Our District

 

We are part of the Rome 3 ward and all the missionaries assigned to that ward make up our district.  We attend district meeting every Tuesday morning.  Every 6 weeks new missionaries come to the mission and those that have completed their 2 year or 18 month mission go home.  At the same time their are many transfers through out the mission.  So changes to the district occur every 6 weeks.  It is hard to see them go, but it is good to get to know their replacements.  We have been impressed by all of the missionaries that we have met.  They are all hard working and are striving to build the Kingdom. Here are some of our district pictures from the first 2 months.

 

 

 

These missionaries are the best!

Our new home

 

We have a nice apartment.  It is not very big, but big enough for what we need.  For those of you familiar with the old missionary apartments in Rome, we are only a five minute walk from my old apartments when I was assigned to Rome 4 and the Mission Office.

Our apartment is on the seventh floor. These photos are the view out the front of our apartment.

 

 

 It is enjoyable to watch and listen to the kids playing out in the court yard in back.

 

The first decorating we did was to hang our family calendar.  We are so happy we have it!  

 

 

Ann had to get some plants for the balcony. There are some beautiful balcony gardens.  I don't think we have enough time for Ann to get that many plants.  She does have some herbs and flowers.  She also found an old step ladder someone had been thrown away in the trees across the street to set a plant on.

 

 

The entry way.

 

 

Looking in from the entry way.  Everything was here for us, we have added only the pictures.

 

 

The kitchen, it's so small we have to take turns going in there.

 

The bedroom.  How did they know Ann loves blue?

The bathroom.

 

 

The guest bathroom.

 

 

 The "second" bedroom.  Ann's call it "the hall."  There is room for another twin bed, we just take it down so there's room for the ironing board. 

 

 

Last week I looked out the window, and couldn't believe it, a fox den!

The sun was about to go down so the pictures aren't very good.

We really do enjoy our apartment.

 

 

Villa Borghese

   Villa Borghese is a large, beautiful park near the center of Rome.  One evening we went with a group of Senior Missionaries to a theatre in the park.  We saw the play Romeo and Juliette.  The theatre was a reproduction of the Globe theatre in London.  The acting was excellent so even those that did not understand Italian enjoyed the production.  Thanks to Elder Kimball for the picture of the theatre.  After the play we walked through the park back to the subway and paused to enjoy the view of Piazza del Popolo and Saint Peter's lighting up the night sky.  It was an amazing view.  A very enjoyable evening.

 

 

 

The many faces of Tivoli

   One afternoon we went to Tivoli, a town in the mountains just outside of Rome with the Sister Missionaries that work in the Mission Office.  We went through the Villa D'Este gardens.  The fountains are natural water pressure.  There are some great architectural designs and interesting faces as part of the fountains.  After enjoying the gardens, we walked around the city a little and had a nice dinner at a street side café.  Before driving home we enjoyed the view of the lights of Rome below.  We will return some evening to see the fountains lighted at night.

 

 

St. Paul Outside the Walls

   One day we took one of the young sister missionaries to a doctors appointment.  After we dropped her off at the doctors office we started back for home.  The direct route home would have taken us past the coliseum and some restricted driving areas, so I went the opposite way so that I could go around the restricted areas.  Not too far from the doctor's office we passed St. Paul outside the walls.  When I was here as a young missionary I had an apartment about a quarter of a mile from this church.  So we stopped and went inside and then drove past my old apartment.