I Hope They Call Us on a MIssion

 August 2014 We are off to Utah. The Futrals kindly drove us to the airport and took our final picture before departing. We were so excited to go. We were to report to the MTC on Aug 25th but went a week early so that we could visit some friends and wind down a bit after a frantic month of getting ready.

 We were so lucky to be able to see our daughter-in-law Ashley (Ben's wife) in Utah. She was attending education days with her family and we hooked up for lunch. It was wonderful couple of hours spent visiting with her and having lunch on the BYU campus.

 Stratton (Anna's husband) loves J-dogs. These are hot dogs extraordinaire. He especially loves the sauce they make so I sent Bill in to pick up 2 bottles so that we could bring them to him when we returned to Atlanta. Well the bottles where huge as you can see and weighed a ton. Not so easy getting these puppies back home with us. They better last you Stratton!

 We saw a beautiful double rainbow while in Herriman. You could see the entire thing even though I only got half of it.

 We were able to visit with our old friends the Cook's. They took us to Emigration Canyon on a very cold and rainy day. We froze. Bruce and Connie, well actually Connie is a decendant of Isreal Barlow who is famous in church history for his work with Joseph Smith. Kinda cool to have a monument in his honor at the Canyon.

 We love the Salt Lake Temple!

 They are turning what was once the Provo Tabernacle into a Temple. The construction job is amazing and we enjoyed seeing it in progress.

 Faith and Tom, whom we stayed with for the week live up 6000 ft in Herriman. Step Mountain to be exact. It takes a two mile drive up a dirt road to get there but is worth the trip. There is a beautiful view from their porch which you can see below of the valley. We saw lots of deer, a bobcat, and a coyote while traversing the road. It is so incredibly quiet where they live. Very relaxing and just what the doctor ordered before our report to the MTC.

 Faith and Tom Wadleigh. Our very dear friends.

 Faith and Tom dropped us off at the MTC  where we hugged them for dear life being very nervous and petrified. We were a bit teary as they left us. We clung to each other as we walked into the MTC. A very nice woman put our badges on us, we gulped and said to each other, "We're in it now, there is no turning back."  You would think we were two school children on the first day of school.  If I knew then what I know now we were nervous for good reason. It was one of the hardest yet most rewarding weeks we had ever spent as we learned how to teach the gospel.

 Our first selfie with our new badges on.

 There were about 20 couples in our group that started together. We were divided up into districts of 4 couples each. Here we are with our district. The Sister to my right and her husband behind us became fast friends. They are the Butlers and were headed to England as office missionaries. They had to stay a second week for training with the computers they would be using. The other two couples the Holts on the right end and the Nickle's on the left end where also very nice and it was a good group to work with.

 The traditional MTC photo at the big map. We were so excited to have this picture as we had seen all the young men and women with this shot. After 30 years of desiring to serve a couples mission we were finally doing it.

 Another wonderful surprise we got was that we were able to hook up with our dear girl Emily Christensen who had just gotten home from her mission in Texas and had just arrived back in Provo to begin school. We had a lovely visit. We just love her!

 She took our picture in front of the Provo temple. We could see the temple from our window in our room at the MTC.

 This was the last picture of the home we left. We had a few teary eyes saying goodbye to it but we will return in 18 months and will appreciate it even more.

 Our new digs. We arrived in Palmyra September 5th or so and took occupancy of an apartment in the Martin Harris home. It is a beautiful stone house and we are one of two apartments on the second floor. It is a wonderfully cozy apartment. This is the living room. The walls are a foot thick so the window ledges are great. You could sit on them.

 We eat and work at this table. It's perfect.

 The kitchen is small but workable. No dishwasher unless you count Elder Nagel! It is working out just fine and it was completely stocked with everything you would need. I brought my good blender for Green smoothies though.

 The bathroom is the biggest in this house. It has great light and plenty of storage.

 We have a separate bedroom with a queen bed. The room is quite large. You can see the slanted roof line ceilings.

 2 windows too!

 I have this wardrobe to hang stuff in and Bill has a small walk in closet in the hallway for his stuff. We can also put our coats in his.

 The tomatoes came from a garden here at the house and some from the Joseph Smith farm. I froze about 4 bags for future soup making. They were sure good. Must be the historic soil.

 Elder Nagel even managed to fiind a car show. What? It's in Palmyra. The brick building behind the red car is the Grandin Building where the Book of Mormon was first printed.

 The icing on the cake for this mission is our proximity to my family. My mom and I made peach jelly one Saturday. We are able to see them as much as we like so my mom's house has become a  bit of a bed and breakfast for us. We even get lunch and dinner occasionally. Not bad eh? We will probably get to see family nearly every weekend at least until the weather turns bad.

Oh, this is our laundry room. There is a nice little pantry here for great storage as well. Who knew we would get our own washer and dryer? We just love it here.