Ceff Mission Blog

  Christmas day with our Ethopian friends, the Cashmore extended family and friends. Monday 19th December 2022 Typical Monday - bit quiet but a bit of running round catching up on things. It looks like wet season has started. It was too wet to do any exercise outside this morning, so we just did Tai Chi inside. We had a mission wide Zoom call this evening with President Vongsawad. He told us that our Mission has been selected to integrate full-time young service missionaries in with the full-time proselyting missionaries. I can't remember all the details now, but it sounds like it will be really good. Tuesday 20 December 2022 This morning we had a District Council meeting, and it was my turn to teach the financial self-reliance lesson to the young elders. After the meeting, we had an appointment to visit a young lady from Utah named Carolyn, who had a boating accident in the Torres Strait and had been flown to Cairns for surgery. Her best friend's mother had contacted us and as...

L to R: Alberto, Elders Hamilton and Schick, Amoi Well, I have slipped back into my old habits this week and I write this report on the Saturday night, and the week is all but over. Let's see how much I can remember (with the help of our calendar and Fit Bit and Google calendar, I may be able to reconstruct the week to some extent. Monday 12th December 2022 We don't have a P-day (preparation day) like the young missionaries do, but their P-day is Monday and they often come here to wash their cars, and Elders Ricks and Spackman did arrive here this morning to wash their car. Margot and I were home for most of the day, catching up on things around the house. My friend Brett had today off work, so I rode the bike down to the Esplanade and met him down there, where we had a stroll and a chat, and then I rode home. We had a young fellow (about my age) named Peter Roberts come up from Innisfail, so we could help him with his family history today, particularly using Family Search. Pet...

  Our coconut delivery from Paul. Monday 5 December 2022  I don't know if I have mentioned this before or not, but I have a little project underway for studying The Book of Mormon. I have set up a study plan in the Gospel Library app to finish this project by 4 October 2026, which will be my sixty-ninth birthday. The project is quite simple. I am making a "note" for every verse that I read. I usually only do 3-4 verses a day to keep up with the study plan. I started back on 19th October, and I am now halfway through 1 Nephi Chapter 11. It's been a good exercise for me, forcing me to look deeper into each verse. Some verses a very plain and straightforward e.g. "My father dwelt in a tent" and I might read and re-read a verse several times before I think of a note to write about it. We had Seniors council via Zoom this morning. Lots of training from the Vongsawads and the Grangers, mostly about how we can best help the young missionaries. Had a bad sleep last ...

 Monday 28th November 2022 Started the day with an early bike ride to the Cairns Base Hospital and back in 24 minutes at an average speed of 19.3 kmph and an average hearth rate of 122 bpm and a max heart rate of 159 bpm. I started the ride with my next-door neighbor, Aashiq, who was on his way to work at the hospital (he's a doctor) and I had to let him go ahead, as it is hard to keep up with someone on an electric bike! But while we were cruising down Greenslopes St together, a pretty serious bike rider (you know the type, all in lycra, and well hunched over the handlebars) went flying past us. No-one was going to keep up with him! Our departing Elders Taufalele, Pemberton and Misa, just before I did up my top button :) Missionary transfers happened today. We said goodbye to Elders Misa, Pemberton and Taufalele, then later in the day we welcomed Elder Hamilton (with Elders Ricks, Black, and Chadburn) for dinner in our home. Elder Hamilton is our new District Leader, and I am sure...