Fun in Florida

Missionaries are a highlight of our mission.  We love these young men who are so valiant!!!

Elders Wright, Navarrette, Talbot, Nemelka

They are loving their lives in serving.  It shows!!

These are two of the office missionaries.  Together these two will keep you laughing constantly.

Elders Chambers and Mott

They are always up to something.

I love this beautiful little flower.  

It looks like a powder puff.

These are Azaleas so I'm told.  They come in a variety of pinks and peaches.

Our backyard.  These blackbirds came in by the hundreds!

Fun in the backyard.

For Jordan

This is the hedge outside of..... well you know the place.

This is the Winter Haven bishop's home.

It is beautiful to say the least.  They are so generous with it too.

They have their ward parties at their home many times.  It is open for anyone at anytime.

A close-up of the home.

We were invited for dinner one Sunday but had to turn it down.

It was the Sunday of the recital.

Our Zone Leaders are in his ward.  I think our next Zone P-day is going to be here!!

A visitor at our house.

Janis will remember our own little pet turtle.

Look at the snails that have attached themselves to him.

You can see he was in a fight with something from his broken shell.

There are two spots that are damaged like that.

Jordan, I'm always thinking of you.

Is that not spectacular???

These bushes are everywhere.

This one is particularly beautiful!

Elder Draper is showing the Elders something about the oranges.

We are learning a lot about oranges!

Here he's tossing some of the last of the tangerines down.  

The ones on top are the sweetest, especially on the south side of the tree.

The longer they stay on the tree the sweeter they get and

the blossom end is sweeter than the end attached to the tree.

These were so wonderful today.

We had a wonderful experience at our home out in the yard today.

We were all fasting and this is how they broke their fast.

These truly were the sweetest oranges ever eaten!!

They even got some Grapefruit.  You can see their bags are being filled.

We are so blessed to have this fruit where we can pick whenever we want.

Any time we want we can go out to the orange grove with Brother King to pick too.

This little Azalea bush is just getting ready to blossom out.

This tree is also in our yard.  It is just getting leaves.  

It only dropped last years leaves about 1 1/2 months ago.

Below the tree in the garden are all these little trees that the tree starts to grow each year.

Brother King has to pick these all out and there are hundreds of them.

You can see the vines hanging over the bushes.  Soon they will be green and beautiful.

We have many cardinals at our house.  We wake up to them chirping each day.

One comes and sits on our windowsill about 5 minutes before our alarm goes off.

It wakes up Elder Draper and he's lost those precious last 5 minutes.

So sad!!

The is a Coral Snake.  

You have to wear gloves to work in the gardens here.

It does NOT have fangs to inject poison but it has many teeth and he will take hold of you and just keep biting and biting filling you with deadly poison.

It is a beautiful little snake though isn't it?

If black touches red it's poisonous.

We love our Mission President!!!  His personality is just what you see.

He is so full of love and support and trust.  He follows the Spirit ALL of the time.

President Summerhays with a lemon!!

Isn't that the worst looking lemon you've ever seen?

They love the lemons though so he was happy for this last little lemon!!!

The Assistants

Elder Johnson and Elder Zylstra

So he will remember us, we call him Elder Zed.

They were in the Mott's office working when we came in.

Elder Mott went and changed the names on the door because 

these guys always steal the Mott's office when they're out of the office.  

(It is a nicer office.)

Look at the look on Elder Zed's face.  He's a card!!!

We love them!!  They are great trainers too.

Time is flying by but the work is going forward and we are having fun.  Our experiences will stay with us forever and we wouldn't trade them for anything!!!

When the Lord promises that you will find your life in the service of others, he is absolutely right!!

His promises are sure!!!  We are so grateful.

We love and miss you all.  Plan and prepare for a mission now.