March 28 - April 1, 2016 - Calendar Looks Empty

March 28 -  This week there is nothing listed on the Calendar. Hopefully I can get all the Convert Baptisms entered into the Church System. There is a huge stack here waiting for me.

I spent all day entering in Convert Baptism records. I got 51 done. There were some interruptions of missionaries needing a new name badge, another phone, pamphlets for their zone etc. It was very tiring sitting here most of the time typing and trying to decipher missionary handwriting.

We had family home evening at the Mission Home. Sister Thomas was in charge of the discussion. We talked about the Atonement--very fitting since yesterday was Easter.  She made a yummy banana cake that reminded me of the ones Grandma Keele used to make when I was growing up. During FHE  there was a major thunder and lightening and rain storm. When we arrived at our house, rain had gone under the front door. The floor must be slanted a little to one side. There was about 1/2 inch of rain next to the one wall and went all the way down the one side of the room. So I got the squeegee out and push it out the door.

March 29 - Elder Peterson took the group of mission zone leaders to the airport about 5:30 a.m. to fly back to Mbuji-Mayi this morning. All of our running shoes were on our porch since yesterday morning. They were soaked from the rain last night.  Elder and Sister Peterson sent a text saying they weren't going to run/walk this morning. Since I was already up and awake I went to the office to get a head start on the Convert Baptism records.

A little after 9 a.m. Sister Thomas came over to see when I could help her finish the Mission History Report that is due. We decided to do it right then.  Microsoft Word was having some major issues with the files that had already been done.  It would freeze, we would have to restart it, then it would have a recovered file, but then would not save it.  I finally had to copy parts of it and put it in a new document.  It was so frustrating. It should have only taken about an hour max!!  But 6 hours later, it was divided into 5 Word files, a total of only 37 pages. We printed two copies. Then the electronic files were put into a folder on a jump drive for President Thomas to put in DropBox for submission to the South African Area.

I worked some more on convert baptisms -- only 36 total for the entire day. But I am done for the day.

March 30 on our walk

March 30 - What does this post headline say?  Calendar looks empty!! It is a good thing because those Convert Baptism records are weighing heavily on me. Between other little jobs 42 baptisms were entered today. The stack doesn't seem to go down very fast.

March 31 - Starting with the sunrise

March 31 - Elder Peterson and I went to the bank today to get some money. On the way we needed to stop at this traffic light. It is a little hard to see but it is red. The sign below it says, "Made in the DRC".  

Then it turned green and I was able to snap this picture, just before a car came whizzing through the traffic light from our left. Color means nothing to some of these drivers.

Still tackling the Baptisms--83 done today!! Hooray, the stack is looking smaller.

April 1 - No April Fool's here today. Stayed at the office until after 7 p.m.  Finally finished the last 87 baptism records.  All total  299 records entered. The smaller stack in the picture are the ones that aren't entered yet because a vital piece of information is missing and can't be entered. 

The Epson printer we use for printing missionary photos hasn't worked right since the men came to install our new computers. I moved it into my office and downloaded the driver for it onto the old laptop computer we brought. It printed just fine again. Then when I tried to print a photo of the cabin it turned it into a "poster" size. It took a couple of days and 3 pictures later to discover there was a setting that comes now as a default.  It is "Poster 2 x 2" of the 4 x 6 size.  Hence the 3 giant photos of the cabin that I put on the bulletin board. So, they were actually failures on the part of the printer, but they look great. A good lesson--sometimes when we think we have failed, we actually have succeeded. It is just part of another plan.

This is what the bulletin board looks like in my office.