9 October 2016

Let's see, what can we share with you this week. It has been pretty calm and routine so far. We are completely settled in our apartment now except we have to get our email registered so that we get the emails sent to us when our packages come. Right now it is set to email the temple president for any that are temple missionaries or family history missionaries and not registered with their emails.

We wanted to thank those missionaries that were so helpful with our move so, we first invited Elder and Sister Lewis to our apartment for dinner. We did not ask anyone to help us because we were not in charge of anything and did not want to get help, not knowing what time the van would be coming to move us, how big it was going to be, and how much help the office was arranging for. The day that we moved, Brother Lewis just called and asked when we wanted him to come. It did not matter to him that we could not guarantee anything, he was going to help in any way he could. What an example they were to us.

We next invited Elder and Sister Hanson for dinner. They have been by our side since we arrived. They were our trainers for the family history center and have helped us find our way around New York. When we moved we let all of our food deplete so that we would not have to move much. The problem with that was that we did not have anything to eat when we got here so the Hanson's brought us over some salt and pepper, a kish, and a gallon of milk so that we would have breakfast until we could go grocery shopping the next morning. Looking at eggs without salt and pepper was more than we wanted to look at, so what they brought to us made our day. We had a lovely time with them.

Our next challenge was able to master the system for doing laundry. The laundry can only be accessed by the service elevator which is only available from 8:00 - 11:00 am and then not until in the afternoon. They have it reserved for moving tenants and receiving supplies for the apartment building. We have cards that we put money on that works the washers and dryers and the facility is really quite nice.

Diane: 

I was able to work with Alida, a patron that came into the FHC. She had never been into the center before, so I explained the differences between Family Tree and the other trees that are found online and the services that we offer. After explaining the system Alida was able to search records 24 hours a day for her to help with documentation. She like what she heard and decided to create her account. 

She had very little information to start with, but once she put her grandmother's name in, the system pulled up some potential duplicates that could be hers. To her surprise, there was her grandmother's information that she knew very little about. All she could say is, "I can't believe it. This is wonderful!" She had an account with Ancestry.com but was just frustrated because she was just spinning her wheels and getting nowhere. 

I worked with her for over an hour and then she was requiring research and analytical skills so I turned her over to Golden.  I had worked with her on her mother's side of the family.  Golden worked with her adding her father, Henry Bach and several more records were found which added three generations to her father's side of the tree.

She was so excited she was shaking and was just amazed at the information we had found.  She was embarassed because one of the crowns on her tooth kept coming off, and we just kidded that we were all losing our hair and teeth.  

Alida couldn't get over the power of the information that were coming through FamilySearch.  At shift change, Liz Hanson worked with her.

I got to work in the temple office on Saturday. It was my first time serving in the office of any temple and I had a wonderful experience. I met several new temple workers and they were all so great to teach me the ropes in the office. I also was able to work in the baptistry which was a new experience. In Utah the baptistry is pretty much it's own entity and they keep the same staff and rarely if ever use other temple workers.  

Golden: 

While Diane was serving in the office, I worked in the Initiatory, Sealings, Name Issue, and finally as baptizer down in the baptistry.  Since the Philadelphia Temple just opened, the workers that are in that temple district are not serving in Manhattan and so the temple is quite short on workers.  Especially on Saturdays when most of the patrons come (this is a big day for Spanish speakers) the temple ordinance workers, along with the temple missionaries, are quite busy and very much appreciated.

A new temple presidency will start to serve at the end of the month, so lots of challenges come with these things, and the Hartford Temple in Connecticut will soon open so more of the temple workers will be missed when those in this temple district serve there.

We are still assigned to Inwood First Ward, but now we only have the subway ride once a week, on Sunday, rather than the 5 days each week we had before we moved to Lincoln Square.  It has been a good week!