June 7-11, 2010

This week is zone conference week. We rotate around the four zones and go a different place each month. This is the chapel in Rotterdam; one of the oldest in the Netherlands. There are four zones in the mission and two meet one day and the other two meet together the next day. Even though this wasn't where our zone met, we came to this one to deliver zone supplies (boxes and boxes of them!) and Loel had to distribute all the new cell phones that they had ordered for all the missionaries. The missionaries were so excited to get their cell phones, but the only problem was, the cell phone provider hadn't taken the internet off their phones as requested! So the missionaries quickly figured out they all had the internet!!! The Pres hurridly made an announcement for everyone to turn off their phones until we got this fixed. Missionaries only get about 30 mins a week to use the internet to read emails and write them a week, so this would not have worked.  Plus our mission budget couldn't support the additional cost.

We are so impressed with the missionaries in our mission.  They are so intelligent and dedicated.  Today I was talking with an elder from Maryland that finished his degree in Elementary Education-Special Education and then decided to serve a mission.  He had been offered a teaching position at the school he interned at, and insteaad chose to first serve a mission.  This is the kind of commitment we see in all the missionaries.  Zone Conference is so special because this is the one opportunity each month that we see all the missionaries in our zone and have an opportunity to hear from President and Sister Brubaker.  We are so impressed with both of them and feel so blessed to be able to associate with them.  Serving in the office we get to see them all day every Monday, as that's the one day of the week that President and Sister Brubaker are in the office.

These ladies are fast becoming my best friends! From left to right: Sister Salden, Sister Pankratz, Sister Langeveld, me, (all senior missionaries) and Sister Brubaker (Pres' wife). We all helped get the zone conf lunch ready, which the missionaries consumed quickly. They leave very few leftovers.

This is a Spanish braille Book of Mormon! All of these binders are one Book of Mormon. It fits into a huge box! Just one of the many supplies I order for all of the missionaries. We bring them to zone conf once a month to distribute, along with all the mail I've collected. We also deliver the mission newsletter, where I now have a column entitled, "Sister Tibbitts' Tidbits."

 These are the four sister missionaries in our zone and the Apeldoorn zone, and myself and Sister Brubaker.  This was our zone conference day and so we stayed the entire day and loved it.  The theme this month was using teaching records to help commit our investigators to baptism right from the start of teaching them.  We practiced with two sisters; Loel and I were, of course, the investigators!  These two sisters who practiced with us are on either side of me - the one on my left is brand new - we just picked her up at the airport 3 weeks ago.  They were incredible teachers!!!  I was going to try to be a hard-nosed investigator who didn't want to commit to baptism, but they were so loving, kind, accepting, strong, etc, that I got emotional and felt like saying, "Yes, yes, I want to be baptized, let's set a date!"  The Spirit was very strong in that little room we were practicing in in the chapel in Apeldoorn, a beautiful city 2 1/2 hrs north of Brussels in the Netherlands.

This is our cute little car - a Renault, Modus. Small is very important as you weave in and out of traffic. Loel is getting very good at driving here. I can drive to church on Sunday (when there's no traffic!) and to and from the office, which is about 7 minutes away, but in traffic jam times, it takes 25 minutes. And Brussels has lots of traffic jams. I'm trying to become more comfortable with the driving here.

This is a very cool old church we discovered just walking around our neighborhood one morning. I loved the look of the stones. I'm standing in front.

Side view of same church.

Another view of same church.

This was a picture taken on a drive out to a military base near Mons, Belgium, which is actually part of the France/Paris Mission. It was a beautiful drive in the country and a nice break from the big, noisy city of Brussels. We load up on supplies at the base.

This is Elder Conder, a new elder in the office who is learning how to be a financial secretary. They will often buy these huge sandwiches from the kebap place down the street from the office. They are full of meat, veggies, tons of sauce, and fries!!! I can't believe the elders can eat the whole thing!!!  The picture is not an optical illusion.  Elder Owen's comment was, "Sister Brubaker would not approve of this.

Our Antwerpen District had another baptism this past week - an 80 year old man whose been coming to church with his faithful wife for 30 years! He just decided he was ready. It was very touching to see how happy his wife was. He was a big man so two men (members of the ward) went down into the font with him; one to baptize him, and the other to help lift him up out of the water.  Sister Brubaker put a picture of Brother Willems on the mission blog and an unidentified person commented, "No way.  I taught him 15 years ago".

I bought a new little notebook computer at the base last week and I love it!  Loel downloaded all my programs on it, hooked up the modem so he and I can both do emails, etc, in the evenings now.  So now I use my little laptop to write in my journal, download pictures, and even type in my journal while we're driving.  I brought it to the office the day after buying it, and all the elders were really jealous of my new toy!  I even took it to zone conference and used it to type up my notes.  It fits in my purse.