November 16, 2014 What do you mean "it doesn't get that cold in Atlanta"?

The weather has definitely changed here.  We have had days where the high temperature is in the 40's.  It is a real shock to our young Brazilian Elders.  We journeyed to their apartments to survey their winter preparations.  The one who is probably the most prepared for the weather is also the one freezing to death!  Riding bicycles in the cold is not pleasant, they are discovering.

Today was a very blessed day at Church.  There were 15 non-members there!  We are so excited to have less actives rejoin us and non-members become members.  The conversion stories are wonderful.  We are so grateful to be part of it all.  I assure you, it is not because we are good at this.  The Lord is sending them to us.

We spent time running cars to Lilburn to get them fixed.  It is about 45 minutes from here.  I am getting so that I can get there without the Garmin because we go so often.  It is always a delight to be able to see the other senior missionaries.  They run things so smoothly and are wonderful people to be around.

As a senior missionary, we are allowed to go into the Atlanta area.  We are also allowed to visit with family.  We had the pleasure of having dinner with Elder Dixon's brother on Wednesday.  He is so busy and so are we.  We hadn't seen him for almost two months.

We had a Zone training on Tuesday.  The Zone Leaders invited a man from one of the Wards here to speak to us about teaching.  He is well qualified to teach on the subject, his resume was lengthy and impressive.  He talked about the importance of using open-ended questions when we teach.  If we use questions that can be answered with one word, we are not getting everything from the person's answer.  He taught us about different forms of teaching and when to use different kinds.  For example, he used to be in charge of safety training (in some way) at UPS.  They had lots of injuries for people because of falling in ice and snow.  He said they developed a machine to simulate ice and the person was in a harness.  That way, the person could safely learn how to walk on ice.  Instructing them was not enough.  They needed to be able to feel firsthand how to walk so as to not fall.  Good food for thought!

Every time we go to visit our Elders in Alpharetta, this little car is parked there.  We think it is amazing that it can sit there and not be damaged or stolen.

Another little bit of Atlanta trivia.   This is the homebase for the Chick-fil-a organization.  Their restaurants are EVERYWHERE!  There are a few, though, that have had me scratching my head.  This is a picture of one of them (I didn't take these pictures, but it looks like the one we pass):

Yes, you are seeing it correctly.  It is a Chick-fil-a Dwarf House, complete with a small red door.  I was really surprised that these were in existence, so I looked up the history.  As it turns out, the initial restaurant for Truett Cathy (the founder of Chick-fil-a) was called a Dwarf Diner because it was so small.  There is nothing small about their business now!