FHE, Farewell DCM, More Bream Bay House, and Stake Conference

I couldn't resist a picture
of Ruth.

Our P-Day was nothing like last week. We stayed home and took care of a few neglected things we've been trying to get done. We started with Seminary. I presented the lesson and I think it went pretty good. I received several more Mother's Day greetings as our Monday is the US Sunday. It was very sweet to get them. Anna's text was so touching it made me cry. I love my family so much.

We made some foot warmers to keep Steve's feet warm in bed. We had a wonderful Zoom call with Season's family. Madison was home from college, so it was wonderful to see and talk to her. We talked to everyone except Brooklyn since she was at work. I love our weekly video calls with our family! I'm not sure we could do this without modern technology. I also worked on some HawkSoft for a while.

We had the Elders and the Davises for Family Home Evening. We should start getting a few more each week. We have to cancel next Monday as we will be in Auckland for the day. I hooked up my laptop to our TV and we discussed the same information I gave for my Seminary lesson. We had a very nice discussion and a fun time playing our game. I love our Family Home Evening. I'm anxious to get more people join our group. 

The two girls next to me are going home.

We went to The Chemist Warehouse after Seminary on Tuesday morning. We have been waiting for Steve's prescription for weeks. It finally came in and we were able to pick it up. We shouldn't have any problems in the future. They now have fixed our phone number and our address. That made all the difference. 😊

After our scripture study and daily planning, we headed out to visit. I printed up some little invites for Stake Conference that we handed out to those we visited. It is always nice to have an invitation to something to give them. We made sure we were back home before Sister Budge got there for her Pathway class. 

Sister Kinikini and Sister Hinton

We had our "transfer" DCM meeting combined with the South District. Two of our beautiful sisters are going home on Monday. We had a RWH (Return with Honor) party. The Elders took care of everything. They decorated with balloons, streamers, and a streamer curtain. Another sister was celebrating her 9 month mark. At the end of our meeting (before the party), nearly every young missionary bore such strong testimonies. It was very touching. The Spirit was strong. 

After the closing prayer, the "party" started. The Elders brought out three little cakes and some ice cream. They sang to the three girls. We took lots of pictures, gave lots of hugs, and shed a few tears too.

Cleaners Cleaning

We received a call from President and Sister Allen called us this morning to see if we would be willing to serve as assistant vehicle coordinators. Elder and Sister Bailey are leaving in a month. A new service missionary couple will take their place, but they only work part time and won't start for a couple of weeks. They won't have the opportunity to see how transfers work before the Baileys leave. So, we will learn the ropes and train the new couple next transfer. We will also act as assistants to be a backup for the new couple to answer questions that occur when the other couple is not working.

Around 5:00 we got a call from Elder Garner. He asked if we could meet with one of the property managers about two apartments in our area that they have some issues with. He thought an in-person meeting with the property manager would be best. Since it was after 5:00 I emailed to try and set up an appointment for Friday.

The Storm

Thursday was long and somewhat boring. After Seminary, we quickly changed clothes and packed a lunch before heading to Bream Bay again. We met the cleaning crew to take care of cleaning the windows inside and out, shampoo the carpet, and take care of the spots on the walls and ceilings. I was told it might be around 3 hours. We let them in and headed to the beach around the corner. Our original plan was to take a nice walk, but it was rather stormy. The wind was blowing and it rained off and on all day. So, I pulled out my laptop and worked on several different things.

After a couple of hours, we headed back to the house and parked in the garage. I needed to plug my laptop in. We pulled out our camp chairs and plugged the laptops in the garage. I had Elder Wilcox join my Zoom meeting so I can see what the Seminary students will see. I want to teach them how to use some features like writing on a whiteboard or sharing their screen. Their interface looks different than mine as the host. AFTER 7 hours they finished and we headed home. We got their with enough time to grab our music and head to choir practice. Our finally choir practice went well.

On Friday, we borrowed a water blaster (power washer) from Brother Ah Mu so we could get rid of the moss on the walkway in the side yard at the house in Bream Bay. While Steve took care of the walkway, I contacted the property manager. I then called Sister Garner to report. We went back and forth a few times. We will be making a few visits over the next few days.

In the middle of all that we got an urgent message about another change for our Stake Conference. To summarize: Originally, we were supposed to have Stake Conference at the Stake Center that has been under construction being remodeled to make it bigger. It was supposed to be done by Stake Conference. That didn't work, so the Stake tried to make arrangements to hold it in the auditorium at the Whangarei Boys High School but were told it was booked already. Then they decided to have 4 wards show up at our chapel in Hikurangi and broadcast to several other buildings for the other wards and branches. That was where it was at last Sunday and that is what was told to the Saints. 

On Monday we were told our visiting authority wanted to see everyone in person, so it was announced we would hold two sessions of conference in Hikurangi. One at 10:00 with 4 wards and branches, and a second one at 2:00 with 4 wards and branches. That was the flyer I printed, and we delivered all week to let people know. That was going to be tough on our little choir. We had about 10 children in the choir, and it would be hard for them to sit through two full sessions of conference. Our choir is AWESOME. Everyone agreed to do both sessions. I was very humbled.

The urgent message on Friday was we were now going to all meet together at 10:00 at the Whangarei Boys High School. Apparently, the event that was scheduled was cancelled. The Lord knew we needed to all meet together. I spent the rest of the time while Steve cleaned the walkway sending out all kinds of messages about the change for conference. Steve finished about that time so we could rush home in time to meet the Elders for our Comp Study.

Sister Hinton, Sister Lilloux, and Sister Kinikini

Saturday morning, we took care of a few things around the house like washing the car, doing laundry, grocery shopping, and working on my Seminary lesson.

We headed to the leadership meeting of Stake Conference in the afternoon. Our visiting authority is Elder Paul B. Whippy, an Area Seventy based in Suva. He was so tender and spiritual. He shared great stories and also has a great sense of humor. In our leadership meeting he introduced a pilot program for the Pacific Area that we will be participating in for the next three to six months. I expect we will see some great results and the leadership embraces this.

Sister Kreutzkamp played the piano and I conducted both the leadership and the adult sessions today. Three of our sister missionaries played and sang a beautiful prelude number. For the evening session, both Sister Hinton and Sister Kinikini were back. They attended the Temple this morning and got permission to come back to Stake Conference because they are in my choir for tomorrow. Anyway, they were sitting right next to us on the front row of the right-hand side near the piano and organ. Sister Lilloux played prelude music and accompanied the special numbers in both sessions. Near the end of the adult session, the Stake President started doing sign language and mouthing words to the sisters. I thought he was asking them to bear their testimonies, but that wasn’t the case. He finally texted Sister Lilloux and asked the sisters if they would sing a song at the end of conference. They gave a thumbs up.

They whispered a few things back and forth and then settled down to listen to Elder Whippy give the closing talk. He shared story after story about different ways to minister to people and help them get on the Covenant Path. Some stories were personal, others were about other people doing the ministering. It was all so beautiful and loving. The whole meeting was that way. I think the Stake President mentioned to Elder Whippy that he had asked the sisters to sing a song after the closing prayer, because Elder Whippy ended about 10 minutes before the hour. When the closing prayer was said, the Stake President asked everyone to remain in their seats for a few minutes for a special musical number, then he nodded to the sisters, and they got up to sing. They motioned to Sister Budge and Sister Griffin to join them. Then they sang a BEAUTIFUL arrangement of I Know That My Redeemer Lives with interludes and a second ending. The music was straight out of the hymn book, but the arrangement and flair was all Sister Lilloux. The other impressive part about this is they had never practiced a note. It was all on the fly. I cried!

Whangarei Boys High School

We left early Sunday morning to get there in plenty of time to check out the auditorium for Stake Conference. Thankfully all the chairs were set up. The only thing we had to do was set up the chairs on the stage. The first row was for the speakers, the next two rows were for the choir.

The stage was not very deep and only three rows would fit. I would have preferred it to be deeper so we could have had more narrow rows and more of them. The choir was spread out very wide and it was hard to hear them. Several people in the audience told me they sounded beautiful. I’m glad the microphones worked. I also had to conduct the music for the hymns. The music stand was in front of the first row. There was not much room. I felt OK when leading the music for the congregation. When I turned the music stand around so I could lead the choir, I worried that I might fall off the stage. Thankfully I didn’t!

It appears the sound system was great for the audience; however, those of us on the stage could only hear muffled sound at best. We would pick up a few words here and there. Some speakers I didn’t understand at all. The others I at least got the basic premise of their talks. From what I heard was wonderful. It was so nice to meet Elder Whippy and even talk to him several times. I’m so glad the choir got lots of complements. They really did sound good. The pianist and I were so happy it was finally over.

Once home, we had a fantastic Zoom call with MyLiege’s family. It is so fun to talk with each person in the family as they share the different things they are doing. Anna graduates in two weeks!  I can’t believe that because that means I have FOUR beautiful grandchildren graduating this year. Kinzley, Brooklyn, Anna, and Joey. I can’t believe they are that old. It has been a GREAT day.

All our Love,

Elder and Sister Wilcox

P-Day, Bream Bay House, Choir,  Funeral, Mother's Day, and Ward Conference

Our Senior Missionary P-Day started right after Seminary. We quickly changed and hit the road for a long drive to Manea Footprints of Kupe. It is a Māori Museum. We had two wonderful tour guides who told us all about the history of how the Māori came to New Zealand. They have some beautiful and very unusual carvings of their ancestors and gods. They told us their stories and beliefs. Near the end of the tour, they had a video and interactive presentation. Our tour guides interacted with the video in dance, song, and storytelling. They had some special effects, too. We all enjoyed it very much. I think we had a total of seven couples. It was so much fun to visit with them and enjoy this cultural event together. 

After our tour, we had a very nice lunch al fresco. And from there we went to see the Tāne Mahuta tree about a half hour away from the museum. It is the largest known living kauri tree in New Zealand. We had to scrub the soil off our shoes and have them sanitized before we could walk into the forest on a special walkway to see the tree. It was a WOW moment. 

The day was actually a miracle as it was supposed to rain all day. We had rain on the drive over and a few little drops here and there while we were outside, but the downpour didn't come until on our way home. Tender mercies.  Once we got home, we had time to get ready for Family Home Evening. I made brownies, and Steve cut up ice breaker questions for our getting to know you game. The Elders showed up, but no one else did tonight. We will continue to invite. We had a fun time with the Elders.

Tuesday started with Seminary again. On the way home we stopped by the Elders' flat to pick up several broken chairs. They don't give the young missionaries these wooden chairs anymore because they break too easily. Now they have heavy duty plastic chairs and are practically indestructible.  After a visit with a couple of our seminary students, we headed home to meet up with Sister Budge for her Pathway class.

Wednesday started with Seminary and then our District Council Meeting (DCM) and finally a nice visit with Joe. After that we packed a nice lunch and headed to the Bream Bay house to do some cleaning in preparation for our final inspection on the 24th. We decided to eat our lunch at the beach since it was a beautiful day. I worked in the house vacuuming up spiders and cobwebs. Steve worked outside weeding and brushing down all the cobwebs around the house. We left after several house. Still more to do.

Our Thursday was a little more traditional. We had Seminary, then picked up a few groceries on the way home. We had our weekly Zoom SFP meeting with the mission. Sister Allen shared about the Pacific Area meeting in Tahiti they recently returned from. It sounded awesome. Elder Soares was the visiting General Authority.

Our Tour Guides

After the SPF meeting, our Ward Elders came over for our weekly Companionship Study. We had a wonderful discussion on Faith in Jesus Christ. We shared scriptures and insights we all have experienced. I really enjoyed it. I spent a little time working on our Temple Prep lesson before we headed to Sister Collins' house for a nice visit with her and her husband. She is pretty much confined to her easy chair and doesn't communicate very well. Her husband is a great talker. We always enjoy visiting with them. 

We got another email from Sister Garner about the Bream Bay house. We were trying to get a straight answer on what they needed done. At first, they were trying to get us (the Church) to replace the carpet because it is badly worn in the master bedroom. We can prove it was before we ever leased the property. So now they just keep sending the list of things to do, which includes professional cleaning of the carpet. So, I started trying to find a company to do the carpet and windows all before May 24th. Everyone I talked to was booked through the middle of June.

We finished the day with choir practice. We did not have all our choir members, so it made me a little nervous. We were scheduled to on Sunday. Most of our children were not there and they do a whole verse by themselves. I prayed they would all be there on Sunday. 🙏

We planned on going back to Bream Bay on Friday but got an invite from our Bishop to attend a funeral in a Marae. Typically, the family and friends will have a ceremony for about three days. The body lies on a marae. A marae is kind of a community center for the Māori. It is made up of a courtyard and several buildings that surround the courtyard. They hold weddings there too, as well as other things for the Māori community. The body is placed in a beautifully woven sack. It is open for a day or so, while the family and friends gather together to share memories and songs. There is food too.

On the final day they have the funeral. This can actually be done twice. They will have one at the marae and if the Church is close, they may take the body to the Church and hold another funeral ceremony. We only did it at the marae today.

Before the actual funeral started, several people sang. Some were solo songs, and many others were joined by the whole congregation of people in the marae. We recognized a few songs even though they sang them in Māori. We sang in English. Others we did not know at all. ALL of them were so beautiful. I think I loved the singing most of all.

The funeral itself was similar to what we are used to. The oldest daughter shared the eulogy. She had some wonderful stories to tell about her mother. Two of her brothers also shared their thoughts and feelings. A group of her grandchildren sang a beautiful song called Testimony. It was the same song the missionaries sang for the devotional last Sunday. Most everyone stood up when the songs were sung as a sign of respect. 

After the closing prayer, they carried the body out of the marae followed by family members and then friends. Many of them proceeded to walk up a very steep hill behind the marae to the graveyard, where they buried her and dedicated the grave. It was a very beautiful ceremony. I’m so glad we had the opportunity to attend.

Saturday, we were back at the Bream Bay house. We did some more things around the house. I mopped all the floors and cleaned the blinds. Steve worked in the yard again as well has changing some light bulbs and a few other things in the house. We met a cleaning professional around noon and got a bid for the work we wanted done. Since the other guy never showed up, I went with the guy that did show up. We will meet him and his crew next Tuesday morning. On our way to the house, we got another text from Elder Garner asking us to stop by the Elders' flat to check out the bad leak they reported from their washing machine. They said it was flooding the washroom. 😮 Since we had to pick up the keys, I had Steve drop me off so I could finish preparing all the lessons we are giving. So, I spent the rest of the day working on several lessons and doing laundry.

Sunday dawned bright and early. We were singing for Ward Conference, so I had the choir come early so we could run through the song. It was a good thing we went even earlier than the practice, because Bishop needed some help on the computer that I was able to help with. I was a little worried because we didn't have many people show up early from the practice. It was also Mother's Day, and our song was about mothers. Thankfully, people started joining the choir in the choir seats. Over the course of several weeks' practice, we have never had the same number of people at practice. Everyone that showed up had been to at least one practice so that was good. We ended up with about 8 or 9 children and youth, so our children's verse turned out very well. The rest of the choir filled out well also. The whole song turned out beautiful. I was able to breathe a nice sigh of relief when it was over. Everyone seemed to really like it. The counselor in the Stake Presidency came up to the piano player (Sister Horsford), Sister Ah Mu (ward music leader), and me to talk about Stake Conference next week. Our choir is singing two songs for that. He asked Sister Horsford if she was willing to play the organ next week for the Sunday Session. Sister Kreutzkamp is playing for both sessions on Saturday. He then asked if I could direct for both Saturday sessions as well as on Sunday. One good thing came out of all that directing. I put my Fitbit watch on my right wrist and I get to count ALL those movements as STEPS. Hahaha. I get a good workout directing the music. 

Ward Conference was very nice. During the second hour, we met with the counselor in the Stake Presidency where Elder Wilcox received a new call. I mention what it is in two weeks after he gets sustained and set apart. We talked with the Seminary teacher about some changes that are happening there. It looks like we will be holding in-person lessons on Mondays and Wednesdays when most of the kids show up. Tuesdays and Thursdays we will have only Zoom meetings. I will be doing those lessons, and we can do that from our house. We don't have Seminary on Fridays. This coming week will be "normal." We will implement the new changes next week.

We finished out the day with a special Temple Devotional Sunday night. It was a very inspirational Devotional. They made two key announcements. They are starting a Temple Bus once a month. The Stake Presidencies of both the Whangarei and Kaikohe Stakes talked with the Temple President and have arranged a special time once a month for just our Stakes. They will open the Temple much earlier on Saturday morning for our two Stakes to do ordinances. At first it will be 50 seats on the bus. Of course, we can drive ourselves if we want, but we need to let them know as the number of available ordinances will be limited. Everyone was very excited for this. They also said this will pave the way for a Temple to be built in Northland someday. If we can consistently get our members to the Temple, we will be able to qualify for a Temple of our own. I LOVE THE TEMPLE!

All our Love, 
Elder and Sister Wilcox

Seminary, Family, Walks, Meetings, Inspections, and so forth...

Emma in Réunion

I think we are officially integrated into the Ward! We were asked to help with Seminary because the 2nd adult was sick. She was supposed to come back on Wednesday morning, but her mother is sick, and she has gone to take care of her. So, now we are the second (and third) adult until they can find someone else to be a second. It is OK; however, we need to adjust our going to bed time. Lol. It is a small class that is held at the home of the Seminary teacher. By the end of the week, she asked if I would be willing to start teaching on Mondays to give her a little break.

Since it was P-Day we did our Zoom call with Sierra's family. We were supposed to do it a little earlier so we could have Alena on the call. She is currently working in Newport, but Sierra and Shonee when home a little early because of the weather. So, we called Alena and talked to her until Sierra and Shonee got home. We had a lovely visit with Alena learning all about her job and what is going on in her life. We had a great Zoom call with the rest of the family. I love catching up each week with one of our children and their families. After a nice and fun call with Sierra, we sent Emma a message to see if she would like a video call. She is currently living in a place called Réunion, which is near Madagascar.  It was the middle of the night for her. She texted us back a couple of hours later and we had a wonderful video call with her. I love modern technology that allows us to see and talk to everyone in real time.

Tuesday started nice and early again with Seminary. When we got home, we did our Scriptures Study and then went for a nice long walk. We had a little break from the rain that had been going on since the middle of the night. It started to drizzle on the last little bit, but for the most part we were rain free.

We visited several people and invited them to our Family Home Evening group and a Musical Devotional that is on May 5th. We had to rush back to get home in time for Sister Budge to do her Pathway class. Luckily the class got postponed for 30 minutes, which gave us enough time to get home and her settled before her class started. The last person we visited to a lot longer than expected AND they lived a lot further away than the other. Everything turned out all right. We will make sure we are home before 2:30 next week.

Wednesday, again started with Seminary. We did our walk when we got back and then headed for our DCM meeting. The South District is also meeting at our building, so we were able to connect with Sister Buchanan. Elder and Sister Buchanan have an electronic picture frame exactly like we do, so they let us borrow their remote control. We were able to connect our picture frame to our Internet. Now we have our New Zealand pictures added AND it shows the correct date and time. I have also programed the sleep schedule and the motion sensor, so we don't even turn it off now. It goes to sleep when no one is in the room, or it is nighttime. Pretty cool.

Cool face on a tree in our forest.

We held another Missionary Choir Practice after our meetings in preparation for the Musical. I think we are sounding pretty good. We visited five more people on our way home. We met with four out of the five people so that was good. We had some really good visits. We invited all of them to the Devotional. We also invited several of them to our Family Home Evening group.

When we got home, we connected the picture frame to the Internet. Then it was time to go to the Hesters for dinner. It had been a while since we had been together. We had a wonderful visit with them.

Thursday was a little different for us. After Seminary and our walk, we had our SPF Zoom call with the mission. Then we did Flat Inspections. We have our Denby Sisters as well as the Elders from our ward. The Elders share their flat with another set of missionaries. We did the Sisters' flat first. They did a great job. We found a couple minor things that we had to dock a point for, but they made up for it by doing some extra create stuff, so they got full marks. We left them some candy for a job well done. I told the missionaries we would be coming sometime that week, but I didn't tell them when. So good job to the Sisters.

The Elders were pretty good. We did have to start in a different room so they could quickly do the dishes. They had a few more things that we docked points for and ended up 10 points below the max. It was still good enough to give them candy. Lol.

We stopped at four more houses on our way home. No one was home so we left Devotional Invites. We did find out one person moved. The Elders showed up for Comp Study not long after we got home. We had a good discussion about Preach My Gospel and then about the people we are both working with. I am so glad we meet each week. After they left, I worked on HawkSoft for about 1 1/2 hours before we headed to Choir Practice. We had such a good turnout. We sounded so good. I actually think we can pull this off.

Sister Lawrence at the Whangarei Quarry Gardens

On Friday, we slept in a bit. No Seminary. I ended up staying home all day as I had a lot of things to catch up on. We had several people drop by for various reasons. We had a sister show up to pick up some large pieces of cardboard what we had from our furniture boxes. Then, because several of the boxes had a bunch of Styrofoam in them, we had to pile that up to go out in the rubbish. Of course, that ended up leaving lots of little Styrofoam beads all over the garage. So, we spent the next half hour cleaning up the garage and vacuuming it. Did I tell you we have carpet in our garage? We have a tarp on the floor so we can park in the garage. We no sooner finished that, than Elder and Sister Garner dropped by. They had a big checklist and keys for closing out our house in Bream Bay. Elder Garner asked us if we would be willing to do the walk through with the leasing company. We said yes, before we read the list of everything that needs to be done. I checked with Elder Garner, and we can hire out a lot of the stuff like shampooing the carpets, washing the windows inside and out, maybe touching up the walls, etc. We left the house clean when we moved out, but we didn't wash windows. Lol.

We did our walk before Steve took off to take care of the Elders' flat. They had a leaky toilet, and Elder Wilcox knows how to fix it. He talked to Elder Garner, and he told Steve to go ahead and take care of it. So, Steve bought the part and a new toilet seat (the other one was disgusting) and headed over to fix it. I didn't need to stand around while he worked on that, so I stayed home and worked on other things like HawkSoft. Later, the Bishop stopped by to see if I could help him with his Tools app on his phone. I first had him sign in on Steve's computer. Everything looked good, so I knew he knew what his credentials were. Next, he tried signing into his phone. Big error message. He told me how old his phone was, and how the app used to work but suddenly stopped working. I decided to have him sign in on my phone. He did and was able to get to the Tools app. Now I knew it was his phone that was too old for the app. I explained how programmers want to take advantage of new hardware in their apps so they can do better and better things. Sometimes that means the apps no longer work on older devices. Mystery solved. We didn't get everything done, but it was still a very productive day.

I started Saturday out by planning all the things that have come up for next week. I needed to get it recorded in something, so I wouldn't have to continue to think about it. I added everything to the Todo app by Microsoft. It has become my life saver. I like it, because I have a repeatable task that contains all the things we do every day. I then add all the other things we do that day. But what I really like is adding all the other things that we don't do for a day or two or a week or whatever. Once they are in my task list, I don't have to think about them until they reach my daily list. I usually review all my upcoming tasks every day so I can be prepared, and nothing sneaks up on me. Steve and I went over the master plan list. 

We had three lessons to prepare for the next two days. We had our Temple Prep class on Sunday. I had the Seminary class on Monday. And Steve had Family Home Evening for Monday also. I had a lunch activity with a Sister from our Ward. We had a Relief Society Service Auction several weeks ago and I bid on the lunch she was offering. We had a wonderful time at the Quail Cafe located at the Whangarei Quarry Gardens. What could be better. Delicious lunch, stimulating and friendly conversation, and a delightful walk around the beautiful tropical gardens. We managed to stay busy and got all our lessons prepared. I think we finished around 7:30 that night.

The Quail Cafe

The Sabbath was long and beautiful. We got to Church early so we could greet people as they came in. Bishop grabbed us to see if we could cover for his wife in Primary. She injured her eye, and he wasn't sure if she was going to come. I got with the Primary President to see where the class was and the age group. We can't do the very young classes, because if a young one needs to go to the restroom, we can't take them. That would require us to separate, and we can't do that as missionaries. This class was for older kids. We went to Sacrament meeting, and I glanced through the Come Follow Me manual for the past week to see what I could teach on. I picked a couple of principles. There was a short video, too. I felt pretty comfortable with coming up with a lesson for them.

After Sacrament meeting, I went to set up the room. Just then the Primary President came by and said the teacher was there, so I headed toward Sunday School. When I got to the end of the hall, Elder Wilcox was there waiting for me. The Bishop had just asked him if we could cover the Youth Sunday School class instead. There were about 10 or so kids already in the room. Since I already had something in mind, I said we could do it. Just as we were going to start with a prayer, the Sister Missionaries came by looking for the class. They said the teachers from their ward were in a different room waiting for the kids to show up. Since it was their month to teach, and I hadn't really prepared a lesson, I sent the kids down to the other room and headed to Sunday School once more. After a couple of minutes, the Bishop came and sat next to Elder Wilcox and said they needed us back in Primary. His wife's eye started weeping again and the Primary President sent her home. So, we headed back to the first class. We had about 9 or 10 kids. They were all so good. They participated well in the discussion. I enjoyed teaching VERY much. I have missed that so much.

Last rehearsal before we sang.

After our meetings, we hung around for an hour or so before our Temple Prep class started. Brother Horsford came into our class and had a wonderful talk with Steve. He is a counselor in the Bishopric. His wife came in later and talked with us about Family History and another Devotional we will have next week. She is the piano player for our choir. They left just before our class started. We had a good class and I think the discussion went well. I made a PowerPoint presentation today. It made it easier to display the scriptures they were to read, as well as the different quotes we had them read. I also added pictures that help make it a little more interesting. For example, one of the quotes was from President James E. Faust. He mentioned seeing a Temple all lit up at night and how it is a beacon to all who see it. I displayed a picture Elder Wilcox just took of the Hamilton Temple at night, all lit up. It worked perfectly.

Once home, we had a fun Zoom call with Douhet and Kylee. Normally, we would do that on our Monday P-Day, but we are having a Senior Missionary activity on Monday, so it just was not going to work. Thankfully, they were able to meet with us today. After the call, I worked on my recap and Elder Wilcox worked on dinner until it was time to go to the Devotional. It was a really beautiful devotional of music and testimony. I teared up a few times. The music was so beautiful. The missionaries in our Stake were the closing number. I think it went very well. Elder Kreutzkamp didn't sing, but he did take a video. Enjoy!

All Our Love,

Elder and Sister Wilcox 

Sister Lilloux at the Piano.

Temple Trip, Spring Devotional, ANZAC Day, and Choirs 

Monday was a travel day. We were supposed to start our day with a visit from a young Seminary age student, but her aunt texted me they were having car trouble and wouldn't be able to make it. We went for our walk and then quickly packed for our Temple Trip. We ate a quick lunch and hit the road. Just as we were heading out of town, Audrey texted me with a link to the Oregon City Spring Devotional. She told me her dad asked her to send it to us. So, at 2:00 our time, I connected to the Zoom link for the devotional. Our reception was spotty at times, but overall, we got to watch most of it. Steve only listened since he was driving. The miracle for us was we got to see Douhet in the Stake Choir. Then, Season and Madison got up to share a scripture and testimony. I thought, wow, that is cool that we got to see them too. A little later, Anna and Alyx showed up in the Youth Choir. And then as if that wasn't enough, Elle was singing in the Primary Choir. A few days later, I found out that MyLiege and Adrienne made the beautiful bouquet that we saw at the podium. I am so grateful for the miracle of modern technology that allowed us to watch a devotional halfway around the world in real time while driving down the highway. It truly is a miracle.

When we got to Hamilton, we ran into some problems trying to check in. My phone was not downloading the document that had the password to the lockbox so we could pick up our key. Finally, I rebooted my Church phone and was able to reconnect the hotspot so I could download the document. All was well. Our room was like a mini dorm room. It had a couple sets of bunk beds and a queen size bed. It wasn't exactly the Ritz, but it was clean, warm, and comfortable. We both slept well. And the price was GREAT.

Tuesday morning, we got up and tidied the room before checking out. Then we went to our Temple Session. The Spirit was very strong in the Temple and I'm so grateful we were able to attend. On the way home, we stopped at Costco just outside of Auckland and a little shopping mall across the street. We had several things we wanted to pick up where we could get a little better variety. 

On Wednesday morning, I took a picture of a house with a red door that we pass every morning when we walk. It always reminds me of MyLiege because she loves red doors. Lol. We had a wonderful District Council Meeting after our walk. Near the end of the meeting the South Zone joined our Zone for training. Sister Kinikini and Sister Lilloux did our training. I just love them so much. They talked about a lot of different ways we can meet people. They made it a fun activity. We headed home for lunch before we were going to go out visiting, when we got a call from the electrician. We had called our landlord about two weeks ago about a heat lamp issue. The electrician that came out said he had to order a part before he could fix it. The part came in, so he came over to fix it. He was supposed to be there at 12:30 but didn't make it to almost 2:00. They called to let us know. 

After he left, we mapped out a few people we could go see. We got a call from our housing coordinator, Elder Garner. He wondered if we could go to one of the Elders' flats to check out a leaking toilet. We added that to our list. Our afternoon proved very productive. We saw everyone at home except one. They had just moved two days before. On the way home we stopped by Sister Hester's to pick up some butter so we could butter several loaves of bread for our ANZAC activity the next day. We also swung by a sister who lives near us. She fell and broke her elbow the day or so before and we wanted to see how she was doing. Later, Sister Kreutzkamp dropped off the bread we needed to butter. 

Thursday was a very long day. We started with our SPF Zoom Meeting. Elder and Sister Shaw gave a beautiful slide presentation about the Temple. President Allen is letting all the young missionaries who are in a reasonable distance from the Hamilton Temple go to the Temple. I’m not sure how often. Maybe twice a year or once a quarter. Unfortunately for our missionaries in the Whangarei Stake and further up north are too far away to make the journey. I think President will transfer the young missionaries down south sometime so they will have a chance to go. As seniors, we don’t have that restriction. We are allowed to go once a month. It does take two days out of our work week to do it. Well 1 ½ days for sure. 

After the meeting, our Elders assigned to our Ward came over for our weekly Companion Study. We had a great meeting. After we did training on Chapter 9 from Preach My Gospel, we talked about different people we could help each other with. They asked us to visit a couple of people that they thought would be helpful to them. We put them on our list for Friday. We in turn gave them someone to try and connect with as well. 

After our meeting we headed to Pipiwai to the Te Horo school where we were holding our ANZAC activity. We had a pretty good turnout. Sister Kreutzkamp, Sister Hester, and I planned the food. We didn’t know some of the members were going to bring things, too. We had so much food. We were able to send a lot home with some families. We planned on something they call Sausage Sizzler, which is like a hotdog only they use buttered bread instead of buns. They also put grilled onions on them. Yum. We planned for 100 people. I think we had about that many. We also had chips and cookies. Well, someone brought about 5 pizzas. There were also Sloppy Joes. We had more deserts than you could imagine.

Those who wanted to, played Touch Rugby. They seemed to have a great time. I didn’t see much of the game because I was barbequing the sausages. Everyone had a good time. There was a playground where the little ones could play, so there was something for everyone. Of course, there were those who just sat and watched the game. After the Touch Rugby game was over, the rest of the people came and ate lunch. Then a bunch started up with a volleyball game while people finished up and started packing things to go. We invited the missionaries to come too, so that was fun for them. We had our Elders, of course, and a set of Sisters came.

We rested up a bit when we got home, and then headed off to choir practice. We have ALSO been asked to sing at our Ward Conference, which is the week before Stake Conference. We are still trying to recruit people to sing with us. We already grabbed a couple of sets of Sister Missionaries to help with the Stake Conference, but they won’t be there for our Ward Conference. I sure hope we can pull it off. 🙏

Friday was a slower day. We had a beautiful walk in the morning and took some pictures of the forest across the street from our house. We went and visited the two people the Elders gave us the day before. We had a wonderful visit with each family. The first one recently moved into the ward. They are not in the Ward Directory yet. They had a baby boy about two months ago. It was so fun to see a baby. The other man we saw is not technically in our ward. He is in the Denby Ward, but since they have Sister Missionaries, they can't visit a single man without another member present. They have been having problems getting other members to help so they asked our Elders to teach the man. Our Elders asked us to go visit with him since he is closer to our age. The Elders will still teach him, but they thought he might like a visit from us. We had a really good visit with him, too.

We ended up staying home for most of Saturday. We had planned on visiting several people on Whananaki North Road, but everything took longer than we expected. We had several things that just needed to get done and Saturday was the day to do it. Steve replaced a shower fixture in the master bathroom, fixed a handle on one of our suitcases, replaced a wheel on a portable heater, and even did some yard work. I cleaned the house, did the laundry, paid some bills, and took care of some paperwork that needed to be done before the end of the month so I could send it to MyLiege via email so she could print it and mail it to the Social Security Office for us. The paperwork needed to be signed by two witnesses, so we headed to the Hesters' house so they could sign our paperwork. I even managed to get an hour or so in on some work for HawkSoft. All in all, it was a very productive day. We accomplished several things that have been bugging me for some time now. I feel much better to tackle next week.

Sunday was a little busier than normal. We always start early with Church. We had a wonderful meeting and Relief Society lesson. After our meetings, we had Ward Council. It was fairly lively today. There were a lot of things that were brought up and we had good discussions. It is nice that we are able to contribute from time to time. Today we announced that someone we were trying to visit had moved just a week ago. The brother happened to be the 2nd Counselor in the Elders Quorum. No one had been able to get a hold of them for a few weeks, so it all made sense. Everyone was surprised by the move. Sister Hester called the Sister when she got home from Church to get the new address. She found out they did NOT move after. The address is wrong in the Ward Directory. Instead of 27 we needed to go to 21. I guess we will try and visit them again this coming week. 

After Ward Council we had our Temple Prep Class. It went pretty well. We have a great group of people in the class. I'm excited to be able to go to the Temple with them in the coming months. We came home after that, and I worked on my Blog Recap. Steve made a delicious dinner. He spoils me so much. After a few hours at home, we headed back to the Chapel for a Missionary Choir. The Stake is putting on a Devotional on May 5th, and the Missionaries are singing. I love serving here.  

All our Love,

Elder and Sister Wilcox

Exercise, Visits, Internet, and Zone Conference

Monday morning started with finally getting back to an exercise routine. We took a very nice walk around our new neighborhood. The morning was beautiful and fresh. The homes we passed have lots of greenery and are beautiful. There were plenty of little, rolling hills to challenge us. Shortly after we got home, it started to rain so we timed it perfectly. 

Since it was P-Day, we busied ourselves with lots of things that needed to get done. For example, Steve took care of collapsing the cardboard from our move and getting it out for the rubbish collection. I spent time on the phone to get our internet ordered. They told me on the phone it could take up to 10 days to get started. They turned it on the very next morning. 😊

We had a nice Zoom call with MyLiege's family. They told us all about their trip to California for Disneyland and the HUG meeting in Carlsbad. Djeryd, Eva, and Ruthie got on the call too. It had been way to long since we saw baby Ruth. 

We went to the doctor, finally, so we could get our prescriptions renewed. We are all set now and don't anticipate any issues. We have to see him again in three months for the next renewal. He wants us to send him our medical history before that. After that I don't know if we can just have them automatically renewed.

We walked again on Tuesday morning. Two days in a row!!! I spent way too much time trying to finish setting up the modem/router. I finally called the Office Elders for help. Since the router came from the Mission, I couldn't get help from our service provider. The Elders said they would come by sometime on Thursday when they got here for Zone Conference. So, we stayed on our Hotspot for two more days. Next, we worked on planning our visits. Since there is a school holiday for two weeks, we decided to focus on Seminary students that aren't attending. We found out that two had moved and one had a SOLD sign in front of their house. We were able to leave a couple of messages with some parents, but we didn't see any kids. We took the opportunity to invite them to our ANZAC (Australian and New Zealand Army Corps) Touch Rugby game on April 25th.

Wednesday was our DCM (District Council Meeting) and more Seminary visits. We also got our walk in before our DCM meeting. We were on a roll. We had a great District Council. We had some fun, shared some great Book of Mormon insights, reported on our activities from the previous week as well as a miracle that happened, and received some great training. Sister Allen showed up for the last 10 minutes to share a message with us. Basically, she said we are where we are supposed to be by “divine design.” We talked a lot about trusting in the Lord, even when we didn’t understand why. Several of us shared experiences when we thought we knew best, only to realize that what the Lord had in store for us was far better than what we had in mind. We finished up visiting the rest of our list of potential Seminary students. Out of the four we were hoping to see, we scheduled an appointment with one for Monday morning next week. We should be able to visit with her aunt too, as she is bringing her to our house. We were able to visit with two others and extended the invitations to Seminary and the ANZAC activity. The third one moved over a year ago. As we were leaving our last visit, we were met by our Sister Missionaries. They told us we got back too soon. They were trying to "heart attack" our car. It was so sweet. We love our missionaries.

After our walk on Thursday morning, we had our SPF Zoom call. Several missionaries shared their favorite General Conference talk and why. I found myself thinking with everyone that shared, "that's one of my favorite talks too." Not long after the SPF meeting, our Elders from our Ward came over for a companionship study. We haven't done that before, but we are asked to meet with them once a week. I decided to make some cookies so they will like us. 😉They already love us. LOL. They came as a threesome. We had a great study session. As they were getting ready to leave, Elder Cockbain asked what I thought was wrong with the router. He is a techie and wanted to take a look. I had plugged in the ethernet cable that came out of the wall, but it didn't connect to the Internet for some reason. It turned out that cable was not connected to the Fiber Optic box that was hiding in a hall closet. We moved the router to the closet and connected it directly to the Fiber Optic box (since I didn't have another ethernet cable to connect the Fiber Optic box to the ethernet connection in the wall) and voila, we have Internet!!!

Friday was Zone Conference. We managed to walk again before Conference. It is so wonderful to see everyone. In our two short months we have made so many wonderful connections with members, missionaries, and people. They both leave on May 20th but will spend the weekend in Auckland so they can go to the Temple one last time before they head home. We heard some beautiful musical numbers from "our Sister Missionaries." I call them ours because we have really developed a great bond with them. Sister Kinikini is leaving on May 20th. 😢Sister Lilloux played the piano in the first number and the violin in the second one. Sister Allen sang for the second number. They were both so beautiful. Brother Ah Mu from our Ward presented some Māori Culture. He gave us several handouts with awesome information. He shared one Māori prophecy that talked about the coming of a church that would be for the Māori people. You can find it at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/P%C4%81ora_Te_Potangaroa.  He said, "You will recognize it when it comes. Its missionaries will travel in pairs. They will come from the rising sun. They will visit with us in our homes. They will learn our language and teach us the gospel in our own tongue. When they pray, they will raise their right hands.” It was all very interesting.

After a delicious lunch, the Elders and even some of the Sisters danced the Haka for those missionaries that are leaving before the next Zone Conference. I can't believe how much that got to me this time. After they do the dance, they all sing, "God Be With You ‘Till We Meet Again.” I cried. After that, the young missionaries went back for more training, and several Seniors went to a Flat Inspection meeting. We will be inspecting two flats between transfers. Elder Garner is also going to rely on the Seniors in the northern areas more to help care for the young missionaries. We will take care of things like when they lock themselves out of their apartment, or get a flat tire, or some furniture breaks, or whatever. We have been asked to watch over the storage unit and move furniture in and out when needed. We won't be doing full moves; Elder Garner will come up for that. But if something needs to be replaced, we can take care of that. We ended the day by getting a flu shot that President Allen said everyone needed to get for a particular strain in New Zealand that is particularly nasty.

It rained on Saturday morning and put a damper on our morning walk. So, I decided to do a walking exercise on YouTube. 😅6 days in a row. We attended a baptism of a cute 10-year-old girl that our Sister Missionaries in Denby were working with. Nearly all the missionaries turned out in support. Her family was also there. None of them are members of the Church, but I think they enjoyed the baptism. We talked to Season after that to wish him a Happy Birthday. It is tricky to get the day right since we are 1 day ahead and 5 hours behind. We wanted to call on our Friday, which was his Thursday and his birthday, but by the time we sat down to call it was after 7 PM our time and so it was after midnight his time. So, we waited until Saturday and sang him "Happy Belated Birthday to You!" It was nice to visit with him. Finally, we headed up the very long and twisty road that we have been on several times before. We have about 8 members on the road. It is several miles long. No one has been home before. We didn't know if they were working or moved away. We decided to try Saturday since we KNEW one brother lived there. We found him home and he was a wealth of knowledge for us. Most everyone on the list still lives there. There was one that moved to Australia and two had passed away, although their families are still there. We had three that didn't have house numbers and he was able to tell us where they live and an educated guess as to what their address is. We picked the furthest one away and found him at home. We had a nice visit and invited them to our ANZAC activity. He suggested we drive a little further down the road to get to the actual ocean. We had seen several inlets, but this time we saw the actual beach. It was also the end of the road. It was quite beautiful.

Sunday was another rainy day. We woke up VERY early so we could watch the funeral of a very dear friend, Jim Bean. It was a beautiful service. His wife, Helen, passed away in 2020. We considered them some of our best friends. 

We had to get ready for Church while we watch the funeral on Zoom. It finished just as we were ready to leave for Church. We got to speak in Sacrament meeting today. I think the talks turned out pretty good. I spoke on the General Conference talk by Elder Jose Alonso entitled, "Jesus Christ at the Center of our Lives." Steve spoke on President Eyring's talk entitled, "All Will Be Well Because of Temple Covenants." After Church we had our Temple Prep Class. It went well too. One of our students is going to miss two weeks, so we will be making those classes up with her after she gets home. 

All our Love,

Elder and Sister Wilcox