Transfers

The first part of this week was spent in recovering from a terrible head cold.  Susan started coming down with it on Friday night and by Sunday she was down for the count.  Monday Gary started to get it.  Drinking lots of herb teas and taking the essential oils that our daughters have sent helped us to recover.  By Thursday we were both feeling much better. 

It was a good thing that we felt better on Thursday as we were scheduled to go to the town of Osijek, Croatia.  Once again it is about a 3 hour drive from Tuzla.  We arose early and arrived there close to 10:30am.  In Osijek Elder and Sister Preston have been helping us develop a project.  It is working with a home for psychologically ill adults.  The patients currently live in an institutional setting.  The government of Croatia has implemented a program that patients with the capability to become more self-reliant could be moved to live in an apartment or home setting with the hope of gaining more independence.  The residents will shop for their groceries, cook their own meals, care for their clothing and clean their apartment with staff supervision.  This has been a community effort.  The government has provided the apartments and has remodeled the interiors with new walls, ceilings, floors and windows.  They updated the plumping, electrical, heating and cooling systems.  The Church is providing the basic household appliances.  Other organizations are providing furniture, bedding, closets and dishes.  One the patients who will be moving into one of the three self-reliance apartments is a member of the church from the Osijek branch.  Our primary purpose in driving to Osijek was to pay for the refrigerators, washing machines and stoves for three independent living apartments.  We also enjoyed seeing the work that has been done and in visiting with the Prestons.

After going to the store to purchase the appliances and arranging delivery we had the opportunity to visit the three apartments.  Like our apartment, from the outside they do not look like much, but they have done an excellent job remodeling the interiors.  The pictures are not much, but you get the picture.  One apartment even had the furniture in it and is ready to be moved into once the appliances are installed.

 

We spent the rest of the week getting several projects ready to close as well as submitting a new clean water project for approval.  We also continue to make notes and get things ready for our replacements. 

 

Friday morning we got word on missionary transfers.  All the missionaries have been very anxious about this transfer.  Elder Sheridan will be training a new missionary here in Tuzla.  Elder Graham will be going to Banja Luka to work with Elder Fausnaught.  Elder Stuart who has been in Banja Luka will be going to Karlovac, Croatia to replace Elder Brown who is going to be working in the mission office. Elder Quinn will be staying in the office.  Elder Meline is going to Rijeka.  As a side note, Elder Merl will be training a new missionary as Elder Compton is going home on Tuesday along with Elder Kroff.   Our sisters will be staying her in Tuzla.  We hate to see Elder Graham leave.  He is a great young man and he is our pianist.  But we will live, and the Lord will provide.  We are delighted to be able to keep Elder Sheridan and Sister Matthews and Sister Orgill.  They have all done such a wonderful job with the work here.  As we left church today everyone was gathered around the keyboard singing "I Know That My Redeemer Lives".  

 

 

 

With next week being conference, we look forward to being able to hear the messages that the Brethren have prepared.  Since we do not yet have the Internet in our church building, we will have Fast Sunday as always.  Then we will be able to download the talks and share the messages in the following weeks with our members.  Everyone is anxious to be spiritually fed and hear the word of the Lord.  

 

We also want to acknowledge birthdays this last week.  Rebecca and Jordan share their birthday on the 24th.  Landon is now our favorite 6 year old.  They all had a wonderful day. 

 



 

Media Interview

This was a full week!

Monday we went to Kalesija municipality to attend a closing ceremony for our water project in the village of Hrasno.  Actually we will be closing Phase One of the Hrasno project.  We are in the process of submitting Phase Two of this water project.  We went to the Mayor's office where we visited for a short time and then drove to the project site itself.  This has been a great project.  The local people did all the labor.  The Church helped to supply the materials - pipe, cement, connections, etc.  The local people located an underground spring and built a cement box to capture the spring water and laid pipe to bring the water to those in need.  

 

 

 

Tuesday we stopped by the visa immigration office here in Tuzla to inquire about our visas which will expire October 10th.  We received instructions on what to do, which means we will be able to stay through the end of November.  Check that off the list of "to do's''.

 

Early Wednesday morning we drove with our translator the 2 1/2 hours to Sarajevo for a meeting with the Canton Sarajevo Minister for Education, Science and Youth.  We would like to do a vision screening project in Sarajevo next year.  Hence we will need to meet with the same partners we worked with in Tuzla in order to begin a project in Sarajevo.  The Minister liked our proposal.  Now we will need to meet with the hospital, Institute of Public Health, outpatient clinic, and the Red Cross.

 

Thursday we had the opportunity to go the  Tuzla UKC Hospital where we had a media interview.  The sister missionaries were invited to go with us.  The Church provided some basic vision equipment to the hospital.  Much of their equipment was over 40 years old and in need of repair.  The staff at the hospital trained all the volunteers who did the vision screening in the schools.  This training was provided free of charge.  The UKC Department of Pediatric Ophthalmology has been an outstanding partner to work with.

 

 

Friday was our district meeting.  We have some wonderful missionaries serving in Tuzla at this time.  They are doing wonderful work with the members and investigators.  They have suggested that each member have a calling to help them feel a part of our group.  We are thankful to have these outstanding young people to serve with.

 

One final note.  We received a call from President Rowe asking if we would delay our travel home plans until November 26th.  Of course we said yes.  Therefore that is our departure date/arrival date - we even have an email confirmation of our flight plans.  It really does not seem real yet, but I guess we better start getting use to it.    

 

 

Goodbye Elders, Hello Sisters

As we told you in our last post, this new round of transfers threw us for a loop.  We lost Elder Quinn to the mission office, Elder Kroff to the president's assistance duties, and Elder Stuart to Banja Luka.  Sunday night we literally "packed" everything Elders Kroff and Stuart owned into our car and drove them half-way to Banja Luka.  Elder and Sister Ivins met us at the half-way point.  We then packed them and their stuff into the Ivin's car which is a wee bit smaller than ours.  They had the back of the car totally full of suitcases (too bad we forgot to take a picture).  They also had more suitcases stacked in between them in the backseat.  Not to mention, they had things on the floor in between their feet and stuff on their laps.  The drive was only 1 1/2 hours to the half-way point, so it could have been worse. 

Monday morning we packed all of Elder Quinn's things into our car.  Elder Sheridan only had to take an overnight bag, so we did not have nearly as much in the car.  We drove to Zagreb where we dropped the elders off at the Mission Office.  We were able to see several other missionaries and pick up the mail for Tulsa.  All the missionaries who are going home meet at the misson office.  They usually all travel from the MTC to the mission together, so it is like a family reunion.  They spend their last night at the mission home.  It is interesting to see how they have grown from their service.  We have seen several go home and miss them and their influence for good in this mission.

We took care of our meetings regarding wheelchairs and water projects with the Croatia Red Cross in Zagreb on Tuesday morning and then returned to Tuzla.  Late Wednesday night the sisters arrived in Tuzla.  We met with them on Thursday and helped them get registered at the immigration office.  Thursday was also Gary birthday so we went out to lunch to celebrate.  Thursday night the elders arrived by bus.  We always try to pick them up at the bus station as they have lots of luggage.  This time they also had some of the sisters' luggage. 

Our new missionaries are Sister Matthews from Heber City, Utah, Sister Orgill from St Louis, Missouri and Elder Graham from Sandy, Utah.     

This week we also took care of things in the office as well as made a payment for supplies to rebuild a primary school restroom in an outlying village.   Friday we met with the Ministry of Education and the University Klinical Center Hospital to discuss the plan to continue the vision screening of all school age children (31,000) in Tuzla Canton (county) this fall.  We also worked on ideas for going to Sarajevo to see about implementing a potential vision screening program there as well. 

Summers are slow in Bosnia.  Everyone goes on vacation.  These vacations are anywhere from one week to six weeks long.  We have learned that Europeans are serious about their vacations.  Speaking of vacations, our own children recently gathered together in Utah.  Rebecca and her family came down from Canada.  Reachel and her family came from Arizona.  They had a great day at Snowbird.  They shared it with us via pictures on Instagram. We look forward to the time when we can once again vacation together.       

We always have the missionaries over for Sunday dinner.  Today we are having Hawaiian Haystacks.  Everyone has been fasting, so there will not be leftovers.  But there are never any leftovers - hungry missionaries.

 

TRANSFERS!

We received word about transfers on Thursday.  There had been many rumors and much speculation so everyone was anxious for the final word.

Elder Quinn will be going to Zagreb to work in the Mission Office.  Elder and Sister Erwin had to go home unexpectedly as Elder Erwin was having some health problems.  Since Elder Quinn is quite good with computers, he will be working with Elder Meline in the Mission Office.

Elder Kroff will be going to Zagreb where he will be an Assistant to the President.  His companion will be Elder Mecham.

Elder Stuart will be going to Banja Luka.  His companion will be Elder Fausnaught. Both Elder Stuart and Elder Fausnaught have been in country since the first week of June.  They will be challenged with the language, but the Lord will help them work miracles.

Elder Sheridan will remain in Tuzla.  He will be training a new missionary who will arrive in country on Tuesday. 

Tuzla will be getting sister missionaries this transfer.  We know that we will be getting Sister Matthews who came in April along with Elder Sheridan.  She will be training a new missionary as well.  Rumors had it that maybe we would have a local sister serving a mini-mission, but no word as of yet.  Rumors are rumors.

We had a wonderful meeting today.  Elder Kroff and Elder Quinn gave talks.  Elder Stuart shared his testimony.  The closing song, "Families Can Be Together Forever" was sung in Bosnian by the Elders.

We drove Elder Stuart and Elder Kroff to the half way mark to Banja Luka this evening.  Tomorrow morning we will take Elder Sheridan and Elder Quinn to Zagreb.  Tuzla is in some big changes and we are excited to see where it will all take the future of the church here.