This morning we awoke early, 0300, to take Brother Harrington to the airport, it is about a 15 minute drive away. His plane left about 0530. It was great to see him finally be able to finish up and go home, but we will miss him very much; he has become like one of our own sons! After returning home Elder Gowans was able to return to bed for about an hour, but it was a sleepless hour.

We arose just before 0600 to prepare to meet the young missionaries at the church to drive them up to Lexington, SC for our Zone Christmas Conference. The morning was filled with training and and a couple of talks; one by the local Stake President who is a CES employee, so you can imagine that was a pretty interesting talk and then the other by a friend of the Holms who has just received a call from the 1st Presidency to serve as a Mission President in a Spanish speaking mission somewhere in the world. The afternoon was filled with lunch and fun skits produced by each missionary district. They were a lot of fun. Then we ended with two short talks from President and Sister Holm and then we sang Christmas Hymns for about 30 minutes.

After returning home from the Conference we dashed up to the Post to do our 4 hours of service, serving many of the service men and women who were assisting the hundreds of AIT students to the airport for Holiday Block Leave.

The following are some photos from the Christmas Conference and the dinner we helped serve.

 The one above and below is from our district's skit. The above photo was 4 missionaries who had trouble focusing on their morning studies because it was near Christmas. Below, I was Mr. Scrooge. Elder Schwartz was the Ghost of Christmas present, warning me I'd better talk to those missionaries who knocked on my door.

 Another skit

And a story reading.

 Soldiers eating dinner at the Friendship Chapel. Many were helping AIT students leave for the holidays, so they would come eat dinner here while waiting for their next trip to the Airport.

 The serving table. Sister Gowans and I did most of the serving.

This morning we met with the young missionaries to practice our skit for tomorrow's mission Christmas conference, we had a good time practicing. This afternoon we picked up Brother Harrington and brought him back to the apartment to stay the night; we will take him to the airport at about 0330 in the morning. Elder Gowans attended his Branch Presidency meeting this evening where we discussed disciplinary councils for the majority of the evening. You might say it has been a different day, but were are about our duties.

This evening over 500 young men and women graduated from their AIT training. We had 8 young men and women graduate. We believe that some must have gone home earlier for we could not find them among the graduates.

 John Baker and Jacob Harrington. Jacob arrived for training clear back in July, however due to medical issues he faced he was 'recycled' or held back to later classes. He was most faithful attending most all of our activities. Elder Gowans ordained him an Elder back at our stake conference. He is hoping to serve a mission next year. Brother Baker arrived after Jacob, he brought his wife out and they both were very active also. We enjoyed their faithfulness at most of the activities, too.

 Brother Dransfied. We got to know him and then his wife came out to live here. They moved up north and so we didn't see him very often, but he will be stationed here so I'm sure we will see them around from time-to-time.

Brother Requenez, a very faithful young man. Great desires to be obedient and do all that Heavenly Father wants him to do.
We love all these young men. After graduation several of us went to Olive Garden to celebrate their success.

 John's wife Aurora.

Us and Jacob. He is so happy to be going home.

After church this evening we hand delivered more Christmas cards to our military families, wishing them a Merry Christmas, thanking them for their service and telling them we love them. It has been good to get out and see many of them again and remember where they live and where they live in relation to everyone else. The roads and streets are so crazy around here we've been able to put more people's homes in perspective to everyone else.

Today was a great day! This morning we went up to Post to meet our students as usual. We went to the company where three LDS students live. We were waiting in the CQ area when we saw one of our students walk by; we didn't get a chance to pull him aside, but then he walked by a minute or two later and we pulled him aside and had a chance to visit with him for a moment. We wished him a Merry Christmas and ensured that he was going to be able to go home for Christmas, he said he was and then he went on his way to his morning duties. We then were looking for another fellow when we saw a fellow walk by and on the back of his camel back we saw his name; we reached out for him and said, "Are you brother Hart?" He said he was. We had an opportunity to visit with him too. We always invite them out to church; and remind them of the time and place. The last fellow would not come down out of his room. He said he was packing, which was fine, at least we knew he was going home too.

We then went over to another company to find another individual whom we had met for just a moment. We found him too and had a nice visit with him. He would be traveling home and he also said he would come out to church. We hope all these young men keep their word.

We were also able to visit with Brother Downs for a moment and Sister Ferre. Then we headed over to the 73 Ord BTL. We were looking for a brother Thompson, who we had not yet met. We found out he was checked out to the PX; so we hopped in the car and headed that way. We had a feeling that we would find him. After looking around for a few minutes two men walked by and we noticed his name take; all we could see was 'mpson'. We knew that  must be him. In the PX we cannot ware our name tags. So Elder Gowans went up to him and said, "Are you Brother Thompson?" He answer, "I'm a brother Thompson." Elder Gowans then said, "I"m Elder Gowans." We had a nice visit with him and got acquainted. He is different than the normal troops. He is 35 years old. We look forward to getting to know all these knew troops better. Heavenly Father certainly helped us meet those who we wanted to meet today and others, who needed our visit too.

This afternoon we drove out to Aiken, SC. We had an appointment with a family with the last name of Ahlers. A member of the High Council and his family live out that way too and invited us to lunch. He grilled hamburgers and they were delicious! We had a real nice lunch with them and then drove over to the Ahler  family. We arrived at their home just before they did. They had been out and left a note on their door, but we didn't think it was for us. Can you believe this, it said, "Elder Dougal"! I cannot believe that they mistook our name Gowans, for Dougal and that name being the name of our son in law and daughter. They were very friendly and cordial. We learned that he is indeed deploying in February time frame with his Nation Guard unit. She is expecting a baby and will deliver in April. We tried to impress on them that they could call on us at any time and we would do our best to do all that we could to help. After our visit with them we drove over to two more families and just had a short visit with them, giving them a Christmas card, and wishing them a Merry Christmas. Both those families were prior military, but we wanted to drop in on them, introduce ourselves and let them know that we were there in case they ever needed our assistance.

We love our work and are so grateful that Heavenly Father guides us to those who need our ministry.

This morning 3 of our 2nd LTs graduated from Basic Lieutenant Officer Course. They have been here several  months and it will be difficult to see them go. They have been active in Church, Institute and Family Home Evening. We will miss their activity and friendship. Here are some photos of them.

 George and Tiana Allred. They are from Cedar City. She accompanied him through the 6 months of his class. She is 5 months pregnant, so Fort Gordon was good to them.

 Brother Russell and his wife. She stayed home with their 4 children; he was here by himself for the entire course.

Brother Wallock and his wife were here together for his entire course. She was also involved in an internship and her graduation from BYU-I was today; so she was there he was here, so mom came out to support him.

This evening we had a wonderful institute class built around Joseph Smith and his remarkable young life. We examined his early history, his character, his confusion over religion, and his discovery of the truth.

Today was laundry day. Wow, exciting, I know. However, while Sister Gowans did laundry, Elder Gowans, organized all the maps to the homes of our military families. We estimate there is about 150 military families in the stake who work out at Fort Gordon. So he divided them up by wards and then alphabetized them. We are in the process of visiting each one, one more time and delivering them a card and a special Christmas message. Most will be done on the door step as it will take time to go from house to house.

This evening we got together with the young missionaries to practice a skit for the mission Christmas party. Afterward we were supposed to have a Correlation meeting, but we thing the ward mission leader must have fell a sleep at work; he never showed up.

We also finished preparing the institute lesson for tomorrow, we will be studying the First Vision, it should be really good.