A Marathon and a Museum

 Died and gone to heaven this past week...except for the humidity. But you take what you can get.

The Montréal Marathon was held this morning and the runners came right past our apartment building. It made for kind of a loud Sabbath, but it was fun to see.

Sister Diane Clawson and I visited a history museum in Old Port. It’s the Château Ramezay built in 1706.

This is one of the two kitchens. See the wooden wheel in the wall next to the fireplace? It's hooked to the spit and they put a little dog in there to run which turned the spit. Not sure how I feel about using dogs that way.

I did NOT know that the U.S. tried to make the Montréal area a 14th colony!

We had a tour guide dressed in period costume who was a retired chemistry professor from McGill University. The really interesting thing is that he kept throwing in personal family connections to the history of the house and people that he mentioned because his ancestors were connected to the Ramezay family. I left him the website of Family Search before we left.

Is this happening in YOUR neck of the woods too? I love that they're maple  leaves...since I'm in Canada. 

I feel like things are really expensive here in Montréal. This tiny bottle of nail polish, which I needed for a hangnail, put me back $6!!

Friday was transfer day. This photo reminded me of a bunch of teenagers hanging around in Sister L's kitchen. I love that our office secretary, Sister L, creates a warm and welcoming place for our young missionaries in the office. From what I hear, it hasn't always been that way.

Elder B and Elder H visited us at the archives last week on their P-day. I'm sad I never thought to get a good picture of them. But here they are helping Elder H with a new contraption he's building. I had Elder B try a few captures just for fun.

And there he is, Elder B. He's gone now. He "graduated" from the mission. I miss him. There is truly something special about him. He is a magnificent young man.

Who knew that you could use tampons to scrub your sink ?!?

Our parking garage is super dusty. If you don't get a car wash every 2 weeks, the other missionaries decorate your car. I'm happy to report that my car is now much cleaner than in this photo.

A few months ago I started playing the organ for the Mandarin branch. I am not  an organ player. I don't know the first thing about it! I played the piano for a baptism after church today and it felt soooo good to be back on a familiar instrument!!

Running number of captures: 108,295

Setting Foot in a New Land

Well, between traveling across the country, getting internet set up, and dropping my phone with a deadly result, I'm a week behind on my blog post.

I spent a week driving across the country with these two: my sister, Kathy, and my African son, Jared.

The view from the back seat which was dubbed "the cave."

No pictures from here on out because of said dropped phone. After I dropped the phone the screen went black but the phone still works. It's a $250 repair so it's a goner. 

We dropped Jared off in Washington DC so he could get a replacement passport. Then Kathy and I headed to the Canadian border.

I was warned that Canadian border crossings for missionaries can be difficult and potentially take hours. We spent a total of 15 minutes at the border. And that was even after discovering that I had no car registration documentation in my car! I'd call that a tender mercy.

The other senior missionaries have taken such good care of us (Kathy stayed in Montreal for 4 days)!! They've shown us around, fed us dinner twice, helped us get set up with groceries and internet, given us free tickets to attend the symphony next week, and EVEN loaned me a phone for a week until I get my own replaced! I could hardly believe that one!

I've attended 2 wards and 1 branch the past two weeks. It has been a true missionary initiation. I've played the piano for sacrament meeting twice, shared a testimony at the request of one bishop, and I'll be speaking in church next week. And all of this before even being assigned a ward to attend  because I have yet to meet the mission president!

I've been learning more about my assignment to do digital captures of historical documents. And a  missionary couple who is leaving next week has given me some good tips on how to pass the time while doing this mundane, yet crucial work of document capture.

I'm starting to settle into my mission and become acclimated.