Week 33
Sometimes we don't know what to expect when the FHE activity is announced--so Disney Food Art meant nothing to us.  Well, each group got $10 to go the the grocery store and buy whatever they needed to create a scene from a Disney movie using food.  Our group went for simple but dramatic.  We bought some dry ice, an apple, and some white icing, and made the poison apple from Snow White (and we added some live action).  The witch pulled the apple from the smoking cauldron, gave it to me, I took a bite and collapsed.  Prince Charming then rode on the scene and gave me a kiss to wake me up.  "And the crowd went wild."  The other picture is a darling Finding Nemo scene--all food.

Classes went well this week--in Church History we talked about the years David O. McKay was the prophet.  He became the prophet a month after Kerby was born, so we've been alive for 8 of the 16 presidents of the Church.  We told the students that from this point on it's still history to them, but it's all memories for us!

Wednesday was Zone Conference.  It was President Walkenhorst's last, as he'll be released at the end of the month.  The theme of his message was obedience, and it was excellent.  One memorable thing he said is that you can't be something that you haven't paid the price to become.  

Yesterday we decided to go to Ponca City (45 miles north) after our service at Elite Repeat.  We'd heard the city referred to since we got here, so wanted to see what it was like.  Our first stop was the Marland Mansion, and then the Conoco Museum.  E. W. Marland was an oil magnate who negotiated with the Ponca chief to allow oil drilling on their land.  From there a large refinery was built in 1918 and is still in operation (not the original, of course, but the location), making it among the oldest operating refineries in the US.  Marland later acquired the Continental Oil Company (CONOCO), and about 960 people in Ponca City are employed there.  

Horse-drawn oil "tanker"

Now, just in case you think interesting things don't happen in Oklahoma, here's more of the Marland story.  He and his wife, Virginia, had no children, so in 1916 they adopted his wife's sister's children (George, 19 and Lydie, 16) and sent them to private schools, etc.  Virginia died in 1926, and in 1928 E. W. had the adoption annulled so he and Lydie could marry!  He'd always wanted to live in a palace, so he built a 55-room (including 10 bedrooms, 13 baths, and 3 kitchens) mansion on a 30-acre estate.  It had all the latest innovations for 1928, and really was fun to see.

The Mansion

Kerby with George

Sculptures on the estate

E. W. had great respect for pioneer women, and commissioned a statue of Pioneer Woman to be installed in Ponca City.  He had a contest of 12 sculptors making 3 foot tall statues which toured 12 cities where people voted for their favorite.  (Replicas of the 12 are in the mansion--they're wonderful.)  In 1927 the winner, entitled Confident, was announced. The 27-foot statue was erected in Ponca City soon after. 

E. W. went on to become a US senator and then the 10th governor of Oklahoma.

Today, Elder Kerr gave a great talk about repentance in sacrament meeting.  The person who was originally assigned to speak went out of town, so Kerby was asked on Wednesday.  When the sisters came to dinner, they told him that the investigator who was with them said that the talk was exactly what she needed to hear, and it was like he was speaking directly to her.  Nice when the Spirit does that, isn't it?

Week 32
Whenever there is a baptism, that is absolutely the week's highlight.  Daniel was baptized yesterday, and will be confirmed today.  He is a wonderful young man who was raised in the Catholic church, but has explored many other faiths.  In March he wandered by the booth the sisters set up on campus every week, and invited the missionaries to tell him more.  His family is very opposed to his decision to join the church, but he feels absolutely right about it.  We sat in on his final lesson with the sisters on Friday, and we're so excited to have him join the ward.  Last week we decided that we'll give a quadruple combination scripture set to every new convert.  When we give Daniel his, his face lit up like a Christmas tree!  He really loves studying the scriptures and was genuinely pleased to have his own quad.

The sisters, Daniel, and Anthony

On Tuesday there was a Seminaries and Institutes training broadcast--absolutely wonderful, of course.  In addition to the S & I director and a panel discussion, other speakers were Sister Neill Marriott, of the Young Women, and Elder Kim Clark.  The focus of the training was the new Doctrinal Mastery plan for seminaries.  We have remarkable youth, and this will give them remarkable tools to navigate life challenges.  One speaker mentioned a BYU-I devotional talk given by Sherri Dew called Will You Engage in the Wrestle? We watched it this morning, and highly recommend it.  http://www.byui.edu/devotionals/sheri-dew 

Yesterday morning was another S & I in-service at our building for all the teachers in our area.  Brother Valletta led a great discussion about Elevate Learning and obtaining (not just receiving) the word in order to teach with power.  The word of God, the Spirit, and our desire to love and teach the students are required to be effective (D & C 11: 21).  We made cinnamon rolls and a big fruit bowl for the refreshments.  

We got a little busier this week with our classes.  We have previously taught two of the Church History classes, alternating with Brother Valletta, but this week we took over the class for the rest of the summer.  The topic this week was Postwar Recovery, and we had some incredible stories from Europe and the Pacific to share.  The book On Wings of Faith by Babbel was a great source of information about Ezra Taft Benson's 11-month mission to assess the needs, re-open missions, and get welfare services relief the the people all over Europe.  Also this week we started teaching the Missionary Preparation class while the stake teachers assigned to it take off six weeks to have a baby.  Baby girl is supposed to come this week.

The weather was very hot and humid this week.  Over 100 degrees a couple of days, with heat advisories (meaning that the combined effect of the temperature and humidity felt like 110 degrees or more).  We had an errand to run on Thursday, so decided to walk to a building on campus that is not awfully far away.  We were totally wilted by the time we got back, and that was with a stop at the Union to get a lemonade and cool off!  The elders and sisters trade off having the car or biking every couple of days.  Shortly after we got back to the institute on Thursday the poor sisters arrived--their day on bikes and I thought we were going to have a couple of cases of heat exhaustion on our hands! 

 Last night we wandered around the pond in our apartment complex and saw this incredible sunset.  I think Heavenly Father simply goes out of His way to make beauty for His children!

The sunset reflected in our pond

Week 31
Another quiet week in Stillwater.  Summer has arrived, and we've been at or above 90 degrees every day this week.  So far our ceiling fans and air conditioning are keeping us comfortable.  We haven't had any thunderstorms this week.  There is one wonderful compensation for living in a hot, humid area--fireflies!!  We watched our first ones this week, and they make me just as excited as they did when I was young living in Missouri.

Elder Kerr wasn't getting enough attention, so he donned this boot for the week:

Going for sympathy

Actually, he decided to do a little jogging around the pond two weeks ago, and felt his Achilles tendon get sore.  After a week it was still swollen and painful, so we went to the walk-in (well, in his case hobble-in) clinic, and they prescribed some steroids and a boot.  His foot feels much better, but still a little sore when he walks.

Home evening was water games on Monday--here they are playing water balloon volleyball and water balloon battleship:

I finished two kimonos for the Wondertorium on Tuesday, and here are a couple more just waiting to be hemmed this week.  I made two more out of cute teenage mutant ninja turtle fabric so the boys have something fun to wear.

While taking a different way home one day, we came across this charming and inviting corner:

It says "Westwood Neighborhood Little Free Library"

I hope every little kid in the neighborhood borrows a book and sits on that bench!

Friday, Jake, who's working on his PhD in animal science, stopped by the institute and invited us to come over to his apartment for some kabobs.  The only other folks there were two of his lab cohorts and the wife of one of them.  It was fun to visit and eat grilled kabobs, corn, and pineapple.

The beef guy really knows how to grill!

Tuesday Twiddles was cancelled this week because it was our ward's turn to clean the temple after the 7:30 session.  Three young women rode down with us.  One of the things that impresses us constantly is the dedication of our YSAs to doing what's right and good.  Several of them have committed to going to the temple every week--that's a 1 hour 15 minute drive each way, on top of their school and work responsibilities.  What a privilege to work with these fine young adults!!

Week 30

Lots of wonderful highs this week.  Three young women in our ward received their endowments, so we went to the temple on Tuesday, Friday, and Saturday.  Friday and Saturday were two siblings, one of whom is going on a mission in July.

Molly on Tuesday

Jennifer and Sienna on Friday/Saturday--with their other sister Jessica and friend Michael

There is a lot of construction on the interstate on the way to OKC.  On Tuesday it delayed us for only about 5 minutes, so we weren't worried about leaving too early on Friday.  Big mistake--traffic was completely stopped several times and moving at 5 miles an hour for long distances.  Our friendly google maps app told us we would arrive at our destination (the temple) at 1:30--the time the session was to start.  We kept debating whether or not to get off on an exit and take surface streets, but Kerby just felt strongly we should stay on I-35, so we did.  When we finally got past the construction, it was clear sailing (and I drove just a bit above the speed limit) and we arrived at 1:17--cutting it a little close, but on time.  One of the little tender mercies we experience so often.

Along the roadsides lots of the wild flowers from early spring are gone, but they have been replaced by gaillardia--a hardy prairie flower that just happens to be the state wildflower of Oklahoma.  I've been growing them in my garden in Utah for 20 years--who knew?!?!

Zillions of these happy guys along the freeway

This was transfer week for the missionaries, and Sister Liddell (who has been here since two weeks before we got here) was transferred to Shawnee.  This was her first move, but she was still here on Monday for the FHE bowling trip--Wednesday was the actual transfer day.

Sisters Liddell, Smith, and Christensen

Since Monday was a holiday I spent a couple of hours playing with the new serger.  It is an engineering marvel, hence it was quite hard to figure out--will actually work on the kimonos for the Wondertorium this week, so we'll see how well I did figure it out.

Kerby made me include this dreadful picture

We make little magnetic labels for each missionary who leaves from our ward and they get posted on the Called to Serve world map.  Our predecessors, Elder and Sister Andersen got it started and we think it's a great tradition.  Here is Ammon putting his on Roseville, CA.

Tuesday Twiddles seems to be a success--15 YSAs there on Tuesday, with some whole group games and several sub-groups later on.  Not a lot more to report this week, but we are grateful for scriptures, words from living prophets, and our institute classes.