Over the week-end of Sat & Sun Mar. 17 & 18th we had a fabulous District Conference.   Mission President Simmons was there along with the new missionary couple that will be in Bathurst.  They are Elder Sister Lindmark from Tooela, Utah.   Pres Barr and Sister Barr, the Sydney Temple Pres. was here.   Conference was held in our chapel here in Orange because it is the largest building and the district center.   The chapel was almost full.   It was a wonderful sight.   It was so good to see these dedicated people that have to travel so far to come and worship.   One lady is 6 hrs away if she does not stop.   People were really encouraged to get their recommends because the only one that can sign it for the stake signature is the Mission Pres.   And he is not close to any of them very often.

Just for a side note.  President Barr was Ashley's mission President in the Baltic Mission back in 2002

We had 2 full days of spiritual uplifting.   Meals were served both days of Saturday and Sunday.   The Orange Branch sisters are encouraged to bring the desserts because they don’t have to travel. I took a Pretzel layered jello salad. I haven’t really seen them do anything with jello (which they call jelly). It was a real hit and several wanted my recipe. One lady said that several years ago another Sister missionary used to make it. This ladies son loved it and has been begging for more ever since. But she did not know how to make it so he never got it until now.    She of course was one begging for the recipe.

The Theme for the Conference was "Finding the One" The speakers spoke of Temples, doing our family history, and missionary work. We were encouraged to get out and do missionary work as Branch members and make these branches grow. If they got turn down by someone once, maybe this time they will be ready and accept the visit. Don’t give up. One inactive family that we have been working with was there at the Conference. So you never know when they are ready. The messages were so good we wish others had of been there. But we will work with them as they are ready.

That afternoon after the conference we made our regular rounds up to Dubbo. Teaching the Chinese family. We were just sick when the wife told us she had gone to church today and no one was there. She has not gone for so long that we did not even think to give her a flyer about the conference. Everyone had gone to Orange to church. We encouraged her to come next Sunday there in Dubbo.

Monday Mar 19^th I helped Josephine download Rootsmagic onto her computer. I tried to transfer all the information that I already typed into my computer onto her computer, but I haven’t learned how to do it and I couldn’t figure it out. So I will have to learn that and do it next week.

Monday evening was our 6^th Family game night.   We again had 21 people.   Most are regulars but tonight we had a man that had never come before He came with his wife that has come before.  It was good to visit with him finally.
Karl told me that he got off work late but he is always anxious to come and taste of my dishes that I bring. This time I brought a BIG Tator Tot casserole.   He just barely got a little taste by scraping the pan.   It went fast.

Patrice is asking more and more questions about baptism, marriage, Temple marriage, etc. I hope she is our next baptism.   We don’t really feel like we had a hand in her or Fiona’s interest in the church. But it is sure exciting to see these sisters choosing for themselves to come into the church.  The work is moving along, but slowly.

Ngatuakana sisters playing ping pong

Kotchell's in back, Fox brothers and Fiona in front playing Phase 10.

Elder & Sister (not pictured) Tietjen, Josephine and Boyd playing Dominoes.

Others outside playing basket ball, climbing light posts and playing on a scooter as seen in back ground

Update of Firesides and Family Game Nights

When we first got here Elder Tietjen had the idea to put on some Firesides about families. We will present it to every branch in our District.

Our 1^st fireside held Sun. Feb 26 in Bathurst we had 30-35 peopleThere was a much better turn out than I thought there would be.
Some inactive members came, an investigator and a non member that had found Elder and Sister Tonumaipe’a just the day before and asked a lot of questions about the church. They invited him to come and he came. I am not sure how many came but I am guessing about 30-35. Everyone thought it was really good. One person commented on how he liked the way Elder Tietjen stopped the video "Family Answers" every so often and discussed it. They all seemed to enjoy it a lot. I am so glad it was so successful. Elder Tietjen and Elder Tonumaipe’a has really worked hard on it. There was food and visiting following the fireside. 
Our 2^nd fireside held Sun. March 11 in Mudgee   All were strong members. This branch is really struggling. But they that came enjoyed the fireside, food and visiting.  We had 16 people, not including the 2 babies.

This Wed. March 14, Elder & Sister Tonumaipe’a will be leaving.
They will be leaving for their original assigned mission calling to Papua New Guinea.    They have been waiting for their Visa to come.    They have been here for 3 months and have really gotten in and worked hard and seen some progress with some people.  
They are a little sad to go to start all over at getting to know people and a whole new area.

There will be a new couple coming to replace them.    Elder & Sister Lindmark from Tooele, Utah.   They have been in Australia for their mission  for 1 month.   They will be coming to Bathurst Saturday March 17.    We will get together with them sometime and update them on some people in the area that both Elder & Sister Tonumaipe’a and us have worked with.   

Mar. 12 we had our 5^th Family Game night in Dubbo   We had 21 people come this week.  

Sister Kochel took the little kids and showed them how to do somersaults and did racing games with them while all the big people played basket ball.

The little girls even had fun climbing the light post

Brother & Sister K are BYUI students here on an Internship.    Brother K is from Canada and they will go back there until their semester starts in the fall and then they will be back to BYUI.      They will be leaving Australia in April.    We will sure miss them.    They have been a great blessing to this small Dubbo Branch.      The Fox brothers brought some nephews from New Zealand and a nonmember friend and the regulars came.   They all love it.    We had good food and everyone went out to play in the wonderful weather that we finally got.

An outing with Josephine and Kim

We went and picked up Josephine and Kim in Dubbo.   They are 2 of our inactive sister that we have befriended.   Josephine, knowing that we love to go see old cemeteries,  told us of a cemetery way out and probably forgotten about.    She guided us on how to get to the Old Dubbo Pioneer Cemetery

Here is Kim standing by a really tall headstone.

Josephine, Kim, Sister Tietjen

Josephine wanted us to get our picture in front of this big interesting tree.

After taking pictures of all the headstones in the cemetery they took us to see the Japanese Gardens.

We almost got swollowed up by a giant Australian Barking Gecko

I could not believe how smooth it was carved out of such a huge stone.

Sure hope these stepping stones don't sink

Wouldn't want one of those giant gold fish to swollow us up. 

It was such a lovely place.   Wish my back yard looked like this.

We ended our tour with visiting the Automated toilet.    By the wave of your hand you can get your TP,  water to wash your hands, towels to dry them etc.  And the whole time you are in there, it talks to you and plays music.    Josephine said they should have one up at Lightning Ridge.  They will think something from  outerspace  has landed.   No I haven't seen automated things around here.   Remember they are about 30 yrs behind times.  So everyone tells us.   This is a real novelty.

Josephine then took us to go see the Minore Falls where her son likes to go camping.   She has never been there and was sure that if there was a FALLS, it would be a little trikle running to a small pond.

So we went to find this here Falls.

Wow, what are getting ourselves into.   We are really out in the outback.

And downunder- Look how tall those plants are at the side of the road.

The road came to an end and we had to get out and walk.

Behold the fountain of filthy waters.

We did not even see a trikle of a Falls.
All the rivers are muddy like this.
We really had a good time with these 2 sisters.

More giant things

Here are some Yucca plants

These spikes are huge

Elder Tietjen was not very successful in moving this boulder.

Watch out above

We had made our rounds in Mudgee and we were heading home.   So we stopped at a cemetery to take some pictures.   We were just about to leave the Mudgee Monumental Cemetery when Elder Tietjen all of a sudden slams on the breaks and calls out.  "Look how big those things are"  Well they were on his side of the car so I could not see them.   But when I did, WOW.

Anyone care for a pinecone?

here are some lying amongst the graves

Watch out below for them thar babies

They measured about 9 inches high and are real heavy weights.   

We brought 2 home for our front door decor.

Celebrating my birthday in Australia as a Missionary

Mar. 1 was my birthday and my daughter Natalie asked what things I did "Australian Style" for my birthday.  
Valerie sent me a birthday card that all my children signed.   Can you believe it, one of those  slimmy slippery slugs got up into our mail box and ate holes in the envelope.     Besides being  folded in half to get it into the mail box and rained upon, the card turn out pretty good after rescuing it from it's delapidated envelope.   It was a beautiful card.

Wed Feb 29 we went to the Doyle's (in the rain) for our weekly Wednesday night dinner with them.   After dinner Elder Tietjen surprised me with a chocolate cake straight from the bakery with a battery powered tea light candle on top.   It actually looked pretty neat.    He also gave me a beautiful birthday card and the movie "Cars 2".   This was still at the Doyle's.     We have really bonded with the Doyle's and I could not think of anyone that I would have wanted to be with more (here in Australia) than them.    We then came home and watched the movie till midnight.

 
Thurs. Mar. 1 We are planning on presenting a fireside on the Family to 5 Branches.    The one in Mudgee on Mar. 11.    Elder Tietjen wanted to go to deliver some invitations to some inactives up in Mudgee.     

We left our house in Orange at 10:00 am, still Mar 1, and drove towards Bathurst in solid rain.
We stopped a little while in Bathurst to talk to the missionary couple there and Elder Tonumaipe'a wanted Elder Tietjen to help him give someone in the hospital a blessing.     So we went to the hospital and did that.

Then we drove up to Mudgee another 2 hrs north.  Still rain pouring.   The Doyle's have 2 inactive children living there that we wanted to give an invitation to.  We never could catch them home.    But I did capture this movie of a young kangaroo that got on the wrong side of the fence from 2 other kangaroos it was hopping with.   It finally figured out how to come back around the fence. 

We traveled up farther North to Gulgong  (still pouring rain) (and I mean pouring buckets, cats & dogs or England downpour, whatever you want to call it, it was doing it.)

We finally found one person home.   They lived way out on a dirt road way out in the bush.   If I would call someone living in the bush, these people did.    We were afraid to drive on the road for fear we would sink down into no where.   We were already out in no where with the rain pouring, no phone signal and on a dirt road.    Luckily we did not get stuck.    We were not invited into this house and they said they were not interested.  

As we left their house and traveled down the dirt road for a bit, we had to cross the railroad track.    I told Elder Tietjen that I should take a picture down the track and then I could paint a kangaroo hopping across it.   Right then a small black kangaroo hopped across the road in front of us.   What a coincidence.   And I did not have my camera ready.    

It was now getting dusk and raining so hard you could hardly see the road.   We decided that it was time to head home.   Wipers going full speed we headed over to Wellington to come home down to Orange.   We had to travel slow because of the rain.   

We got home in Orange around 11 pm and it was still raining. 

So I guess the Australian thing I did for my birthday was travel far into the bush, way downunder, on dirt muddy roads and pouring rain.

Just for an update: As of Sun Feb 26- Sun Mar 4, it has rained solid making a total of 8 days.  There is much flooding going on.   Don't worry, we are in a safe area.