This week is starting out.......

THOUGHT:  "Being creative will help you enjoy life.  It engenders a spirit of gratitude.  It develops latent talent, sharpens your capacity to reason, to act and to find purpose in life.  It dispels loneliness and heartache.  It gives a renewal, a spark of enthusiasm and zest for life.    Elder Scott

Monday, Mar 14th

Our week got all messed up yesterday.  We had plans to fly to Reynosa to do zone conferences today.  We were scheduled to fly there today, do zone conferences tomorrow and Wednesday and fly back Wednesday night.  There are major problems in Reynosa with drug lords right now and people are being shot all over the city.  10 people got shot and killed today alone.  All the missionaries have to stay in their places and so no meetings are allowed.  It has always been the most dangerous place since we got here 16 months ago.  So we got up and did the usual this morning.  I walked only 3 miles on the treadmill today because in an hour I had to go with Sister Longhurst to visit a sister from our ward that needs a little encouragement.  (Like what encouragement am I going to give her!!)  So I met Sister Longhurst over at the church building across the street. I was sitting on a little retaining wall waiting for her to come out and a cute lady walked by with her son.  I recognized her from the ward and we said hi and off she went down the street.  We walked all the way UP the Pueblito to see Estrella.  It took us a little wandering and asking and we finally found her "house".   Some cute guy asked us what we were doing and when we told him we wanted to visit with Estrella he started whistling and yelling for her.  If finally became apparent that she wasn't home so we headed back down the hill.  I was so tired from doing the treadmill that I could hardly walk!  We got ourselves all the way back down to the church building and met the same lady I had said hi too before I walked all the way Up the hill!  Sister Longhurst calls out "Estrella!"  Oh my gosh!  It was her that had walked by me in the first place an hour before.  I was so pooped that I came home, but Sister Longhurst went back up the hill and probably had a nice visit with Estrella!  So much for me serving someone today!  It's never easy!!!
I took a nap this afternoon and Greg had a new adventure by helping Pres. Whitehead with 2 disciplinary councils with 2 missionaries.  He said is was interesting but very sad.   The Pratts did FHE.  They are part of the Pathway Program here in Mexico so they spent their hour telling us what they do and how they get people into education programs through BYU I .  This seems like an amazing program for the Mexican people to get an education and also they have to take Institute classes.  The Pratts took us through one of those classes on digging deeper into the scriptures.  It was a great lesson.  We had to hurry home to have a conference call with Greg's brothers about their mom.  She has been a wild and crazy lady this past weekend and the family needs to decide what to do with her.  It's too bad she doesn't have a daughter to whip her back into shape.  I could do it, but it's hard from clear down here in Mexico!  6 1/2 weeks to go!!!

Tuesday, Mar 15th  HAPPY BIRTHDAY SWEET HADLEY!!!

This will be the best part of going home - hugging and kissing the grandchildren.  I hope Hadley has a fabulously fun day being five!!!! They are all growing up way tooooo fast!!  Greg had some errands to run this morning and I did my morning thing with the treadmill and cleaning and a little crocheting.  The Griffins stopped by so we ended up running down to Ruebens for a hawaiian hamburger and curly fries.  It was a beautiful day today.  The weather is a little warmer and spring is on the way.  The jacaranda trees are out in full bloom now and flowers are showing up all around.  We got home from lunch and took Bonnie with us to the grocery store.  We haven't had food around for awhile because we were gone all last week and thought we were going to be gone all this week.  The mangos are starting to appear and that is a good thing!  They are yummy!  We got home just in time to have a little yogurt and crusli with strawberries before we went up to the Griffins for movie night.  We watched the All American.  It was a true story about a football player who got cancer in his leg.  It was sad.   The Hackings came to the movie as well!  He is feeling better from his food poisoning so whatever he got into this past week!    Good times!!  No good internet for a long time!

Wednesday, Mar 16th

Today was very fun!  Sometimes this mission is so rough!!! Greg hurt his knee back when Sara was here the end of January so he made an appointment with Dr. Perez out in Toluca for a knee check.  We left home at 9:30 am with the Griffins for an adventure after the dr. visit.  The Dr. appointment was at 11 am.  We got there about 20  minutes early so we had to wait for the dr to show up.  It turns out Greg just has some tendonitis and needs to take a few pain killers and don't do exercise for 3 weeks.  He's happy about that!!  We then hopped into the car and drove off to find our destination  Ville de Bravo.  It took us about 2 hours to get there and it was worth the trip.  The drive was fun cause we got to see all the little pueblitos along the way.  Unfortunately it is the dry season and so the scenery is all brown but the green trees still looked great.  The lake and all the buildings around the lake looked so pretty.  The weather was perfect, the sky so blue and the town was so fun.  We ate lunch on a floating restaurant on the lake.  We watched people go out in boats for waterskiing or just a drive.  It made me miss Lake Powell with the kids and it also made me want to go to Lake Tahoe.  I love that place as well.  Lake Powell is coming in July so that's not far off now!!!  We walked around for awhile and then got back in the car and drove around the narrow streets to the center of town.  There were lots of people there and I can see why!  It took us another couple of hours to get home, but it was a very fun day!

I went to see an orthopedic in Toluca - this was his office.

Locked gate to his office.

He had a nice aquarium

Waiting for the doctor

Catholic church right outside of his office.

Shops next to the doctor's office.

Selling their wares

Leaving Toluca we started to climb into the pine trees.

Little villages at the base of Nevada de Toluca - the big volcano next to Toluca

Beautiful road

Little church on the way

We arrived at Valle del Bravo

Beautiful Lake where they were waterskiing

Lots of boats to take you for a ride

View from our floating restaurant

Boat behind our floating restaurant

The Griffins treated us to lunch

Large boat that was parked next to us - out for a spin

Even sailboats

Peg really wanted the Crocodile!

Homes build up the hillside

Tiny little alleys

The main square

It is a colonial town

More narrow alleys - look at the car coming down the alley!

Thursday, Mar 17th    Happy St. Patricks Day!!!

Today was a mellow day.  Greg had a meeting with the main Dr. from the insurance company down at the Linda Vista hospital so I got to stay home in the peace and quiet!  He ended up being gone all day.  After he got home Pres. Whitehead called and needed to have a meeting with him so he went to the mission office for that meeting.  I had a great day, but I didn't do a whole heck of a lot!  When he got home from that we took Bonnie Anderson and went shopping.  I bought more yarn to make 2 more afghans.  That should keep me busy for another month!  We went to the Andersons and watched a short movie - one of the old murder mysteries they like to watch.  Good times!!

Friday, Mar 18th

I am exhausted after today!  I'm glad yesterday was such a nice relaxing day!  Greg had his temple clinic to go to so I go to the temple.  The Sandbergs asked to go with us because he had a family name he wanted to do.  So we did that!  All went well and we met Greg afterwards and had some lunch at the temple cafeteria.  They serve Mexican food in the cafeteria here - go figure!!!  We headed for home.  The problem was it was the end of the week, and the start of two weeks of vacation for everyone for Easter and it was pay day.  Needless to say it took us 2 hours to get home today.  The next problem was that the Pratts were sitting on the front bench waiting for us to take them to the MTC to listen to Elder Cook (apostle) who was speaking there.  We had planned this the other day, before we got our senses about us!  I did not want to go, but it never matters what I want!  We left -and it took us another 2 hours to get there!  We went into the cafeteria to get some dinner and it was shutting down.  We got the scrapings of dinner so you can imagine the mood I was in today.  I'm glad the temple went so well, cause it's been down hill since!  We did get to listen to Elder Cook who talked a lot about Preach my Gospel.  I guess he was one of the head guys in developing the book.  He answered questions from the missionaries and gave them some advice.  We had a nice little visit with the Packards, Calls, and some cute missionaries.  One story that was amazing was - We arrived a little late due to traffic (beginning of Semana Santa.)  We found the Packards who were saving us seats in the huge cafeteria in the MTC.  Next to Sister Packard was a sister who noticed our name tags and said, "Elder Stevens.  We have an Elder Stevens."  Elder Stevens was tall and skinny but said he was from Maryland so I dismissed that he could be related.  We went to the self serve counters for what little was left and came back to sit by the Packards.  I asked Elder Stevens if he might be related to a David Alma Stevens and he told me the story of my great grandpa's gun battle with land rustlers in New Mexico.  So I asked for his parents' names and he said, "Ed and Kristina."  Then he said his grandparents were Jack and Gerry - My dad's brother.  Turns out he is the son of my cousin Ed - who was so much younger than me that I hardly knew him.  He is in Maryland where he works for NASA.  We then went to hear Elder Quentin Cook of the Twelve Apostles.  He spoke about working with the missionary committee to develop the Preach my Gospel program.  Some things that I wasn't aware of is that it was entirely written by the first presidency with some help from the Twelve.  President Hinckley told them that he didn't want it to be something they could memorize - He wanted them to learn it.  He then said that people often ask him if the leaders of the church still have miraculous events in their lives - they never talk about it.  He said they do but hold them sacred and do not talk about them.  He then said very powerfully, "But I know the Savior's voice and I know His face."  that was pretty powerful.

The beautiful jacaranda trees at the MTC
I can't get the color to show through like
they really look.

Bright purple trees.

I love the cafeteria at the MTC with
ALL of these bottles of hot chili sauce.

More purple jacarandas

Elder Stevens with Elder Stevens

Shaking hands with Elder Cook

Shaking hands with Elder Cook

World's largest rotating restaurant

THOUGHT:  "If we can find forgiveness in our hearts for those who have caused us hurt and injury, we will rise to a higher level of self-esteem and well-being. ... Let us remember that we need to forgive to be forgiven."      Pres. Faust

Sat March 12
I had my monthly meeting with the doctors that help at the temple clinic.  They are dedicated servants of Heavenly Father and sacrifice a lot to make sure the missionaries in Mexico city (7 missions) are cared for and healthy.  When I got home we hopped a bus down Paseo de Palmas to the metro with the Griffins.  The metro was very crowded and we squeezed in barely.  When we got off to go to the Ciudadela a police officer noticed Sister Griffin's camera bag and told her that she needed to be very careful as the metro is full of thieves.  We walked 2 blocks to the Ciudadela, an artisan market.  We ended buying a small beaded nativity scene as did the Griffins.  We walked back to the metro and rode where we could catch a special bus called the metrobus - a very long bus that has a special lane in the middle of busy streets that is dedicated to these buses.  We were able to catch a ride to the World Trade Center building where we went up to the 45th floor to eat at the world's largest rotating restaurant.  Food was ok but the views were fantastic.  We caught an Uber home.

I caught this pic of this little boy sitting by himself in the subway
playing on a phone.  Who knows where his parents are!!

Here is a pic outside the window of the restaurant!
Sad that this is such a clear day and still the smog is bad!!

Sun Mar 13 - It took me 2 1/2 hours to do my report to Salt Lake.  We were able to walk to church since the Andersons were out of town.  Elder Salinas spoke (the area 70 that lives in our ward) and gave a very good talk on the fast.  We had dinner with the Griffins and then had to deal with a crisis at home.  All in all it was a spiritual Sunday.

The beginning of the end!!!

Monday, Mar 7th

Sara asked me on the phone today if I had done anything for the last time yet.  The answer is no - not yet.  I still have another month to go before I start doing that!  Greg had decided we had 5 missions he still wanted to visit or re-visit before he goes home.  So last week we did training in the Southeast mission - except for Thursday.  We missed that day because Pres. Stutz was very sick so we made up that last zone conference training today.  Poor missionaries have to come to a zone conference on their p-day.  They will get p-day tomorrow so they won't suffer too much!  We got up, packed up and headed out by 7:45 am.  The meeting was an hour away and morning traffic is very unpredictable.  We made it in good time.  Greg did his schpeel and I didn't have any hermanas to talk to because this area is not safe enough for hermanas.   I was able to help make lunches for the 80 missionaries to take with them as they left the meeting today.  We made ham, turkey and cheese sandwiches.  They also got water, chips and a cookie!  Hopefully they won't starve!  We cleaned up and went out to lunch at Toks restaurant.  The Nebekers were with us and we had a nice visit at Toks.  I even liked my meal there which was a big surprise!  I forgot to take a pic of us together!  Bummer!  We were kind of in a hurry by now because we were heading to the airport and didn't want to be late for that.  We got on Zaragoza which is one of the main roads heading into the city.  It is the wildest road you will ever drive on with small hills and valleys and jumps and such.  I call it Mr. Toads wild road!  We had to drive over to the Temple to leave our car there.  We called Uber to come get us and take us to the airport.  We made it in good time which was a good thing because the lines were very long to check in at the airport.  We made it with all the rushing only to find out the plane was an hour late leaving.  Welcome to Mexico!  Well, we finally made it to Chihuahua and was met by Pres. Chavez.  He has the same bad cold Greg has had and doesn't feel well!  It's going to be a fun week.  He drove us to our hotel and he will be back at 8:30 tomorrow morning to pick us up!  We ate some kind of spaghetti and fish tacos for dinner!  Going to bed early!

Looking out our window in Chihuahua

More Chihuahua

A statue on a hill in Parral

I saw this painting on the wall in a restaurant
and love the lines and his expression!  

Tuesday, Mar 8th  HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO OUR MOMS!  

My mom is gone, but Greg's mom - Elaine turns 89 today.  Way to go Elaine!!  We wish you a happy and healthy year - going strong to 90!!  She has outlived all of her family! I hear my kids all got together and took her out to dinner at Olive Garden last night.  Good for you kids!
8:30 came early enough but we were ready for Pres.  The two AP's came with us as well on our journey down to a city called Parral.  The two Elders were very cute and friendly!  I love missionaries!!  It was a 2 hour drive and I didn't get to work on my afghan that I brought to work on because I left the crochet hook in my suitcase.  You can't carry those dangerous things on a plane you know! I might stab someone with that sharp hook!  I was frustrated, but got some reading in and then got to talk to the missionaries once we got to the church.  Greg did his schpeel and I was able to take to 8 hermanas after to answer any questions they have.  They didn't have very many questions so we had a few minutes of getting to know you talk!  They are so sweet and darling!  And hard workers!!!
We finished the zone conference and off we went to visit an hospital.  The missionaries need better care in this town so we are looking for some more doctors and hospitals to help.  Hopefully we found one that will help!  Pres. Chavez drove us around the city - sightseeing and took us to great candy store.  I haven't seen such a great candy store in all of Mexico.  I had to take a pic of this store.  Pres. ordered about 5 baskets of candy that he is taking to Salt Lake to relatives when he goes for conference.  We think he is being made an area 70.  He finishes his mission in June so that will be perfect timing.  Lunch was at a popular place.  My lunch tasted OK, but after lunch - I thought I was going to die!  Mexico has caught up with me!!!  Let's just say - it wasn't a very fun afternoon.  Pres. took us up to a mine to tour the place.  It was cold and windy up on the hill and I wasn't in a great attitude of enjoyment!! I barely made it to the potty up at the little store at the mine (glad I had my own TP)  Note to self - always carry TP with you in Mexico!!!   We drove down the hill and I had to stop again at Walmart!  It was very stressful having these stomach cramps with a 2 hour drive facing me with no pottys in sight!
On a successful note - I made it!  We got back to our hotel and all is well for this day! WHEW!

Chapel in Parral

We went to see if we could make a contract with this hospital - It should be a good one - Jesus' Hospital

The candy store!
President Chavez bought us some sweets here but forgot to give them to us.

This marker marks the spot where Pancho Villa was killed in Parral

Catholic church in Parral

You might have to enlarge this -
Divorced tongue - half with red sauce and half with green sauce - yum.

The Silver mine in Parral

Silver mine

View on top of the mountain where the silver mine is (went out of production in 1974)

Looking down over Parral

Full of old catholic churches

Statue on top of the mountain

Inner workings of the mine - this cable lowered and raised the car that carried the miners down into the mine

Part of the mine

The mine's name - La Prieta

Engine that pulled the cars of ore

On top of the mine shaft

The machine shop

Machine shop

Machine shop

Another view of Parral

Cars that carried the ore - made into planters!

Back down in town- the culture center of town.

There is supposed to be a scar from a cannon ball during the revolution.

?Jesus with butterfly wings?

Wednesday, Mar 9th

I was nervous to get back in the car for another long drive with the problems I had yesterday.  But after a little prayer onward I went!  Pres. & Sister Chavez picked us up at the hotel with their two kids - Kady and Ulysses and another friend of the family.  We never did get her name.  She was in the Puebla mission and we remember her from there but never got her name.  We all jumped in the car and we were off on a vacation for a minute.  Pres. was taking all of us to the Grand Canyon of Mexico.  This is one of the things left on our list that we wanted to see.  It is called the Barranca de Cobre - Copper Canyon.  I guess there is train you can take from one end to the other, we didn't do that.  We drove to Cuatemoc for a zone conference.  All went well with the conference, but the problem we ran into was that a big, freezing storm had moved through most of Mexico actually.  We heard that in Mexico City over 600 trees blew over in a bad wind storm.  The temperature dropped and in the Copper Canyon it snowed and the roads were closed getting up to it.  We decided to go have a late lunch/early dinner at Applebees.  Food was good.  President kept checking his iPhone for updates on the snowy roads.  At the last minute he heard they had opened the roads, but he felt it was too dangerous to drive up there still.  We were going to stay in Cuatemoc for the night and try again in the morning.  As we were driving away from the restaurant he decided to make a go of it and head up there.  It was a 3 hour drive.  There was snow on the sides of the roads a little, but nothing on the roads and we made it to Creel safe and sound.  Creel is the little town about 40 minutes from the canyon.  We stayed in this awesome little hotel that had little cabins with fireplaces in them.  It smelled wonderful in the pine trees with fires going.  You know the smell!!!  I thought I was in heaven for a minute!  It's been a very long time since I smelled such good smells!!!  We got all settled in our places and then went to the main building and ate a piece of pizza and hot chocolate.  We all were freezing.  It took me most of the evening to start to get warm and I never am cold.  We are tucked in to our warm little cabin for the night!  Awwwwwww!!!

The road to Creel

Our cute hotel room in Creel

It was a very cold night

This was our heater

Thursday Mar 10th

We had a wonderful and warm night.  I could have stayed at that cabin for another 10 months or so.  We were up and going - eating breakfast and packing the car and on the road to the canyon.  Pres. & Sister Chavez are so nice to take time out of their very busy schedule to drive us all around and show us the canyon.  We got to the canyon where they have a gondola that goes down into the canyon.  Also there is a 2 kilometer long zip line at this place.  Supposedly it is the longest in the world.  You get going 55 MPH while riding this thing.  It was quite expensive and quite windy so it wasn't a possibility.  We did get a ride on the gondola down into the canyon.  There were cute little ladies there that were Tarahumara Indian ladies that live somewhere within walking distance from there.  I watched one lady weaving a basket.  Actually President Chavez bought me the basket that she had just finished.  I love it!  I got some great pics of the ladies and some of the children that were running around.  We rode the gondola back to the base and then we shopped at the little tiendas that they had set up there.  President  took us on a little hike over to a VERY SCARY rock that was teetering on the edge of a 1,000 ft drop off!  Pres and Sister Chavez went out there and kept calling us to come out and stand there while our picture was taken.  Greg always lectures the missionaries to not do stupid things on their missions.  This was a stupid thing  and it was the Pres. doing it!  We hurried and took some pics and got off of there.   WHEW!!!  We had lunch at the restaurant that hung over the edge of the cliff.  There is a large area of plexi-glass where you can see about 1,000 ft down the cliff from where we were sitting to eat.  Good times!!!  So, our vacation was over.  We got back in the car and had a 4 hour drive back to Chihuahua.  I had spent so much time locked in the car that I found the treadmill and walked for 1 hour.  That felt much better.  Now it's time for sleep!!!

Our room on the end

The lobby of the hotel

Breakfast with the Chavez family

Beautiful lodge

picture on wall of the lodge - tarahumara child

My swing

View of the world's longest Zip line - couldn't see the end

Looking down the canyon

The tram

More tram

Beautiful Copper Canyon

Handsome couple

looking down the canyon

Tarahumara indian lady making baskets

Lots of tarahumara at the tram base to sell their wares

Cute little child

We are on a mountain about 1/3 down the canyon.

Looking back at the rim

The children are so cute.

Lodge just below the ridge

Zip line - earlier in the day it was too windy - now in use.

We are standing on a wobbly rock - 1000 feet straight down on all sides

President and Sister Chavez

Let sleeping dogs lie

We were standing on the rock on the edge of this cliff.

Looking through the glass in floor of the restaurant - down 1000 feet

looking down

Looking through the glass - Ropes and a very wobbly bridge down there

Kady and Ulysis Chavez

Scaredy cat

Sister Chavez and her kids - being brave

Lunch

Tarahumara lady on a walk

More kids

Selling goods at the train station

Waiting for the train (it came about 20 minutes later)

Ladies selling their goods near the train station.

Here comes the train

Just hanging out

Driving home

Friday, Mar 11th

I was still very tired this morning.  These week long mission trips are quite exhausting.  President picked us up around 9 am and we drove to another zone conference.  It was the same old, same old and all went well.  President drove us to the airport so we could catch our 3 o'clock flight.  So as usual we found out our flight was delayed an hour.  We finally made it home about 9:30 that night.  Traveling sounds so fun, but in reality a lot of it is waiting and waiting and waiting in airports and taxis and such!!!  We only have 3 more mission visits to go before we go home!!  Endure to the end!

Our beautiful hand made basket.