Spiritual Highs this week

Monday May 9th, was our P-day, we went to Evanston and called the Bartons another missionary couple who had stayed in town overnight to meet us for lunch, we went to "Jodies" recommended by our trek directors. Tender mercies that the Stake Presidents wife and first counselors wife came in to eat. We told them to come out to the ranch for family night, we had the dessert and were having a missionary couple from last year a Naturalist to show us all his elk, bobcat, moose, beaver, coyote, wolf, bear pelts, or anthers for all these different animals. Fascinating night, and all the Stake Presidency and wives came.

Elder Call is in charge of teaching all the missionaries how to make handcarts. We each get to make one.

We had our two route reviews this week. We have to learn the routes, the routes that the trekkers are on and the support route for the port-a-johns and water buffalo, and the support roads for the food trailers. We have 9 weeks of trekking and we are the lead missionary couple on 3 of them. Each stake has to come and see their route, these take about three to four hours.

Still cold at night here, we had a frozen water one night, We bought an insulated water hose, but didn't realize you have heat tape the stand up pipe also, so heat tape was purchased.

Thursday May 12, Jolene Allphin the author of "Tell my story too" came and presented a morning side. What an  amazing morning, we could of listened  to her stories all day. A spiritual up lift to our week. She has done research on the handcart companies, each person and each rescuer on them. Such sacrifices they went through. Each morning at pray meeting we each share one of their stories. She shared the love story of Anson Call and Margaretta Clark, Anson is Elder Call's great-great grandfather. Anson was one of the rescuers. Elder Call shared this story in our farewell talk.

Some of our work assignments, includes, spraying weeds, cleaning, painting, welding, changing oil in trucks, making port-a-john plugs, mowing, building projects, venting the dryers, washing 7 farm trucks, moving handcarts, washing 6 side by sides, learning trails, and support routes, doing route reviews with the stakes coming, knocking down swallow nests, spraying the thistles on all the roads we trek on, picking up about 30 trash bags of garbage along our exit, and pounding in new stakes for the routes and adding arrows at critical points, covering the heat vents in the trek center, building carts, building steps and hand rails for the port-a-johns, fixing rivets for all the port-a-johns, hauling the handcarts to the staging areas, taking the pull bars and ropes to staging for the 150 handcarts. This is just some of the work projects we have each day, this is why it takes 6 weeks to get ready for the trekkers to come.

Friday May 13, at prayer meeting we were told of the Elder and Sister Caverhills who are service missionaries who builds buildings. They are on the ranch building at the cowboys headquarters that is on the other side about 30 miles away. We met them that night at the gate as we went to meet a stake there coming to rent a handcart. We invited them to our special meetings and they joined us at the Temple on Tuesday. Everyday there are these tender mercies.

Saturday May 14, This day was the sheep round up at the corrals by us and we enjoyed watching them do their work, they have quite the production line. One of the workers is in the Stake Presidency of the stake that is coming on route review next week. They don't like us taking pictures of what they do to the sheep for fear of PETA. So we just take pictures of the sheep dog taking a break. (BTW it is a big dog.)

After our work assignments we left the ranch for home for the weekend. It seemed really different to not be in our bubble of spirituality that is felt here. With only 11 missionary couples we are so isolated here and loving the spirit of this dedicated property set apart for the youth to come and feel of the pioneers and what they sacrificed for us.

We went to Jori Maxwell's wedding reception in Midway. Jori worked at the Testing Center. We had a wonderful visit with some dear friends for two hours as we set on the patio and visited. A relaxing night.

Sunday May 15, special baby blessing of Olivia Tregaskis, daughter of Alyson and David. This is Sister Call's daughters baby. A beautiful blessing given by David. We had a nice visit with family and shared some of our missionary moments.

Monday May 16, our P day and lots of weeds to take care of at our home, they grow fast in 3 weeks with all the rain, then Elder Call got some golf in with his son Jon, and Sister Call enjoyed tending Olivia for the day. It was nice to get back to the ranch where we feel it is our home and where we are to be at this time. We pulled in just as the missionaries were going to watch "Once I was a Beehive." Such a cute movie if you have not seen it I highly recommend it. Lots of laughing and some tears also shed among the missionaries.



Tuesday May 17, We had a wonderful trip to the Payson Temple and then dinner at the Family Tree restaurant in Santaquin. It was a long day, but a great day with the missionaries.

Wednesday May 18,
A beehive of activities at the ranch in order for our special guests. A fun  hot dog roast and campfire and games. We laughed so hard our stomachs hurt after we were done.

Thursday May 19, Elder Mark Durham and Elder Lynn Summerhays the new and released area authority 70's came to our pray meeting. This was another spiritual experience. We felt like we had our own little general conference just for us. Elder Durham, pronounced some really special blessing on us. This is a dedicated land set apart to bless the lives of the youth that come on these treks.

We all drove that afternoon to the far east side of the ranch to learn another escape route in case of fire. WOW was it beautiful with  deep canyons, aspens and pine trees, and streams. This is where the outfitters go fishing. We came out by Croydon, Utah and Lost Creek State Park. We then had dinner all together at Taggarts. Beautiful place and amazing food. Would very much recommend it. A end to a perfect day.

Addendum to Yesterdays Post Special Spiritual experiences

Sister Call and I are new to this Blogging business and don't always include what brought us here. So I laid awake last night thinking of all the things we left out. Especially, the spiritual moments and tender mercies that have happened everyday. And we have had these everyday since we have arrived.

This property we are residing on is dedicated to the Lord in remembrance of those who came before us. There is a spirit here that is hard to explain. We are preparing for the youth to come here and in a small part, experience how difficult it is to pull handcarts over open prairie up and down hills. These routes we are reviewing and getting to know are not easy routes to trek. There are many hills and ditches and rocks to cross over; sage brush to pull through, badger holes to avoid, some so big that they swallow up baby lambs, (one of which Elder Higginson had to rescue). Some hills are so steep that they have to tie ropes on the back of the carts with 4 people on each side to slowly lower the carts down these sharp grades. So this is not a flat walk in the park, but difficult, and the weather does not always cooperate. We trek in snow, rain, high winds and heat. One of the seasoned Elders said that the weather for each of these treks, is just what the Lord intended for the needs of these youth. We cover such a large area, that one trek may have rain and another will not see a drop on the same day.

Our other posts have shown you how much fun, and hard work we may be having or doing, but the spirit of these past saints seems to be present in everything we do. In our Prayer Meetings we have each morning we have a story about one or two of the members of the handcart companies followed by a scripture discussion. Many tears are shed when we hear these stories.

Names of members like, Peter Howard McBride (6 years old) and what he remembered as a survivor. His view of things were different than that of the adults. (Story from the book,"I walked to Zion") Here are some of his own words. "The next day we had nothing to eat but some bark from trees. Later we had a terrible cold spell; the wind drifted so much I knew I would die. The wind blew the tent down. They all crawled out but me. The snow fell on it. I went to sleep and slept warm all night. In the morning I heard someone say, 'How many are dead in this tent?' My sister said, 'Well, my little brother must be frozen to death in that tent.' So they jerked the tent loose, sent it scurrying over the snow. My hair was frozen to the tent. I picked myself up and came out quite alive, to their surprise.'

Sarah Frank and George Hadley (17 Miracles love story) the movie didn't tell you why he came on this handcart company. He was a master wheel maker, so he stayed behind making wheels for all the carts of the other companies.

Elisabeth Bradshaw with 5 children, Sara Ann (daughter) made 32 trips across a river carrying people. She remembers her dress had frozen icicles that clinked and made a tingling sound as she walked.

Robert Till became Robert the dipper, because he baptized so many people in England.
Albert Jones, Samuel Jones, Mary Ann Greening, they all have stories. We learn more about them every day.

Their spirit is here. When it's cold or windy or raining and we have to do something out side it seems not so terrible anymore. We get to go back inside and get warm. We have food and shelter. Our spirits are lifted.

The biggest and most common thing among these handcart saints is that they believed in Jesus Christ, that His church was restored, that he had called Joseph Smith as His Prophet. They all had a desire to come to Zion to listen to a Prophets voice. How could I not have their faith and strength? We have the Prophet so close to us. We watch conference from our homes. We have it so much better than these saints who struggled so much on the plains. I know that Jesus Christ lives. He has called a modern prophet in Thomas S. Monson. He has guided us to be here on this mission. Our hearts are turning toward our Fathers and those who came before us. The spirit is strong here. In the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.

A Week of work, weather and fun.

Monday May 2nd, we drove the side-by-sides on our first trail. There are 6 trails that we trek on and they are about 28-30 miles over 4 days. We have to learn each one, since they are through fields and so you have posts that you follow about every 100 yards or so apart. We had to stop and fix some posts and the arrows on them. Spencer found some antler sheds along the way. We were so dusty when we got back. We were out with the trek directors and I said, "This is not a mission, this is like a play day every day." WOW do we have a great mission.

We were in charge of family night so Spencer demonstrated the AED defibrillator to them and then we played the game of two truths and one lie. A game from girls camp. We sure had a fun time getting to know the other missionaries better.

Since Monday was to be our preparation day, we didn't get one this week, but had so much fun.

Tuesday we drove another trail this time with 8 missionary couples. We stopped for lunch and played a fun game called, "chicken, taco, boom," ask us sometime and we will have to play it. Another long fun day.

Wednesday May 4th was a work day and with 20 people you can get a lot done. This mission we are doing things we have never done before. Gaylene is on the lawn committee and so we had to get all the hoses out and check for leaks and connections, YES we do have some grass among the sagebrush. Then we filled in all the badger holes with dirt. Four loads of dirt, they dig big holes in the lawn, Then learned how to drive the riding lawn mower, learned how to wash out the side-by-sides, and how to hook up the fire hose for washing out the ranch trucks.

We then power washed out the pavilion, and picnic tables, took apart an old satellite dish and moved it out of the way. Spencer is on the weed spraying committee, so figured out the sprayers and you take the side-by-sides and one drives and the other goes along the dirt roads and sprays the thistles. There are lots of roads so this will take weeks to get it done. Some worked on the port-a-johns, some cleaned out our "skunk shed" some buying materials, so many ongoing projects to do before the trekkers come.

We had a fun flag raising ceremony that Spencer did. The flag is right out our window and is so fun to see it flying, We have a light on it at night.

There were 4 truck loads of sheep delivered, and they were so cute. It reminds Sister Call of growing up in Heber City, and we would have to shut the gate when the sheep came by that were being herded.

Thursday May 5th was learning another trail, Yes this is a mission with lots of fun. Our director said this sure beats hitting the pavement every day and I agree. We then went to dinner that night at Don Pedro's and attended the play Oklahoma preformed at the High School. The kids did a great job for a small High School, with a graduating class of 175.

Friday and Saturday were busy work days of finishing up the last of 150 handcarts, of tightening the bolts, checking the boards and wheels and anything else that needs fixed. Each cart has about 50 bolts, so 7,500 bolts, that why it takes many missionaries to do the labor,

We cut out 48 new port-a-john plugs, Each port-a-john driver has to plug the toilets before it is moved to the next stop. Oh the joys of trekking.

Elder Call is on the handcart committee so he made a sample handcart and then all the missionaries get to make a cart. Sister Call learned to use a router, more things to learn.

We have had all kinds of weather the last two weeks, from snow to rain, to hail, to sunshine.

Happy mothers day on Sunday May 8th

Information Overload Week 2

This week our training was intensive with learning all that we needed to do for the treks. We got all the assignments for what Treks we will be head missionaries on and which ones we will be the second missionary couple. We have to learn the trails that we will be on. We called the stakes we are lead missionaries on to schedule them to come up for a 4 hour route review before their stake comes, for their trek. We have to learn the trails that the youth trek on and also the support roads that the kitchen staff comes on to set up camp each night, the port-a-john stops and water buffalo stops. There are 6 different trails to learn and each one is about 30 miles long for a 4 day 3 night trek.

We have 11 trek missionaries that are staying here in the missionary compound. Each morning we have prayer meeting and tell missionary stories. Spencer shared some of Anson Call's story the morning we were assigned.

Cows are delivered. There are over 1300 cows that are being delivered to be branded, vaccinated, and tagged, and cut. All week about 4 semi's of cows were delivered from around promontory point. We had quite the choir of mooing every day. The corral is right next to our compound. We fed the cowboys lunch on Friday. It was fascinating talking to them at lunch. They all work for the ranch and have bachelors and masters degrees.

A lot of morning we woke up to a skiff of snow and Friday we woke up to one of the missionaries scraping our porches. With the wind blowing it dries up really fast. We have all temperatures every day. If you don't like the weather wait a few minutes and it changes.

Wednesday April, 27 we went to the Ogden Temple and it was a nice outing. We then ate in the cafeteria after our session there. It seemed so different to see green grass and flowers again since we are away from it here at the compound. We then went shopping at Costco, and Home Depot for supplies for projects at the ranch.

Thursday and Friday April 28,29 were spent bringing in part of the 150 handcarts to be checked out. Each one has to have all the bolts tightened and screws tightened, and see if boards need replaced, or repairs done. We also get to build some new ones. We started the first one, and have another month to do a lot more projects, before the treks start. Each missionary couple has different assignments to work on. Many hands make light work.

Saturday April 30, 2016 We left at 6:00 am and went to see the greater sage-grouse mating dance. We watched about 29 males do their mating ritual with two hens. Each Spring at dawn the  greater sage-grouse puff their chests and fan their starburst tails like avant-garde turkeys. They act like Jr High boys, trying to win the hens.Where they hang out is called a "lek" so we saw a lek of sage-grouse.

This is a little information overload for the week for you to read all this. But we are loving our mission and so glad to be here.