Training to serve

The Mission Training Center is in Provo, Utah.  Right across the street is the Provo temple.  We started each day with a walk up around the temple.  The MTC is an amazing place where old and young missionaries come to learn new languages and to learn how to help people come closer to Christ.  We are instructed in how to have the spirit in our lives so that we can bring it into the homes of those we visit.  The missionaries come from all over the world and are going to serve all over the world.  There are 15 MTCs, but the one in Provo is the largest. 

We were assigned a district.  In our district we had the Tupeas, Samoans living in South Jordan and going to serve in Knoxville, Tennessee, the Hunsakers living Alpine going to serve in the Carribean, and the Becks, living in Shelby, Idaho, going to San Antonio, Texas.  We really grew to love and respect these powerful couples!  

The MTC keeps growing; this is the view from the newest buildings.

There are about 10 of these amazing huge paintings in one of the new buldings. We were encouraged to tour them and feel he great spirit they bring.

We were assigned "others" to get to know, teach and challenge.  We really loved our others; the Sants from Garden City, Utah going to Moscow, Russia! 

Meals are an adventure in the MTC with all these hungry young missionaries and us slower moving senior missionaries sharing lines and tables.  

We had Wednesday evening free and were able to take our sweet Sister Fisher to the temple to do some sealings!

One of the other new buildings has these beautiful pictures on the wall from the Bible Videos.  Each shows an aspect of Christ helping us come closer to him.  They are really powerful!

One of the tender mercies of the Lord was that on our walk each morning we saw Elder Allen on his way to work! 

Thursday evening we came home and packed up the car so we could leave right after class on Friday!  

We are excited to be on our way to Iowa with a few days spent with family in Colorado on the way!

The After Mission life

I have been surprised at how hard some things are, like calling Elder Quincy "Richard" again and not having a calling or responsibility in the church.  I missed my Texas family so much while Hurricane Harvey clean up was going on!  I loved the pictures and stories of them helping and reaching out to each other!  I really am excited to see everyone again when we visit in November!
I've been surprised at how easy its been to live in the basement of our house and share with my daughter's family.  We love having grandkids upstairs!
I've been doing lots of family history, which I love.  We have visited all of our kids and grandkids.  We've been to 9 temples since we left Cleveland, Texas and plan to visit 3 more in the next 2 weeks.  That has been awesome!
Probably the thing that's been the most fun is talking to people about our mission; we've had 3 mission report opportunities and seeing the young missionaries we love so much!  The thing that makes me happy every day is the continued interaction with our loved ones in the Cleveland ward!  The texted scripture reading assignment for the day I send to 18 people now, is something I love preparing for and I am so happy when I hear from people in response!  We loved seeing Shannon Watson in Denver, and the Delallatas in Salt Lake City!

My parents, siblings and their spouses.

Reporting our mission to family.

My siblings.

So excited to see these 3 great Cleveland missionaries at our 2nd mission report!

Elder Quincy's family in St. George.

Our fun mission friends and mission president and his wife in St. George.

Elder Barrett came to our 3rd mission report!

The first missionary I trained in Chile 40 years ago!  Sister Beazer came to our 3rd report!

We have some obligations, mostly babysitting grandkids while our kids get away and helping with a new grandbaby, so we plan to be ready to leave on our next mission in May.
Of course they Lord has His way of dealing with our plans... so please continue to plan on visiting us when you can!

Helping hands in the Cleveland ward.

Getting to know our youngest grandchild again.

Jessica brought her kids and came from Denver to our 3rd mission report!

My mom and dad came and met Kinsley after the mission report.

A fun visit to Seattle to see  our son's family and to help with some projects.

The missionary reunion was fun!

These old neighbors of our's are in assisted living center now.  They turned 97 and 96 last month!

Avery turned 2!

More great Cleveland missionaries at the reunion.

General Conference was awesome and thanks to Glenda Cleveland we watched the Saturday morning session in the Conference Center!

The clean up crew at Tammy's preschool.

Chris Carroll was baptized last month!  the work goes on!

We met the couple who served in the Cleveland ward before us; the Murdocks!