Missionaries and Christmas Preparations

As usual, the day we had laid out in our schedule was not quite what we thought we planned, but all turned out well in the end. We arrived at the office and worked through emails and news before attending the weekly service center devotional, which followed our plans.

We ducked out before the meeting was finished so we could go to the South Stake center for district meeting with the young missionaries. As we arrived we thought there were more bikes there than usual, but didn't think too much about that until we didn't find the district meetings in the usual rooms. It turned out that both South and East Zones met together for a special zone meeting where they were watching the Mormon Tabernacle Choir Christmas concert video with the Muppets from last year. What a great treat! That meant we could give hugs and Christmas greetings to a much larger group of missionaries than we thought we would!

After the movie and all the missionaries had moved on with their day, we decided to stop at Mama's New York Deli for lunch, where we found a group of 13 elders who beat us there! After we ordered two more elders came. We overheard some of the other customers comment on there being a large group there for lunch today. We were quite impressed with how quickly they were able to take orders and get the food served. We were out of there in a very short time, even though there was a large group ahead of us.

As we left lunch we made one quick stop at an office supply place, then went to the mission home to check on the turkey for Friday. Sister Leavitt volunteered to cook it today and we thought we should see if she needed any help. So here is the funny story for today.

We arrived at the mission home and found the gate locked. We had to wait a few minutes before the guard came and let us in because everyone was on the second floor for a Christmas party. We went up and learned the turkey we were to take on Friday was being served at this gathering today. Sister Leavitt had decided to put both the turkey she had for today's lunch party and the one I provided for Kampang Cham at the same time, since they both fit in the oven. When it was time to fix the rest of the food for today's meal it was discovered that the propane had run out, and the breast meat on the two birds was all that was fully cooked. We assured them this was not OUR turkey and that it seems to have all worked out just right. Sister Christensen will buy another's bird and roast it tomorrow, so it will still be done in plenty of time for our trip to Kampong Cham.

This slight change worked better in our day. We thought we were going to have to divide and conquer later as Elder Oveson had a meeting, and Sister Oveson was going to go back to the mission home to help get the turkey cut and taken care of for Friday, then ride a Tuk Tuk home. We are blessed to know who is in charge and He even takes care of little details we couldn't possibly know on our own.