Elder and Sister Partridge's Mission : January 2014

Friday, January 31, 2014

31 January 2014

December came and went, without snow, but we certainly felt the Spirit of Christmas. Here are some details and photos of our Institute Christmas Program.

We'll call this, the typical Dominican dress rehearsal.
5:00 sharp. Not one student was there. By 5:30, there were a few girls...in the bathroom putting the finishing touches on their makeup.

Prelude began promptly at 7:20...whoops...our program was supposed to begin at 7. But, hey...we're pleased we're only 20 minutes late.
Performing here, our string trio - violin, viola and cello.

Our narrators, Cesar and Kristy, doing their Spanish version of Music and the Spoken Word.

Hermana Partridge having more fun than she
deserves!

What could be more fun than this? Serving a mission and getting to lead the choir and congregation and instruments to boot!

Is this heaven?

The congregation loved joining in...

Sister Douglas and Sister Partridge doing what
they love best! That's my sweet Daniel (of the many miracles) behind me in the dashing pink tie.

My best sopranos and soloists - Hermana Ewell and Manuela Baez. My sweet friend Rocio is behind them.

Arcadio Vargas on viola

The touch of the masters hand...Sister Douglas's
professional touch added so much. Her family had just arrived from the states...children and grandchildren waiting for her at the Mission Home even as she played. A great sacrifice of her time and talents at such a busy time.

Sister Ewell sang a beautiful solo...Mary, Sweet and Tender Maiden, in Spanish and English. So beautiful! She is also one of my pianists...what would I have done without this good missionary!

Manuela sang "Look on me this day" from Savior of the World. We used the beautiful accompaniment track available at LDS.org. It was wonderful! We also sang Come, Lord Jesus Come...in English, from the same production.

Get ready, get set...sing!

My amazing men's section, especially that white-haired handsome dude on the back row. Doesn't he stand out nicely? Bless his heart, he had been sick for several days before our program with laryngitis and bronchitis, but with a Priesthood blessing and faith and prayers Elder Partridge recovered enough to help the basses stay on pitch. I'm so grateful for his support.

This is Gemima, one of my Haitian students. She led the alto section beautifully.

Making memories for years to come. What a marvelous blessing - to lead this wonderful group of Dominican YSA's in singing praises to our Savior, remembering His birth, honoring Him with word and song, feeling and hearing the angels who helped us and knowing that our gift was accepted and appreciated.

Tuesday, January 21, 2014

21, January 2014

Before we get too far removed from the Holidays, a few more musings...

In December, Sister Douglas planned feasts again for all the Zone Conferences. She had done Thanksgiving feasts with turkey and stuffing casseroles, salads and all the trimmings in November for all the missionaries and since I wasn't available to help much at that time, I wanted to help her as much as I could in December. I was on salad detail. So Monday morning it was arise early, get ready for work, have Bill drop me off at the Mission Home, don an apron and start washing lettuce. The local lettuce has to be washed carefully in Clorox water, rinsed with bottled water, spun in a salad spinner and then dried leaf by leaf the day before the Zone Conference. We have stacks of towels for drying lettuce. Quite a process.

For our largest zone of 106 we washed 33 heads of lettuce, peeled 30 cucumbers, washed and Chloroxed dozens of peppers (of all colors...they're beautiful), and tomatoes...I lost count. We cut up carrots (thankfully we had carrots from the states so no Chlorox necessary.) Then we cut up onions and celery for stuffing, peeled 50 lbs. of potatoes for mashed potatoes, cooked 25 turkey breasts and made gallons of gravy. This was a 2-day process for each Zone Conference. On the day of the conference we cut up the lettuce, cucumbers, peppers, tomatoes and mixed the salad together in massive bowls. They were garnished with gorgeous large avocados (how I will miss these!) Then there were mountains of fruit to cut up for massive, and I mean massive fruit salads. Pineapple, papaya, melons, oranges, grapes. So nice to have these in season all year. Everything had to be transported to the zone meeting.

We did this 3 times in 2 weeks and on the last morning of the last conference, when my body alarm went off, I rolled over, looked at the clock and thought of the movie "Groundhog Day." "Morning campers! Rise and shine! It's Groundhog Day!" It seemed to be happening to me. The other senior missionary wives, Sister Fagersten and Sister Carroll, both made hundreds of yummy homemade rolls and helped cook turkeys and prepared mashed potatoes. We got the bright idea after the first conference (actually it was Toni, Sister Douglas's friend here to help her from Utah, who thought of this) to bake potatoes instead of mashing them. Brilliant!

Sister Douglas's two ovens filled with baked potatoes. Still a lot of work to Chlorox, scrub and wrap 100 potatoes. But we did it!

Cutting up celery...yes, I'm having fun! I think...

Here's a peek at one of the fruit salads. Now that's a wooden spoon to be reckoned with!

Stuffing anyone? .

The missionaries loved getting to have a Christmas feast.

They ate themselves silly. We had to monitor how much they took so everyone would get fed

Our beloved President Douglas.

And Sister D, equally beloved...she fed them well!

It was a joy to serve the mission and we were grateful to be available to help. "Groundhog Days" long to be remembered!

Sunday, January 12, 2014

12 January 2014 Ocean World Fun!

This "purple" post is long-over-due! When Missy and Jacob visited in November, we had the great opportunity to go to Ocean World in Puerto Plata. Missy had worked all summer selling skirts from India to earn enough money for all of us to do the "Dolphin Swim!" Never in my wildest dreams would I have imagined myself doing this. It was a once-in-a-lifetime experience we'll never forget. The pictures tell the story!