunday night.

You can see Brent preparing to go shopping.

Sunday we headed early for Eger. We met the first set of missionaries and checked their apartment. Dad took a picture of the Bedroom. He had to climb up to see it and took the picture of me standing below. I wouldn't go up the ladder. but the missionaries were happy to pose on the ladder. They are Elder Baxter and Elder nqust. We then found the other Elders and checked their apartment. It was nice too.

We had seen this apartment before and it looked nice and clean. I think that because we give them warning, they try really hard to clean good.

Then we went to church and spoke in sacrament meeting, and taught Relief Society and Priesthood. We were asked by the Branch President to speak about when you are a member and your spouse is not. It was hard to prepare, but we found some good material in the Ensign, and were able to tell some stories of family and others who have been in that situation. One lady, Kati, wiped a tear away a couple of times, and after told me that I had given her hope. I hope so.

That was a busy morning. But then to make the day even more exciting we drove over to Miskolc and too a different route, which, as it turned out was good. The scenery was beautiful. We found this mountain with outcropping of rock, that we had not ever seen anywhere in Hungary. Very interesting. The temperature was really nice and so we really enjoyed the ride.

When we got to Miskolc, the elders were not home, but had been delayed by a terrible accident on the highway between Miskolc and Kazincbarcika, where they actually live. We got to spend some time with Elder Whiting, who you can tell by the color of his hair ( he was in Debrecen with us) and Elder Erickson, who is from Bountiful.

When we left, we got routed around the accident a very long way, but we could see the accident. I am sure someone was killed. It was really awful. We also got to drive through some small areas that we would never have seen.

We then went and called on our sisters.

Sister Anderson and Sister Warner. Brent says that Sr. Warner has the best handshake of anyone in the mission. These two really are getting along so well and working hard.

After visiting with them, we went to the last apartment. It was one that they had just moved into.Wow,,,,the colors! This was one room, the others were hot green and lavendar. Oh my goodness. I could never relax in that one. They had made pumpkin cookies and saved one for us. That was nice.

The trip back home was good. I was glad to get home and fall into bed, as I have spent the last several days catching a good cold. At any rate, it was a good weekend for us and so nice to get out of Dodge, even if it was only for a day.

This is a picture of a church in Miskolc. I had tried to take a picture of it once before and I couldn't get it. I am still fascinated with the church steeples in Hungary.

Fall is really in the air and we are feeling it. Our temperatures are now in the 60's during the day and it really cools down in the evening. It is hard not to be there with you all sometimes and we are well aware of many things that are happening there. We pray for you all each day and are looking forward to a year from now when we will be back with you.

Today we are tired....very

This is a double steeple church in Bekescsaba. Sorry we were driving and I cut off the second top.

Our work week was a good one. We really worked hard and tried to get many things done. Brent works as hard or harder helping me with the finances as he does with his other jobs. On Thursday the President called him into his office as asked if he would be the executive secretary to the mission presidency. He will have another meeting each week to attend and will also need to be taking minutes of those meetings. He will also have some other responsibilities. I can just sit in the counting house counting out the money.

Brent has been fortunate that our CES Couple, the Woods, have a bit of spare time and have volunteered to work a couple of hours every day in the storeroom, to help Elder Gudgell. We are finding lots of old stuff that can be disposed of and are really doing a great job in organizing it a little differently that he had been before.

We enjoy the Woods and try to spend some of our P days with them. We are planning to take a river cruise with them in the near future.

I am lucky or blest, which ever it may be, in that Gerry Frazer, my new best friend in England, has received permission to come to Hungary for a few days to help us and to see if he can simplify some of the things that we are doing here financially. I will give you a report after he has been here.

This weekend we didn't have a chance to rest, as we needed to clean our apartment, and do some grocery shopping before leaving for a marathon trip to the South part of the country. He needed to do some apartment checks, which is a challenge, realizing that the apartments are fairly far apart in different cities thanl we would be visiting for church. We managed to check 11 apartments and speak in two branches. It was our first trip to Szeged and our second trip sto Bekescsaba. They are both nice little branches and we enjoyed being there. We hope that we don't have too many more trips that take us over night. The President is trying to cut down on that particular part of the budget. When there were six couples, I guess they all had two weeks a month that they would be visiting other branches. With just two of us, we need to be able to be available every week except for Fast Sunday. Most times we will just travel on Sunday. If we can get the office under control, we may be able to get to some of the out of the way places sometimes during the week.

I have downloaded some pictures we took along the way, actually some of the Elders and Sisters in the apartments we visited. I was able to collect a new picture for my ugly lamp contest. I think from this picture that we could also have an ugly wall contest too.

Just like the missionaries, the apartments are of diverse sizes and shapes. Baggetts, you may recognize Elder Huggard, with the lovely beaded entry way. and his companion Elder Carter.

I think that when we have visited all the apartments in the mission, we will post the ugly lamps and let you all vote for them, just for fun.

We had a wonderful time with all the missionaries. They are so great! Sometimes we see these young men, especailly, on P day and just shake our heads, then we see them at work in the branches, and are amazed that they are the same people. We had a group sing yesterday in the service, and it was beautiful, very close harmony. I love the spirit that the singing brings to a meeting.

The sisters seem to drink a lot of water, but can't find where to recycle the bottles. They have so many that they think that the Elders will have to help them move them out. In some cities there are recycling bins on almost every block and other places nothing.

The other morning I looked out the window and saw this man going thtrough the garbage cans. There is quite a number of people who do this for a living. This is a big office building just straight across the street from where we live. Most people keep the cans behind locked gates.

This has absolutely nothing to do with missionary work.

We just had to take a picture of this house in lovely orange, just in case anyone was thinking of painting their home and would like a suggestion for color. There are lots of homes this bright all over the countryside.

The other morning Elder Morgan, pictured here, came out of the office bathroom holding a toothbrush and tube of toothpaste, and asked us if it belonged to any of us. There are six of us on the office staff. He thought it might be his but wasn't quite sure so he thought he would ask.

We decided that he needed a bigger toothbrush, so we looked until we found one for him. He loved it. We all laughed hard.

You can see that we do have a good time part of the time, in spite of the serious work that we do, and that we do still work hard. We love it and love our missionaries.

Just a Little Bit of This and That.....

This is family home evening at our hourse. We have a couple of members and a couple of missionaries. We had a good time. We open our home each Monday evening and anyone in the Buda Ward is welcome, as well as any missionaries with someone they are meeting with. The missionaries, Elder Spackman and Elder Roundy brought the man with with. Edit just always comes and tries to bring others with her. Sometimes she is successful. It keeps me on my toes trying to have a different treat each week.

We keep having Family Home Evening and do enjoy it. The Woods the other senior couple in our mission work with CES and Outreach and they have the young adults in their home for FHE. I think they have more fun than we do. Oh well. They also have a HUGE croud to feed. I like the small crowd.

This is a picture of a young man, Jesse, who has been attending the English Branch. He is from Brazil and doesn't speak Hungarian, but we have some missionaries who speak Spanish and they translate for him. He is also learning English and bore his testimony last week in English. He came here to try to play soccer for Hungary. He left on Saturday to go to Costa Rica, where he has a contract to play soccer. He loved being here and really participated with the young adults. We hated to see him leave.

This is a picture that I have wanted to take for a long time, but would always forget to take. Some key Huh? This is the key to our apartment in Debrecen. This week we had to turn over the keys to that apartment as someone else is moving in there to work the outreach program. The president a member couple if they would go there and do that as branch missionaries. They are thrilled to be there and we are very happy to have someone there who will be able to strengthen the branch and the Outreach program there.

This is kind of fun. The Zone leaders had a training this week. The AP's created a lesson on obedience. The night before the training, they called all the zone leaders and told them that the President had a new rule. No more bag ties and no pink ties. They were to pack up all their ties and bring them into the mission office with them and turn them in to the President. Now the president knew aobut it all. In come all these missionaries carrying all their bags and boxes of ties. I am sure that some of them were carrying broken hearts. They buy these ties from people you and I wouldn't like to know very well, and pay way too much for them, but they have a great time with them. Anyway, the AP's gave their training about obedience. They asked how many of them brought all their ties. Hands went up. They said to the president how about that new rule. The President said there is not rule. It was a good training, and a good laugh. I sent my camera down, because I wanted pictures of this no bag tie zone. I just thought you might like to see what the missionaries are up to.

This one is from today. We had to do apartment inspections today before church in Szolnok. This is an apartment that we have seen before. It was much cleaner than it was last time. It also had plants that the missionaries had not been watering and I guess I gave them a lecture of taking care of the plants. They were quick to tell me that the message had been passed on and they had been watering them regularly. One of the things I noticed was the beautiful lampshade in the living room I have decided to have a contest for the ugliest lampshade. So far this one is in first place.

After stuffing a missionary under the lampshade, we then took them in Sweet Pea, our little car, and put them in the back seat behind a white board that we had in the back seat to deliver to the branch house. I thought it was a funny picture to take, but it wasn't all that funny when we took it. Oh, well, you get to see it anyway. The Elders are Elder Linenbach and Elder Hazy.

Here is what they really look like. Nice young men.

On our drive down, we noticed again that the beautiful sunflowers of the summer were still standing and black. We couldn't figure out why they would grow them and then leave them. Finally we saw that some of them were being harvested. They only thing I can think is that there is some use for them . Perhaps they use them to feel animals or something.

Can you tell that we have had a hard week in the office. Brent did have to do some training for the zone leaders with the driving program. He has to give them written and actual driving tests in order for them to be able to drive in Hungary. It is necessary that the Zone Leaders have drivers licenses.

On Saturday, after a very busy and long week, Brent again had to do training. He attended the Branch President and clerks training that the President puts on several times a year. I went grocery shopping with the Woods and then went to the office so I could get some more stuff done, and be there to give reimbursements to the branch presidents. It was good to get to know them and let them know that I am here to help them. so that's the big week. Mostly work. And now it starts all over again. I think it is going to be a while before we get a real P Day. There is so much to do.

This one is short

This has been a very busy week at the office. It was transfer week. Unfortunately, our office elders all three of them were sick and so we didn't see much of them. The transfers went smoothly. We said goodbye to three missionaries. One of them was one of our sick office elders. His parents were supposed to come and pick him up, but they live in Louisiana and could not get out to come. When we found out Wednesday afternoon that they wouldn't be coming, Brent got on the internet and the phone and was abe to have our new hero Carla Cook at missionary travel get him a flight home on Thursday morning. We stayed late that night at the office to be sure that he had the flight information.

I spent quite a bit of time with another new friend, Jerry, from England who is assigned to our mission for the finances. He and I will work together by phone and fax and e-mail, to be sure that I am doing things correctly. I still wonder why I am doing the finances and Brent is doing the computer stuff. We will both learn new skills at this time in our lives. I am hoping that I will soon get to know all that I need to be doing so that I can write a 1-2-3 document of what needs to be done and then how to do it before I leave. The last one was done about two tothree years ago and has lots of handwritten notes all over it, and it can be very confusing sometimes.

Next week we hit the road again for speaking, but I honestly can remember where we are going I think it Szolnok, but then it could be Szeged and Bekescsaba. We give basically the same talk each week we are gone. Because there are only two senior couples, we will not be doing the training and will try to get to two closely situated branches, where possible, to speak. The couple that was here just a month before we came, I think I told you, was released because of the health of her local mother. They have her living with them. They are relocating from Gyor to Debrecen. The President has asked them if they will do the outreach program as members in Debrecen. We are happy about that. It was going very well for a while, but after we left it sort of fell off.

Yesterday we went to Tatabanya, which is fairly close, to do apartment inspections. That is another problem that we have. Apartments that are not getting inspected because we don't have the manpower. We are trying to figure ways to remedy this situation. Brent suggested thata we ask the Zone leaders to do them, but a former Zone leader said that he didn't think that would work. We are still working on that one.

We haven't had any programs to go to in the last two weeks. We are missing that. We will have to get on the new missionaires here to remember that we are here.

Oh, Liz and Becky, you remember Becky LeFevre. Her nephew is the new mission assistant, so we see him every day now. Nice young man.

Today is a very hot day, as was yesterday. Tomorrow it is supposed to rain and get cold. A man in the grocery store told us that after this week it is going to get very cold. I will be happy to wear my warmer clothes. After one summer here, I know how to pack and what to pack. Unfortunately, I can't make a change for next summer, but for winter we are set.

Sorry this week isn't so interesting, but some weeks are just regular weeks, almost like going to work every day. You know the drill I am sure. I will try to take more pictures this week.