Your ability is enough

I'm writing this record to remember our mission but I think I need to record daily because I'm having a difficult time remembering the week that has passed, like now...what even happened this week? Oh, it's coming back to me. I haven't been feeling well.

When we applied for our mission we requested a humid area for my air way breathing problems, which we definitely got humidity. Six weeks or so back I've been noticing that I was really struggling to breathe so I'd use my portable humidifier which really didn't make a difference. We tried to locate one here on the island and they'd look at us funny cause who needs a humidifier on a very humid island? I noticed a while later that it really wasn't my airway that was causing the labored breathing it was my lungs. My lungs were heavy and painful and I was so exhausted with hardly any energy to do anything. I had heard about some people developing a condition or something on their missions that stayed with them their whole lives so then I worried about that. Dave and I wondered even if we should be reassigned. I messaged our children and asked them to join us in fasting and praying to know what to do. They then suggested to go to the doctor, which honestly I didn't consider, being in a foreign country etc. We were able to get into a doctor in Trinidad during our trip there for Zone Conference. A lung X-ray , EKG and blood work were done and everything checked out fine. With  that information, knowing I don't have some kind of COPD developing, I can just continue to acclimatize here on the island and I'm confidant I will be good to continue our mission. I did need to come to grips that I am not a young sister missionary with lots of energy and that the Lord is pleased with whatever I can do to serve and I shouldn't let my limitations over take my joy.

Senior couple missions are totally different from the young Elders or Sister missionaries. The only rules we have are: Keep the Commandments and don't do anything to lose your temple recommend. Other than that, you really just make it up as you go seeing what needs to be done and doing it. They really can be as busy and involved as you want or are able. You can rest if you need to and explore the local sites. You can face-time with family as often as you'd like. Your family and friends can visit. You can determine how long you want to be gone; 6, 9, 12, 18, or 23 months. We need senior missionary couples or single Sisters presences in branches and wards all over the world. The current senior missionary participation level is only 30% of the needs of the Church. We need them to mentor new inexperienced local leaders and help them become self sustaining. We need them to show how to minister. We need them to teach music in primaries. We need them to love and teach the youth and young single adults, so the future of the Church will be in good hands. We need senior couples in so many other ways too.

You could choose to snow bird on an island in the Caribbean instead of St George for 6 months and make a huge lasting difference in building the kingdom and helping make disciples of Jesus Christ. Imagine sitting on your porch in your rocking chairs reminiscing about your life and talking about your adventures and experiences in loving and changing peoples lives for the better rather than your golf game or how many cruises you've been on. If you are concerned about leaving children and grandchildren, you are promised that the Lord will take care of them much better than if you were there. You really can go for 6 months at a time and you will stand all amazed at how much you will be able to do with the Lord's help in doing the Lord's work in just 6 short months. Along with helping build the kingdom, you will find yourself becoming more like the Savior in how you think, speak, act and love. Your relationship with your spouse with be refined and you can learn how to become a celestial couple. You will love and treasure this time together. It is a blessing, privilege and honor to wear the name of Jesus Christ over your heart for all to see, and attempt to give back a small offering for all He has done for you.
I hope I have encouraged you all sufficiently that you are ready to get out here and help! 

We taught the second missionary discussion to Angie and Rocky. We challenged her to a baptism date of June 22nd. She said she would think and pray on it. 

Thursday: We flew into Trinidad. Went to the doctor for 3 hours, which included 4 different attempts to get blood....I just had an invigorating thought: When we are resurrected and perfected, we will never have to have blood draws anymore because we won't have blood! That is a happy thought!

Zone Conference was great as always. Our mission is getting smart phones for the young missionaries, so it was all about that and training and preparing them for that privilege. Technology is a very powerful tool in building the Kingdom and is inspired by God but as in most things that are good ie: money, loving relations, food, entertainment etc. Satan also uses them for destructive ends so we do need to prepare and plan how to deal with things that may come our way.

Sunday: I was notified I was speaking in Sacrament meeting late Saturday. Before my mission this would have kept me up all night but now I just get a few thoughts in my mind and pray and get up and speak. I don't claim to be a great speaker but I can discuss a few thoughts, feelings and testify and feel like I did alright. I spoke for 12 minutes and then the only child, a 3 year old boy, in the branch decided to have a melt down and I could see no one was listening anymore and it was time to close.
After church we had our 2nd branch counsel which went fairly well, we think they are starting to understand the purpose. Then we went to administer the Sacrament to Sister Henry. We took Bro. and Sis. George with us. On the way there Sister George realized that Sister Henry hadn't been getting the Sacrament since the last senior couple was here 2 years ago. I think she felt bad about that and suggested that this needed to continue to be done after we are gone. "Perhaps we could take turns weekly" she said. We do need the men leadership to be involved with this but the concept of the branch taking ownership is huge.  Hallelujah! Yes! Missionaries are only there to support not take over. What a break through for this little branch!

 Zone Conference. These gatherings give us such a boost! I probably should have put my shoes on...

 Have to do the goofy shots!

 This was NOT fun! The Doctor was very sorry to have hurt me. 

She told me this doesn't happen to her, ever!

 These trees are in bloom now!  So stunning!

 We came upon another fort to explore

 This is where buck shot was made

 Another lovely secluded beach

 Our kids will be visiting us in January and I think this may be a fun place to jump off....after we explore it and make sure it's safe. I probably won't do it but I can see a few of them trying it....maybe

 We love creatures!

 This is a crab shell. Just like we outgrow our clothes...crabs outgrow their shells.

 So amazing! The crabs are black before. 

 Just. So. Cool!

 This isn't yet ripe to eat and belongs to one of the missionaries. We will need to get one and try it.

Every where we see these flowers, we see these caterpillars. 

These caterpillars were 6 inches long. I kid you not! 

So many cool happenings!

Still in Curacao on Monday. We went to swim with the large sea turtles. It was really cool. I was able to touch one on it's back as it swam by. I later learned as I enthusiastically exclaimed, " I touched one!" that that was something I wasn't supposed to do. Oh well..... It was very fun and I highly recommend it. Then we went to a lovely part of the island where you can hear the island breathe and it shoots water up through different holes along the coast. I could have stayed there for a long while just watching the waves roll in and out. That evening, The Bairds took us all out to dinner at this lovely restaurant right on the ocean, then we came back and some of us played games until bedtime. It was so satisfying and comforting to be able to spend this fun time with everyone.

Our flight was supposed to leave at 8:30 am the next day, Tuesday,  but as we were checking in that evening we discovered that it had been delayed until 8:30 pm and then delayed again until 11:45 pm. The mission home needed to be vacated for other missionaries arriving so we decided to get a hotel in town and wait for the flight and have a place to sleep in case it was delayed again, which is a frequent occurrence in the Caribbean.
Since we had several hours before the flight, we went shopping in town and had dinner payed for by the airline since they delayed us. We left the hotel at 7:30  for the airport and fortunately we did get on the flight to Trinidad at 11:30.  Since we had missed our connecting flight, we spent the night in a hotel in Trinidad. There were no flights available back to Tobago until Saturday so the next morning Dave and I determined we would go to the airport and get on stand by. It took us 4 tries to get a seat but it was worth it. We had to go back to the ticket counter every hour until two seats opened up.

We rested up the next day and did laundry and grocery shopping. A member had called us when we were waiting in the airport on our way to Curacao. He was sobbing and wanted us to come to his home. We told him we would when we got back. We arranged to meet at his home and he shared with us that his wife had a miscarriage and the twins she was carrying were lost but she didn't tell him. She thought he would leave her. They were due the end of April. Rockie, the husband couldn't figure out why she hadn't had the babies and why she wouldn't go to the hospital. He was very hurt. He said there was good news though, that she was 5 months pregnant. She lost the babies, couldn't tell him and then figured since she got pregnant again, all would be ok. We had been planning on starting the missionaries discussions when the babies came and were settled but we just asked if she was willing to hear the lessons now and she was. We taught the first one tonight, Sunday. I think it went well. Rockie is a returned missionary but hasn't come to church for a while because of his divorce etc. He is very excited for his wife to get baptized and then go to the temple.
Saturday, we went to three homes to visit and no one was there so we decided to drive around the island. It was very fun.
Dave has been trying to change the Church building location on the site since we got here and found out it was not correct. He finally got the right people at Church headquarters to make the change. That made him super happy. Another wonderful thing is, we finally heard back from TPAF (Temple Patron Assistants Fund) that Molly and Hannif Emamudin from Guyana have been approved to go to the Manaus, Brazil temple so we will be planning a trip to go with them hopefully in June! Super excited about that too! 

 Fun statue in Curacao

 Place of many turtles

 Ready to go!

 Dave found a pearl.....earring

 Such great, fun people!

 Eldrer Vermeeren, The Haakes, The Jones, The Bohnes and us

 not too bad of a picture without an under water camera. 

We bought an underwater camera after doing this so we can get some good shots

 Blow hole. The island breathing...

 Always beautiful scenery to pose with

 This is a cairn beach. People stack rocks on top of each other to make a balanced tower. 

They are used to mark trails or as memorials.

 Dave of course had to make one

 Here he has left his mark

 The Curacao flag

 These fist markers are many places in Curacao. They represent slave lives that 

were lost fighting for their freedom

 Curacao is really a desert island 

 One of the beaches we went to has lots of pigs living there

 This is the famous skyline of Curacao

 This is the country's license plate. Pretty cool 

 The deck you see is the restaurant we ate dinner. It's by the port where all the cruise ships dock

 The group enjoying our last dinner together

 Some cute posing....I think it's cute...The Vermeerens

 Dave and I

 The Bohnes

 The Bairds

The Haakes

More cute posing

Dave suggested we use the A for April

Waiting for the airport to open so we can change our delayed tickets

Off to the hotel to wait for the flight at midnight

the court yard of the hotel

Enjoying dinner at the hotel

Yep.....delayed

It's been a long day and it's not over yet

Back in Tobago driving around the island. This tree is humongous! Can you see me?

The road is very curvy and up and down. Then these beautiful scenes appear!

So many different kinds of palm trees

The houses are built is amazing places

One of the beaches was having a cook off competition for the youth. 

Who ever won would get a scholarship to the culinary school here in Tobago 

Love this!

Another gorgeous cove beach...in fact most of the beaches are in coves cause a great deal

 of the coast line is rocky and full of thick trees.

Love this too!

Lots of little fishing boats

This house can only be reached by foot

The houses are usually built one level at a time as they get the money to finish it.

 It can takes years to do so

All the coves are different little towns

It's an amazing engineering feat to build these homes on these steep hills

Lots of colors. It gives the island a very happy feel

Another beautiful cove beach

As we drove around the island we came across this ruined sugar plantation.

This was a small plantation. In the history of Tobago at one point there were 2,000 white folk and 10,000 black slaves. The original people of Tobago were Amerindians. 

This water wheel and crank thing to the right of the sign were used to process sugar cane

As I walked around the remaining walls and rock stairs and cobblestone walk ways I could just imagine how many slaves and how many years it must have taken to build all of it. 

This bush was full of these caterpillars. A mamma and her babies

This is little Tobago on the east end of the big island and is a Bird paradise. 

We will go there one of these days

The sweet girl in the middle is Naomi and her son Malachi. He was blessed today. 

She asked us to be the godparents. Not sure what that means but we said yes.