Thursday--The best visits

We love Thursdays.  In the morning the young missionaries stay in to do their planning. We have a 2 hour Skype call with our language tutor in Utah. Elder Spencer is getting really good at not only speaking, but also reading script. We will do a post later about the language specifically.

We usually visit new members or investigators with missionaries on Thursday afternoons.  It his difficult to pick favorites, because there are so many. However, for sure children are favorites. So here are some of the remarkable people that we visit.

We visit this family every other week because they live 30 km away from the church and we drive the missionaries there.  We have become so close with them. We love them dearly.  Mother and daughter.

Another picture in that same neighborhood.  The sister in the 7 UP shirt is also a recent member.  She is so faithful, even when she does not have transportation to attend church, she reads the scriptures every day.  Remarkable here.

One of our the top 5 pictures from our mission. These two little girls pretend they are missionaries and carry bags around the neighborhood. We lent them our scriptures and name tags to help them pretend.  They are adorable girls.

So many darling children.

Just playing with grandma and grandpa's reading glasses.

Her uncle.

Can't get enough of these beautiful children.

This dear family lives far away as well. Their daughter is serving a mission here in Cambodia.

This is another favorite family. They always have extra children around. This mom is amazing.

Sometimes we are given a treat.  This was a lovely visit. 

Wednesday--English Class and Piano

On Wednesdays we go visiting in the mornings or get caught up on paperwork. At 3 p.m. Sister Spencer starts piano lessons. It is a joy to teach these young people about music and prepare them to conduct and accompany in Church.  Teaching piano was not on my list of talents, but I have learned so much and am grateful for resources that the Church provides. The Harman Foundation in Salt Lake makes it possible to provide a keyboard for promising young musicians so that they have a keyboard to practice with. The students need to be old enough and have the potential of playing in Church and teaching others.  The Foundation has placed many, many keyboards throughout the world. The last lesson ends at 7 p.m.

These six sisters/cousins all wanted to start learning piano. It is not ideal, but we make it work.

These three girls each play one song for Sacrament meeting. Their Branch President is preparing them for the future.

Another darling student. She isn't a member but has come to Church several times to hear the music.

At 5 p.m. English class starts. The missionaries teach and entertain mostly young people with a free English class.  We have seen great missionary work success with this program.

We learn a lot of English playing "Simon Says". The students love it! (Elder Spencer is the best!)

The Elders' clowning around is a big attraction. And they make their point.

The Elders use all of their talents!

We usually go out to dinner on Wednesdays, because it is a full afternoon.

Tuesday--District Meetings

On Tuesdays we attend district meetings at the chapel. We enjoy participating in these meetings as district leaders teach their groups of missionaries. We take turns so that we get to support each district. It is so rewarding to see the nervous, first-time District Leader teaching a lesson and then more seasoned Elders learning to include more comments from the group and creating a great learning experience. We see great leadership and strength and we feel the Spirit often when these diligent young women and men are discussing the gospel and how they can be more effective in their missionary work.

This is the first group of missionaries we served with. Some are already home now (April 2016).

These Elders love to see each other.

We often document the day with pictures.  We love these young missionaries.

This picture was before transfers.  We don't want to forget anyone, ever!

Sometimes after district meeting we go out to eat lunch with the missionaries.

The Elders love this place where we sit on the floor. Not our favorite!

Sitting at tables is so much more comfortable. The missionaries know the best, cheapest places to eat.

The first week of the month is Zone Training. We don't meet as districts, instead the Zone Leaders meet in the mission office in Phnom Penh and receive instruction.  They return and on Friday we meet with 24 missionaries from our Zone. Our area includes Battambang, Pursat and Siem Reap. The missionaries come in for this extended meeting.

We also celebrate birthdays at Zone Meetings. There is at least one birthday every month.

We love working with these amazing young missionaries. They are dedicated and faithful in a mission that is very challenging. They are great examples to us. Every parent should be proud (in the President Uchtdorf kind of way!)

Another Monday Activity--Sister Spencer playing dress up

One PDay, I did glamour shots with the sisters at their insistence. It ended up being such a fun time.  We laughed so much!

People in Cambodia love to dress up. Weddings are multi-day, multi-outfit affairs. Everyone has lovely clothes to wear and if the family can afford it, the bride and the entire wedding party (men and women) dress in matching colors for various pictures. It is amazing! There are photographers on every corner ready to dress the bride and groom to create extravagant wedding shots. We will take you behind the scenes.

The Sister missionaries picked one of these photo shops and we asked them to dress us up. We spent 1 1/2 hours in a hot dressing room with clothes all over the floor and make-up used on everyone (and everyone before us.) There was also lots of hair spray and a wig.  The young sisters really do look so amazing.

The back story. The dresses only have one shoulder, so the other shoulder is covered with bits and pieces of fabric and add ons. (The one shoulder look does not work for missionaries!) Also, most of us have the tops tied on in back. These costumes are made for tiny Cambodian bodies. All the glitter is definitely fake. It is amazing how good it looks in the picture. The Angkor Wat backdrop is definitely photo shopped in.

Now check out our shoes.  They are size 5 or so.

Then they had us hold items.

and stand by interesting items.

Sister Earl insisted I get this photo because I look like I am thinking of Elder Spencer, all dreamy. (The earrings are photo shopped in.)

 Love all these sisters!

Every week starts with Monday

Sometimes we post glimpses of our life as senior missionaries. We hope to give you a more complete picture by posting about each weekday.  This is a typical senior missionary Monday here in Battambang. We are so grateful for this assignment.

We often have the most beautiful sunrises.

The beautiful beginning to another beautiful week. We have amazing sunrises and sunsets here.

Elder Spencer going about his work.

Preparation Day.  The young missionaries run their errands like haircuts, shopping, cleaning house, emailing home, and are encouraged to visit local points of interest so that they get to know Cambodia and their area.  By 5 pm they are out proselyting again.  Senior couples have more flexibility. We also use Monday to catch up on things. We are encouraged to be in touch with our families. We try to Skype with our children and their families on Monday mornings. We are 14 hours ahead so this is their Sunday evening.  We are so grateful for Skype. In fact, Skype was invented so that senior missionary grandmothers can stay in touch with their grandchildren. (Did you know?)  We treasure these times. The grandchildren are all growing so much. We love to hear them read their first book, talk about their school and other accomplishments. We love to see the babies start to crawl and walk. We also keep in touch with our children through a LINE app that has free messaging and calling. We really want to share all the wonderful things we are experiencing that do not get on Facebook or Instagram. There are many personal and sacred experiences that are just too private.

We got to hear a talk by a granddaughter over Skype. She shared a message about a baptism here in Cambodia.

Showing off a little brother that we haven't met yet.

We also often do laundry, clean house, do some baking because we are home. We have had opportunities to serve on Mondays, like having missionaries here for special circumstances of Skyping with home or the Area doctor. The public internet cafes do not lend themselves for these private conversations.  Or we have gone out on missionary adventures.  We don’t do that much anymore since we have seen the sights of Battambang.  Sometimes, we get the car washed. For $3.50 we get a thorough car wash including the interior and undercarriage.  It is all done by hand and takes almost an hour. We have chosen this time to sit in the café next to the car wash, enjoy a smoothie and discuss things that need to be done. We schedule, or discuss projects we are working on, or letters we need to write. We enjoy this focused time together.

This is a car wash and incidentally, this is the car we are renting from the Church. (Someone asked us if we have bikes. No.)

The $3.50 car wash is very thorough.

This is my favorite egg lady at the market. Chicken and duck eggs.

Our favorite butcher. He imports meat from Australia and puts his shirt on when we come. 

Several times we have had missionaries over for baking. It is often for therapy or before transfers. The Khmer Sisters want to learn to make American food. We bake pizza, cakes and cookies. We make pizza like fry bread in a pan on the stove, so that they can replicate the cooking faclilities in their homes without ovens. Also, we make cake in a rice cooker. It turns out quite nicely.  I haven't found a way to make cookies without an oven yet.  Even though most missionaries just want to eat the dough anyway. (This is not recommended here, because of the possibility of salmonella. I pray every time for safety. I know they are tasting the dough!)

We just have fun. These sisters work seriously all the time. On P-Day they relax for a little while.

They requested chocolate rice cooker cake. It is very tasty.

Baking with some sisters on P-day.  Below, they set up a massage chain.

We have started having a Young Single Adult Family Home Evening on some Mondays.  It fits into our assignment with Young Single Adults. We love these young people. They are often the only members in their families. It is a time to sit with them and discuss the gospel. They are just like YSAs everywhere. They think about Temple marriage and eternal families.

These are some of the darling YSA sisters. The sister in the middle has submitted her mission papers.

More sisters. They love pasta and sauce.

Sometimes we go out with the missionaries in the evenings for visits with families. We love our visits with the young missionaries.

Love this family. The father on the bottom right is a former Branch President.

Love these sisters.

One night we were out visiting and ran into these missionaries who were totally drenched from a sudden rainstorm.
 

I wish every Monday could be like this. But often we have urgent things come up, so all of the chores get postponed. We go to the grocery store or open air market during the week, because we have a very small fridge and any special event requires another trip. We are very flexible.

We are grateful for this day of "rest."