Carolee: We have had another Doozie of a week! I would say it ended on high note with a senior missionary trip to Seward to go on a whale watching tour yesterday!
It was amazing !! We saw all kinds of animals like humpback whales and sea otters, Dall's porpoises(black & white look like mini Orcas), Harbor seals, orcas, Sea Lions and more! Beautiful water mountains and more!
Badgers went with us and we went down Friday so we could do the sealift rescue place too! It has aquariums where they can rescue the larger marine life and huge tanks for fish & other critters & birds. That was great! It’s a small port or harbor town with lots of cute churches shops etc. we were glad to not think!
Monday we had district council which was really good with a great discussion! We were getting our week planned and knew Gary was teaching Seminary Wednesday for Justin and as we were getting ready to go to FHE at Cook Inlet he called and said I’ve lost my voice can you take my 7:30am class! So we bagged our plans and worked together to have a class ready early! It’s a tough class, a hard one but it was on service and was okay! Then we had our open institute afternoon. I mended an elder's pants and finished a quilt. I also had papers to fill out for dr. app on Wednesday. I also made homemade cupcakes(German chocolate) and peanut butter popcorn. Justin called while we were there and said I guess I need you to teach tonight too ! So Gary prepped for class amidst many interruptions from mailman, missionaries and such!
I had temple on Wed and my Dr app for my shoulder so Gary was on his own for the Seminary classes on Wednesday. His classes went really well.
I had an other miracle at the temple! I was asked to do the initiatory for a new endowment. I have never done that before! I was excited to realize it was Lisa one of our young adults that we had been with a bit recently! I meant to ask her if we could go with her when she said she was going to the temple for the first time but didn’t. Then I got to be there anyway! It was wonderful!
My Dr app was great and got a cortisone shot in my shoulder . My pain is mostly gone! I’ve slept better for 4 nights than a long time! Another miracle!!! The only bummer was I got stuck behind an accident for 2 hours. I thought I was so brave to go to Wasilla by myself to the Dr and did, that then sat on the freeway. Gary and I were both feeling relived and thought the tough week done! We were ready to go to bed after 9 and the phone rings and Justin asks if we can do all his Thursday classes starting at 7:30 in the morning! He still hadn't got his voice back. We got to work and talked until midnight. I finally went to bed he did at 1;30 I think. We pulled it off and had a pretty good lesson three times on count your blessings. King Benjamin’s speech! It gets better as we interact more with the kids’. We definitely have favorites! But then had errands and made banana bread for institute. By the time we got home we were both dead!! It was full and rewarding week! It is really hard and the other seniors all voted our call the hardest!! We will grow I hope! We love our Savior and we do know when we are in the service of our fellow men we are on the service of our God! Our desire is to serve Him!!!
Gary: Last week was an eventful and exhausting exhilarating week. The first four days were filled with gospel study, lesson prep for seminary and Institute and teaching seminary and Institute. On Monday, JUSTIN called and said he was sick & was losing his voice and ask us if we could teach, his Tuesday 7:30AM class, which of course we said we would. He already arranged for us to teach his Wednesday classes because he was going to be in training for FSY this summer. Carolee does not do very much of the in front of the class teaching, although she does some, but she is absolutely invaluable in our preparation. She can walk me through my complex, brain cramps, simplify what I am trying to say, and we can come up with ways together to be able to get a message across. We both have such different styles, and we have been able to work together to take advantage of the best of both. We’ve tried this before in the past when we taught Institute 8 years ago and it didn’t seem to work so well. I think that is one of the biggest successes of our mission is that I’ve been able to be humble enough to hear her out and she has been patient enough with me so we can work through it.
There is something about the early morning and my age that just is toxic😩. I just don’t know what to do about it. Early morning gets worse in proportion to my age. Every early start day is worse than the previous one !! 🤔 Maybe my attitude is what is causing it, but me and early morning just do not get along. That being said the first period class is half asleep, and has a lot of quiet kids in it. At first, we thought it was just that they didn’t care, but the more we’ve taught them the more, we realized that they are quiet kids, and if they’re not quiet, they’re asleep. I do not know how early 6AM morning seminary functions – from the teacher's perspective or from the student's. The kids who make it through that deserve a medal or a scholarship, and the teacher deserves a raise!
So, because of my attitude and their lack of willingness to participate (I guess that’s what you would call it.) it is always hard and I came away a bit discouraged as usual. So we came up with a quick plan after the class and how we would adjust it for the next two periods which would be on Wednesday. But I didn’t have a lot of time to work those changes because I had to finish my preparation for Institute class that night. We keep the Institute building open all day Tuesday for anyone who would like to come and hang out, study, play games or whatever. We’ve only had a couple that have taken advantage of that except for the full-time missionaries. Tuesday happens to be their preparation day , and so the Institute is a great place to come where they can play ping-pong, pool, foosball, board games, chess or just go to a private classroom so they can talk to their family on the phone. I know that I am such an introvert & I just crawl in my hole and disappear – NOT! I just seem to end up talking with these young guys and girls as they play pool and ping-pong and learning about them and how things are going, etc. These young missionaries are YSA’s and I enjoy talking to them and swapping war stories.😊. That does not help when I have a lesson to prepare for Institute and our class of 30 YSAs that night. So I had to crank out a lesson plan while Carolee was in the kitchen, baking and making treats for the kids after Institute. I could have used her input more, but we were kind of on our own for Tuesday night.
I also usually make popcorn in the big popcorn maker that is there for the Missionaries as a treat while they are there. We did have a good turnout for Institute, and the kids are so engaging, mature, and wanting to be there, on their own, so it makes having a discussion and learning together much easier. Plus the topic we are teaching is the teachings of president Russell M. Nelson, since he has been the prophet. Wow, he has delivered some unbelievable discourses! He is a master at packaging deep and important truths in small bite-sized phrases that are easy to remember. Think of how many—Think Celestial, Hear Him, Peacemakers Needed, Let God Prevail, Overcome the World and Find Rest, Focus on the Temple, Jesus Christ is Always the Answer, Now is the Time, the Power of Spiritual Momentum, the Temple & Your Spiritual Foundation, Go Forward With Faith, etc.,etc.,etc. and the way he says things… and he has made so many invitations that it is hard to keep up. And the temples that he is announced that he will never see the completion of...he is serious about gathering Israel. I have no doubt that he is the living prophet and that the heavens are open. What are glorious time to live!
Anyway, it was a great time that night and the next day we taught two classes of seminary and made the adjustments, which made them both really good classes that we both felt good about. By the end of the days that we teach we are so exhausted. At 9 o’clock that night we thought we were safe from a call that JUSTIN still wasn’t better and that his voice hadn't returned, but as soon as we said something, he called and asked for us to teach on Thursday. It was a different topic, different subject matter so it was a very quick preparation and the kind that Carolee likes the best. I couldn’t over- prepare and she proved to me that we could do just as good a lesson and a short time. Even the 730 class was better. So by Thursday night, we were totally exhausted in such a good way.
Then the next day on Friday we left for an adventure in Seward. We drove down the two hours with the Badgers and stayed on Friday night and enjoyed a beautiful drive even though it was a little cloudy. We explored Seward enjoyed Lunch and dinner And ice cream afterwards, in our room with them. We knew this would be the case, but it is one of the best things about a senior mission, Is the new friends, you get who are serving alongside you. The Badgers, the Kuerths, and the Newmans have become very good friends as well as the Whites from the Office and President & Sister Smith.
It was a glorious sunny day as we headed out on the vessel into Resurrection Bay (the crew told us it was not a boat or a ship, but as vessel?). Since the cruise was only half full about 75 passengers, we had clear access to view from anywhere the sea creatures we were hoping to see. We saw some of the most spectacular scenery that is on this earth. Mountains rising from the ocean, steep, jagged points, mostly covered in snow and snow fields that don’t melt every year. We saw mountain goats on some cliff sides and we saw sea otters Harbor seals, humpback whales, orcas, sea lions, thousands of birds and a bald eagle. It was a stunning array of wildlife and beauty around us. The wind made it a little chilly, but the temperature was about 49° and the sun was so bright and brilliant that it was pretty close to perfect. The water was smooth and little movement so we had a wonderful trip.
So, after dinner and Ice cream again that night we went to church the next day at the Seward branch. It was barely a twig and needs some help. It’s a very small community with about 2,500 people and very dependent upon tourists which are going to be coming this summer.
We enjoyed a leisurely ride home, stopping at many photo opportunity sites to capture more of the beauty of Alaska.
And that capped an incredible week. After experiencing the spiritual high of teaching the gospel of Jesus Christ and then experiencing the unbelievable world that He created makes for a good week.
We love you all, and are grateful for each one of you.
PS Here is the link to our shared pics of the trip to Seward. Lots of great pics to see.
Saturday was outdone on Monday by riding bikes 22 miles on the coastal trail! It was amazing in every way! Dad and I were on peddle assist bikes or we would not have made it! It probably sold us on the bikes!! Even Dot went the whole way!! We saw moose and lots of beautiful ocean and beyond. 
Trying to give the Teeples the whole Alaska in one week!! So we had to go to Moose’s Tooth pizza after the big ride! Weren’t as hungry as we thought so had left over pizza in the car Tuesday on our way to Denali National Park.
Saturday the last hurrah Teeples all caught the train to Seward at 6:45 in the morning. We drove down and got there just as they did but left 2 hours later! It is a beautiful ride!! They really enjoyed the train! We had a bad lunch!! But went to the sea life preserve and hiked up to the Exit Glacier! Both were a great success! Got close to the glacier this time! The Kenai lake was as beautiful blue even though cloudy! Ice cream in Girdwood finished our day. They had to be at the airport 9:30 last night so we had leftovers at our house a few showers and I got a great haircut courtesy of Chalae and Lyzzie!! Then they left! We feel a little sad today but so grateful they came!! Shared some great experiences and it will tide us over! Back to missionary work we go!!!
One of our daily Moose sightings 
