Another lovely day in Curacao

We slept in some this morning to rest our bodies for more journeys tomorrow. The Jones' picked us up around noon and we drove around the island. Had lunch, then walked around some more. The Parr's joined us for dinner at a beautiful scuba/snorkeling cove. Then back to the mission home to pack and get ready to fly to Trinidad in the morning! It's been such a great thing to get to know these couples and see of their dedication and commitment to doing what ever needs to be done here in this mission.

The view from the mission home

Bus stop

Flamingo hot spot

Common sight to have a table outside for the locals to play dominoes

Self explanatory

Feet in the Caribbean Sea

Another gorgeous sunset

The amazing office couples
Elder Weeks, Elder Jones, Elder Parr
Sister Weeks, Sister Jones, Sister Parr
I promise I did my hair but the humidity restyled it for me...

2nd Week

2nd Week of our mission. We left the MTC and slept Sunday night at home in Bountiful. We got up at 4 am and our bishop picked us up at  4:30 to take us to the airport, so we didn't have to say goodbye to our children again. What was supposed to be a twelve hour travel day turned out to be eighteen! Our plane in Miami to Curacao had mechanical problems and after sitting in the plane for two hours they decided to changed planes, so we had to disembark, unload all the luggage, walk a million miles to the other end of the airport, wait for that plane to arrive, be cleaned and luggage and passengers boarded, then we were on our way. We got to the island at 1:30 am. This is the screen shot in the airplane.

We were greeted by our mission Pres. and wife. The Baird's. We had a ton of heavy suitcases and we were pretty dead tired. We got to the mission home, which is beautiful and they visited with us until 4:00 am. We are excited to hear what our assignment will be. We will start in Guyana and help with the branch there and then when we get our visa for Trinidad we may be assigned to Tobago as the only missionaries there to help with the struggling branch. Should be very exciting and challenging.

Today we had a marathon training session with the Senior Office couple, The Parr's and the Jones'. We drove around the island and took a few pictures. The above picture is the capital of Curacao. Willemstad. We had a delicious lunch. Then more training.

In the evening we drove down to the beach and had a scrumptious Indian dinner and watched the sunset through the palm trees. It's hard to believe we are on a mission and we will be living on an island for the next 23 months or so!  Truly a blessing and an adventure!  

The end of the MTC

 This is our other district instructor Brother Thatcher. He was great!

 This couple, The Olsen's, Were our "others" whom we practiced teaching with. 

 We found another Sister going to the Trinidad mission. These three will be in Suriname speaking Dutch. Aren't they the cutest!?

Saturday we got to go to the temple for the last time for......however long it will be....months. This MTC experience created a lot of growth in our knowledge and abilities to hopefully be very effective servants of the Lord. We feel like we have been drinking out of a fire hydrant but are ready to get out there and work to build the Kingdom! 

People we love!

 This is our district. These are the dear people we have worked with from the beginning. Our sweet teacher is in the middle. We have been taught how to prepare to assist the Spirit to teach by learning how to invite others to understand doctrine, commit to try and eventually change to becoming more like our Savior. It has been so enlightening to discuss and learn about the gospel with these lovely people and instructors. ( top left to right) Elder Catrell, Elder Weeks, Sister Farnsworth, Elder Attwood, Elder Hoopes (bottom left to right) Sister Catrell, Sister Weeks, Sister Attwood, Sister Hoopes.

We were walking through the MTC looking at all the beautiful murals and we came across these missionaries who will be in our mission! They all are dutch speaking but I'm sure we will get to see them now and then! We had not met anyone who was going to Trinidad yet, so this felt like a sweet miracle to meet up with them! There are over 2000 missionaries here so the odds were quite slim we should meet up with them.
We found out today that we will be flying into Curacao on Monday, Nov. 12th. Fly to Trinidad on the 15th and then fly to Guyana and stay there until December sometime....We are very interested to find out what our assignment is going to be...

MTC Missionary Training Center

                                                                                   

We were just leaving at 8:45 am to drive to the MTC when a lady walked by and we asked her to take our picture. We arrived in Provo at 10:30 am. There were many missionaries there to help us park and carry our bags and tell us what to do. The MTC runs like a well oiled machine. We loved getting our name tags and our authority cards signed by our Prophet!  We have been to lots of classes of training how to be good missionaries and have learned a lot from the other couples who are getting ready to serve  missions all over the world. It's fun to visit with the young missionaries too!

They have this very large map in the main building which is a fun thing to have your picture taken by. We still can't believe this is really happening but it's wonderful to be here and try to learn how to invite others to come to Christ and live His gospel.

Great Grandmother Kathinka

 This is my great grandmother on my father's side. She went on a mission to join her husband. She was 59, I am 60. I am very touched to have been given this information from the Church.

Farewell

This is all the family (minus 2) at our home after our farewell meeting in church. We took 17 pictures and there wasn't one that someone didn't have their eyes closed, so even though Graham has his eyes closed he is still adorable.  We couldn't ask for better, more wonderful children and grandchildren. Love them all so much!  We had to say good bye for the last time to our family from Colorado, Mark, Annie, Brightynn, McKinney, Brenner and Davis. It was tender and full of tears. That is the toughest part of this endeavor for sure!                                                           

  These are the sister missionaries that we had the honor of working with and loving while we were in Mississippi. All from Utah, so we got to go to their homecomings and they came to our farewell!
Thank you all, family and friends, for being there for us! We feel very loved and supported!

             7 more days!