Welcome to Houston!

        We left St. George on Friday, September 13 and went as far as Page, Arizona that evening.

The next morning we saw our friends Paul and Janet Doxey at breakfast - they were in town for a boat show! We drove to Albuquerque that evening and can't believe we didn't get one photo with Melanie and Kurt Johnson, our niece and their cute family! It was so nice to rest and enjoy their food and sweet guitar music. We also got to attend church with them and loved their ward. Kurt is the bishop there and we could tell they are loved!

                                               
                                       Lots of rattlesnakes - we knew we had made it to Texas!

We had some delicious food in Cross Plains Texas and enjoyed a nice scripture on the menu.

That night we stayed in Lubbock, Texas before forging on to our nephew Scott's place where he and Jessica Law treated us to great BBQ at the Law Law Land Ranch. We loved seeing their sweet kids and walking around the ranch to see chickens, cattle, goats and horses. The weather was starting to warm up as we headed south, but there was just a touch of humidity in the air. 

These beautiful deer were enjoying the ranch too!

A beautiful barn used for basketball, gatherings, and is the location of their Cowgirl Motel where we stayed overnight.

The beautiful Law home.

After a quick stop at the local Harley shop to get John a t-shirt (we couldn't pass up ZZ toad!) we drove the last part of our journey to Kingwood, Texas where the mission office as well as our  apartment complex is located. It is so beautiful here - such lush green trees! 

                                    We made it! Boy it was a long few days - but here we are!

This is in the mission office - one of the missionaries left it behind.

We got the keys to our apartment which is very nice. It is an easy walk to the mission offices and the apartment had been newly renovated with all new appliances. Sadly it was probably under water from the last big flood.  Speaking of floods, it started raining just as we got to town and then it poured for the next couple of days! Our greeting from Tropical Storm Imelda!

                                                           Our apartment building.

                          John is always prepared for the weather conditions. He was going for a                                                  James Bond look but is afraid he looks more like Inspector Gadget!

             At one point the storm drains got clogged and our parking lot started to fill up!

Luckily the garages got a little bit wet but no major damage. Our car was parked where it was higher and managed to stay out of the deep water!

One of the first places we ate was a cajun cafe - shrimp creole and . . .

a shrimp po-boy - yummmmm!

Today we attended church at the San Jacinto River Spanish Branch. We were surprised to see this on the program cover!

 The crazy thing is that on our last Sunday in Bloomington the Houston Temple was on our program                                                                            cover!

For the intermediate hymn they asked for all of the men to come up to sing - so John was bold and joined them! 

We didn't understand much of the meeting but we have been studying and the people were so welcoming. Hopefully we can keep learning. The highlight of our time here so far was a drive to a little town called Fred, Texas where we visited a sister missionary who has been sick and needed medical clearance to fly home for surgery. She and her companion were so cute and I think we were able to give her some encouragement as John felt prompted to share a scripture with her - 

D & C 124:49. In her case her enemies were gall bladder trouble and pain! She plans to come back out but if she can't we told her the Lord was pleased with her being ready and willing to serve. We drove nearly two hours each way through the most beautiful countryside and then we listened to the BYU football game on the way home - not fun! We are loving it here so far. Things will start to get busier this week with different meetings that we will be attending in person and via computer. Mondays are especially busy because it is P-day for the young missionaries and they tend to get hurt when they play, so we are prepared for some phone calls. Until next week!