Birthday evening...

December 15, 2009 - to end my birthday, Walt took me out to dinner.

Our camera has a mind of its own--the date changed without my noticing till we were in the restaurant. The photo should say 12/15/09

Walt took me out to dinner at "Kansas," which advertises as "the best North American food in South America," and it is! I ordered the "Houston Bar-b-que Spareribs. Walt and I shared...he gave me half of his grilled salmon and I gave him half of my spare ribs.

Sometimes the date goes waco on my camera...the photo is really 12/15/09

First, before the photo of what we had for dessert at my birthday dinner,

here's what's left of the delicious fudge gift from all of our kids.

Thanks, kids, this is the best fudge we've had...next to John's, of course.

We usually don't order dessert after dinner at the Kansas Restaurant, but for my birthday I got the New York cheesecake... but we were so full, I took half of it home.

Walt chose a hot fudge sundae -- no surprise.

Except the "fudge" wasn't hot.

Thank you for all the birthday greetings today...

It's fun being 71!

I'm wearing the "Inca rose" stone necklace Walt gave me.

Sometimes the date stamp on my camera goes waco. This is really 12/15/09.

Here is the beautiful Argentina gem.

Our little corner of Buenos Aires...

Our corner of Buenos Aires this morning...view from our living room,

and second bedroom where we have our desks and laptop.

So this is what we see when we're at our computer.

This shows up better than I thought it would.

I've been wanting a photo of the view from our apartment's 2nd bedroom. Sunday Walt said he thought it would show up best in the morning. Since I've been up since 4:50 a.m. this morning when Walt was leaving to go pick up an Elder and his companion to go to the hospital for a hernia repair, I've been trying to get a good photo.

The sun is starting to lighten the sky more.

I think this is the photo we'll have made into a poster size to put up in our office den at home in Burley to remind us of the view of "our little corner of Buenos Aires."

Fed Ex came through a day early! Walt's driver's license arrived yesterday, Monday, Dec. 14, so when Walt and Elder Leckie returned from the subway trip to Florida Street downtown Buenos Aires, he was authorized to drive our Church Toyota mission car again.

Thank you, Fed Ex!

Yes, it is going to be a

My last day to be 70...

December 15th will be a great day for more reasons than just

the day I turn 71. Read on...

The photo above is in our area office this morning.

I've been driving in Argentina since Friday evening going to our apartment from the area office. Friday afternoon Walt discovered that the paper he got from the police station on Oct. 13 when he went to report his wallet had been pickpocketed on the subway--does NOT authorize him to drive without his driver's license that was in the stolen wallet.

Up until that moment he had been told it authorized him to drive. However, that afternoon

he read at the bottom of the paper that it did not.

His new driver's license is scheduled to arrive tomorrow,

Dec. 15, via Fed Express from Boise.

Until then, I've become the designated driver.

So far so good...

1. The mile and a half from area office to our apt.

2. Saturday morning from our apt to our grocery store "Jumbos"...about 1/2 a mile.

3. To our ward building Sat night for the Christmas party...a couple of miles.

3. Sunday to ward for our 9am to noon Church block.

4. The mile and a half this morning to the area office.

As long as I can stay in my lane with Walt telling me when I need to change lanes

...I've done okay.

It's just when some of those 13,000,000 other people--well maybe only a million of them have cars...try to push me out of my lane or make 5 lanes across where only 3 lanes are painted,

when I start to panic.

Fed Ex...please come through tomorrow with Walt's driver's license!

Merry Christmas month continues...

AND THERE THEY GO...

At the end of the final zone conference in the Paraguay Asuncion Mission.

The four zone conferences were from November 30 to December 3.

We hope that our health presentation and then talking with missionaries one-on-one to help resolve their health concerns will help this Lord's Army of Righteous young men and young women go forward in converting many so they will be able to receive eternal blessings through the temple ordinances and covenants.

This mission is not blessed to have any senior missonary couples.

Presidente y Hna. Callan from Farmington, Utah, are doing an exceptionally wonderful job as mission president and wife of the Paraguay Asuncion Mission since they arrived in July 2009.

We enjoyed the 5 days we were invited to spend with them and their missionaries at their four December zone conferences.

Of the 160 missionaries, 92 had a health concern that they wanted to talk to Dr. Petersen about at the four zone conferences Nov. 29 to Dec. 4. It took about 12 hours driving to get to the different areas of the mission.

I keep the records of concerns, diagnosis, and treatments suggested by Dr. Petersen.

Mail from home for a missionary is like manna from heaven.

We love serving missionaries. Caption is at the bottom of this photo.

Missionaries...above, pose just before going back out to teach the truths of the Gospel to God's honest in heart.

We love all missionaries, but have a special place in our heart for Sister Missionaries.

Only a few Christmas packages come in time for Christmas. Most of the parents don't realize how long it takes to get a package to a missionary....even after it arrives in the country.
So most get their Christmas box in January, February, or even March. These missionaries had "sandwich pizzas" for lunch in Ciudad del Este, Paraguay.

The boundaries of this zone are next to Igauzu Falls.

You can tell which Elders have been well taught at home, they don't have to be asked to help. They see what needs to be done and do it--like cleaning up after zone conference.

The Callans said that Elder Eyring told them that when he thinks of missionaries in Paraguay, he thinks of the red dirt on their shoes. We saw the truth of that...the dirt here IS red.

Great missionaries! From all over the world.

Teaching God's truths.

I always lose one photo per post. I lost the Elder playing the piano. Will have to put in another post. This Elder is a great missionary and a great piano player.

Below: We love to see missionaries eat.

Some days they don't have much food, but on zone conference day they get tp make up for those scarce days.

My favorite photo from Paraguay Asuncion Mission Zone Conference #2

This 3rd and final Twin Rix shot will give him life-time protection from Hepatitis.

Paraguay Asuncion Mission Zone Conference #1

Ten of their 16 sister missionaries are in these zones.

Merry Christmas month...

If any of you are in the Salt Lake Area, please stop by to see Grama A at Highland Cove T-107. She would love to show you her Christmas village.

So many photos, so little time. More after we get back from Paraguay tomorrow.

Today when we left Zone Conference at 7:15pm (ZC was over at 4:45, but the President still had missionaries to interview). We saw 28 missionaries today with health concerns after our presentation, making a total of 92 for the 4 zone conferences here in Paraguay.

President & Sister Callan are wonderful, as are their missionaries.

We have had a great mission health visit with them all.

Happy Thanksgiving...

"No human counsel hath devised nor hath any mortal hand worked out these great things. They are the gracias gifts of the Most High God, who, while dealing with us in anger for our sins, hath nevertheless remembered mercy."

--Abraham Lincoln, on making 'thanksgiving a national holiday in the middle of the Civil War, 1863.
Sent to us by our friends, Ruth & Gerald Budge.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
We send you Thanksgiving greetings from the Argentina Bahia Blanca Mission where we are on the second half of our mission health visit here: Nov 9-15, and Nov 23-27.

Walt said we will probably be having empanadas and media lunas for our Thanksgiving Dinner this November 26.

We give thanks for each of you and what you mean in our lives.

We love you and miss you and pray for your happiness.

We pray your Thanksgiving Day with family and friends will be wonderful.

Love, Mom & Dad/Grama 'n Grama Mission/Elder y Hna. Petersen/Uncle Walt & Aunt Eileen/Walt & Eileen - Argentina

Happy Thanksgiving Week...

H A P P Y T H A N K S G I V I N G W E E K

Becky, here is the turkey I mentioned.

It's really better on a pineapple but...

I cut the pineapple for our Sunday dinner,

so used a kind of squash they have here.

You can get the idea with the "pineapple tail feathers".

Here is the turkey face I made from the pattern on Google search.

In Relief Society, years ago, we sewed it from red felt,

with the eyes...etc., but this one works okay.

I cut up an orange file folder.

And that's about the extent of my "craftiness."

Good luck, Mr. Turkey...

Primary Program in Argentina - Families are Eternal

I'm adding a third photo so I can see which one is best to e-mail these sweet leaders.

I'll print a copy for the ones who don't have computers.

These 13 children sang with as much gusto as a 50-children primary group.

Little children are precious no matter where in the world they are.

Those boys had been still for 1 hour and 5 minutes, and they had many wiggles.

It will take all three photos to see the faces of the 13 sweet primary children did their primary program today in our Palmero Ward, Belgrano Argentina Stake today.

The fourth child from the left stole the show when she gave her sweet testimony from her heart. Her family was just reactivated in May.

Blanca, left is the president, with Naty, Vanessa, Juliana, and Danielle. We couldn't find Magdelena, another teacher, for the photo. She is the grandmother of two of the primary children. The rest of the primary leaders are young single adults.

Mission Health Visit to the Argentina Bahia Blanca Mission

Here Elder Petersen, the area medical advisor, is summing up his 45-minute "Missionary Health & Safety" presentation with the 4 main points that will secure maximum health for missionaries (or anyone) anywhere in the world. 1.Drink a minimum of 2 liters of water a day of only purified water. 2. Eat a balanced diet of well-prepared, non-contaminated food; only well-done meat. 3. Wash hands often -- for 30 seconds of vigorous scrubbing with soap.. 4. Exercise - 30 minutes for 6 days a week: 20 min cardiovascular; 10 min flexibility one day, then alternate with 10 min of strength training.

Unlike the big multi-zone conferences with 50-75 missionaries, this mission president is doing single zone conferences. This zone conference on Nov. 11 had 21 missionaries. The zone conference on Tuesday, Nov. 10 had 24 missionaries.

After the health presentation, Elder Petersen sees each missionary one on one who has a health concern. It's pretty hard to stump this old-time family physician. He reassures many missionaries by telling them the diagnosis of what they have, and 99.9% of the time it is nothing dangerous. They can go do as President Hinckley's father counseled him when he was a missionary in England: "Forget yourself and go to work."

In addition to keeping the medical records of the heath concern of each missionary and what Dr. Petersen diagnoses and prescribes...I take photos of the mission president's wife and her Sister missionaries to share with our missionary granddaughter--Sister Aimee Fisher in the Oklahoma Tulsa Mission.

Presidente Jorge y Hna. Adriana Detlefsen, Mission President and Wife

and three of their six children with us in front of the Argentina Bahia Blanca Mission home. We are on a mission health visit to the Argentina Bahia Blanca Mission November 9-15.

We love to be with each Mission President and Wife.

President y Hna. Detlefsen are from Cordoba, Argentina.

They have two married daughters, 1 son on a mission in Colombia,

and 3 daughters here with them--

Areana 17, Carolina 13, y April 8.

They have two granddaughters.

We have had two zone conferences and

today will drive 5 hours to the Mar del Plata

for the zone conferences Friday and Saturday.

Missionaries are miracles!

They work very hard every day in the hot sun

to bring the truths of the Gospel to many of Heavenly Father´s children.

We hope you will all have a great November weekend coming up.

Two new grandbabies in one week...blessings galore...with Grandbaby #31 and Grandbaby #32

I had this blog originally typed in this pink -- but it's too hard to read on the lavendar background.

Before we could post a blog about our 31st grandchild, grandchild #32 has been born 5 days later. These cousins must be kindred spirits!

Michelle and Brian have a new Baby Girl born November 7, 2009, in Evanston, Wyoming. She joins 3 sisters: Emma, age 9; Taylor, age 6; and Avery, age 4. Since she came 4 weeks early, her name is being decided on. Brian W. Petersen, M.D., Orthopedic Surgeon, did not do the delivery. Watch for photos on their blog "Liviin' in the D" (they've just moved from Detroit) of each of the sisters holding this precious new baby. It would be fun if they would post Brian's fun announcement e-mail on their blog, too.

We are thankful Michelle and new baby daughter are doing well.* * * * * * *

Elizabeth Jane Brewer joins 3 brothers and 1 sister: Seth & Sarah, twins age 7; Benjamin, age 4, and Joshua, age 2. Her father, Jerry Brewer, M.D., Dermatologist, delivered her at the Mayo Clinic Hospital in Rochester, Minnesota, November 2, 2009. For fun photos of each of the kids holding this new sister, you can go to their blog from our blog list.

We are thankful Jen and new baby daughter - Elizabeth Jane - are doing well.