Doing Our Best in the CSDM: We are grateful

We are grateful for family near and far. We are grateful for Mike, Wendy and Family coming to visit. And also the Box family. Wendy pulled off a beautiful Thanksgiving dinner of which I failed to take a picture. It just felt so good to sit down. The Assistants to the President joined us as well. We took Mike, Wendy and the kids to La Jolla Shores the first day we had together. We had fun with the boogie boards and small crowds. Next day we tried Coronado. And that is now our new favorite beach. It was beautiful and had great waves for the boards. The ocean is ice cold right now and it sapped the body heat from the kids who then laid on the sand and absorbed the sun's rays. It helped that we suddenly had extremely warm weather of 100 degrees. When it drops to the 50's at night you find yourself shaking with cold because of the temperature drop.
Any way we had fun doing the things we have learned here and learning a few more. Checked out the Deering Banjo factory, drove to the border to find a North Face outlet. Ate carne asada for part of Thanksgiving and hiked the Torrey Pines State Park with ends by walking along the beach back to the car. Gorgeous.
Today we emptied the car gas tank driving to baptisms at different places in the mission. Friday night we met one of Mark's former partners who was here with his family for soccer games for one of his daughters. It was fun to visit. Smart phones have arrived for the missionaries and they will begin a transition to smart phones over tablets now as missionaries enter the field plus we will gather their old flip phones from them and issue a smart phone to each companionship. Things just keep changing up.
Its been a great week. I will end with some shots of the week. We love you all and we are so grateful for each of you. We pray God's blessings on each of you in your work, family life and school activities. Know you are always in our thoughts.
love
MOM