Thursday, February 26, 2015

OUR MISSION BEGINS........

 
 
Sunday, February 22, 2016 we were set apart to be full time missionaries for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints!  What an honor!  All of our Salt Lake Family was in attendance.  President Paul Rytting presided and Ben and Tom assisted.
 
 
 
 
 
 
 Then we enjoyed our last Sunday Dinner at Monson's before leaving for the MTC on Monday.
 


We arrived bright and early......


 
First letter from the MTC.....
Hi family.  The first thing that happened this morning is that we were greeted by a man who said our assignment had been changed and they needed an F100 pilot to go on a special assignment…….  He turned out to be one of our old friends that we knew in Louisiana!  We had fun reminiscing.  Then we ran into them and their friends at the mall tonight and had ice cream.  The friends are neighbors of the couple we are replacing in HK who live on Towers drive in Salem and the 3rd couple golfs with Roy Miller and he also bought the 10 acres of land from us that we used to own in Salem.  Talk about a small world!! 

The MTC is going well.  We love you!  Mom and Dad

These are our friends from Louisiana, Grant and Mary Jane Palfreyman.  They are the directors of the MTC.


 
  Day two.... A letter from David

Dear Fam....
It has been a wonderful day here.  I am so amazed at how many young Sister Missionaries there are here.  Tonight we had a devotional for all meissionaries with Elder Causee, First counselor in the Presiding Bishopric and his wife as the speakers.  It was terrific. Tonight also we were able to connect with the missionaries who are here learning Cambodian and it was super to feel of their spirit and excitement.  There are five sisters and nine elders leaving here in about one month.  I wish I would have had Weston’s bug pictures to show them.  We also have met several times with Elder and Sister Christensen who are the parents-in-laws of one of our elders, Elder Garner, that we have not heard bout or from since we came home.  He now lives in Kentucky in graduate school.  The world is so small in the Church.  We look forward to being back home this weekend before leaving for Hong Kong.
Love DAD (and M0M)
  
This is the group going to Cambodia!  Lucky kids!!
 

 
We were part of a big group of couples going all over the world.  It was so fun fun to meet everyone!
 

 
 
We were divided into Districts for our daily study.  Our District friends are Elder and Sister Fensky from Alberta Canada going to Toronto,  Elder and Sister Buchanan serving in their stake in West Jordan and Elder and Sister Towers from Utah, going to Hong Kong, China.


 
Wednesday evening we enjoyed going out to dinner with our good friends, Norb and Emma Kemp and Gary and Laree Phillippi, all of whom served with us in Cambodia.  We appreciated them all driving down to the MTC to "bust us out"!  We were having so much fun we forgot to take a picture!
 
 
We were so lucky to have great young returned missionaries as our teachers every day.
Sister Yazzi and Brother Smith did a great job in the mornings.
 
 
 
In the afternoons we had a great time with Brother Teuscher and Brother Swallow!
 
Jordan and Zach invited us to have dinner at their house the last night we were in Provo.  Some of our friends from Cambodia and Vietnam, Shane and Han Harrison, live in their ward so we all went to visit them first.
 
 


Zach made delicious Gnocci and Jordan fixed all the rest!  What a feast!

 
The last day we were surprised and excited to have Elder and Sister Haight who had been our missionaries in Cambodia, come to class to teach us about how to be great senior missionaries.  It was such a treat for us to see them.
 
 

We can't leave the MTC without the traditional map photo, so here it is!  


 
In two days we will be off to Hong Kong on another adventure!



 
 
 

 

Monday, February 23, 2015

Family Fun!!


With only 3 months to go before our mission, we decided to squeeze in as much fun as possible.  Thanksgiving and Christmas were holidays we treasured knowing we wouldn't get to celebrate with family next year.  Ben and Nicole opened their hearts and home to 45 of us for a great Thanksgiving dinner!  It wasn't even crowded!

Lots of yummy food and 14 pies!

What an eclectic group of people we enjoyed on Thanksgiving!

 
Then it was the annual Christmas tree hunt and chocolate dipping to round out the weekend.
Tom and Kristin's 24th Christmas tree.....Jordan and Zach's very first!
 
The perfect tree for Ben, Nicole, Zane, Rhiannon and Kimi's new house!

 
Three generations of smiley women...Jordan, Myrna and Kristin







 
Everyone joined in the fun to get the chocolates boxed!
A special package of chocolates wrapped separately to send to Weston in Cambodia!
We received the most amazing present from all our family for Christmas....a huge book of photos called "Our Happy Family!"  How perfect to take with us to remind us of all the fun memories we have made together! 
 

 
 
 
 
 
 David and I gave them each a personalized Seven Generation Family Photo Chart.
 

7 Generation Photo Chart


 
We were especially lucky to have Geoff and Jolene and family come for Christmas!!  Jarry and Sharron Zaharias joined us for dinner as well!  The more the merrier!
 
 
 


 
We spent many a late night playing Whist!

New Year's Eve was celebrated with yummy food, fun and games and the infamous (that means MORE than famous) Firework Display by Tom and Ben.  Everything worked like it was supposed to so this year we had no neighbors running for their lives.  It was truly AWESOME!


WOW!
More Whist on New Year's Eve!  We were on a Whist Kick!

 
New Year's Day we celebrated with another family tradition.....Bowling!  since our usual place, Sue Rich, closed it's doors, we founf a new venue at Bonwood Bowl and had a great time as always!


Ben, Nicole, Zane, Rhiannon, and Kimi



Jordan, Liza and Ryan.....and various arms....

 

David showing his skills!


Zach, Ryan and David patiently waiting their turn to shine!





We LOVE spending time with the family!


 
 On January 2nd we headed back East to visit all our other kids and grandkids and to trade cars with Evan and Kelli and their growing family.  On the way our beloved Subaru Outback turned over 100,000 miles!
 
 


100,000 miles!  Should be good for another 100,000 at least!



Here are some fun photos of our trip in no special order.  I didn't know I was going to do a blog or I would have done better with the photography!
 
 

Little Myrna blowing out her two candles on the darling cake Kelli made!

Max with Knight.....the perfect pillow!

Jack and his "fight Breast Cancer" pink socks after an indoor soccer game.

 

Howie at his basketball tournament in Cincinnati

Myrna loving her pink smoothie!

Grandpa and Myrna admiring the pictures on the wall of the little airport diner where we went to watch the planes take off.  She LOVES airplanes!


If she were taller it would have been even bigger!

Olivia and Hannah in their matching leopard skin outfits!

Fun at the Marine Corp Museum!  Christian, Tyler and Abby


This Marine Museum is great!  David, Olivia, Abby, Christian and Tyler

 

Little Smiley Hannah!

Hanging out with the girls.....Jamie, Olivia and Hannah

The duel in which Christian regained his place as King of the Chess Board

Grandpa and William playing Army

Olivia has officially passed up Grandma in height!

Sarah's tenth birthday!


Sarah even helped Kim make her yummy carrot birthday cake!

Pretty amazing to be able to bowl while holding a baby!


Our first time of Duck Bowling!

Fun with 3 darling kids!  Claudia, Sarah and Emmett

Cute Claudia!

Grandpa and Myrna enjoying their favorite pastime!

A beautiful sunset somewhere in te Midwest on the way home to Utah
 
Home again with our cute little dirty Mini, Boris!

Now that we have hugged every kid and grandkid, we are ready to take off on our mission!  We will miss our family and friends so much, but we are excited to be able to do the Lord's work 24-7!
 
"Because we have been given much we too must give!"