Teaching

As usual, we have been very busy.  We have started teaching a less active sister and her 2 non-member children, ages 12 and 9.  This is new for us.  She wanted sister missionaries and we have elders in our ward.  She agreed to let us teach them.  We have shared basic gospel doctrine about our Heavenly Father, Jesus Christ and the Holy Ghost.  We have given them a video about the last week of Christ's life and one on the Restoration of the Gospel.  It is a new experience for us and seems to be going OK so far.  We have been giving the children rides to church for three weeks now.  The Mom says that she is not ready to come to church.
We have been busy in the mission office, as well.  Mike sold two cars last week and will have some more to sell in about another week.  He is also trying to get all the oil changes caught up on the cars.  He started with 30 needing changing a couple of weeks ago and is down to about 15.
Tomorrow is the start of another "Transfer Week".  We will be really busy with new missionaries for a couple of days.  It is such an exciting time.  One of the sisters coming in tomorrow is from France.  Her assignment is English speaking, but we do have two French areas.
Yesterday we did an excursion with seven other couples.  One couple is going home on Tuesday.  We all traveled just over a hour to a rural area just outside of Kitchener.  We were in Amish and Mennonite country.  We went to the oldest covered bridge in Canada, called the Kissing Bridge.

We then ventured over to St. Jacob's Market.  We could have used a lot more time there.  We will go again. It was like a huge farmer's market with booths inside the buildings and outside as well.  We bought some jam, sausage, fudge, an apron and a lover's knot.  At the outside area of the market, the Amish kept their extra wares is an enclosed buggy.  These buggies are also called courting buggies.

We saw some Amish people driving on the road in a typical Amish buggy.  We also saw a buggy being towed by another buggy.  I didn't quite get the buggy being towed in the picture.

We all met up at Anna Mae's for dinner.  We had a fine Amish dinner with home made pie for dessert that was to die for. So many choices of pie.  The price was inexpensive too, $28.00 for the two of us.  There was also a huge bakery and gift shop attached to the restaurant.

Another Busy Week and a Convert Baptism in our Ward

 Another very busy week.  We finished our Zone Conferences on Tuesday and Wednesday.  We love meeting with the missionaries and watching them with their enthusiasm and love of the work.  On Wednesday, I had my first opportunity to teach someone in the parking lot while we were inspecting the cars.  She wanted to know why all the cars were lined up with their hoods up.  I explained that my husband, Elder Swendsen, was in charge of all the mission cars and we had to inspect them for cleanliness and mechanical problems.  We were at the Brampton Stake Centre beside the Toronto Temple.  She then asked why we had two churches side by side.  I was able to explain to her the differences between a chapel and a temple.  I told her of the sacred purpose of the temple and eternal families  I did not have any pass along cards or anything to give her.  I fixed that the next morning and we now have several card, pamphlets and a couple of Books of Mormon in our car.  Friday was the mission temple trip.  We do four sessions, 20 minutes apart starting at 7 AM.  /this is done before every General Conference.  Friday afternoon, several of the senior couples went out to the Sugar Shack.  This is some land owned by one of the bishops in the stake.  He has planted many maple trees and makes maple syrup.  We were able to see the operation and see how maple syrup is made.  His wife then provided a lovely dinner for all.

In between the Conference Sessions on Saturday, we went for a walk in the park that is right outside our apartment block.  We are anxiously awaiting spring when everything is green.  We have a small lake that had some geese and ducks in it.  There is also some good size bass and perch, according to a guy who was fishing.  The only setback was that there is a lot of garbage that people have thrown around, such a shame.

Today we gave a ride to two investigators from Nigeria to Conference.  The APs are teaching them.  They also stayed to a baptism afterwards.  Lukusa Kabeya was baptized into the Heart Lake Ward, which is the ward we are assigned to.  It is the first convert baptism in that ward for quite some time.  He is a fine man.  He talked to some sister missionaries and they sent him to our chapel and some elders taught him - all in about a 6 week period.

We are busy, tired but so very happy in serving in the Canada Toronto Mission.