Here Comes Fall

This past week has been tough and yet productive. We have cooked and cooked and cooked. Well, at least Sister McGuire has - I just helped and got dishpan hands. We had two large meals to prepare. We were asked by Brother Mackay to fix dinner for 85 Seminary teachers last Saturday. They were meeting for training for the upcoming year. Luckily we had the help of fellow senior missionaries: the Monks, the Perrys and the Scott's. Nonetheless, Sister McGuire took the lead in preparing Cafe Rio salads and mini-cupcake desserts. We pulled it off, but weren't able to see much of the training itself. Luckily it was based on much of what we were taught in the MTC.
On the heels of that cooking experience we had earlier agreed to prepare lunch for the Mission Leadership Conference that took place yesterday. We had given the APs three choices of food for that and they sent out the possibilities to the leaders. They came back with, yes you got it, Cafe Rio salads. So yesterday it was feeding 65 leaders with that, Frito salads and Texas sheet cake. Guess what - we got very tired. Not only that, in anticipation of those two meals we prepared the salads for the APs and the ZLs we work with for their approval. Four meals of Cafe Rio salads in two weeks!  We'll wait a little while to eat those again.
The result of those two large meals was a week of grocery shopping, cooking, and preparing food. We don't anticipate this re-occurring soon so the break will be welcomed. Of course today we start preparing Thursday Forum lunches at the Institute. Luckily, Brother Mackay wants these to be simple and we think only about 15-20 at most will come.
We started teaching our Pearl of Great Price class on Tuesday. It was a lot of fun!  One thing I have noticed is how much these YSAs need the Institute. It is a refuge from the world.
Last Saturday we went to a SDSU soccer game to watch two of our students/YSAs play in a game.  We got there just after the game started and watched Dallin Cutler play most of the first half.  Winston Sorhaitz came in with about 5 minutes left in the half and we watched until the end of the half.  Since it had been a long day with feeding the seminary teachers, we left and missed the second half, but Winston told us he played the whole second half and they ended up winning 3-1.

Winston Sorhaitz moving to receive the ball

Today we were again cooking for Thursday forum - a time for students and others to come for a short message and lunch at the Institute.  We fed about 20 of us and had a great time.  It is another opportunity to get to know everyone better.  We are enjoying our time in the Institute.  We won't be teaching everyday, in fact once a week, but we will be trying to make the Institute a stronger presence on campus and in the minds of the YSAs.  

We look forward to our first "family" visit as we go next week up to Anaheim to see Bobby and family.  It is always difficult to not see them as much as we are used to, but this is just a window in time and it will probably pass too quickly.