The power of food

As usual, Friday was a big cooking day for Dee. It was a glorious day, sunny and warm. In the morning she went to Todis to get apples to make more pies than originally planned. I spent a bit of time finalizing my lessons during the morning and afternoon. We went into town a bit early, because she wanted to do a trial run of the pie to make sure it worked, and she had two pasta casseroles with ham and cheese to put together as well. Dee wisely sat down for her kitchen activities when possible, to save her energy and her feet.

Dee writes: Several of the kids offered to help with various things, at just the right moments. Boy, was I grateful, because time was pretty tight to get everything done. It takes a long time to get everything ready to feed twenty people. Marilene grated a whole bunch of cheddar cheese for the casseroles, and we really enjoyed visiting with her. She just has joyful personality. Doug did a bunch of dishes (and so did I). Grace also helped out a lot with final prep and with serving. It's really great to have these one-on-one times with the GANS. They're really opening up to us. 

The pie shells prebaking. I made Dutch apple pies. 

You can't beat that crumb topping.

 

For Seminary, we had "only" six kids this time. A couple of months ago that would have been a huge class. A couple of the kids showed up later, after class, due to some conflicts such as a dentist appointment. We played scripture games from before, including Taboo and the ever-popular Bingo, plus we did a new game involving a form of basketball. One kid takes the little ball -- made of balled up paper wrapped in masking tape -- and starts shooting it into a trash can about ten feet away, while I give a clue for a scripture. The other students then have to find the scripture in their paper Book of Mormon and open to it. Once everyone has found the scripture, the basketball shooting stops and we record the score. They enjoyed it quite a bit, but Bingo is better!

While several kids were waiting for Seminary to start, Dee asked me to put out some cookies and Nutella in one of the classrooms, as every horizontal surface in the kitchen was full. There was also a young married couple (former GANS :) who had missed their train, waiting there for the next train. Food is powerful stuff! The place went from half a dozen people just sitting and not interacting much, to everyone standing at the table, eating, talking, and laughing.

We have a new Ganziano, with last name Wijesundera. He is from Boston, with parents from Sri Lanka, and he joined the church just a few years ago in Florida. He attended Pepperdine University for a couple of years before his mission. We are looking forward to getting to know him.

My Institute class covered the final eight chapters of 3 Nephi, the end of the visit of Christ in America. It included the final two chapters of Malachi which Jesus shared with the Nephites, so we had great discussions about tithing, Elijah, family history, scripture study, the name of the church, three Nephites, etc. I forgot to take my usual class photo, but it ended up being a pretty good-sized group, with many people sharing stories and comments.  In addition to the class being mostly full, there were two students online listening in.

After my lesson, the place was packed with kids, not all of whom made it in time for the spiritual part, but they didn't miss the food! 😀 We are just glad that they are there. 

 

Grace at the stove, in the plaid skirt.

 

Anziano Wijesundera, in the white shirt

 

As is usual for Fridays, we got home a bit late. I then spent some time on the phone with our accountant back home, Norm, talking about the tax returns for us and for my in-laws. We each will end up paying more taxes than anticipated, which of course means that it was a good year. No alarms were set for waking up Saturday morning. Nice!