Dearest Family!   

    This Christmas Season is such a wonderful time of the year! It has been and amazing week!  We are so blessed to have a wonderful family & a very special opportunity to serve!   We have been blessed this week to enjoy both!!!

    Had the opportunity to help several in their homes the first of the week!  Also attended a great High School & Swing Choir Concert!  Tuesday night, our regular night in the FHC we had 6 from one ward come into the center, then the on Wednesday A.M. they came in again, plus several more whom they had texted & invited.  This is on Christmas Eve day, Several are from one family, & Mom comes with them, she is the YW”s President.    The second day they came in, 9 yr old sister came in, she has been our helper with other things.  She & Bro Croft added pictures, then she said,   “I want to learn indexing!   & now she is a very good indexer.  Mom, & 5 children were in again tonight, all indexing!  Plus we had more youth from other wards tonight too!  Joy and Symphony came later in the evening. Bro Croft and I enjoy doing indexing everyday . . . such a spiritual uplift and blessing to them and us! !

     We were home in the a.m., too stormy to travel to Al’s in Worland to be with his family!  Bro Croft received a new Samsong Galexy Tablet & I a vacuum that doesn’t squeal.  We had fun trying it out Christmas morning!  Went to the Grants after lunch, then Home & enjoyed a visit from Rob & Michelle!   Had a nice visit with the Fikes on the phone & Skyped on Friday!  Also great visits with Vicki & Allen!  Thank you so very much for all your special gifts!

    Then Saturday, we were expecting  Allen’s family for supper on their way home from Billings Temple! Were surprised to also have the Fikes arrive from Laramie!   How fun it has been to have them!  We are enjoying every minute we have with them!

    Another blessing of today – Ryan & Rhonda blessed little Quinn in the Powell Second ward!  Super to be with them and their extended families!

    There was another 3 inches of snow and colder temps this week so we didn’t get out fishing.  Our tomatoes in the greenhouse are getting red now that’s exciting!  We love you all and are grateful for your examples of righteous living!!    

CTR     We love you all!   Bro & Sis Croft

 

Quinn Robert Croft blessing day Dec 28, 2014 in Powell Second Ward

Croft Nativity and Christmas Tree 2014

It was a special day for our 48th wedding anniversary!

Dearest Family,

    Happy Birthday to Kenny & Melvin!   We hope you each have a wonderful day!

    We have had a wonderful week, helping, serving, enjoying several Christmas Concerts! – A middle school concert & the Lovell Wyo Stake Christmas Concert!  One highlight of the week was helping an 82 yr old man record several stories. We will help him put them in memories in Family Search this week. All the new technology makes this so easy now. On Wednesday, I helped in the FHC & Bro Croft watched over another tree removal project.  We had a very old 60 ft tall Douglas fir tree, right against the house, on the north west corner, by the living room.  Took professionals to get it out of there!  It is down on the ground now. We have enjoyed a day in Cody, doing a little shopping & having lunch together!   It was a special day for our 48th wedding anniversary!  Bro Croft was also able to fill his last deer license on Saturday evening, got a doe right near our fish pond!

    We met with our stake youth FH consultants last night to review the progress on the million names indexing project. More youth are getting into it . . . . with our report last night close to 29,000 names have been indexed!

    It’s a wonderful season of the year!     http://www.mormon.org/christmas    Ctrl click to view this amazing video about the Savior.   We so want to wish each of you a very wonderful Christmas day! We are so very grateful for our many Blessings!  

    We send out love to each of you! 

  Thanks for all your love and prayers for us this year!

  Bro & Sister Croft

    

Cut down the 60 ft Douglas Fir tree next to the house. 

Today was a WOW day!

Dearest Family,    .

    Happy 1st Anniversary today, Ryan & Rhonda – an many more!  and there is another Anniversary this week, 48 years with my wonderful sweetheart!

    Today was a WOW day!    Busy, but so enjoyable, with so much help from above!  We witnessed the Lord’s hand in so many ways today!  We have some amazing Youth consultants, helping in several classes today! They do a great job! Two of our classes talked about Descendancy Research – love to watch the excitement when our Bro & Sis’s find names using it that they can do the temple ordinances for. One bishopric member found 6-8 names last week in class using it & more today! The Family Search program was totally down this afternoon & we still had one more class to teach.  We called FS support, & yes, it was down, check back maybe in an hour, well, it was only 30 minutes until our class would start.  Bro Croft checked his computer & did have a set of snip-it screens covering this lesson which we could use!  I tried FS again just as class members were coming into the room, & it was back on line! Miracles happen every day!  The FHC was buzzing tonight, 8 youth in to index, several adults learning more about it!  There has been snow and rain all day with temps in the mid 30’s sure could be slick in the morning if the temperature drops.

    One Youth consultant taught his Grandpa how to index, in preparation for the Meeting of the YM-YW Stake Youth Council meeting tonight!  His Grandpa is the Stake YMen’s President & the Youth consultants have invited their adult leaders to help them with their Million Names Indexing Challenge.  He wanted to get started & be an example!

    Last week the total indexed with only 4  of 8 wards reporting was almost 6,000!      Our wards are reporting to us this evening & it looks as if it could be twice what it was last week!  The snow ball is beginning to roll & it is picking up momentum & growing in size each week!   

    One afternoon, we had two 9 year old cub scouts come to the FHC!  Their leaders are always a bit skeptical, wondering how they will ever be interested for more than 10-15 minutes!   The boys were wanting more time after 35 minutes!  Bro Croft helped on young man add photos to his tree!  He was on his way home to help his Grandpa add pictures to their tree!  The other one entered the room saying, “This is fun, I already know how to do this!”  We had worked with him before.

    Enjoyed so very much a trip to Worland.  We were able to see Ira’s Christmas Program – attended the dress rehearsal in the afternoon.  It was very special, Ira did great! We enjoyed seeing Amber, Melvin, Leanne & Camille. We also stopped to see Aunt Leona & Aunt Lavon in Greybull on the way home!  So nice to visit with them!  We enjoyed our ward Christmas party & watching the local BBall games & Dance Team on TV.

   Thanks, Darece for the perm on Monday and a hair cut later in the week. Sure feels better. Bro Croft got a hair cut as well so we’re both in good shape for a few weeks! It’s been a warm sunny week with a couple days in the low 50’s so it’s melted a lot of our snow  except in the shady parts of the orchard. We finished our pday on Friday morning with 3 hours or fishing at Pond 5 at YT unit. We found 10” of ice with some water on the top from all the melted snow and the fish were really biting! We caught large mouth bass, hybrid sun fish and trout . . . . over two dozen fish in an hour. We kept several of the bigger ones to eat. A nice time to be together and enjoy the wonderful outdoors on a sunny warm morning!

We love you all & CTR

Bro & Sister Croft

Some of the fish caught at Pond 5!

The First Presidency Christmas Devotional was wonderful!

Dearest Family,

    It has been a wonderful week!  The First Presidency Christmas Devotional was wonderful!   Have you noticed how history of families is talked about so much!  We loved the story of Joseph, Mary, & baby Jesus, relating it to our families!  And the dime’s worth of candy – that was so special!   If we each share our memories & experiences, the stories we have heard our parents & grandparents tell, how amazing the results will be!   And that was just the finish of an amazing Sunday!   Each class was special in it’s own way!  A man learning more about a great-grandmother who raised her son, without a father in the home – there is so much more to learn.   A consultant helping a patron with severe limitations do Family History – they are both feeling the spirit. Youth beginning to work on the Indexing challenge, over 4000 indexed in 3 wards, they are just beginning & the snowball is just beginning to roll down the mountain!

    We were able to get answers from Family Search Support for one of the consultants.   If we explain & ask enough questions, they will be able to help.  Later in the week he received an email telling him what he needed to do, so the temple work could be completed for a sister-in-law where there were some unique circumstances. Several of our in home visits resulted in finding info on a family where temple ordinances are needed! These were couples in FS whose children had not been entered in the Family Search Tree!  It was also great to help several people on the phone & answer question!  It is wonderful to learn that there are more people working on it at home!

    A Stake Family History Consultant Meeting was great!   We led a discussion with them, which brought out some great points!   It is what we are learning – work one on one with patrons – even spend more weeks having more hands on computer time in the classes. Invite them to come to FHC where we can help them more, especially if they need help with computer skills!

    There was also time for pleasure, ice fishing one morning at Deaver Reservoir - no catching but a sunny warm time, quilting a little, Bro Croft cut down a tree, did a little grocery shopping one day & even watched a basketball game or two. Talon’s in person & one on BYU TV. We continually review new updates and video training so that we are able to keep our consultants using the currant technology! To be an active part of the “Hastening” is a wonderful blessing each day for us and those we serve!

    We love you all & CTR 

       Bro & Sis Croft

    

Bob and Rena ice fishing on pDay at Deaver Reservoir

At 12:01am on Monday the Youth indexing challenge begins . . .

Dearest Family!        Happy 15th Birthday, Isaac!    Hope your day is very special!

    Well it has been a wonderful week!  Always different when there is a holiday! But it was nice! We were able to do a few things here at home! I even quilted most of one day, making some real progress on the temple part of Ethan & Bekah’s quilt!

     Nice day at the Public Library, Our Deacon age young man came in & found several more names for the temple.   Bro Croft helped an older sister with many things, computer stuff & Family History things.  There were also several calls to SLC for answers to questions, some we are still waiting for the answers!   We so appreciate the help we get from FH Support Missionaries! There were cancelations also, people are just busy with extra things. 

    We cut up my second deer this week with Dad having one more license yet to fill. Talon got a nice deer Sat evening and has it hanging in our meat room for a few days. We got 14 inches of snow in 24 hrs early this week, took dad several hrs to get the snow blowing done. By mid week it went to 50’ with no cold nights so the snow melted quickly by Sat. Well by noon on Fri it was 52 ‘  then a big temp change hit . . . by 2pm it was at 10’ with a 20 mph wind. Today we awoke to 3” of dry snow again and a –10’ temp. It’s supposed to be cold a couple more days then normal temps in the low 40’s.

        Today we were even able to listen to Ken & Darece speak in Sacrament Meeting!  It was so nice to get back in the grove of our regular FH history activities – witnessed several miracles – as leaders showed up just when they were needed, new people were called & they are excited to be working together!  We were able to begin training all & witnessing their excitement  We Love it!

    It is a wonderful season of the year!   We are so grateful for each of you!  You are all the greatest!  We so appreciate your love, prayers, & great examples!   It was wonderful to spend Thanksgiving Day with some of you & get to talk to the rest of you this week!  Even got to love on little Quinn! There are so many things to be thankful for – It is unbelievable how we can communicate around the world. We Skyped, Joy & Family on Saturday night & also Jane in Denmark one day!  And then  by the same token sometimes things can be a little slow – Saturday November 29 we received a letter Joy had mailed November 1  It was stamped, “Found in Supposedly Empty Equipment” Interesting, huh????  We did get it though, that was a miracle!

    At 12:01am  on Monday the Youth indexing challenge begins . . . . we’re excited for them! !

Love to all & CTR, 

  Bro Sis Croft

So far this month of Nov we have had over 20 inches of snow!