Felt Flowers, Elder Kearon and Piano Project

Last fall when we visited the elderly center we saw several of the ladies make flower pins and jewelry.  This sparked an idea for Susan.  She thought that she could go to the elderly center and teach them how to make felt flowers.  Problem #1:  No felt in Bosnia.  Problem #2:  No "big shot" (circle punch) to cut out the circles.  She started asking around and found that there really was no felt material to be found.  If she had found the felt, last resort was to could cut out the circles by hand.  About this time, Jenifer Johnson (a fellow crafter) from her home ward made a comment on the blog.  When Susan responded to her comment that she was having problems trying to make these flowers, Jenifer offered to send her some felt.  Problem solved.  Not only did Jenifer send some felt, she had the Activity Day girls (ages 8 - 12) in her ward cut out the felt with the "big shot" and assemble them into kits.  These young girls went the extra mile and made lots of kits.   Lizzy and Sara, our daughters, were good enough to mail all the supplies to us.

      
We took the young elders to help communicate the instructions.  Sign languages works, but sometimes you need more than that.  The elderly center is a place where the seniors can go during the day.  Making the flowers together was a big hit. 

We will be going back to another elderly center later in the month of June.  Again we want to thank the Activity Day girls and their leaders, Jenifer Johnson and Jennifer Naylor, for all their help.  Not to forget a huge thank you to Lizzy and Sara who never complain of their Mother's requests. 

After our visit to the elderly center we along with the elders departed Tuzla for Belgrade, Serbia.  The purpose of our adventure was for a Area Presidency Mission tour of Adriatic North Mission by Elder Patrick Kearon and his wife.  Elder Kearon is the first counselor in the Europe Area Presidency.  The plan was a fireside on Monday night and a Zone Meeting for Serbia and Bosnia on Tuesday.  We gathered at the church on Monday evening to learn that Elder Kearon's flight had been delayed.  Back in January Elder Kearon was going to come visit, but his trip was cancelled because of a heavy snowstorm.  On Monday night the meeting started at 6:30pm and Elder Kearon and his wife were not able to get there till nearly 9:00pm.  The chapel was filled to capacity with people standing in the back and out in the hall.  Everyone was delighted when they were finally able to arrive and enjoyed the spirit that was present in the meeting.  Elder Kearon spoke of 60 years ago when the first party climbed Mt. Everest.  He told that when they got 300 feet from the top, two were chosen to make the final ascent.  Of course they made it, but no one knows who reached the top first.  This was to make the point that we can do great good, if we do not care who gets the credit.  It will take everyone working together to make it through life, but our Savior will help us the last 300 feet.  The Atonement takes care of everything else.  He also spoke about this video.   (See the video clip below.)  He reminded us that we do not have to carry the pain.  We need to let it go.

    https://www.lds.org/youth/video/reclaimed?lang=eng

The meeting on Tuesday was great as well.  We left in the afternoon uplifted and recharged to be better missionaries.  We arrived back in Tuzla about 8:30 Tuesday evening.

On Thursday we were invited to visit one of the local schools, Brčanska Malta.  Earlier in the month we were able to submit a project to help the school with an electric piano.  We were able to purchase the piano as well as provide the students in the class with T-shirts which had the Latter Day Saints Charities logo and the school logo on the front.  They used these shirts when they performed in their school competitions.  Upon entering the classroom we were seated in chairs reserved for us.  The class then performed several songs for us.  Music is taught to all the students and we were impressed with the quality of their performance.  One of the songs, even though performed in Bosnian, was a song which we recognized from when we in high school.  (Sealed with a Kiss)

We have a trip planned to the Dalmatian Coast next week.  We will go to Rijeka to meet with another senior couple there to see about potential humanitarian projects in that part of Croatia.  Till then . . .