FOURTH WEEK, OCTOBER 2 TO OCTOBER 8, 2011

 HAPPY, HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO RUBY AND LUCY (Sept. 18)

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO VICTORIA (Sept. 24)

All three girls turned 2 years old that day.  Sorry I didn’t think to greet you in the blog until today!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY DEAR CATHERINE TODAY!  (Oct. 9)

We’ll just say Cathy is 30+ years old today!

UNBELIEVEABLE!  1/18 of our mission is now over.  We have just had so much fun with all the bill boards we have seen.  (There are many, many.)  We are sending a few today and will do so from time to time.  Some make me laugh and others just plain gross me out! 

When I took this picture, the Korean man asked me what I was doing. I told

him I liked his sign and wanted a picture. He was so pleased. I wonder if he is “happy” over the collision or the customer will be “happy” to have it fixed.

 This is a Sansalvadorian Ambulance.

 “Wow! Tires cheaper than your shoes!  What a bargain! (Written in English, Spanish, and Korean)

Our days were full this week.  We found more people to work with and had a few successes.  The Garnica’s family home evening went so so.  The dad, Marco, was gone to a meeting.  Karla, 15, had a friend over and did not come out of her room.  The mom, Miriam, just wanted to visit.  The very hyper preschooler, Edwin, terrorized everyone.  Marco returned just as we were finishing the lesson on the Tree of Life. They all showed up to frost the gigantic heart cookies I made. We are going back next week .  We’ll see how that goes. 

The Freddy & Marta Moran’s home evening on Thursday went better.  Freddy, the eight year old, loved it and little Alison was just her cute self.  Freddy wants a memory game next week so I guess we’ll be making one.

On Tuesday just before the 3^rd Ward Missionary Correlation Meeting we had been out contacting all afternoon and decided to try one of the many native restaurants. This time we picked one from El Salvador. Notice the Flag from the country.

Here is the menu.

We were not very brave. Dale had steak with onions and Connie had fried shrimp.

Everything else was the same on both plates. We did try a native fruit drink  that had a very strange flavor.  They couldn't tell us the name of the fruit. The Hors D’Oeuvre  was sort of a cross between a thick potato chip and a round taco served with a tomato salsa. They were very tasty. “Fried bread” came with the main course

Now for the gross sign-- notice what is written

We met a new family this week—the Ordonez familia.  We just loved them immediately.  As Jenny, the mom, opened the door she just beamed and literally welcomed us with open arms. They joined the church a few years ago and have been sealed in the temple.    They have a boy, 17, Gabrielle and a girl, 8, Jenny.  They are truly very nice kids.  They invited us tomorrow night for a San Salvadorian dinner of pupusas.  Pupusas are a Salvadorian specialty. They met us at Sacrament Meeting today.  We invited 6 families to church today and 4 came. 

I have learned the Spanish alphabet and sounds, a few phrases, and words.  Putting sentences together is the next challenge.  I can read most words—I sound like a first grader but that is where everyone starts when learning to read.  I am getting to the point I can pick up key words and phrases and sometimes I know what is being said. Some days it is just plain hard and frustrating.  As Dale said the other day, “I wish I didn’t have to work so hard for the gift of tongues that President Harris’ blessed me with.”  We will take some pictures of some of our families and put them in the blog next week.

We have been here 5 Sundays and 3 of those Sundays we have met with long, long detours —one bike race returning from church, a San Salvadorian independence parade going & coming from church, and a family bike ride, returning from church.  The last one was on the entrance to Shatto Place, our street!  Dale was pretty upset by the time we made it home. They celebrate everything here. 

CONGRATULATIONS!

The bright spot of our week was when Dr. Charles Claire called and wanted to know how I would feel if he and Lisa were to marry.  We couldn’t have been happier.  We are truly happy for both of them and their sons, Matthew and Colton.