Late March and April in Memphis

Spring in the Mid-South Spring in Memphis has been a combination of beautiful spring days and blossoms and frequent Storm Watches, Storm Warnings, Tornado Watches and Warnings.  You can bet we are glued to the television weather coverage and are listening to the nearly constant warnings from our weather radio as we hunker down during these weather events.  We did not know that there was such a thing as a "Tornado Season" here and that it is getting worse (experts say) due to global warming. This picture is right outside our front door of our apartment complex.
Tornado Damage in Wynne, AK One of the communities hit hardest by and an EF3 tornado on March 30th was Wynne, Arkansas....about 50 miles from us.  We drove to Wynne a week later to see the damage ourselves.  The High School was completely destroyed and other school buildings damaged. In the path of the tornado, homes were leveled or 2nd stories and roofs completely gone.  We saw tangled steel hanging from trees and large trees snapped like toothpicks.  There were 4 fatalities, including a young couple killed when a tree collapsed on their bed.  Looking at the devastation, it was amazing that there were not more deaths. See pictures here....yes, that is a bleacher from the football field thrown on top of a building.  The news coverage here has more pictures:   Wynne, AR storm damage live shot - YouTube
MyBaby4Me and Spring Baby Showers  This time of year it is a tradition here to have multiple community events for pregnant women and young families.  MyBaby4Me has been invited to be an exhibitor/table at several community Baby Showers.  This was our first event and it was great to meet so many pregnant women.
Guns and Barb-B-Que We were with a group of people in multiple cars to go to dinner.  Our #1 choice of southern "Q" was closed for a family emergency, so someone suggest we go to a nearby option called Fergusons.  No one said anything about the additional opportunity to have a side of machine gun with our food.  Think "Top Golf" only with guns....with a glass wall separating the food from the firing range.  We did not take advantage of the guns, but the Barb-B-Que at Fergusons was delicious.
General Conference Weekend Twice each year, we feel blessed to hear from our prophet, the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles and other church leaders in General Conference.  Conference sessions are broadcast throughout the world in the native language of each country.  Between the sessions of conference, the church shows a World Report of global humanitarian work. MyBaby4Me was featured in this issue of the World Report.  Click on the link below to see the footage.  If you want to skip ahead and just watch the coverage of MyBaby4Me, it begins at around 4 minutes into the program.  https://youtu.be/LFxV1tx7Zzo
MyBaby4Me Progress Report We were asked to provide information about our efforts to date, so spent some time reviewing this work.  MyBaby4Me launched on November 29th, so we are approaching a 5-month anniversary.  In that time, we have had 43 scheduled group meetings, served 30 women and partners, with 87 encounters with those individuals.  And that doesn't count all the babies and young children that accompanied them to our MyBaby4Me groups.  It is gratifying to mark progress and makes us eager to see these numbers continue to grow.
Loss of a Baby...... We wanted to share a tender story; this is not from one of our participants but from a man that we met and shared tears with.  He works PT as a security guard on a college campus and is a pastor at a church.  He noticed the Oregon license plates on our car and asked what we were doing so far from home.  We explained our mission goal of impacting infant mortality.  He then shared the story of his own baby boy who died in the first few days of life.  His wife had developed diabetes during the pregnancy, and the baby had problems after birth and did not survive.  The tears ran down his cheeks as he described the busy time with 4 women delivering close together, and his black baby being the only baby that did not live. We don't know the facts, but he felt as if his baby had received less attention than needed in comparison to the 3 white women and white babies born close to the same time. "I think he could've made it" he said quietly.  We cried too....color or the perception of a racial bias should not affect outcomes of an infant or any other person.  Doctrine and Covenants 18:10 says "Remember the worth of souls is great in the sight of God."  We thanked this man for sharing his painful story, expressed our sorrow to him, and committed to work even harder to improve infant outcomes.
How Do We Demonstrate Love? As we continue to meet and get to know the MyBaby4Me women, we grow in love for them.  We cry with them, laugh with them, hug them and try to encourage them with the hard things in their lives.  Sharon Eubanks devotes her life to Humanitarian Service projects overseen and coordinated by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints.  She spoke of love in the October 2021General Conference: "Baptized members of the Church are under covenant to care for those in need.  Efforts to do so require the guidance of the Holy Spirit and a willing heart to say to the Lord:  Here am I, send me. Jesus Christ asked Peter:   'Do you love me?'  The essence of the gospel is contained in how we answer that question."
Easter  Our "home" ward held a Saturday morning breakfast and re-created a spiritual walk depicting the last week of Jesus' life and ending with the empty tomb.  It was a moving experience and helped those who participated feel of His divine love. He laid down His life for each of us and took it up again.  Because of Him, we have hope.   May we always remember and be grateful for our Savior, Jesus Christ.  It is His love that we strive each day to model. Blessings to all of you, Lynn and Joell Archibald