Some returning missionaries  having some fun with the President.

 This custom leather scripture cover is quite impressive,
(as is the missionary it belongs to)!

 These wonderful sisters in Matsudo went the extra mile for our last zone conference!

We were amazed at how artistic they were with the face cookies!

The last block of the quilt was signed this transfer, so we are now using the edges. 

It is exciting to have it completely filled. In case you're wondering, there are 579 blocks!

Two shinkansen (bullet trains) nose to nose at Niigata station.

They obviously can go either direction.  These two were linked together.

Some of the sisters gathered outside the temple on Jan 13, 2015.

Look who came to the Nakano ward Christmas party!

We had a few missionaries over for lunch yesterday.

 Thank goodness for these sweet ladies who came to help!

Our wonderful office couple on a P-day in Nikko.

You can see the famous "hear no evil, speak no evil, see no evil" monkeys in the background - this is where they originated, carved on the outside of a stable. 

Now we have iPads!

 The Assistants and Technology Elders were the first to receive iPad Minis in mid-January.

 Matsudo Zone displaying their new iPads in early February.

These sisters in Niigata are excited about the new technology and its capabilities!

We discovered this quaint little country train platform near Kisarazu in Chiba last summer.
This is the whole thing - no ticket gate or anything.

The train system in Japan is legendary. I love the contrast between this tiny station and Shinjuku station in Tokyo, which boasts of having 36 platforms, over 200 exits, and an average of 3.64 million people using it daily!

Everyone loves Sado Island!

The jet-foil ferry from Niigata to Sado Jima.  It was an amazingly smooth ride!

The members of the Sado Branch.

The Branch President - a wonderful, hard-working fisherman of both fish and men.

This is NOT Tokyo!

What a beautiful place to air out your futons!

In July, we acquired the beautiful island of Sado in our mission, which used to be part of the Sendai Mission.  Its been a few years since they have had missionaries on the island, but just this week, we sent three lucky elders there. These pictures were taken in August.

The field is green, all ready to harvest.  Well, maybe not yet, but you can't argue that this is a true green!  In August we travelled to Niigata, which is famous for its high quality rice.

The aisles of Costco, just like the streets of Tokyo, are very crowded!  You should see the looks I get when I buy 2-3 full cartloads of food at a time.  We are grateful to have Costco here.

Missionaries are some of the happiest people on earth!  Especially when they're eating.  :)

June 18, 2013.  This was the last temple day before the mission split.  One. . two. . . jump! President Budge had to jump over the wall to get in the picture before the camera timer went off.  He made it!

The missionaries surprised Sister Budge with a "heart attack" in the mission home on her birthday.  Each heart had a message from the missionaries; they gave her flowers and made a wonderful cheesecake.  It was very thoughtful and a lot of fun.  Sister Budge will treasure these messages and the memories forever.

Sister Budge's homemade cinnamon rolls were a big hit at the zone conferences.

September 2012.  We have learned not to teach lessons about the relative merits of cooperation versus competition by using an arm wrestling metaphor when training at zone conferences!