Greetings from Headquarters

We have just completed our first week of training here in the Salt Lake City Headquarters Mission of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.  We live in the West Temple apartments, which is directly west of the Conference Center.  From our second story balcony, we have a view of the Temple--beautiful, especially at night.

We are getting used to living the "simple life" in the apartment.  Thank goodness departing missionaries left behind some of the "necessities."  Those items are made available the first Saturday of each month in front of some storage sheds in the parking lot:  The Swap Meet.  "Newbies" get to enter first so we were able to grab up a broom, laundry basket, trash cans, extra set of dishes, mixing bowls.  Sister missionaries also leave a lot of clothes behind--a few great finds for me.  The Elders, mostly leave white shirts.  We begged some other things from nearby family and went shopping at Deseret Industries.  I think we are set-almost.

In the Training Zone, we start at 7:30 each morning in a state-of-the art computer lab, where we are taught how to use familysearch.org.  We then practice, then have individual reviews over what we've learned--not too scary.  Most afternoons we have instruction over a wide variety of subjects:  health, our relationship with young Elders (YE), Church history, family search data control, turning hearts.  We also had opportunity to tour the Family History Library and the Church History Library.  It seems everyone is eager to recruit us to their zone, although we don't know how much the mission presidency takes into account our preferences.  We will receive our assignments next Friday--and start training again for that particular zone.

The Training Zone is in the amazing Joseph Smith Memorial Building, third floor.  It is amazing not only for its beauty, but also because of its maze of back stairways.  It's more straight forward to take the elevator, but much more adventurous to take the stairs.  We've opened some doors and wondered, "Where are we?"  Thank goodness, not in the middle of a meeting.  

Outside of training, we have found a beautiful place to walk and we don't even have to drive to it:  City Creek Canyon.  It gets us out of the city quick.  We also like climbing the hill to the capitol and walking around the tree-lined path that surrounds it.  Great views from there.   And we've done some exploring by foot in the city.   The City Creek shopping area may be "the great and spacious building," but it is beautiful with its fountains, lights, waterfalls, and even a trout stream.

We have loved visits from some grandkids--and their parents, of course. :) It has been fun to play with them in the Children's Place of the Church History Museum and introduce them to the Discovery Zone at the Library.

One evening, we went with other missionaries to the Church's Humanitarian Center and helped pack buckets with cleaning supplies that could be distributed to victims of flooding and hurricanes.  Our group packed about 1100 buckets. Elder Challis stacked buckets and I broke down cardboard boxes that held the supplies.  That was a "feel good" experience.  And a tiring one.

Our send-off at the MTC.  

Look who we found at the MTC:  Sister Hope Gaughan and her companion