April 26 – May 2 – Our Story: The Bell Family

I think the WordPress Blog app has been overwhelmed by all the people who decided they have time to write blogs during the quarantine because my posts haven’t been successfully publishing for a few weeks!

This week was technically finals week for Mark, but he has one more project to finish on Monday. He went to the bird refuge once this week as well to check on his cameras.

I was able to attend a Facebook baby shower for one of my mission companions. There were posts for us to comment on and a couple games to do on our own. I don’t love attending baby showers so it was kind of nice to have this casual version. And I was happy to be able to support my friend who lives far enough away that I wouldn’t have been able to attend a shower in person.

Last week we got “front porch” pictures taken! Pictures on the front porch have become popular while social distancing. Our front porch is too dark so we went to the side of our building. Aggie Village paid so everyone who wanted could have two pictures.

Friday afternoon we had a video chat lesson with the sister missionaries in our stake. They are amazing! One sister was serving in Hong Kong and she had to be quarantined all alone in a tower at the military base in Japan where her parents live. Now she’s been reassigned here which is perfect because our stake has a Chineses Branch. The other sister has only been out a couple months and was from Hungary. They helped us think of ways to minister to some friends who are not members of the church.

We’ve continued weeding and watering our garden regularly and things are starting to grow! There’s still no outside water so we get to carry water out in a bucket. It’s a good workout.

One blessing this week was getting a second air conditioner! We started thinking it would be nice to have one since we’ll probably be home a lot this summer and we’ll be here for another 2 1/2 years. We had started shopping around a little and then someone on our ward said they were giving one away! It was so perfect!

We were able to help sew masks for healthcare workers. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints and other humanitarian organizations have a goal to make five million masks. Mark and I only did about ten, but it takes many drops to fill a bucket so we’re happy we could do a little bit!

We watched some jets from hill Air Force Base fly by this week to show support for healthcare workers. They were very fast and loud. They’re actually the jet Mark’s mission president test flew. Many people gathered in our parking lot to watch. It was so fun to see!