December 1-30 (More)
There was so much going on in December I have to do an addition. Pardon me if some of this is a repeat - I don't remember what I've written and what I haven't. If I repeat, you'll know it was important! :-)
One of the advantages of serving a mission in Salt Lake City is that there is so much going on – life never gets dull! That would certainly be the case for us. I worry when January comes. We’ll be so used to a LOT going on, in January, we may get bored! OK – that won’t happen, but maybe!
On Monday, December 5th, we had our Branch Christmas dinner. It was WONDERFUL! We had a catered dinner on the 10th floor of the Joseph Smith Memorial Building with a nice program after. The food was really good but we didn’t get to see the program because before we knew about the dinner, we had arranged to see “Christmas Carol” at the Hale Center Theater with the Hunsaker’s! We had a great time. The show was amazing as usual for that theater! They did so many unique things and the actors were so good, I’m afraid we’ve been spoiled to see anything at home again! We saw a different Scrooge than we saw last year, and even though he was different, he was really really good. We really had a great time. I hope we can attend more things there before we have to leave!
After the Vigil, Lisa, the Angel Committee and “Rick” treated us to dinner at Marie Callendars. I think that’s a tradition they do every year after the vigil. It was a small group, the two families who spoke, the sculptors, Ortho & Jared Fairbanks, Lisa and her husband, Rick and his wife and daughter, and Rick’s brother and his wife and daughter. It was really wonderful to get to be with all of them in a relaxed setting and a great way to get to know them better.
Remember how I said there was so much going on here? Well, Saturday, December 10th was definitely one of those days. Here’s our day: At 2:00 we went to Kingsbury Hall on the University of Utah campus to see the “Blue Man Group”. What an entertaining and unique show! I don’t know how people come up with their ideas. One night, laying in bed and thinking. . . “I think I’ll find a couple of buddies, paint our faces bright blue, and be funny on stage. We can tell jokes, include the audience, and play rhythm instruments like PVC pipes and garbage cans. People will come to see us and we’ll make a fortune!” They did all of that and we loved it!
At 4:30, we went to Gilberts house for a British Christmas Dinner. It was so fun. We had “crackers” and all the typical British Christmas dinner things. Roasted turkey, ham, TONS of veggies, Christmas pudding and mince meat pies. It was really very good. Sister Gilbert did a great job cooking dinner. Our contribution was the bubbly drink! I’m not from England so didn’t get a very big assignment! We took a drink. That’s probably all they trusted me with doing!
This is the table before we started eating, with the “crackers” and all the decorations! Above: S. Kanouf, S. Brown, Kent and Barbara Baker (She’s the consultant over the missionaries.
Barbara Baker and Sister Brenda Rose to the left. Barbara is our Consultant and Sister Rose is from London, Engand.
Below is Sister Rose, Sister Linda Marks and Elder Vernon Marks. The Marks are from Orem, Utah, but have moved to Salt Lake City for their time on the mission.
This is Elder Gibert with Sister Gilbert behind him. Sitting are Sister Kanuf, from the USA, Sister Brown, from Ireland/England, and Kent Baker, Barbara's husband.
This is a HORRIBLE picture of Sister Gilbert but it was the only one I had of her alone. She made the huge dinner for all of us by herself. She and Elder Gilbert are from Melbourne, Australia.
We couldn’t stay long because after that we went with Lynzi and Ron to the Conference Center to see the musical production, “Savior of the World”. It was a beautiful production and so well done. Lynzi’s friend, Adrienne, played Mary Magdalene. Everyone did an amazing job, and Adrienne was incredible as usual. The Church sponsors the production every year from Thanksgiving to Christmas and it’s something you could see every year and not get tired of seeing it.
Every year the Church does a special Christmas lunch for everyone in the Family History Department. Missionaries and employees. It takes an entire week to fit everyone in and it’s on the 28th floor of the J.S.M.B. and there were probably about 400 people every day. I was asked to play the piano for background music, so on Tuesday of that week, I played the piano. I did pretty well, but when you don’t really touch a keyboard for 6 months, it’s hard to jump in and play again without any practice. I’m glad I had that opportunity. On Friday, the last day, we went for our lunch. It was good, and probably cost the Church a lot to feed that many people. I’m sure they did the same thing for all the other departments also. I’m betting there was a similar lunch there every day during the month of December!
On Tuesday, the 13th, we had a great opportunity to go to a Kurt Bestor benefit dinner and concert with Rex and his kids. We were planning to go anyway, with Rex, because we donated a weekend at the cabin for them to auction. The benefit is for cancer research at the hospital. During the dinner, they asked for people to raise their hands if they had been touch by cancer, or if anyone in their family had been touched by cancer. I think almost every hand in the auditorium went up! About 2 weeks before, Rex called and told us that the Powell Foundation had purchased an entire table for 10 in his honor for all the work he had done for them. He included us in the 10. There were Rex and Amber (Shana didn’t go), Troy and Reina, Cindy and John, Shane and Kathy, and Terry and me. It was a good dinner, but it was really fun to see all the things that were in the “silent auction”, and then watch the real auction. Troy bid and won a couple of the silent auction things, but he also won a fly fishing trip for 2 on the Green River in the regular auction. When he won, he looked at Rex and said, “That’s for you and me to go fishing!” It was fun to see how people bid on the cabin. It went for $1800.00, which is about the same as what it went for last year. Most things didn’t raise as much this year. The only thing that got more, was the evening with Kurt Bestor! We didn’t feel bad when he pulled in more than our cabin! Anyway, after the dinner, we went to a concert in the Fine Arts Center. It was totally amazing! He had his full orchestra with him, and it was one of the most amazing concerts I’ve ever attended! I hope we can all do that again next year! (including Rex!) Again – I forgot to take my camera so I have NO PICTURES!!!!!
We had a sad thing in our Zone the same week. Sister Payne called us and told us her 13 year old grandson had accidentally passed away. He was just playing around and it was an experiment that went horribly wrong – he accidentally hung himself! Our hearts ached for her and her family.
On Thursday evenings she usually takes a group of Sisters out shopping so I did that for her. Sister Brown, Sister Kanuff, Sister Trappett and I all went to Walmart. We had a good time together. I did a little Christmas shopping as did Sister Trappett, but Sisters Brown and Kanuff did a TON!!! I think they each had a basket full of “whatnots” as Sister Brown would say.
Remember I told you that it was a busy time and there was a LOT to do here? Well – then on Saturday, the 17th, we went to the Tabernacle Choir Christmas Concert with Lynzi and Ron. It was beautiful! This year it featured Jane Seymour and Nathan Gunn. We definitely will try every year to get tickets because it was so wonderful. This year, everyone tried, but Brooke was the only one who got tickets. Just being there was more than I actually expected – however – our tickets were right on the side, so really not very good, but the sound was still spectacular! They had the Tabernacle Choir, obviously, then probably 100 dancers, some on pointe, who came in through the isles and danced there and also on the stage. They had some kind of snow that came from the ceiling, but was gone by the time it got to the ground. There was the orchestra, and also the bell choir. When everything played together, it was the most Heavenly sound I’ve ever heard! It filled the conference center. Nathan Gunn has an amazing voice and sang several songs, and Jane Seymour told the story of Good King Wensaslas and also the Christmas story from Luke. Interesting side note – we found out (because we used to be in the Patron and Products Services zone) that she is actually from Jewish descent, on both sides of her family. They didn’t know if she is still a practicing Jew or if that’s just by descent, but she did a beautiful job narrating. I’m sure it was as much an opportunity for them to perform at that concert as it was for all of us to be able to watch it. We saw the last performance, so it got a little emotional for everyone at the end.
The next week in December wasn’t quite as jam packed, but there were still fun things to see, places to go, and things to do to get ready for Christmas.
Tami’s family, Heather’s family and Brooke’s family all spent Christmas at the cabin. Lynzi and Ron and Gregg and Mar were all on the year that they needed to be with the other side of the family. I’m sure they all had a great time, but I choose to think not as much fun as if we had all been at the cabin together! Heather and her family stopped by on their way to Island Park and we went to breakfast together at JB’s by Temple Square. It was fun to see them, and they took all our packages to the cabin for the rest of the family. We had to borrow Gregg’s car top carrier for them to fit everything in! It was fun giving gifts, but I’ve certainly found that a lot of the joy of giving, is seeing the receiver open the package! I missed part of that this year.
On Christmas Eve, we went to Market Street Grill for dinner. It was really good, and interesting to see all the people who were out for Christmas Eve. I KNEW why we were out, but seeing others and trying to figure out their stories was interesting. After dinner we drove around looking for houses with lots of lights. We didn’t really find any! We thought if we drove above the Capitol, in the Ensign Peak area (a VERY ritzy area) we would see some really decorated houses! NOT! I was really surprised that it was just a random string of lights here and there. Anyway – we went home after that and watch “The Help”. It was an enjoyable but a very different Christmas Eve.
Christmas morning we woke up and opened gifts. That was fun and we gave each other some really nice things. Then we got ready and went to Church. The Ward Choir sang and they did a WONDERFUL job! I was so pleased with the way they sounded. Now our challenge will be to keep up the good work! After church we went to Gregg and Marthea’s house where she made a really nice Christmas dinner. She roasted a turkey and had all the trimmings. I made the stuffing and a salad, and Lynzi made rolls. Marthea had made 3 different kinds of pies. YUMMY! Then we all opened gifts from each other. It was fun! Besides all the regular things, the kids gave us several tickets to the Hale Center Theater. YEA! We LOVE going there! All in all, I really missed our regular Christmas, but what we did was perfect, and being here on this mission is perfect so I can do NO complaining!
AND – once again – I’m a dork and don’t have any pictures of Christmas!!!!!!!!!
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