John and Karen in the Canada Montreal Mission

I know it must seem that I am obsessed with winter here in Montréal and … I am.  Except for 18 months serving in Ghana, I have never lived anywhere without cold and snow during the winter months.  So it's not as if I'm new to the experience but Quebec is a different winter experience for me.  Once the snow arrives, it is here for the duration.  The temps rarely warm up enough for any of it to melt. When we returned from Zone Conference on Wednesday afternoon, the snow trucks were clearing the street where we park.  All the plowed snow was collected and taken away so that the curbs were visible again.  It snowed all day Thursday and Friday.  This is how the same street looked when we tried to park on Friday morning. And how do you collect your mail here?  How does the mail person even deliver it? The senior couple serving on Prince Edward Island survived Hurricane Fiona when it hit in the fall.  The destruction there was pretty bad and they ha...

We had the privilege of teaching the Valiant class in Primary today.  Our Primary isn't very big so the Valiant class includes all the children age 7 and older.  We had 12 children in class and they were all so well behaved and reverent.  They were a little rowdy during music time but we'll blame that on the music director!  They have been learning "Tell Me the Stories of Jesus"  this month.  That has always been one of my favorite Primary songs and it seems like we stopped singing it for years.  I'm so happy it is being taught to the children again. It's been another cold and snowy week here.  We were chatting with one of our Nigerian friends at church today.  He moved here from Denver and said that he prefers the cooler weather (to the intense heat and humidity in Nigeria) but that Montréal is just too much!  We couldn't agree more! We had Bishops Storehouse Saturday morning and a baptism in the evening.  We thought we had an appo...

  Angrignon Park Thursday afternoon The park was almost deserted after the big snowstorm Wednesday night and all day Thursday.  None of the roads or walkways had been cleared so we had to blaze our own trail.  It was peaceful and quiet as we walked.  It brought to mind the Robert Frost poem Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening .  I could only recall two or three lines of the poem from when I studied it back in high school.  But it refused to leave my mind until I found the poem online and wrote it in my journal. Whose woods these are I think I know. His house is in the village though, He will not see me stopping here To watch his woods fill up with snow. My little horse must think it queer To stop without a farmhouse near Between the woods and frozen lake The darkest evening of the year. He gives his harness bells a shake To ask if there is some mistake. The only other sound's the sweep Of easy wind and downy flake. The woods are lovely, dark and deep, But ...

Welcome to Montréal in the winter!  I took this picture as we crossed the bridge onto the island Thursday.  Downtown Montréal is directly ahead but as you can see, you can't see it!  Some days aren't quite so overcast but the sun rarely peeks through the gray during winter. Gray all winter long - it could be depressing!  We gets lots of snow, rain and freezing rain until about April.  We went to the temple Wednesday evening and when we came out, it was freezing rain.  We drove home (about 45 minutes) in scary freezing rain all the way.  We were grateful for a safe arrival and a warm apartment to greet us. The church parking lot had been plowed when we arrived for District Council on Thursday morning, but the pavement was a solid sheet of ice, about 1/4 inch thick.  We could have played broom hockey! Last week at church we made an appointment to visit a family in the ward on Monday evening.  They are from the Congo and their English is still a...

Happy New Year!!  We knew that not much would happen between Christmas and New Years so I saved the previous week events for today.  And I didn't want to clutter Christmas day with trivial stuff. We had a lovely Christmas afternoon with our Nigerian friends.  I had asked Wumi what she would like to eat for Christmas dinner.  She promptly requested turkey and shrimp, so that's what we had.  We found an 11-pound turkey, put it in a deeper 9x13 disposable pan and it filled the entire oven!  We were a little worried about it roasting properly but it came out just fine.  We also made homemade stuffing, which none of them had ever tasted but they loved it and took all the leftover home with them.  None of them had tasted cranberries nor did they like them; said they were too sweet.  They ate a lot of mashed potatoes but they don't do gravy. Solomon and Wumi Seun, Wumi, Solomon, me, John, Femi Solomon, Seun, Wumi, Femi After dinner Seun insisted on ...