HAPPY BIRTHDAY to ME!

Between the Assistants to the President and our district leaders making me a very fun homemade birthday card, to getting phone calls from several missionaries throughout the mission, to receiving bear hugs from many of the sister missionaries, to going to a concert in an ancient Roman theatre, to seeing the Mediterranean, to seeing a rainbow in Rome (the world must not be coming to an end yet), to cooking dinner for an investigator and several missionaries, to attending Zone Singing in downtown Rome, to being fingerprinted (it’s for my Questora – permission to live in Italy), to receiving emails and care cards from all the kids: Life is good, and I feel spoiled rotten and much loved.

This morning at DDM, the missionaries from our district served birthday cake and ice-cream and sang happy birthday once again. I've decided that this birthday has been so much fun that I think I will have one birthday a week for the next several weeks, and get this getting old stuff over with so I can just enjoy life.

The Mouth of Truth is an ancient stone mask that was moved to Rome in 1632. At one time the mouth moved and the legend was that if a liar put his hand inside the mouth, he would lose his hand.

The Theatre Marcellus, completed in 13 BC, now features outdoor summer concerts every day of the summer June through September. We enjoyed a concert there on Friday evening. We have tickets to go to four more concerts during the summer.



The missionaries from Rome 1 and Rome 2 meet together in downtown Rome and sing hymns as people walk by. After a bit, a couple will go out and talk to whoever has stopped and wants to talk, and then in a while, they go back to singing and others break away from the choir and visit with people. They look pretty sharp dressed in white shirts and ties, and skirts.