We're Raising the Roof Here on the Farm

The men are making great progress on the garages.  Here are a few pictures which are self explanatory.

 Walls went up first.  Bruce is still pretty agile for a Senior Missionary!

When the trusses first arrived they were 8 feet too short due to a manufacturing error.  It was fixed later that same day.

In other news, last week we had our first Semi-annual Zone Conference with the Smith's and our Directors from Salt Lake.  We were well fed, enlightened by the Spirit, and enjoyed showing off our projects.  Our 5-minute presentations were centered around the Articles of Faith.  We each had to pick one and talk about how our life has been influenced by it.  Our focus of study for the next 6 months is on the Articles of Faith, which will be fun to study.    One funny part was that at the beginning and the end of the conference we sang all the verses of two hymns...acapella.  Well, with only 7 people there (our Farm Manager joined us but didn't sing), the songs sounded somewhat lame because the range was way too high for everyone, and none of us come near Tabernacle Choir quality.  At the end of the conference our Director was praising our efforts and giving us instruction but added, "I know I'm just preaching to the choir....".  After his third reference to this I piped up...."It's pretty obvious that we ain't no choir!"

Happy Missionaries standing in front of a Farm tractor.  Pretty scenic, huh?

Over the weekend we took a little overnight get-away to Monterey to visit the Aquarium and see the sights.  It was wonderful!  After spending hours in the aquarium we ate at Fisherman's Wharf, played at Dennis the Menace Playground, ate some fried artichokes, then spent the night at the Smith's son's house with his family.  Very fun!  The funny incident was that at night I was brushing my teeth so I stuck my hand in my travel bag, but pulled out the cortizone cream instead of the toothpaste.  It is REALLY NASTY.  Five days later I can still taste residue of the cortizone cream on my toothbrush.  The good part is that my teeth don't itch as a result. :)  

Aquarium pictures are below.

                                         This is a giant artichoke, but not the one we ate. The picture below is at Fisherman's Wharf where we ate clam chowder and garlic bread.

 We trust you will all have a Happy Halloween!  We'd like to thank our daughter Jill for sending us our Halloween decoration.  That's about as good as it gets out here.