Week 68

We had a great time in Ohio visiting Kirk's family.  We got to Columbus Thursday afternoon.  On Friday the boys went to the Ohio State Basketball game and the girls had a girls' night out at Cheesecake Factory.  The Christmas lights were still up at the enormous mall where the restaurant was, and they were fabulous.

Seb with the Chick-fil-a promotional cow before the game

The boys at the game

We had a lot of fun reading books and playing games.

Cute grandkids

The highlight of the visit was having Seb receive the Aaronic Priesthood and become a deacon.  He's so excited and is going to be a great asset to his Deacon's Quorum. The strangest part of the visit was attending church in a regular church building and meeting with so many people.  Didn't realize we'd grown so accustomed to our little triple wide trailer and tiny branch. Got back home about 10:30 Monday night.

It was so good to meet again with our men in the prisons.  I've mentioned this before, but one of the men said again this week--"This is the only hour of the week when I can forget I'm in prison."  We are going to miss these inmates and the warm and uplifting experiences we have with them.

Thursday we resumed our Temple Preparation class in Marksville (after a December break).  It is such a good experience to be part of helping these couples prepare to receive their temple blessings and be sealed as families. 

Before our class we had some time, so we went to see this old cane mill in Cottonport.  Not much to see and no explanatory material, but here it is anyway.

Dora Plantation sugar mill ruins

The weather took center stage again early Saturday morning.  Our power was out for a couple of hours starting just before 5 am, and we had a fantastic lightening show and some heavy rain.  Up near Shreveport, however, tornadoes killed three people.  All week our temperatures had been in the high 60s and up to 75 degrees.  When the cool air from the north came in Friday night, the weather turned nasty.  Yesterday and today the highs are in the 50s--not bad by snow-covered western standards, but cool for us.  A new addition to the flowers we've had all winter, we are already starting to see daffodils in bloom.

Today was our Branch Conference followed by a linger longer meal.  We sure do enjoy our stake presidency; just delightful, good men.  President DeFord spoke about the blessings of the temple, the blessings that come from paying tithes and offerings, and preparing ourselves to meet the Savior.  He told us that from our stake there are 55 temple ordinance workers (five from our branch alone), and there is a stake much closer to the temple with only two ordinance workers. 

With the Monday college football championship game, excitement is high around here.  Even though LSU is 2 1/2 hours away in Baton Rouge, there are tons of grads and fans in Alexandria.  Geaux Tigers signs are all over the place, cupcakes with deep purple and bright yellow frosting are for sale in the grocery store, and even the soda pop display boasts its support for LSU!