Tue 10/30/07 4:00 AM

Dear Family,
It has been awhile since I wrote. Just a short summary of my doings. While Roylene was in the US for the wedding I traveled the mission and interviewed all of the missionaries. I sure missed a beautiful wedding of a beautiful couple. I knew when we came on this mission that would happen because I felt that Aaron would meet and marry while we were serving. The impression of this was strong as was the impression that my mother would pass on into the eternities while we were here. Both of these events are of an eternal nature and they are such a blessing. I am constantly amazed at the heritage that I (We) have. We sure are blessed. Then Roylene came back ( I am thankful for that ). Life is not the same without her. I Laney was able to visit and see some of the mission. All of my children have now had the opportunity to be here except Rick. I wish he could have come. We love all of you so much and we are thankful to have each of you in our lives. It is amazing to me that the schedule of each one coming fit perfectly into our schedule. We were not as busy during all of their visits so we could show each one some of the mission. After Laney left I had to hold a Disciplinary Council for a sister in Slovenia. She refused to attend and she will not meet with any Priesthood Leaders. She continues to have conduct unbecoming a member of the church and was Excommunicated. It is really sad as she is well known. Just another example of the adversary fighting the work. The next day we did Slovene Zone Conference. That was on 19 Oct 2007. On saturday the 20th we went to Zagreb and attended church. After church I had Coordinating Council Meeting with all three District Presidencies and Elder Roth our Area Authority Seventy presided. We then returned to Ljubljana that evening. I had started with a sore throat and head cold during that quick trip. The next day on monday we had the final interview with Elder Calchera a Slovene Elder who was returning home the next day. He had to go home a month early because of military responsibilities. On tuesday we sent him home and picked up two Elders and two Sisters that finally received their visas. On wednesday we oriented the new missionaries and drove after that to Zagreb. Of course Roylene was busy cooking for those going and coming. I met on that night 24th with a member that is in apostacy. He is really not doing well at all and is fighting the leadership. I will not be surprised if we have to hold a council on him and some others. We then held Croatia Zone Conference on 25 Oct 2007. Afterward I met with the District President for a couple of hours. Among other things we talked of possible ways to really move missionary work ahead with greater success. But I fear until the member problems are resolved it won't happen. The next morning we drove to Serbia. I met with Priesthood and did a number of changes. I called a new District President for Serbia. I reorganized the Beograd Branch Presidency and the Sremska Mitrovica Branch Presidency. After these calling and releases we held a musical fireside put on by the Elders. I then spoke for a few minutes. On saturday the 27th we held Zone Conference for the Serbia Missionaries. After that meeting we held District Priesthood Leadership Meeting. I did training for them. Then we had our Adult Saturday Evening Session. The speakers really did a good job. I had them all assigned a talk about blessings. I then gave a 30 minute talk about Happiness. On sunday we held the General Session. During this we did the releasing and sustaining of leaders. After this session we did the setting apart. It was a great conference with better attendance than we had previously experienced. The spirit was good and the leaders were all supported. One thing to note. My new First Counselor in the mission is President Juhart who is also the District President of Slovenia. My new Second Counselor in the mission is President Mihajlovic who is the new District President of Serbia. This gives these two presidents priesthood keys so they can do temple recommend interviews and setting aparts and Melchizedek Priesthood interviews that they could not do as District Presidents. After all of this we drove home which is usually a six hour trip. We made it in under that because of the new car with cruise control and less traffic and boader delays. I went to bed early on sunday evening and sleep all night. My cold is finally going away and I feel much better. Yesterday we found out that another Elder who was delayed coming to Slovenia has his visa and we will receive him on thursday. So I am doing November transfers early. I made the calls this morning. Now I have alot of paper work to catch up on. It is always witnessed to me of the hand of the Lord in doing this work. I tried many times to figure out how to do this next Slovene transfer and yesterday it just all came together after getting word of the Elder finally coming. There were some major changes too. We will now have a set of Elders also assigned to the office for so many hours each day. That will help alot. We also received word that the new office was denied by the Brethren after approvals all the way to the Executive Committee. I think we need to have more success before they will do a long term committment. Life is good and we are happy and we still have alot to work on to improve things here. Thank you for all of the faith and prayers. Please include in those prays specifics to soften the hearts of the members who are going astray.
Love Dad