Smith's England Mission Minutes

Hello!

Just dropping in to let you know we are still here in "jolly ol' " (a British saying) England! The weather has turned cooler and wetter. We are still mowing and doing some lawn care because the grasses (mostly weeds) have rebounded from the heat and are flourishing! We are also feeling the need to speed along some outdoor projects like this patio that we are expanding. Not having installed a patio before, it has been a bit of a learning curve. With the help of Google, YouTube and some experts, we are almost done and it is turning out "lovely". (a British word) Each tile is quite heavy as it is stone.

We had a tractor come in and dig out the area, which was a sidewalk, the back of an existing patio and the side of the patio. Then, we spread this coarse material consisting of large and small rocks and sand-ish. It was hard moving!

Next, we formed up where we were going to be working.

We rented a tamper (?) and crushed the rocks and smoothed off the top. Sounds easier than done!

We bought the pavers slabs and had them delivered. Each weighed up to 80 lbs! We laid them out to where they would go.

We cemented with this old mixer and formed each spot by hand and put the pavers level-ish.

Then grouted and cleaned it. We need to still take care of some misplaced yard and haul off the rocks, but- YAY! We're done! -ish

Joseph and Mariesa came to visit and we had a brillant (another British word) time.

We went to Cambridge, London and also Warner Brother's studio and saw the set of Harry Potter. It was fascinating and mesmerised. (S's replace Z's here- like organise instead of organize).

We also got Covid and were laid up for a couple of weeks. We basically just had a very mild case of a head cold but Joe tested positive for about 10 days so we had to steer clear of everyone for a while.

I used my time to update this coffee table in our living room. It has some water stains and was in need of some sanding and varnishing. Once sanded, I decide to paint it. We now have our living room as the Peacock Room!

We had the once in a lifetime experience of witnessing the death of a Queen. All of the UK was in mourning and many people stood in long lines just to put flowers at local cathedrals. We found out that they have to replace the money, the mail boxes, and many other things because of the change from a Queen to a King! We also sang "God Save the King" in Church for the first time. (I didn't know it was in the hymnal!)

We were able to get back to the mowing after the patio was finished, which took about 3 weeks. I never thought I'd be glad to mowing again, but I was good to have the change!

Joe spends a lot of his free time droning, editing his drone videos, playing with his trail cam, and hunting and scouting with a Ward member. He is in heaven here and I doubt he ever wants to go home except that we both miss our family and friends so much.

I am amazed at how much I am personally learning. A lot of emotional learning, that is. I am finding out what is truly important and how to stay centered even when things aren't going quite as expected. I firmly believe that God, our Heavenly Father is more interested in our growth than our comfort. I heard this quote, " There is no growth in comfort, and no comfort in growth." I can attest to that. This has been a pretty painful 3 months but it's getting better. I do believe that I am a different person than when I came out, even than last week. I'm grateful for the changes and I think that God is more interested in our BECOMING who we need to be.

We love you all and pray that you will find that peace that passeth all understanding as well!

All our love!

Elder Joseph and Sister Gloria Smith

More pics....

We went to Ely about 45 minutes away and visited the Oliver Cromwell house. He is a hero that deposed a wicked King.

...I'm glad he's not Oliver Cromwell. (OC died a terrible death!)

Stairs up to the stain glass museum. The stairs are worn...so is the missionary! LOL!

This is the marker that people put in around the 1800's. It was completely buried with muddy swamp land. After draining it, this area is now 20' lower and compacted with a mossy ground.