Award for the Cleanest Apartments

We started a new policy in our mission to award the cleanest apartment a trophy to display in their apartment for each transfer.  We started this in December and for the month of January three apartments tied for 1st place.  Here is one of the winning apartments it is the Elders in Matadi.  It was excellent.  All of the apartments improve through this new evaluation. Here is the President awarding the trophy to the Sisters apartment in Binza. We are so proud of them!

Here is our new senior couple Elder Gary and Debbi Bailey from Ogden. They are serving in Pointe Noire Congo.  Their assignment is Missionary Leadership Service.  They take care of our American missionaries in Congo and help the branches in Pointe Noire.  This is their second mission in Africa.  They were an office couple in Cote De Ivory.  We are so grateful for their williness to serve.We could not do it without them.  We are so far away in another country.

Saying good-bye is one of the hardest things to do.  Here is Elder Mpungu. He was our "trainer" when we first arrive.  He taught us everything.  He speaks beautiful English and French.  He spent many hours interpreting for me. He was one of the first Elders to go to Gabon. We are grateful for his service. He has a beautiful voice and has a dream of being in the Tabernacle Choir someday.

Here is our Elder Zurcher.  Elder Zurcher is from Providence UT.  We knew him before we came.  We are dear friends of his parents Arnette and Charles Zurcher.  Elder Zurcher was one of the first Elders to go to Gabon.  This was because of his diligence and hard work as a missionary.  Elder Zurcher is a great Elder!  We have loved serving with him.  We have spent the entire month of February doing Zone Conferences.  We have 12 zones so we have done 12 zone conferences.  It's so interesting to me how each one is different even though we use the same outline.

We said good-bye to two of our Senior Couples. The Gaileys serving in Douala Cameroon and the Whitesides serving in Yaonde Cameroon. They did a wonderful job in helping us in these areas with missionaries and branches. Thank you to them! And wish them much happiness!

President Cook celebrated his birthday on February 12 in Pointe Noire with our missionaries.  We had a great time there.  Time is flying !!

The New Year Brings Baptisms

Isn't this wonderful?  Going to a baptism is my favorite thing to do.  During the month of January we had 127 baptisms in ONE WEEK!!!!!  We personally went and saw 27 of the 127 be baptised that week.  Our Elders and Sisters never have problems finding people to teach.  So many just show up at church on a Sunday and want to "pray" with us and finally get baptised after they have been taught by the missionaries.  President Cook even loves to go grocery shopping with me because he takes off and finds someone to talk to about the Church.  Everyone stops him and asks what does his badge say and they end up in a great 1st discussion.  We didn't travel very much during January our visas expired after 6 months and needed to be renewed.  Aime our office helper was so excited when he told us that the government had renewed our visas until 2019 ???What I said?? President Cook got that twinkle in his eye thinking for sure NOW we can stay for 3 years....hmmm

Well it finally  happen!  Teaching the Elders and the sisters in Douala Cameroon to crochet.  Sister Gailey organized all the young women in Douala to come to the church and learn how to crochet.  We had to teach  Elder Masse to crochet because he was our interpreter how was he going to translate for us if he didn't know how to do it!! Haha (at least that's what we told him).  We were so surprise how quickly they all caught on.  It was the best two hours !!!  Here are all the senior missionaries and other Americans who work here in Kinshasa on New Years Day at a restaurant that is owned by a member.  We had a lovely time together.  You can see they reserved the whole restaurant just for us!!

Christmas Day at the Orphanage

Some of the Senior Missionary Couples decided to provide Christmas for the orphans that we had met before.  This orphanage is run by a lady who is a member of the church.  Elder and Sister Gates donated clothes, shoes, and toys for the 18 children that live there.  Elder and Sister Smith received canned goods from a local food store City Market.  Elder and Sister Sneddons family donated school supplies and 10 benches with desks attached, that are being built for their school that is located next to the orphanage. And we brought the humanitarian boxes  that came in our container.  There were hygiene and school kits for all the children and workers. The night before (Christmas Eve) there was a huge rain and thunderstorm.  You can see all the water that had pooled out front of their sleeping quarters.  The children all climbed up on the top bunks to stay out of the water that had filled up to 2 feet deep. They set up this table on a small piece of relatively dry piece of ground.  

The older boys baled out water in buckets all night long.  There is no where the water can go.  Even by afternoon they were still baling water out of their bunkhouse.  The bunkhouse is lower than the yard so all the water goes right into their sleeping quarters.

Here are the three oldest boys (14-17) they have grown up in the orphanage.  The two on the left are blind but get around amazingly. We brought chicken drumsticks, fries, a roll and cheese puffs.  They thought they had died and gone to heaven and so did we!

We ate inside the school building so we could have privacy from all the neighbors that had gathered around to watch

Here is their school building it has nothing inside but separate rooms with a chalkboard and bare floors the children sit ons...but no longer thanks to the Sneddon family!

Here is President Cook doing his magic tricks with the lighted thumbs.  He had that light going through their ears, mouth and noses.  They were absolutely mesmerized!

I wish this picture was in better focus.  Here are two of the youngest little boys showing off their new outfits.  They were so proud if themselves.  The other children just squeeled as they were getting these clothes on.  The boy with the red shirt, Chance is his name, went right outside and showed all the neighbor kids his new clothes.
The boy on the left has a congenital hip problem.  His hip is completely out of socket so his leg on that side is about 6 inches shorter and but still is able to walk.  Our battery went dead on our camera so we weren't able to photograph the children opening their one small gift of a toy.  Soccer balls were given to the older boys, trucks were given to the younger boys and baby dolls were given to the girls of all ages.  Thanks so much to Elder and Sister Gates who organized this for the rest of us missionaries.  Many tears of joy were shed that days, hugs of thanks were given by all. Singing was their greatest gift to us.  We can't help everyone here in Kinshasa but this day we helped and gave hope to 18 children who had never had Christmas before.  We received more than they did this Christmas Day of 2013.  It will be one we will all remember just how much our Heavenly Father loves all His children everywhere.         Love to All

Merry Christmas from DRC Kinshasa Mission

 This is our missionaries that are serving in the city of Kinshasa.  It was a beautiful sunny hot day! These are only three of our Senior Couples L to R  Sneddons, Cooks, Smiths, and the Gates.








Here we are celebrating Christmas in Yaounde Cameroon. Elders Roth, Porter and Hunt showed us their talent with Sister Whitesides.  Our Yaounde Elders are showing off their new ties that were given to them from our home stake the River Heights Stake. They were so grateful and wanted everyone in the stake a big "Thank You". Elder and Sister Whitesides are the Best.

Here is about the most Christmas decorations that we saw in Kinshasa

Here are the first Elders that have stayed at the mission home.  They were allowed to stay longer for Elder Bednar.  They are also showing their new Christmas ties!  Notice our first American Elder ever allowed into the DRC Elder Graham.  President Cook was able to get his flight for going home out of the Kinshasa airport so he could be here for Elder Bednar also.

Here are our wonderful Elders serving in Douala Cameroon. Showing their Christmas ties too.  Thanks to Elder and Sister Gailey for all they do for these Elders we couldn't do it without them.

Last but not least a wonderful Christmas Zone Conference was held in Pointe Noire Republic of Congo.  Christmas ties and socks were loved by all.  A big thanks goes out to Elder and Sister Bybee for filling-in at Pointe Noire

Here are Santa's Elves packaging up the socks and ties for all our Elders and scarves for our Sisters.  These are our Assistants and Sister Trainers they are Awesome!!! Thanks for your help.

This was so fun ! Each missionary was given their Christmas gifts(Ties and socks or Scarves) You should have seen their talent show! It was African all the way!!!

Elder Bedar comes to DRCongo and Gabon

Here is the Gabon branch 

It was such an honor to have Elder and Sister Bednar and Elder Carl and Lynette Cook come to our mission.  Not only to have them visit was wonderful but they came to dedicate the country of Gabon to the preaching of the Gospel!  They arrived on Monday at noon with the Bishop and Sister Causse.  We fed them lunch and then went straight into a missionary meeting with all of our Congo Elders and Sister and one American Elder who was going home through Kinshasa Elder Dane Graham.  As you look closely at the pictures you can see his white face among our Congolese missionaries.  This is a first to have an American Elder to ever set foot in Kinshasa.  But President Cook worked it out for him to pass through DRC on his way home to the USA. Elder Bednar taught us how important that we need to learn from the Holy Ghost.  That we need to participate in the learning process by coming prepared to be taught by the Spirit.  Questions we're ask by the missionaries and Elder Bednar directed the discuss for three hours.  It was amazing.  Following this meeting Elder Bednar met with the seven Stake Presidents from Kinshasa and directed the discussion.  

 He is a marvelous teacher.  We then left the next morning for Gabon to meet up with our Senior Couple missionary Elder and Sister Michael Moody who have done so much to get Gabon ready for this event.  Miracle after miracle has happened to get this dedication done by Elder Bednar.  The dedication was in an Arboreum in Libreville, Gabon.  We walked for about ten minutes in to this beautiful grove until we came to the huge tree that was about 150 years old.  Just as Elder Bednar was getting ready to start the prayer the sunlight broke through the trees and shone directly on him.  It was a scene from the Sacred Grove.  Other than the mosquitoes everything was perfect.  Once in a lifetime event.   We were honored to have been witnesses to such a sacred moment in history of the Church.

Mosquitoes!!

The other news this month was thatBishop Bishop came to visit us in Africa.  President Cook said what a great bishop he isto come all the way to Africa for tithing settlement.  The Sneddons and us expecially enjoyed all the " good news "from home.  In this picture with Bishop Bishop is one of our Assistant fromMadagascar and the other gentleman is one of our office assistants Aime Ngoy.  He andhis wife had a baby girl last week so out came the knitting needles and crochet hooks tomake alittle something for Ariane

Wishing one and all a Happy Thanksgiving!!!!

Missionary Work and the Atonement (+playlist)

Here is another video that is wonderful about missionary work.  It's the reason I am on a mission half way around the world!

Sedrick's Journey

This is a video that was put out by the Church about a missionary from the DRCongo that we have shown and love.  Even though we do not know this missionary it's typical of the caliber of the young men and women we call missionaries here in Kinshasa