Larry and I consider our greatest blessing to be our family.
Each one of them enriches our lives. Each one of them
has supported us as we serve in this calling. They are an example to many of our missionaries of what a family should be like and can be like. We thank them for their willingness to sacrifice in our behalf.
We love each one of them.
Stephen and Shara are working in Dallas, Texas.
Lynette attends BYU
David and Sheri live in Ohio, with Benjamin, Hunter and Preston
Dusty and Janeece live in our home in Oregon with Karl, Phillip and Rita.
They undertook a huge responsibility to take care of our place and keep track of our business affairs while we are away. Their service
allows us to take care of about 200 missionaries here in Peru.
Once a year we have one of our church leaders visit our
mission for a mission tour. This visit is to help teach, train and
inspire the missionaires. This year our visiting authority was
Elder Ruben Torres and his lovely wife
from Columbia. Elder Torres had served as a mission
president in Mexico. He brought with him a vast knowledge of the
scriptures and our manuel for the missionaries preach my gospel.
This was our visit to Zona Tarapoto.
Zona Moyobamba
Our mission tour lasted four four days.
During this time we traveled to four different cities,
spoke to 200 missionaries, held two firesides for youth in different cities and attended a wedding ceremony.
When we left for the mission tour a community wedding was planned by our office missionaries in coordinaion with a local authority. Twenty two couples were to be married. Getting married here in Peru is very complicated and expensive, so getting married as a group is how many people are married because it is less expensive. The office elders were left in charge of this event while we were on the mission tour. Before we left on the mission tour I gave them a few guidelines as to what to do. Cake would be nice, flowers for the brides and table clothes on the tables.
We caught a 6:30 am flight from Pucallpa back to Lima so we could attend the wedding. I walked into the chapel I could not believe my eyes. Over 500 family members and friends were in the chapel waiting for the marriage ceremony. It was an amazing sight to behold. The couples sat up front waiting their big moment. Some couples were young and some were older. Many had lived together. It was a sweet occasion to finally see these couples get married. They were dressed in their finest attire.
The following pictures depict what the office elders did in our absence.
It was amazing and I was so proud of them.
Flowers for the brides
Cake for the bride and groom, and guests.
This is how they had transformed the cultural hall.
They had worked so hard to take care of every detail.
Elders served as ushers, others were taking pictures, one elder
was in charge of all the paper work for the couples. It was
a glorious day for all those couples who got married and their families.
Bien Hecho Elders!!!!Job well done.
Recently all the sisters serving in Lima were invited to
the mission home for a preparation day activity. Sister Sanchez from Guatemala was teaching us how to prepare food from her country. Flour ended up everywhere as everyone got to make home make tortillas.
Right now there are ten sisters serving in Lima. Hermanas;
Farias, Silva, Stull, Garcia, Montenegro, Steimle, Sanchez, Melo,
Linares, and Grow
Elder Oceguera and Elder Price just completed
the first 12 weeks program. Elder Clouse served as an excellent trainer.
New to the mission Elder Truman and
Elder Muniz
We found the chapel in Callao that Larry served in 35 years ago.
It has been added on to but other wise looks great.
This is the street he walked down each day to go to his apartment.
It brought back a lot of memories of serving in Barrio Cinco.
Larry or Presidente Blunck as he is known in the mission always.
has two assitants serving with him. Elder Mar on the left
is going to Iquitos to finish his time in the mission. Elder Carranza from Trujillo Peru will replace him and continue to serve with Elder Sorenson. Thank you Elder Mar for your great service!
For those of you who have never seen our mission logo here it is.
At the top it says Mission Peru Lima North and at the bottom it says
Walk in righteousness.!!!!!
The flags on the shelf represent all the different countries our missionaries come from. Last time I counted we had 17 different flags.
