Burmingham Alabama Mission

      Today is Halle's 3rd birthday and what a cute little spook she is becoming!! Kaitlin is dressed up like Thelma from "Scooby doo" and Niki's carved pumpkin  We took the photos from face time chats. Other photos are the total of my Halloween decorations and some fun we saw on our travels. Niki texted the above photo or her darlings on Halloween.       There are some miracles that are very inspiring about the work moving forward.   One miracle was from a Sister missionary who had struggled in the beginning, but is totally focused and successful in her missionary calling.  She was a forest fire fighter before her mission and a self starter.  She has 8 people committed to baptism and one was a quadriplegic lady who was really worried about getting in and out of the baptismal font.  The missionaries did a "dry run" at the Stake Center and it was so difficult getting her out of the font that she refused to be baptized. ...

       Byron has been face timing two "Old People" every few days while he has been deployed on an Air Force mission to Dubai for two months.  He can't receive regular phone calls, but Facetime has worked great from his tiny bunk. Their plane had a dead battery and they stayed over one day in Germany as they traveled home. He gives us quite a bit of tease and it is with great relief to have him safe again in the states.  The challenges of being gone are resolving in time to plan for the next time.      Aimee crocheted him an amazing afghan that took 600 hours as a surprise welcome home gift!! Tiny Lily changes every day and went to her Daddy just fine after not seeing him for the duration.  Aimee was a trooper and visited family in Boise for part of the time Byron was deployed and we enjoyed them both a few times before leaving on our mission.

     Elder Barfuss and Sister Barfuss got an early start last Thursday and drive 2 hours to  Demopolis to help the Jones pack up at the end of their mission. Two Sister Missionaries were helping for a short time and brought some cleaning products and water as they misunderstood the Jones's request they wanted to give the missionaries those things!!      We all loaded and cleaned most of the morning and Elder Jones and Elder Barfuss did all the heavy lifting.  As a surprise, Sister Jones left me some crochet thread on the truck seat.  {Two beautiful colors she had also been making bookmarks for the Relief Society sisters).      On the way home we enjoyed trying boiled peanuts for the first time and found some funny things along the road to share!

     Cotton fields everywhere!!  It is fun to see the different crops in this humid warm climate. There is amaranth fields, a purple small variety of corn, lots of cotton.      Visiting the Sisters and Elders apartments can be enlightening!! Some of the companionships are wonderfully obedient, clean, happy and productive, well others...  You just never know for sure what will present until you arrive.      Sister Scoleri and Sister Cushing serving in Leeds area were so cute, positive and upbeat. They are seasoned missionaries due to go home soon completing their 18 months.  Sister Cushing responded after asking us how we liked Alabama, "Just enjoy this culture!!  It is so unique!!"  Just darling girls.

Driving the length and breadth of the mission can sometimes be amazing at the things we get to see!! There is a replica of the Statue of Liberty that was sculpted by the grandson of the original Lady Liberty!! Also a wall of all the Eagle Scout names engraved, in the state of Alabama!! As you drive around a corner on the freeway this arched wall and statue come into breathtaking view. It is all quite impressive!! We stopped and visited with the Office staff in the Scout store and took these photos.

     Brother Barfuss and Sister Barfuss drove over 200 miles today checking some missionary apartments.  We drove to Trussville and checked on one set of Elders, passed out treats, and Steve shared a powerful prayer.      Driving to Nector, AL using two GPS's with differing routes and we finally made it.  Finding remote missionary apartments feels like finding a needle in a haystack!!  Steve called the Elders to make sure they would be home,  everything checked out okay and Steve replaced six light bulbs!! Rosie discovered PECAN trees growing in the front yard and the Elders had been walking over those beautiful pecans for weeks, never seeing them!!      The Methodists had a funny sign next to their church around the corner from our missionaries!!

      Sylacauga, Alabama, the home of Bluebell Ice cream and the sweetest little LDS meeting house we have ever seen!!  President Sainsbury assigned us to attend an hour drive away; this tiny branch of the church.  There were 22 people in attendance not including the visitors.  The Branch President is even from another town an hour away!! They were going to reduce their meeting to a two hour block, but the members prayed about it and wanted all three hours.  There is only one child and one teenager actively coming.  The Sacrament talks were assigned from another ward and one lady spoke on love from a wheel chair who had a bad fall and hurt her knee badly.  She was wearing a Fentanyl pain patch (visible on her lower neck) and had difficulty slurring her words.  I was impressed she would follow through on her speaking assignment after her accident!! Her husband gave the final talk and their grown daughter also spoke on patience.   ...

     Steve spent a couple of days marking the wall map of the mission where the 93 apartments are located.  Elder Barfuss is the housing  coordinator and drives the length and breadth of the mission. Byron and Aimee bought us this Garmin GPS before we left Boise and it has been such a blessing!!  I love the "Maps" on my I-Phone too, but there are times we lose the signal and the Garmin gets us through.  Other times the I-phone will recognize an address and the Garmin won't find it, so between the two we can find our way.  We also bought an Alabama laminated road map and a Mississippi paper one that helps a little.  We are so thankful for modern technology in the car, but often frustrated with our lack of expertice on the computer programs we are required to chart on for housing and Mission Medical.      The Tiwi is a monitoring device that cut down driving accidents, speeding and recklessness by 50 %!!  It is a...

Open roads Standstill in rush hour    The church owns a new Chevy Truck 2016 that attaches to a nice white trailer that is used to set up and take down apartments for the missionaries.     So far Elder Barfuss and Elder Tuck made a visit to Huntsville, 2 hours away, to get a bedbug infested mattress. They replaced it with a new twin mattress adding a bedbug bag over it. Hopefully the new mattress can stay free of them, since the landlords cooked the apartment at 165 degrees!! AL 459  There is another highway under us!!     The trees that line the highways are quite beautiful, but it is difficult to find landmarks and the roads look all alike in the beginning!! Elder and Sister Sullivan-hand made quilt                                                               ...

     Another senior couple told us their weather radio went off at 3:00 am with Tropical Storms warning within 24 hours.  We didn't get the warning, so I checked out our radio and it was plugged into the wall outlet that turns off at the wall switch, even though we had turned the radio on earlier!! 10-8-17      Tropical storms brought torrents of rain and all the church meetings were cancelled.  We stayed in all day and watched conference online.  As directed by President Sainsbury, we fasted accompanied by mighty prayer for an hour.  I enjoyed some tears, a great sense of love and sweet peace as I prayed for the missionaries and our families, ward members and special needs.  The power of the spirit surprised me because I usually experience the sweet whispering more in a group.  Steve responded with an increase in faith, well being and motivation.  It was the first time I ever remember staying home together all day long...

     In preparation for Gladys Knight’s Saints Unified Voices firesides, the missionaries put together gift bags at the Zone Conferences that included a sample of her music on a CD, a Restoration of the Gospel DVD and a Book of Mormon to be taken to people’s homes that fill out the referral card for a missionary visit.      Steve and Rosie arrived almost an hour early and stood in line half way around the church.  There were posh porta-potties that had 8 private stalls with nice sinks and breath mints outside in a trailer next to the line up. The most beautiful outside potty I have ever encountered!! We visited in line with a member of several years who invited some people he was keeping an eye out for. So he kept coming and going and coming back and never found his guests. There were others in line we enjoyed visiting with while we waited 45 minutes to get to our seats. The entire church to the back of the stage was filled.  Even the...