The heavy rains are continuing and we worry about areas nearby where they are already trying to drain and combat flood conditions created by previous rains. We also fear having more mudslides on the mountain highways in addition to the ones that have already occurred. There are shortages of needed items in some areas and gas is being rationed in most of southwestern BC and the island. We are grateful for our electric car but sincerely hope there are no power outages which would create a problem for us. On top of floods, summer fires, political unrest in many countries, fighting over covid vaccinations and covid in general, another variant of the disease has surfaced in several South African countries and the world is on alert again. There seems to be no end to the dramatic scenes being played out on our earthly stage at the moment. We are all searching for peace, safety and normalcy. We all feel as though we need a safe, warm vacation.
We have been working to complete our Christmas preparations and gift giving as we will be returning to Germany the end of next week. We have our house and tree decorated, our gifts delivered to our ministering people and most of our neighbors and our Christmas cards ordered but not completed yet. I have made one batch of my Christmas almonds and most bags have already been given away. Trish got here early Saturday morning and gave me a much needed haircut before we left for our Temple Shift and she received one of the nut bags. The others went with Christmas arrangements delivered to neighbors and the Barroby family.
We went to a Temple session on Wednesday morning and Tom served in the Temple Wednesday evening for Brother Barrett. I am not sure when that will change as the Americans are still unable to get across the border without being covid tested and that comes at a cost. How we miss our Bellingham Stake at the Temple and now with floods and highways washed out we are also missing the Vernon Stake and the Prince George Stake. A few people from the island venture over and now with flooding in the valley, only part of the Abbotsford Stake are able to make it in. I go with Tom Wednesday evenings and we serve our own shift Saturday afternoon. It was understandably quiet this last Saturday. Tom served as sealer but we only had ordinance workers to help out.
Max is preparing to leave for Australia and getting everything in ordered. He wanted to set up an HSBC account to expedite the banking process but that requires a 30 day waiting period which he does not have. He asked if we could help him meet our HSBC banking personnel as we use that bank. We met him there on Thursday and made the decision to open a joint account with him but found we still needed to make an appointment with Linda our main banking advisor to complete the process so we will return later this week to take care of that. Tom has decided to give each of the grandchildren $25,000 around the time they get married and because he let Max have the full amount of money from the sale of our BMW, which was $8,500, he is going to give Max $16,500 to add to our joint account. We are hoping this gives the kids a little boost. We will close the joint account once Max has his own account set up in Australia.
We are praying and hoping that the world does not shutdown international travel because of the new covid variant but my heart feels like it will be okay. Tom will probably require at least two more trips to Germany for treatments. We are doing our best. We have both had two covid shots plus a booster and we have also had our flu shots. Most importantly our pleas are extended heavenward and that is the very best thing we can do.
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