Spent The Morning Visiting With My Mother~Dad

Carlos (c. 1941) with his sisters, Celia, Helen and Consuelo aka Chelo.

Yes. It was so amazing and filled a place in my heart. I actually came across some family history cassette tapes I had done back in 1985. and 1991! Apparently I was there on a visit with my parents in California. At the beginning of the tape, my father, Carlos was just ready to leave for work. He took the recorder and gave a greeting to my oldest son, Hank while he was serving his mission in Venezuela.

Carlos with Elena and oldest child, Carlitos. this picture is about one of the stories mentioned on the tape.

He gave a nice message and started to speak in Spanish. I relived that visit and felt a closeness to my parents and the love they had for me and my family. What a wonderful opportunity to spend at least and hour listening to the tapes.

Elena, my mother recounted when she and Carlos met for the first time and the circumstances. It was so sweet and was like going back in a time machine. There was a lot of details on there that I had forgotten her telling but remembered when I heard the tapes again. She spoke of the relationships they had with other family in San Antonio; about their courtship, where they lived when they got married and up to when they built their first home just before I was born.

The house built in San Antonio

I could visualize everything we talked about as I held onto the moment. I stayed up late last night to listen to some of it and continued today as I worked in the kitchen this morning making beef jerky. My husband, Ron is hunting for a few days so I had the house to myself and listened away. Time well spent.

President and Sister Ware

It was unimaginable how quickly a year had flown by and completed our full-time mission service here in the Washington Kennewick Mission aka WKM. We fondly recall the many activities we participated in the year's time we served.

We had a milestone during our mission from the very beginning. The 2012 General Conference announcement of lowering the age for the Elders and Sisters was a huge impact. The word was given days before we entered the MTC in Provo. We knew from the start a huge wave of missionaries would be filling the "Call To Serve" from all over the world. We had missionaries come to the WKM from as far away as Ghana, Italy, Paraguay, Brazil, the Dominican Republic, Armenia and Mexico to name a few. Some of them learned English on their mission where a few were assigned to Spanish-speaking. They were all able to adjust and Preach the Gospel valiantly.

We had two mission presidents, attended dozens of District and Zone Trainings and Zone Conferences. Each day was an adventure to treasure. We loved working along side the young Elders and Sisters. They are all outstanding examples and so ready to bless the mission as they helped "hasten the work."

During the first six months of our missionary service was spent in an East Kennewick Branch that was only about a year old. The members of that branch were so thrilled to have a senior couple besides two sets of Elders and one set of Hermanas there. The branch president gave us several assignments that assisted him in locating the lost sheep who had not been accounted for since their branch was formed. It was over several weeks time that we sought some of those on their branch list to discover many of them had moved away in the meanwhile.

We later were assigned to a Hermiston Spanish group to help them with teaching the Spanish Gospel Principles class occasionally, or Anna was often asked to teach the Spanish group the Relief Society lesson or translate from English to Spanish. We initially attended the English ward sacrament meeting, then the Spanish speaking sacrament meeting was after the block of meetings. We got acquainted with the bi-lingual members who assisted with the Spanish group. The Ward Mission leader was very concerned about us going on Sundays and made sure we had a place to eat dinner with members in the regular ward. We loved getting to know the families and were welcomed wherever and whenever we ate with them. It bonded them to us them and appreciated their hospitality. They expressed their gratitude for assisting the ward with the less actives, the investigators and new members. We often attended the baptisms in the ward and really loved seeing so much effort and the results of the missionaries dedication to 'hastening the work.'

New convert Hermana Valencia that Ron baptized in Hermiston, Oregon, with Elders Hall and Young.

The opportunity to work with the missionaries gave us time with them each week during District meetings and when tutoring them with pronunciation and word usage in Spanish. They learned the priesthood ordinances over time and had opportunity to use them to do baptisms, bless the sacrament, confirm new members, perform ordinations or how to give priesthood blessings.

We are the ones who benefited most from the meetings, Zone conferences and specialized training with the mission presidents and the senior couples. We met each Monday and reported our week's activities and kept the president apprised of the progress the missionaries were making with their language training. We found the members of each branch and group so thankful for us to be there among them. We managed to move forward with new assignments with our "transfers" and to survive-- and grateful for the experiences.

President and Sister Greer finished their three year mission the end of June 2013.

The last part of our mission we focused more on the missionaries' language training and traveled to the new north part of the WKM that was formerly part of the Washington Spokane Mission. The number of Spanish missionaries more than doubled at that time. Some days we would go to Wenatchee to the north. We'd stay over night and work another area the next day before returning home. Some of the places we worked was Wenatchee, Ephrata, Moses Lake, Othello, Walla Walla, Toppenish, Yakima, Sunnyside, Prosser, Benton City, Washington. Also, Hermiston, Boardman, Umatilla, and Milton-Freewater, Oregon.

Traveling over 20,000 miles during the year gave us the opportunity to read the scriptures. We finished the Book of Mormon three times, read the Doctrine and Covenants, the Pearl of Great Price and the first two books of the New Testament in Spanish. It helped to hone my Spanish skill with pronunciation and gained confidence in using my Spanish conversation with the aid of my dear, kind, and patient companion, Ron.

Our mission was truly a wonderful experience. We loved it and are happy to have served with so many choice senior missionaries who became our friends as we worked side by side together.

Ron and Anna.

Remembering My Mother, Elena Sanchez Rodriguez

I just want to pay a tribute to my mother on her birthday. She passed away 18 years ago and would have been 95. I miss her a lot and think of her everyday, and always in my heart. She molded my life and blessed my life greatly and her influences lives on. Happy Birthday, Mama.

My beautiful mother, at age 17, Brownsville, Texas

This is one of my Dad's favorite pictures of her. He always carried it in his wallet over the years

I think this one was taken after my brother Bob was born, by the way she wore her hair then.

Elena, about 7 or 8. with her brother, Albert and Uncle Naco. He was a month older than her.

Elena with her mother on a calf in Harlingen. She was living with her grandmother, Nestora until age 12 when her grandmother passed away. She and Albert then went to live with her father's mother, Jesusita aka Maria Jesus Linares Sanchez in Brownsville.

They were a handsome couple, here with us three older children

The got to 'grow old' together. Love this picture of them. They are about early 60s, guessing.

my Own Insights

We went to Seattle several weeks ago (July 13) to visit with Matt and Beth when their new little one was born. He was all of one day old. How precious he is! My heart melts when I see that little tiny person have all the faculties of a physical body. I marveled as I saw and felt his sweet Spirit. Here he has a spirit and a body, it functions like a new model of each of us. He sneezed, and I had the thought –isn’t that incredible to see him have such a normal, natural human trait! God made his body, and his little spirit is housed in that body, and he is the product of his parents who love each other and brought him into this life. How delicate and marvelous that is to be blessed with two wonderful parents who love him and his siblings…GOD’s hand is definitely in our lives. We take it for granted of what is all around us at that same hand in ALL of our lives.

We wake up to a new day which God made happen, the Sun shines and brightens a beautiful blue sky, with puffs of clouds that bring rain, and gave us trees and flowers to admire his creation everywhere we look. We eat, and have have food that he created, right? Then there are the pets we feed and care for too. We have things to do, and we use our bodies that walk, and eat, we digest our food, all because of the creation God made for us to DO that which we overlook that is part of the divine creation of our habitation in a physical body. We are part of that creation each day and moment we breathe in the Air he allow us to have to survive. And think about the Water we drink too that God made for us that help keep our bodies functioning properly.We cannot survive without either one.

Then night falls, the Moon and Stars come out and grace our good Earth with a time to rest and sleep. We sleep,our bodies renew with that sleep and we repeat that cycle all over again. Then, depending where we live, we have the four seasons, and the weather too.

We just finished reading the Pearl of Great Price, and as we drove I read to Ron aloud (albeit in Spanish). I saw and felt the purpose of the days created from the first day through the seventh when all of these above creations were organized for us to live in this world.

My eyes of understanding felt the depth of what we have with us to constantly remind us how much God IS a part of our lives and how easy it is to overlook the meaning as it applies to us and permeates everything we do and ARE and what we can become through time and eternity.

I Know that God is there; He lives and is high in the heavens, in Kolob and I feel such gratitude for his great love for us, his children. He knows I am awake at this very moment and writing this all down as I woke up without being able to go back to sleep. How amazing that is to know what I know and appreciate that I am his daughter too. I know I am loved, and have such peace with that awareness.

Anna R Walser

Garden Tomato Basil Soup

I made Ron fresh garden tomato basil soup. It was quite tasty. He enjoyed it. We used canned tomatoes and fresh basil from a basil plant we bought at the nursery a couple months ago. The recipe made about 2 quarts. We had some left over for another couple meals.

It is so nice to prepare meals with food from the garden. I appreciate so much to have a husband that takes good care of the garden and plants more seeds now and then to have a bountiful harvest. I see the hand of God all around us.

Sharing old photos of Elena's childhood and Rodriguez Family