Wales Across the Pond: Week 8

London England Temple

Saturday, November 2, 2024

The London temple is out of our mission. Since we are not allowed to drive our car out of mission boundaries, the only way we our allowed to attend is to catch a ride with members. It was our Cardiff Stake's temple day & Nathan and Jeanine East graciously gave us a lift. The 139 miles to the temple is about a 3hr & 20 minute drive. We had a wonderful day. The grounds of temple we extensive and beautiful. I loved the fall colors!

Tuesday, October 29th Zone Conference

Zone conference was held at the Wells Rd Chapel in Bristol where the mission office is also located. 4 zones were at this conference. About 90 Elder & Sisters.

President and Sister Mayall introduced their children, with spouses and grandchildren to all of the missionaries. They have 4 daughters and 1 son. They are a very close family. We were happy they could join us for a short time. Sister South, who works in the office put together a nice lunch for everyone. Hawaiian Haystacks! The conference was from 10:00 - 5:00. We gave the Cardiff sisters a ride to and from conference which is about 1hr 15min drive. Elders and Sisters taught about how to better plan their weeks and daily activities and how to better use social media in finding people to teach. A great day to be with half of the missionaries in the mission.

Dan Jones

This is a well know art piece of Dan Jones who was from Wales. He was a captain of a ship on the Mississippi where he heard of the restored gospel. He join the church and eventually was assigned to go back to England and Wales to teach the gospel to others. He was instrumental in bringing over 5000 people into the church in Wales, many who immigrated to the states to join the saints in Utah.

Poppy Appeal

Wednesday, Thursday & Friday

As a service this week Elder Herdt and I worked two 3hr shifts, one Wednesday and another on Thursday, for the Royal British Legion taking donations for Veterans. We ended up working an extra shift on Friday because one of the sisters in the ward got the flu. Always nice to be of service.

This brought back memories of school days when there were poster making contests for Veteran's Day. I remember poppies being sold an veterans being honored. I learned a few things this year that I had either forgotten or had never been taught.

* Veteran's Day / Remembrance Day here in the UK, is in memory of the end of World War I, which was on the 11 month, 11 day, & 11 hour in 1918. The leaf on the poppy should stand at the 11 o'clock position. The poppy should be worn over you heart. Here they have a remembrance day Sunday service, where they have a program in each town or village. Some wards have 2 minutes of silence in memory of the fallen soldiers at 11:00am. There will also be memorial services on November 11th. It is estimated that 15 - 22 Million civilian and military people lost their lives in World War I. 35 - 60 million died in World War II. Our Veteran's Day is in memory of all who served in wars over the years. War is such a waste of life.

Another 6.5 mile walk

Monday, November 4th

After a week of driving, we decided to just get out and explore the area on a walk up to Castell Coch. We have visited the castell several weeks ago but this time wanted to enjoy the area between our flat and the Castle.