Mission Training Center - April - May 2013

Sunday, April 21, our friends Barry and Peggy Oliver picked us up and drove us to the airport.  We enjoyed our visit with them in the car. I got so excited, I forgot to take my camera out of my purse and take a picture!!!  When we arrived in Salt Lake, our friends Dave and Georgia Owens picked us up and drove us to Provo.

Georgia looks great and feels much better.  She is completely off of the steroids and although she says she tires easily, she is fun to be with.  That night the BYU Men's Chorus sang for us at the Sunday Devotional.  What a treat that was.

Monday we began our week of missionary training.  We found our friends from the Nauvoo Temple, Alma and Fred Bignall.  They are going to the German Alpine Mission.  We got to know them better this week and were really impressed with them. 

We also found our friends from North Gate First Ward, Joe and Jean Riggs.

This is not a good picture of Wayne, but he said, "Use it anyway".  We went out to dinner with the Riggs on Wednesday night and then again the following Wednesday night.  They have a car here, which they are leaving with a son.  Wheels make a big difference.  Joe and Jean are going to Madrid Spain. 

We have enjoyed the speakers who have come for devotionals on Tuesday and Sunday.  The missionary choir sings on Tuesdays.  There are 850 voices and they are wonderful.  They get 2 practices for each performance.  For Relief Society, Sunday, our guest speaker was Sister Bonnie Oscarson, the new President of the Young Women.  She said it was her first official assignment. 

There are 3,000 missionaries on campus right now.  They are expecting to have 6,000 by August.  We can see small changes daily in how they do things, to get the job done.  Yesterday, I watched from my window as a good sized truck was loaded with luggage.  There were two enormous busses warming up.  That was the group going out.  Today a new bunch came in.  It was fhe first time I saw missionaries with "HOST" stickers on their jackets.  Each host had a new missionary in tow to give them a tour of the place.  Here's the dining hall, here's the laundry, here's the bookstore, etc.  The dining hall is now open half an hour earlier than last week, so that not everyone hits it at the same time.  There is still plenty of food, but not as many choices.  It is amazing how they feed everyone.