9 March 2015

Dear Family and Friends,

      Time is drawing to a close. Big news here, we got about 9" of fluffy white snow on Wednesday night -Thursday morning. The wind blew, so it made drifts that were even deeper. Over at the Elders apartment it was about 12" in front of their place. It hadn't been walked on. Elder Fisi'iahi a Tongan from California couldn't resist. It was his first snow. He gave a flying leap into the snow landing on his stomach then he rolled in it. White shirt, tie and all. The Elders found a game of Risk in their apartment. Neither of them had played it before. Since they had been told not to go out that day. They invited me to play with them. While I played Risk mom packed up more of our apartment. (Just so you know, there is a reason why Tonga has never taken over the world.) I got the car swept off but we never went out anywhere all day. The next day we ventured out to visit a few members, but stayed close to home.

    On Saturday we decided to make an escape. The main roads were mostly clear so we drove about 60 miles to the south and visited an Arkansas State Park Museum. We have wanted to go since last year,but it never worked out. The only day we have a little time off is on Mondays and the State Parks are always closed on Mondays. I decided if we are going to go at all, we will just have to do it. So we didn't tell anyone we just got into the car and fled. The Park is in Parkin, Arkansas. It is built on the site of an ancient Indian Village. We could still see the moat that surrounded the village. The village cover a seventeen acre plot. They had dug a moat about 60 feet across and about 8 feet deep. Then they built walls out of vertical poles and then applied a hard clay to the poles, that was just inside the moat. It must have been an impressive fortress. The reason all this is known is that when Hernando De Soto (in the 1600's) and his men explored America they came to this village and three of his men kept journals of their travels and they are preserved and translated. Since no one ventured out to the park that day we had it all to ourselves and the Rangers spent time with just us. I bought a DVD of the film that they showed at the museum. It is real good.

   Mom here: This day light savings time is doing me in.  I went to sleep alright but was woke up at 3:00 am by someone singing, it was Dad.  I finally said shush and told him to stop.  I did not want to get up this morning.  We had our missionary correlating meeting at 8:00am so they can have Branch correlation by 8:30 or 9:00 am.  I'm not really sure why we all have to be to the Branch correlation since we have just discussed every thing with the Branch mission leader and he is in both meetings.  We didn't really want to say anything since we are leaving so soon and will have no part in the future activities.

     We will be very busy these next few weeks.  When I started taking things off of the walls Dad thought that I should wait and do all that the last week.  I plan on being all packed the night of the 27th so we can leave relatively early on the 28th and that means I pack most of everything these next couple of weeks.   I have lots of birthday cookies to give out plus there are a few that still need cookies from other months.  I also want to give birthday cookies to our friends at the Senior Center.  I plan on making a batch of cookies and taking them to the Seniors this week.

     Well Dad's swollen up toes are still sore but on Tues. he will have his big toe nails removed and the Doctor will drain any pus that is still there.  The Doctor wanted Dad to take antibiotics before he surgically removed the toe nails..He probably should have planned a little better since we have to be in Searcy for Specialized training Wed. morning.  He thinks that it will feel so much better that there shouldn't be a problem but I'm thinking that perhaps this won't be as easy as what he remembers from 30 years ago.  Next week we go to the temple on Mon. and on Wed we go back to Searcy for Zone meeting.  We will then finished with driving missionaries to all of their meetings.  The Branch members will have to pick up the slack or the mission will have to let them drive their cars to meetings.

     The huge snow fall is now dirty and melting very quickly.

Dad again: Word to the wise, when you go to the bathroom don't just let you pants drop to the floor, especially if you are barefoot and have an ingrown toenail. Those belt buckles can cause a lot of pain. In all actuality I have gone barefoot this past week longer than I've gone barefoot in the past year all put together.

    Well it has started raining, the snow we leave even sooner.

Love Mom and Dad