We're at it again!

Dearest friends and family,

Lake McDonald, Glacier National Park

After three foreign mission assignments we decided we wanted to try something different.  In September we relocated to Montana to begin a 12-month FamilySearch Support mission.  More specifically, along with 700 other church service missionaries from around the world, we answer phone calls, emails, and chats from people using www.familysearch.org.  The support lines are live 24 hours per day (except for a half day on Sunday for services).

Our instruction has been rather intensive for the past seven weeks and we're finally prepared to take the "training wheels" off the bike.  This week we will begin taking solo calls but we will always have a mentor, or supervisor standing by if we get ourselves into trouble. Missionaries typically serve from home so all meetings, training, and communications are via the internet.  It's a miracle that we're able to handle over 20,000 calls per month from all over the world, around the clock, with only volunteer help.

We've enjoyed getting more involved in family history and exploring our family tree through the medium of familysearch.org.  To help visualize our tree graphically back nine generations, Sister Lindorf made a large wheel shown below with her family lines on the right and mine on the left and our children in the center.  She was actually able to trace one line on her father's side all the way back to Adam using the website we support as a resource.

Despite our busy schedule of training and manning the phones, we've had time to spend with our daughter Jenneka Shumard and her family in Kalispell, MT.  We were fortunate for the opportunity to rent the house right next door to the Shumards which influenced where we decided to serve "from home" on this mission.  Here we are with the Shumards enjoying the beautiful Fall colors.

It's wonderful to be able to serve a mission and have three of our grandchildren right next door.  After 4 1/2 years out of the USA on our previous missions this is a real treat.  As an additional bonus, almost everyone in Montana speaks English!  How could you resist these three?

Montana is beautiful and no smog in sight.  Before the weather turned cold, we had a chance to try out an inflatable kayak on nearby Foys Lake.  Here is Sister Lindorf showing how it's done.

While exploring our new surroundings, we took at trip to nearby Glacier National Park.

Birthdays, are another thing we won't miss on this mission.  Anndra turned five and Parker turned twelve in the past month.

I suspect we won't be sending out as frequent updates as we have on previous assignments due to the nature of this calling.  But we wanted you to know what we're up to and invite you to learn more about your family tree at www.familysearch.org.  The website is free and is available to everyone, not just members of the church.  If you have a question you can call the support number and you just might get one of us!

The first snow started to fall this evening so we'll be settling in for a long winter.  Please feel free to write back.  We would enjoy hearing from you.

All our love,

Elder & Sister Lindorf