Senior NINJA WARRIORS!!!

American Ninja Warrior features hundreds of competitors attempting to complete series of obstacle courses of increasing difficulty in various cities across the United States, in hopes of advancing to the national finals on the Las Vegas Strip and becoming the season's "American Ninja Warrior.

The Senior Ninja Warriors feature thousands of senior missionaries attempting to complete a series of tasks of increasing difficulty in various missions across the church, in hopes of advancing and blessing the lives of others and becoming the best Senior Ninja missionary possible! 

We had a lot to do this week.  The sister's started painting succor rod fences on Monday morning.  We did this by dipping our mitts into paint and then coating the fence surface grey.  Part of the project required us to wade through deep grass, as we worked to cover every part of the fence (post, conjunction, rods).  There was a lot of fence and each time we were blessed with a breeze, we lifted our heads and thanked the Lord.  We began around 6:30a.m. and finished up around 10:00am.  Hot and sweaty, I wiped the paint from my arms and could hear my mother saying,  "Many hands make light work".

The elders have just about finished up the barn, sealed all the holes in the roof and built another huge door and put it on rollers.  The inside has been transformed, they put angle iron around each pillar and cemented around where the pillars had rotted out.  You can see where they replaced rotted wood by the lighter color in the rafters.  Then they used a tractor to grade the floor.  

Our next task (for the sisters) was to clean the Hunter's Lodge and fix it up a bit.  Sounds simple enough, right?  Not so!  The lodge had three bathrooms and I was charged with cleaning the worst one.  The rusty ring around the back of this toilet shows the color of the tub and toilet bowl.  Hard water stained and rusty, required me to use feet (shoes) in the tub and used my larger muscle group to scrub (and scrub and scrub). A pumice stone in the toilet bowl worked wonders (don't worry, I was wearing gloves).  In the end I was victorious over the rust! (A true Warrior, showing courage in the face of thick, stubborn rust deposits that have probably been there for decades!)

Only a small amount of rust remains on the wall and around the drain (my legs didn't reach that high). We hung curtains, scrubbed out the kitchen vacuumed and decorated (and the elders helped us on the hard stuff)

One of the biggest challenges this week for Elder Himle was removing the bark from the pillars on this porch (the insects were burrowing into it).  Getting the bark off was no easy task.  He came home with sawdust crusted arms (sweat + dust = near cement).  I suggested that he go outside and brush off and he informed me that it wasn't coming off... so off to the shower!

Varnishing is all that is left to complete.

We served at Christ's cupboard (distributing food to the needy) two mornings this week. One of the sisters gave swimming lessons to the McClain girls (who up to now were terrified of water).  The girls are no longer afraid.  So service looks different from one person to another.

A pastor invited us to sing at his church with his congregation last night and enjoy pot luck afterwards).   None of us-- and I mean none of us are stellar singers, but the significance of being invited was humbling and we are looking forward to getting to know a few in the community.  I took this small video (after noticing others in their congregation doing the same).

In two weeks, one of the couples return home to Pocatello Idaho.  We will miss them.  Another couple is coming in a few days.  So on Monday we sisters will clean the hunters lodge (where the new couple will stay) until their new place is vacated.

Signs

I've talked about signs before, and here are a few more that I took from my car.

Coming Up

In September, Dave Anderson is coming up and will sing and entertain on three separate nights for the Cedar Vale Kansas community (night one), the cowboys and friends in the community on the other nights.  We are excited and looking forward to giving back through this friend of one of the missionary couples.  So many different ways to serve!

God comforts and blesses me daily through the creation.  I love him and I know he is aware of me!

 

Library, Rhee Drummond Lodge, visitors and the Celestial Barn

Wind and water are hard on things out here. Elder Himle, De Los Reyes and Runnells have spent weeks shoring up a barn just outside of Pawhuska. (and literally saving it from falling down). Elder Johnson is trying to figure out why the electrical isn't working.  He took one of the light receptacles down and discovered that the mud daubers had completely filled it with mud which shorted out the electrical! He had to pull new wire!  

While the elders fixed the roof, the sisters painted the stalls, leaving our houses at 6:00am so we could beat the heat. Ten gallons later we completed what we affectionately call our "Celestial Barn"... after all, the profits for the ranch are used to build temples.

This is a before picture

This is after scraping and still painting

Plenty of things besides Mud daubers around!

Wes and Jose prepare to hang a door. Below is a mud dauber nest.

The sisters got pretty creative and this is how sister Runnells handled protecting her shoes.

Our kids surprised us on the way home from Palmyra and Nauvoo and we got to spend one blissful day with them.  We took them to the Tall Grass Prairie and saw thousand of bison, then bought and sampled delicious pastries at the Pioneer Mercantile, and finally went to Rhee Drummonds Lodge.

There were a few questions while the grandkids were here, like "Grandma, which hot is hot!"

How the bathroom looks in a missionary apartment! The youngest asked me why I wasn't using my master bath. I told her that this WAS the only bath.

Swinging bridge (below).  Our grandson Porter towers above us!  How could he grow so fast in just 3 months!?

We loved the entertainment!

Arm wrestling with grandpa

Bareback riding on the front

Touring the Drummond Lodge

At the Drummond lodge (10 miles from where we live) we were invited to snoop and peak-- so we did.  We snooped all the drawers and closets

Austin pretends to wash his hair. Makelle decided that "making herself at home" probably meant trying the tub out.

Now that is a kitchen!  I don't think you will run out of dishes here!

Plenty of tongs!

Wes and granddaughter Kaitlyn on the deck, which had a beautiful view

People lounging and enjoying the view

Wes, Partrick, Kaitlyn Makelle and Shannon

View from the deck

Sister Johnson and I will be photographing and uploading obituaries (that start in the 1960's) to Find A Grave going forward.  The librarian welcomes our services and can't say enough about us.  This wasn't always the case as people around here had bad impressions about what "Mormons" were.  Slowly, opinions are changing.

Shidler Cemetery monuments are different than what we normally see at home 

Baby Turkey vulture in the airplane hanger near our home (the tiny dot on the left is its eye)
Large milkweed bugs on a pod (above) and a rabid Wolf Spider (below) Which doesn't bite and is named for the erratic way it runs.  Very respectable in size.

Oh what a show stopper it was!

 August 1, 2021

Last night, a storm blew in.  First came strong winds, and then the sky began to light up continuously, however, there was initially no thunder.  We turned off all the lights and opened the blinds and watched as the show intensified.  In instantaneous bursts, the night sky turned to day, as if someone was taking continual pictures using with a giant flashbulb.  Then came the thunder and lightening that reached to the ground.  It was so intense that I could hardly look away.  I thought, No one can do a show better than Heavenly Father.  Experiencing the  different parts of the creation is very healing... He made this for me.

 The storm continued for hours and finally brought with it pouring rain.  The ground shook and after hours we finally had to go to bed.  I got up in the night as the storm continued and a lightening strike lit up. the entire. house, followed by near instantanious thunder.  That was close by!  (Below is a short clip)

I looked out the window this morning expecting to see water standing everywhere, but did not.  The limestone below the surface must absorb the water.  The grass. will be as green as spring now.  I just learned that when it rains, the rain forces the nitrogen to the ground. Microorganisms then take over, converting the nitrogen in the soil and makes grass green. During a thunderstorm, a bolt of lightning can instantly create nitrogen oxide (which is the key ingredient in fertilizers) Lightning is Mother Nature's fertilizer!  LINK

This week has been close to 100 degrees, with high humidity, making the heat index close to 108.  The elders are going to work a little earlier so they can accomplish the work.  They come home soaked in sweat and smiling. (They are on the Lord's errand and they know it). The have been working inside a barn, removing rotted wood in the rafters and replacing it with new.  The wind had blown a large piece of the roof away and the water had deteriorated the wood and compromised the integrity of the structure.

Digging post holes is hard work - it's limestone below

Putting up the metal siding on the lackey barn

Replacing the rotting trusses and stringers in the hunter's barn

What I didn't realize was that the hotter it is, the more. the lightening bugs come out.  Several evenings this week I stood at the window and watched a mini fireworks display right outside my window.  One of the cowboy's wives said that each night her daughter pulls her blinds up and watches the sparking until she falls asleep.  I thought, Wow!  What a happy. childhood memory that will be for her!

I finally captured the sun as it looks in the morning!!!  Seriously, it is this red!

(The cowboys have been busy baling hay this week)

This one is a giant Light Bulb in the water

Last week I asked the ranch manager for permission to buy a gallon of paint for the kitchen.  Everything was rusty and it truly testified to me that it wanted a new coat of paint every time I walked into the room.  He resisted (as the apartment has a remodel in its future) and finally asked what color I would paint it.  "White", seemed to satisfy him, so I and another kind sister went to work and transformed it into a happier place.  Below are the pictures (before and after) and the parable I sent the ranch manager.

Before during and after pictures

Ranch 25: 12   For the kingdom of Sooner is as a (wo)man traveling into a far country, who  beheld the kitchen on the ranch.  And lo and behold she went to the Lord of the ranch and said unto him, give me paint, for the kitchen in which I am living is like unto a barren desert for it hath rust on the cabinet bases, and the walls hath been splattered with grease and other debris.

Ranch 25:13. And the Lord of the ranch looked upon the woman and had mercy.  But he desired to know what color the woman desired for the kitchen in his kingdom for he was afraid.

Ranch 25:14. And the woman jested inside for she knew that the Lord of the ranch was worried about her taste, (because she knew that many women who had come to the ranch with poor taste in colors).  She desired to say "BYU Blue", but she knew that the Lord might not know she was joking because he knew her not.

Ranch 25:15. So the woman requested “white”. 

Ranch 25:16. And the Lord of the ranch was pleased and he granted her request and the woman went to the merchant in town and bade him a gallon of white, semi gloss paint.  And her request was granted.

Ranch 25:17  And the woman returned to the kitchen in the middle of no where, and and a second sister had compassion on her and came and talked with her and worked with her in the barren, rusty kitchen, even though  the woman knew that her clothes would be tarnished and stained if she were to accept.  But behold the first woman offered chocolate and they had joy in the barren kitchen.

Ranch 25:18. And the two women cleaned the range hood.  And it was abominable in their eyes for the grease had been there for many days (decades), and they were sore afraid!  And they were inspired on how to remove it, and TIDE became their constant companion.

Ranch 25:19. And after they labored, and sanded, and chiseled, and soaked, and taped (you get the rest) they began to paint.  And the paint was like unto velvet, very fine and it flowed from the paint cans all the day long.  And the women were spattered, and covered, but they had joy.

Ranch 25:20. And one of the women said to the other, let us return to the Lord of the ranch and ask if he will grant us additional talents that we might improve further and multiply our talents(money).  Let us show him what we have done with the first talent we were given, and perhaps he will grant us additional.  And they did.

(I can buy more paint and a few more items!)

After church today we see something crawling in our direction on the road outside of our house.  Is it a tarantula? No, it's a crawdad?