29 January-4 February 2011

Last P-day we went with the Assistants to the town of Maastricht, which is in Limberg province of the Netherlands. Elder Brockbank served in that area for quite some time and so he was our tour guide. We first took two mattresses to the Heerlen elders apartment. We parked at the train station and walked into town. This is the Maas River with a view of the big boats and skyline. It's an old Roman city. Very fascinating.

We found a flea market! It was fun wandering through it.

These are the two assistants, Elder Matthews and Brockbank. This was a cool old church that has been turned into a big huge bookstore.

This is the big centrum or city center with the big empty square in the middle and the cool old buildings on all four sides.

One of the cool churches in the centrum. It was a beautiful, clear, blue sky day, but cold.

The trees in the winter are so funny looking with little knobs on the ends. Here is Loel with the elders in front of an old museum.

I loved the colors here - notice the red stone tower on the right, the yellowish church building in the middle, the green grass and bushes in the center and the blue sky above! It was so beautiful and picturesque. We wish we could have climbed the tower but it was closed.

Looking up from the bottom of the red tower. Isn't the blue sky gorgeous with the red stone next to it? This is a natural red stone.

The top of the red tower - it was very ornate. If you look closey you can see the clock on the tower.

Here we are in front of the Maastricht train station as we walked back to the car with our bakery items ready to taste. This town is famous for its pies, but unfortunately, we didn't buy the right kind! We bought some others that were good but not as tasty as the creamy ones we found later.
Before we ate our pastires though, we got some tradition Limberger sandwiches which were really good.

The office surprised me with little heart shaped cakes that Sis Brubaker made for me since my birthday was this week. I was completely surprised!

These are my best friends. They made me a beautiful birthday card which they all signed with very sweet notes. (Well, Loel's a friend too, but he was taking the picture.)

We had four new missionaries arrive this week! Two from Brazil (they had been delayed 3 months because of visa problems). The American sister and other elder were both from Arizona. Here we are at the airport picking them up and all their luggage, with the assistants and the Brubakers.

Then the next day we had 6 elders come into the office before going home the next day. Here we are at dinner together at the mission home and then had our wonderful testimony meeting with them. I was able to visit with each one about their school plans, etc, during the day and had some great visits.
We also were busy this day making a video clip with the assistants at the President's request. We were showing how the missionaries use the baptismal calendar as they teach people. I got to be the investigator. I think we taped our little clip about 5 or 6 times! I lost count, but they were happy with the end result.

Here is a final picture of 3 of the elders we drove to the airport as they are leaving with their luggage to check in. It was my birthday and I told them it wasn't a very nice birthday present to have to say good-bye to three friends.

As soon as we left the airport, we were on our way to the Netherlands to finalize our new apartment! This is the picture of the outside that we posted a couple weeks ago when we first looked at it with the Pankratz. Ours is the one on the top floor on the right side. The building has just 4 apartments in it - the bottom floor is a dentist's office.

This is the old church that is right across the street from us. The carillon bells play pretty songs on the hour. The apartment owner told us they played the "Battle Hymn of the Republic" just before we arrived. We are actually on the village square so when festivities happen, they will happen right in front of our apartment.

We can walk across this little bridge and canal to get to the shopping area of the village, which is all a walking shopping mall. Our favorite Netherlands grocery store, Albert Heijn, is there, which made us happy, plus several delicious looking bakeries, a few little clothing stores, several deli's, etc.

We met the owners while there and they gave me a bouquet of flowers!

The apartment is in Rijnsburg, near Leiden. We will actually not move in until the office and mission home are finished - sometime in March or April, we hope? We have a new senior couple arriving in mid-February who will live there until the office moves. We love this apartment as it's on the 2nd floor on the corner, with big windows on 3 sides, so it's very light. It came fully furnished, which makes things very easy for us. This is a picture of the living room, looking out on to the street. Rijnsburg is considered a "village" and it's very Dutch looking with cobblestone streets, canals, bridges, etc.

This is the kitchen, and as is very typical in Dutch apartments, it is open to the dining and living room area - all one big room. This kitchen has a dishwasher!!! No garbage disposal and a very small freezer, but you can't have everything.

The kitchen is on the left; this is the dining area and I'm standing in front of a small second bedroom. Both the bedrooms have doors going out onto the balcony in the back of the apartment.

This is the master bedroom - we actually slept here the first night and the bed was really comfortable. We have a nice balcony outside our bedroom. The best thing about this room is a very large built in closet!!! Wall to wall on one side! That may not sound like much in the States, but it's unheard of in Europe!

We love the bathroom! it's at least 3 or 4 times the size of the bathroom we have now and it has a bathtub AND a separate shower, sink and toilet with plenty of room to walk around in! All nice white tile. We thought the apartment looked really clean, but the Dutch are fastidiously clean and they were not happy with it so will be hiring professional cleaners to come and clean it, plus do the windows, etc. We said, okay, that's fine with us!
One of the really nice things about the apartment, also, is that it has two bathrooms! Well, one is just a half bath with toilet and sink, but that is amazing, too, for Europe.
It's owned by a very nice brother and sister as it used to be their parent's apartment. They came and met us and showed us everything we needed to know; they were so kind and helpful. We can walk about 2 blocks to the shopping area, which is very convenient and cute.
After spending the night, we drove to Rotterdam and picked up another new car for this new senior couple and then I followed Loel home in the other car. (This is a big deal. This is the first time Paula's driven in the Netherlands.) So it's been a very busy, but productive week.