Dear Family and Friends,
This week I went to my last Doctor appointment before we go home. Wednesday we attended our last Zone Conference. The Hursts came out a year ago last August. They served eighteen months so they are going home in February as well. They are actually going home a week before we leave. In each Zone conference they have departing missionaries bear "extended" testimonies (everyone bears testimonies but they ask that we limit it to thirty seconds). President Allred announced that we were having some departing missionary testimonies. He walked over to where we were sitting next to the Hursts and he looked at the Hursts and said, "You didn't know that I knew you are leaving, did you? But I know." He said we would hear from them and then Sister Hurst said, "The Owens are going home too, a week after we leave." Then the President turned and looked at us all wide eyed and said, "You're going home too!?" Forgotten in Demopolis, I guess. When we bore our testimonies sister Hurst told us to go first, "Age before beauty!" We also made our last trip to Costco to have our tires rotated. Sister Owens went to her last hair appointment for her cut and perm (which is good, I'm not sure we could afford another one of those). Friday we had our last weekday RS meeting before we will leave to go home. And today was our second and last Branch conference for our mission. It was nice. We had seventy-three people in attendance. I'm sure at least thirty of them were stake visitors (they always come and bring their whole family). The youth met during second hour and filled their room. There was probably about twenty there. Six of them were members of our branch. We did have several people from the branch come that usually don't. Hopefully it wasn't just for the pot luck after the meeting. In Branch Presidency meeting President Lewis talked to us about Brother White and said how much he thought of him and how much he misses him. He said how wonderful the funeral was and how kind the members of his mother's church were to us to let us use their building. He was impressed that it was such a bonding experience for all of us from the two religions. President James mentioned that Sister Owens had made a friend of one of the ladies in their church. Then I told everyone that whoever stayed for the pot luck after church would be eating chicken that the Baptist church cooked for us. The lady met us at the Walmart parking lot Saturday night and delivered the chicken to us. They told us earlier in the week that they would only accept cash, that we couldn't use checks or credit cards. I have to admit I felt a little shady reaching in to my pocket and pulling out a bunch of cash and giving it to the black lady in the black Malibu there in the parking lot in the dark. I was afraid someone was going to think a drug deal was going down. The chicken was awesome and everybody at the dinner was really impressed.
Our busy week didn't turn out to be quite as busy as we anticipated. Just as we were gearing up for the three meals in three days on the weekend we found out Thursday night that the tornado clean up planned for Saturday was postponed another week. We were thinking it might be, with all the rain we have had this week. They are arranging to have a lot of heavy equipment this time to move the big trees. So we just had chicken enchilada soup for RS on Friday (see attachments) and then got to spend Saturday getting ready for the pot luck on Sunday. Our attendance lately has been pretty consistently below thirty. We thought we might have as many as sixty with all the stake visitors. We were a little overwhelmed with the seventy-three people that were there. We had tables set up everywhere for the dinner and used all the paper plates we had in the building. We did have plenty of food for everybody and there were seven pieces of chicken left when it was over. All the stalwarts usually bring two dishes instead of one to the pot lucks. There seems to be plenty here that just show up to be fed and don't really contribute anything to the meal. The Morgans had to leave right after the meeting and weren't able to stay for the dinner. There was enough chicken to take some to them so they could have some for supper. They did make a change in the Branch Presidency in our conference today. Brother Morgan was officially released as first counselor. Brother Borden was sustained as first counselor and Brother Morgan was sustained as second counselor. President James said they are probably going to have to call someone from Tuscaloosa to come and serve In the branch as clerk after we leave. Sister McCleskey has started coming back to church lately and she might be a candidate for Sister Owens' replacement as RS President.
Keep the commandments and read your Book of Mormon every day, every day, every day.
We love y'all,
Elder and Sister Owens
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