A Little More Than 6 Months Gone (Week 28)

We continue to digitize and digitize.  We get faster and better at the job each week.  There are five of us from FamilySearch that are busy trying to get the WWI Royal Air Force records digitized. Find My Past then has to get them indexed before the big 100 year celebration next year in England.  We each usually do somewhere between 1,000 to 2,000 images daily.  We are moving rapidly  through the boxes.

Elder Smart hard at work

Our FamilySearch work stations

Here is one wall in our work place stacked with boxes filled with air force papers that we have digitized

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Both of us still go upstairs to the London Family History Center to help 1 to 2 days
each week.  This gives us lots of variety.  We both thought that we would much rather be upstairs helping than down stairs digitizing.  This is not necessarily true any more.  Elder Smart is truly in his realm upstairs helping with research, but both of us enjoy the work downstairs also -- after all its what we've been called to do.

John Major's insurance policy

We spent Saturday at the LMA ( London Metropolitan Archives) looking at insurance forms.  If you will recall we found a copy of an insurance claim that Paul's ancestor had made after a fire in his rope factory on the Isle of Wight in 1772.  Paul had been aware of this for several years, but had always hoped to find the original insurance policy to help him trace his ancestor, John Major.  We hit the jackpot Saturday and found that paper. (Wouldn't you know it would be Annie that found it!) He is not sure how much help this will be, but it is exciting to finally have the original document.

Sunday we had two of the Elder's in our ward over for dinner along with an engaged couple in the Ward.  We have grown to love and respect both Mentor Jones and Rebecca McDermitt. Both are good members of the Church. Rebecca is from Australia and served a mission in Palmyra. Mentor is from Nigeria.

Rebecca and Mentor

Paul has been wheezing when breathing at night.  We went to the doctor and then to the hospital for a chest x-ray.  Results were very good.  The lungs are clear and the wheezing is probably a mild allergy to some of the old documents and the spores they carry.   He was given an inhaler and all is well.

We finished our temple prep class  and are anxious for some of the students to attend the temple for the first time.  We have enjoyed teaching this class so much.  We hope we have other opportunities to grow and share here in the England Staines Ward.

We love it here in England and love The Lord.  Serving in Christ's Church is such a blessing.

Love you all so very very much,
Grandma and Grandpa Smart, Mom and Dad, Elder and Sister Smart, Paul and Annie

2 of 4 baby duck with mom @ archives