Theme-less yet Seemless

 Like sand in an hour glass, so are the Days of our Lives...After 17 blogs now, you all know our basic routine, you know the things that generally happen to us. We aren't generating any big news to report these days but thanks for sticking with us for another entry. For our sake more than yours, we want to remember even the simple daily things that make up a mission, so here goes a little more of the same. Except we discovered the emoji button this time. Cutting edge!

Sunday, as I was sprinting across the street to make a green light on our way to church, my phone fell out of my pocket, hit the pavement and shattered the corner of the screen. 😣 I quickly realized it's impossible to take a picture of your own phone so you'll have to imagine a phone with a cobweb in the corner. I have taped it up nicely and we will grin and bear it until we can buy a new one in India. Later that day as consolation, the sun made a welcome appearance. We simply had to stop and bask in the joy and warmth of a bright sunny moment. Ahhhhh. We love Sun-days.

Rob bearing his cross

Monday was Presidents Day and all kids had the day off from school so the entire SL Valley had the same idea that the FSL would be a great place to let them have an adventure. Seriously, it was Jungleland Jim's Playland. The decibel levels were unlike any library setting you've ever imagined. All we could do was just grin and bear it for most of the day!

Normal capacity-2

Tuesday morning was spent doing sealings at the Bountiful Temple. It was memorable because another couple in our group was proxy sealing the entire Gugenheim family that consisted of 17 children. Not a typo.  Apparently the sealer had never heard of the Gugenheim Museum because he stumbled on the name with amazing consistency. We grinned and "beared" it as he pronounced father and child's name wrong exponential times. We are learning patience on our mission!

 That evening we had actual reason to smile genuinely. It was my daughter Maddy's birthday and we met her and Franklin at the Kathmandu Grill for Indian food, a mutual love for all of us. We are so thankful we could be here to celebrate with her. We loved the food and their company so much! Aren't they just the darlingest?

 31 looks so good on her!

The Mother & Child Reunion is a dream come true for me.

Just grinning, no bearing here

Wednesday was Snow Day! It was incredible, I would say at least 10 inches fell in the valley. Our report time was delayed an hour 'til 10:00 for those commuting in. There were a few die-hard patrons but it was mostly quiet and sparsely attended and because all the other church buildings had closed or never opened, we were excused by Church Security to go home at 3:30. (I think they just wanted to go home too). That was an unexpected perk! We came home and curled up in blankets while the snow fell, worked on a puzzle, and listened to a podcast on The Sermon on the Mount that was probably 3 times the length of the original. My hard-working companion sawed a few logs here and there through it. Zzzzzzzzz.

                    Napoleonic Complex dreams?

Thursday is our late evening shift at the library. Have we mentioned before we have had many celebrity sightings while on our mission? We are told right from the gecko we are not to engage any General Authorities in conversation, ask for photos, or even make eye-contact with them, only Reid can get away with hugging them. So it was completely brazen of me to stop President Leavitt of the Choir aka Governor Leavitt that night and ask him if his wife Jackie was in the training that was being held at the library. Dang, somehow I had just missed her! We used to be in the same ward with them when he was The Governor of Utah, (he did not remember me from Eve). Jackie was who I really wanted to talk to but I told him how his wife and I had been in a horrible play about Porter Rockwell together in our younger days. He vaguely remembered that and said he would tell her hi from me. Completely shameless on my part to break all the rules. (My claim to fame is that the First Lady of Utah brought me in a meal in 1995 when I had given birth to Paisley. Isn't that remarkable and kind of her?)  On another day we saw YW YM Presidents Bonnie Cordon & Steven Lund, who I accidentally waved to thinking they were close personal friends of mine since I knew their faces so well. My bad. (He actually waved back at me 😎) And once we were waiting for an elevator on the Travel Dept. floor, the door opened and there was Bishop Causse. This time we quickly averted our eyes and said we'd take the next one. Whew, that was so close! (This is what daily repentance looks like, folks.) And Peter. 😉 3 times now. Just a cool calm smile in passing that you would give any other mere mortal on the street. Fortunately, the same night as the Leavitt Incident, our past ward member Mollie, who is "The Bassoon Player in the Symphony at Temple Square and Official Choir & Symphony Photographer Combined", acquiesced to our request for a photo with her. Though she's pretty important and seen on national television weekly, no rules were broken this time.

My brush with semi-fame.

Friday's highlight was a Discovery Zone trip to the Jordan River Temple with many of our fellow workers. It was a glimpse of heaven to see about 20 of our friends there dressed in white. We all sat together and felt the love and unity. In these 3 months, I'm afraid we've stayed a little too long to just zip off now without a look back. We have bonded tightly with these fine folks, it will be much harder to say goodbye when the time comes. There are no photo ops in the temple and so we will have to rely on the time when our whole life flashes before our eyes to remember their lovely radiant faces in that celestial experience.

Two of many dear friends at the FSL- 

Del and Lila

Saturday is a working day and it was such an awesome day for both of us! It never fails that at least once a week some family member surprises us and pops in. This time it was Maddy and Franklin! Yay! Twice in 1 week!

Thanks for keeping the family thing going, you two! Who's next??

My favorite guest encounter today was with a mother and daughter who had such kindness and mutual respect for each other. Mom Helen was a pure delight, she reminded me quite a bit of Dame Judi Dench; articulate and philosophical and so pleasant and funny, as was her daughter Dana.

Mom talked and shared memories and daughter typed- a perfect working combination They both had such upbeat positive outlooks on life and both were absolutely thrilled to see the records of ancestors coming over to America from Russia on the boat. They plan to come back often, now that they know they can digitize all their photos and documents at our Memory Lane for no cost. She asked me if it was appropriate to give hugs to the helpers and I was more than thrilled to receive one from her. A good tight one. We don't often get those sweet perks! 

Judi, Judi, Judi

And that's a wrap! A theme-less yet seemless week in the life of the Dunlaps. We're still grinning😁 and only occasionally bearing it 😬😬. Life is so good. Missions are wonderfully bearable! 

 

                                     

"Holey, Wholely, Holy"

  Grab you booties campers because it's cold outside, at least that's the word on everybody's lips, (everybody's chapped lips!). February has been a perpetual Groundhog Day and we're starting to wonder is Phil ever going to see his shadow? The snowing has stopped but the inversion is really yucky, and the bright sunny days are actually the most frigid of all! So what do you do with eternity? You just make the most of every single bitter cold day you're given. Bing! That's the ticket. I am truly grateful for turtlenecks and sweaters, earmuffs and gubs, long underwear, and Heatwarmer socks. If not for them, I should've surely perished by now. Apparently Salt Lake is not the only place suffering from bad weather (Even St George got snow!) I know I am truly wimpier than most when it comes to cold weather but even Rob has murmured a bit in our Siberian-like tundra environs. We should count our blessings though. Gratefully, the Lord has helped us to stay healthy through this month. But my socks are getting Holey Holey Holey, and aren't going to last much longer. Darn it. Hurry Spring! Or India! (Whichever comes first) 

This is not a handgun or a horse puppet

There were plenty of wonderful things to focus on this week other than the weather; Valentine's Day, some call it Singles Awareness Day, but we prefer Carbohydrate Overload Day, was great because it fell on our P-day.  We found the yummiest frosted soft sugar cookies for $4.80 a dozen at the Church Office Building (COB) Cafeteria and decided to treat our zone to 24 of them. Look out Swig, Crumbl, Crave, there's a new cookie in town. Unfortunately, everyone else had the same idea and we had other cookies, cupcakes, chocolates, and sundry treats aplenty in our breakroom that could've buzzed an entire starving nation. Still it was fun to indulge for a day with our zone friends in a festive environment.  At home we listened to our Love Songs Playlist all afternoon and had the most beautiful sunset ever, even if we could only look at it for a brief moment before hypothermia set in. 

Love was in the air

Vidhya, one of our Indian Young Adult friends moved into our very apartment complex this week and knowing we were close by, called us to help her move her things up to the 3rd floor. We were soooo glad she thought to think of us! It allowed us to meet 2 more Indian friends, plus her new roommate Anna from Mongolia, who's not the least bit bothered by the cold and was out sunning on the balcony. JK.

Vidhya, Bala, and Clinton. Anna, not pictured

We got an email this week from Elder & Sister Gibson saying they had met one of our friends in Hyderabad. What? How could that be? Well it was Ambika, the one-name sensation! She is back in India for a month visiting her family and had come to the meetings held in Hyderabad with Elder Uchtdorf. isn't it crazy to think someone in India knows us when we're not even there yet? We confess, it's been a little hard to see all those wonderful photos posted on Facebook of India right now, knowing we could've been there had the timing been different. Ah well, even in this desire we were duly compensated. We were blessed to have a devotional with Seventy Emeritus Tad Callister, the author of The Infinite Atonement. The Spirit was there in abundance and he taught us how to enhance our scripture study. All is well.

Sister Gibson, Ambika, Elder Gibson

We continue to console ourselves with all the marvelous visits we had this and every week. Our surprise family pop-in this time was Kinzi & Tom! It is such a blast to look up and see people you don't expect to be standing in front of you! Surprise!! They were coming down to Ogden to attend the temple and figured going 30 extra miles out of their way to surprise us would be a kick. We had a real great chat but since we were on our shift, weren't able to do much more than that. I was excited though to give Kinzi some of her Dunlap family names to take to the temple and even more thrilled to see the next day that Barbara Sanzi's endowment had been completed, thanks to her. Yay Kinz!

The Kunzlers and photobomber Gwen.

Just as promised, the Young Men of the Midvalley 6th ward, our old ward from 2013-2018, came to the FSL for their activity night after the Young Women did a few weeks ago. I mentioned before that we adored these boys when they were in our 7 year-old Primary class. Now they are shaving! We had yet another night of fun and merriment helping them do the ipad discovery activities. 

Imagine my utter surprise while helping James, who moved into the ward after we left, that we were 3rd cousins twice removed. Here, I'll prove it!

Rats, the glaring screen of the ancestral lines is not real visible but you can vaguely see only 3 generations before we find our common ancestor, William Parker and MaryAnn Child. Besides my siblings and daughters, this is the closest relative I have found since working here. It's Cuz Luv.

The guys had the most fun choosing their green screen backgrounds and hamming it up.

It was a double-dose treat this week seeing Bishop Dwight with the guys, and then again in his capacity as our attorney, getting our trust ready before we leave the country. In any and every capacity, He and his wife Jillyn are some of our dearest friends. What a blessing it's been to have bonus time with them.

We love all our friends and family

 wholely, wholely, wholely!

We could devote an entire blog to the friends we have made while serving here. (In fact, I think I will sometime in the near future). They have made getting up every morning and going to serve at the FSL a true joy. There are many types of missionaries that we serve with;  full-time couples, full-time single sisters, the service missionaries of both varieties who generally serve just 2 days a week, and a smattering of volunteers who come in much less regularly. We love them all and we're grateful when we can serve them with homemade sourdough bread, chicken soup for the sickly soul, helps with moves, temple trips, a listening ear, and general friendship. Gwen here, a single sister and not the photo bomber, needed help to put together an Ikea cubbyhole bench. With all of us chipping in and utilizing the power of extra sets of hands to just hold it all together, we were able to assemble it in less than an hour. In the process, we came to love Gwen even more from our time together. She is a dear soul. Service always leaves us feeling happy. You should try it! Daily!

Voila!

Our dear friend Jennifer from S. Africa recently had a huge scare when she learned she had skin cancer on her back. If I could show you the scars on her back, you would've thought she had had a run-in with a samurai and his sword. She has 2 large lacerations over her shoulder blades and back after her surgery. Earlier she had asked our Zone Leader Bryan and Rob for a priesthood blessing to guide the surgeon's hands to find the cancerous parts. They also blessed her that she could be completely healed, according to her faith in Jesus Christ and could resume her mission. She was out for a couple of weeks but here she is back at work, with a smile on her face, and now only complaining about her arthritic middle finger. We're so grateful for the Priesthood power of God that has been restored to the earth to bless and heal us in our times of greatest need.

"And with His stripes, we are healed" Isaiah 53:5

It was a wonderful dilemma to have the Bountiful temple so crowded and busy this week that the only free sessions we could find to attend were in the wee hours of the morning. Despite the added frigidity, there was a peaceful stillness to arrive in the bleak midwinter and see the lights against the darkened sky. It gave us such a feeling of awe and holiness. 

A light in the midst of darkness

We are blessed to be on this mission at this time and in this place. 

Holy, Holy, Holy are thy ways, O Lord.

 

The Pinnacle

 

         The morning sun on the Bountiful Temple

It was a glorious sight to see the statue of Moroni lit up with the morning sun this past Tuesday, February 7th. (The picture doesn't even do it justice.) It was like a sign for us of the pending experience to come. Like many of you who went this week, we thrilled at the clarifying changes we heard that morning in the temple ceremony. We felt deep in our hearts that the Lord Jesus Christ is preparing a people to be ready for His imminent arrival. The Bridegroom is coming for his Bride, (the church) and Elder Dunlap and I truly want to be wise virgins, ready with oil brimming in our lamps. The time is NOW to get to the temple! We encourage all of you to get there, get ready to get there, or get ready to get back there, whatever your case may be. It is GO TIME! Soon there will be no middle ground to rest on. We feel that our focus on the temple has been the pinnacle of our experiences here these last 3 months in the Headquarters Mission before we leave to India and one of the main purposes of our time here. Knowing we won't have this blessing soon, we have taken full advantage of being within a 1/2 hour drive of 5 temples, the Bountiful Temple only 15 minutes away. We've been motivated to find our ancestors like never before and offer them the opportunity to be a part of the First Resurrection. (It's a long time to wait for the 2nd!). Many of the names we reserved will expire during our time in India so this has also been a huge motivation for us, even though the expiration date keeps moving forward, for now. At some point, they'll go back to public domain. Just look at some of these great names of people and dates we've found on our lines! 

I've loved saying Fergusa MacErk's name with a proper Scottish brogue during the time I've done her work. I hope to meet her someday and learn about her life in Scotland in the 700s. You too can find these names in your own ancestral lines. A click and search rescue mission, so to speak.

We had some fun visitors at the library this week. My sister Laurel and her husband Tom came to check out the place and see if it would be a good fit for her. She's been giving tours at The Beehive House for many years but it is soon to close for renovations so she is scoping out her options for another service mission. There are no bad options when it comes to serving a mission and we know she'll find just the right one that matches her talents and experience. Good going Lolly!

On our late Thursday evening shift, I received a blast from my past. A gal came in that looked just like my post-college/pre-mission-days best friend Miriam. We both looked at each other with that quizzical look. "Mir, is that you?" Well, I wasn't too far off, it was her sister Annie that looks so much like her! It had been decades since I'd seen Annie. We had such a great visit, remembering our past and what we remembered of each other and a "Heinz57 catchup" of where our lives were now. Peanut and Bingo are all grown up! (That's the nicknames of her children I remembered somehow.) She was able to put me in contact with her sister Mir who I'd lost touch with when we moved to St George and it was so fun to remember again The Starlight Mint Chalet, Ponkies, Porkers, Licorice Allsorts, and many other things that wouldn't make a lick of sense to anyone else!

A happy reconnection

The group of Visa Waiters waxes and wanes through the weeks we've been here. We've seen many of them come and go. We and the Schramms (Norway) who got here the same day from the MTC are now the Senior VeeDubs. The Thurstons (Pakistan) have been here almost as long and they are so good about hosting FHEs, Sunday after-fast Pot Lucks, etc. for the gang. This picture also shows the newest arrivals~ The Oswalds (Peru) and the Jex's (New Zealand) We enjoy being in the same building as all these couples with the Oswalds right next door. It feels a little like college dorm living!

Classic VWs

I saw where the BYU International Folkdancers were performing for Winterfest at the Conference Center Theater on March 11th.  I adore folk dancing more than just about anything in the world; the music itself, the costumes, the cultural underpinnings of the movement. And how can you resist when all you have to do is walk across the street to see them? So we bought some tickets to give us something to look forward to next month. No sooner did we purchase them than that very day a few hours later we received an email letting us know our visas were submitted and received at the Embassy in Washington DC and are being processed. Yahoo!!! The email also said that in 2022 the return of the visas took anywhere from 20-63 days with the average time being 37 days. When we got out the calendar and counted 37 days from the 26th, that put us at March 4th, a very apt day to march forth to our appointed calling.  Yikes, now we have 2 reasons to be excited about March! We shall see if we have to give our tickets away or if we'll still be around. There are many missionaries who said they'd love to use them so we're not too worried about that. Isn't the timing of that too crazy? If we had read the email first we surely wouldn't have bought the tickets but maybe it will all work out. But that email gave us a lot of hope and reassurance that we are not going to have to apply again and India is just weeks away from becoming a reality. Hang with us! It's getting closer!

Finding Our Bearings

 Have you ever woken up in the middle of the night (like me right now) and due to a vivid dream or a new environment, (like a hotel room) not have the slightest idea where you are?! I have felt some mild panic in those brief moments until I can figure out my bearings. On other occasions, I'm awakened by the sound of a loud honk/gasp for breath by my husband who's flipped on his back and has become a "temporary mouth-breather." (We won't call it snoring). With just the gentlest of nudges I can easily coax him to flip back on his side so he can once again become a quiet nose-breather. And just that quickly, one of us is right back to sleep. Ah well...What a perfect time to write a blog in the dark of the morning. This wonderful and adorable companion of mine who I dearly love and desire to be by his side for all eternity had a birthday this week! I honored him by completing this puzzle as a gift. How generous of me.

                                       Rob's still getting his kicks at 66

Missionary birthdays are pretty low-key overall, but we had 3 days of feasting this week to celebrate him and thanks to all of your kind cards, texts, and Facebook wishes, he felt supremely loved.

Adding to occasional sleep deprivation, another disorienting aspect of our current mission life is our unique schedule. Because our preparation day (P-day) is mid-week on Tuesdays and we work on Saturdays, work a late shift on Thursday evenings with a half day off on Friday mornings for temple and research time (which makes it feel like a Saturday) we can't always find our bearings in this schedule. It's so different from what used to be our typical 5-day work week/2-day weekend. Gratefully our Sundays always feel like Sabbaths and we get grounded and reset for a new week. We've come to love this day of the week most of all. Every day of the week, after our daily morning routines, we ground ourselves with companion scripture reading and prayer. We read and discuss 2 chapters of the Book of Mormon and a Conference talk or Liahona article, interspersed with our own thoughts and testimonies on various gospel principles we're learning about. Sundays we proceed right after our study time to walking a mere block away to listen to Music and the Spoken Word with the Choir and Symphony at Temple Square. Wow, like I've said before; what amazing way to begin a week! It is a Spirit-infused 30 minutes that fills our hearts with joy and peace. We used to watch it on TV at home, but it simply can't compare to attending it "live" to feel the power of it. When it's over, we mosey back to our apartment to do our "Come Follow Me" reading and studying of the New Testament and the life and teachings of Jesus Christ. Often we extend this block of time by listening to Talking Scripture or Unshaken Saints podcasts while we prepare lunch, make bread, etc. Then we're off to our branch meetings at 1:00 for two hours held in the Joseph Smith Memorial Building which allows us to renew our baptismal covenant weekly through the Sacrament. This ordinance recommits us to be followers of Jesus Christ and to be witnesses of him in all our thoughts and deeds. This is one of the most important things we do all week to get our spiritual bearings. 

This past Sunday we had an extra special bonus treat. We had invited our Indian Young Adult friends to come to our apartment for dinner after church. We had 2 no-shows but also at the last minute, Sowmya asked if 3 of her friends we'd never met before could come. Of course! We would've loved to squish us all in our apartment but the #s worked out well to fit us around our table with a little elbow room to spare. We welcomed Sam, Daisy, and Vidhya along with Sowmya and Gideion from the time before. What a dynamic group of young adult friends! Each one is so charming and personable and friendly! When we heard this week from another couple serving in India of the 500+ Regional Young Adults that gathered in Hyderabad and another missionary retreat that we missed out on, our little gathering was a sweet compensation for us.

                         Sam and Gideon in GQ mode. Did I mention they're handsome too?

As I was talking and getting to know Daisy, we thought it would be fun to become Facebook friends. Imagine my utter surprise when I saw we had two mutual friends already. 1-Eb Solomon (not that surprising) 2-Maddy Huerta. (very surprising) "How do you know Maddy, Daisy?" She replied, "Oh I'm good friends with her husband Franklin from Ensign College and I've become friends with her too". She asked me, "How do you know Maddy?" I said "She's my daughter!". Isn't it just too amazing?! We were strangers only 10 minutes before, but no longer. Making new friends and connections is a joy all its own. All this time we were talking, amazing aromas were starting to fill the air and oh, what a culinary treat our taste buds were in for! To think that we added curry powder to a stir fry or garam masala to Cream of Chicken soup over rice and called it Indian Food?!?!? Unh-uh! Sowmya, our cook extraordinaire has an entire spice wheel and the flavors she created were nothing short of spectacular! 

The Spices of Life

 

The first thing we learned that night was how to eat Indian food authentically

-with our hands! (See Rob's paw in the lower left corner)

Like learning to use chopsticks while on a mission in Korea, we think it's pretty essential to eat just like the natives do, and whatd'ya know, eating with no utensils made using my right hand much easier AND it forced Rob to slow down and savor the flavor instead of wolfing it down in one swell foop! I laugh now that I had gone hunting for extra forks from other empty apartments when they weren't even needed that night. (we both cheated a little and used them). Another thing we observed, they didn't generally drink water during their meal (thank you Ambika, we should've known it wasn't just you) and they prefer no ice in their water. Can we adapt? You bet!

Monday, the 30th, we enjoyed Feast #2, American style, with forks and ice water. We gathered at the Rohlfings with all my nearby siblings to celebrate all the winter birthdays; Rusty, Rob, and Lolly. With everyone contributing, the meal was wholly satisfying and delicious, but good golly, Ms. Lolly, you provided the lion's share with the main course and all the added touches! We greatly missed not having Kate and Diane & Jeff with us but felt them all there with us in spirit. Happy birthday to you all, from Utah to Idaho to Heaven! We're so blessed to have Paul back in our midst who had just a few days before moved back from Missouri to Utah. We all shared great conversation about our families, our faith, our heritage, our loved ones on the other side of the veil, and other edifying topics. We could've talked much later but some had to drive back to Salem and Midway, on an icy night no less. We're just so grateful we could be here for such a lovely time. It makes this mission time in Utah so exquisitely sweet! 

 Feast #3 came the very next day on our P-day, after another grounding experience in the Bountiful Temple. We were willing to drive clear across the valley to eat at one of our favorite spots in Sandy. According to The Gentleperson's Guide to Budgetary Feasting-- "If a party arrives at the Golden Corral between the hours of 3:45 and 3:59 PM, one can purchase a lunch meal for $10.50 for seniors Monday thru Thursday. Shortly after at 4:00, the steaks are put on the grill, sauteed mushrooms and onions are free for the topping, and the shrimp comes hot out of the fryer soon thereafter, with optional cocktail sauce available for dipping." One can enjoy a Steak and Shrimp dinner complete with salad bar, soup, roll, drink, a vast array of desserts, all at a fraction of the cost you might pay elsewhere." Yes, it was definitely worth the drive. 

And ending with a world-class birthday hug from Reid, the 3-day birthday celebration was finally deemed complete.    

Now it's time to get back to our austere life of prudence and moderation in eating. For us it's feast or fasting. But we will continue to feast upon the words of Christ daily for in them, we have the words of eternal life. Without that daily feasting, what else would provide our spiritual moorings and nourishment? We all need to find our bearings to bear the viscisitudes of this life and we have found ours!