A Miracle From Heaven

A Miracle from Heaven arrived this week. After 8 years of waiting, our little Oaklee Sage was born. We missed her by 6 ½ days but we love her from halfway around the world. Big sister Remi has waited and waited for a sibling. Many times she would tell me when I picked her up from school “Grandma, I am the only one in my class without a sibling”. She is so excited for this baby sister and will be the best big sister. The cousins are also excited for the new baby.

Monday, after being in Albany for only 5 days, we made the LONG ride back to Perth for Zone Conference. Compared to Albany, Perth was HOT but it was a great week filled with spiritual instruction from President and Sister Wi Repa and the youth leaders. We met lots of amazing missionaries! We are in awe of what spiritual giants they are. We feel so blessed to be able to serve with them. While at Zone Conference we were able to attend the Perth temple and enjoy the blessings of the temple. We were able to take pictures on the temple grounds with some of the missionaries we had met. We discovered that it is a small world. Halfway around the world from home we met Sister Johns who is a niece to Tiffany Harris who served in Special Needs Mutual with me. The Harris family is friends with our daughter Kristi and even live on the same street.

We also met Sister Larkins who turns out to be related to good friends from our old ward.

We finally got to meet Elder Halterman who lives in our same neighborhood. He is a great missionary, and we hope we get to serve with him sometime. It was nice to be able to feel a little bit of home.

We love the missionaries we get to serve with in Albany, Elder Taylor and Elder Jones. They are working hard and doing great things. They are so much fun to be around.

Southern Zone

Northern Zone

We were finally able to meet the rest of the Senior missionaries serving in the Australia Perth mission. They are amazing couples, and we are excited to get to know them better. I even discovered that Elder Jarvis and I are 2nd cousins.

Sister Darton is from Leeds

Sister Speirs served with my good friend Kim's daughter Kelly in the Philipines

We had a Senior missionary activity after zone conference and visited the food trucks for dinner on Scarborough Beach. We have never seen so many different food trucks in one place. There must have been about 40. It was hard to choose which food truck to try. We had a great time visiting with the other missionaries and watching the waves roll in. It was, however, frightening getting out of the parking garage. It was extremely narrow with cars coming in as well as trying to get out. If I had been the driver, I would have abandoned the car and come back for it another day.

While we were in Perth for Zone Conference Elder and Sister Hadfield, the mission secretary and vehicle coordinator, were kind enough to let us stay with them. One morning we went for an early morning walk and found a cute park and listened to the Australian Ravens talking and waking up for the day. We love the Ravens and their song.

While driving around Perth we found Milne street and Milne feed. Our family must have been in Australia at some point. It was a fun site to see.

We also got a picture of the location of our first “near death experience” from last week as we learned to drive on the wrong side of the road. “Make sure to look RIGHT as you make right hand turns” they told us. They really did mean it!! Last week a block away from the mission office and only about 5 minutes after we received our car, we experienced divine intervention. We have nicknamed this intersection T-bone street.

The Lord manifests Himself to us through His tender mercies. He truly is in the details of our lives and watches over us. We have learned from this experience and Dave has become a pro at driving on the left side of the road.

The Hadfield’s were the best hosts ever and took us to Fremantle one night after zone conference to see the sights in Fremantle. Fremantle is a port city for Western Australia which is the entrance point for many container ships, ferries, cruise ships, and leisure craft. It is located at the mouth of the Swan River. It is known for its maritime history and remnants of its days as a penal colony. We had the best fish and chips at the Twin Fin restaurant and even had a train pass through the middle of town right past our table.

The Hadfield’s took us to Pinnaroo Valley memorial park to see the kangaroos in the wild. There were kangaroos everywhere. It was one of our favorite things to see. We saw kangaroos boxing, ones eating roses from kids’ hands, and baby kangaroos in their mother’s pouch. It was an unbelievable evening.

On Friday, we traveled back to Albany and made a stop at Mt. Barker to visit some members. Mt. Barker is a small town about 40 miles north of Albany. Afterwards, we stopped at the Mt. Barker Country Bakery. We thought we had died and gone to heaven. So many choices…it created an ordering frenzy.

Saturday while out running errands we experienced our first DUI check point in our entire life. At random times (usually holidays or long weekends) the police sent up breathalyzer check points. I was not fast enough with my camera to get a picture during the breathalyzer test, but Dave’s startled face afterwards was priceless. We passed, of course, and went on our way but it was an adventure to remember. I will try to be faster with the camera next time.

There have been numerous shark sightings around Albany and there was even an attack of a surfboard off our beach. We think we will stick to the land and the beautiful sights and sounds of the birds. We did think we saw our first snake on our front lawn while Dave was mowing (he ran over it). I freaked out! When the Elders inspected it, they confirmed it was just a very long lizard.

We had the opportunity to visit Sister Cope from the branch and hear her conversion story. As a teenager she fell in love with the Osmond family singing group. She had a crush on Jay because he had freckles, and her friend had a crush on Donny. Sister Cope admired the values and things they represented and because they were members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints she began to investigate the church. After meeting with the missionaries, she had a desire to be baptized. Because she was just a teenager, her parents would not let her join. She continued to participate for the next 4 years until she was 18 when she was able to be baptized. Although the Osmonds may never have known the influence they had on her life it is a good reminder that we never know the influence we have on those around us just by living the gospel principles. Shout out to Bishop Osmond from back home for the influence his family had on others around the world. President Monson once said, “we cannot escape the influence our lives have on the lives of others whether for good or bad”. It serves as a good reminder to always live our lives in a way that we can be an instrument in God’s hands. God puts people in our lives to help us through this journey.