OH FUN!!

LaVar and I left Arizona and went through "Surprise" and after "Nothing" hit the highway and drove to St. George. When in New Zealand the first time, forty-five years ago, LaVar met and taught Rhonda Carruthers she was 17 years old at the time. She was a Catholic and needed to wait until her 18th birthday so that she could get baptized. We met Rhonda and her family,again, when we were in Hawaii in 1982. We got the kids together and had many fun times.
Rhonda and some of her children live in St. George Utah.  She lives right across the street from the St. George temple.

            
This is Josh, they asked LaVar to baptize him in the ocean in Hawaii when Josh was eight years old. Josh works with troubled teens in St. George.

 It was great to see Rhonda and spend the night in her place and eat great soup! Thanks

 Brigham Young had a winter home...... there you go!

After St. George we went to Las Vegas and had lunch with my darling brother. He cracks me up, can you tell? I really did think I was taller than him, ooow guess not...... who knew?

We are going to miss this sweet little family! Hope they find the home of their dreams.

 We had so much fun with them!

Grandad will miss her, he has spent several weeks with her this summer and fall. He will miss her, "thanks Grandad!"
We were trying to get Naomi to call me "Mina" like other grandchildren do. Her dad had been reading her a library book that is all about a banana, well somehow the two combined and she started calling me, "Banana". One day Rachel asked me to give the blessing on our lunch. She is so cute and I had a hard time not watching her fold her little arms and as I was watching her a little too long, she furrowed her brow and said, "BANANA! PRAY!" that was hard to be reverent during the prayer.
Thanks for all those that we have visited it has been a great month! 

October 14, 2011 Continued

WE had our MISSION  call sent to our oldest son in SALT LAKE CITY.  He called us first thing in the morning and told us our letter had come. He said, "YOU WILL BE VERY VERY PLEASED"!  from that moment on we knew we had been called to AUCKLAND NEW ZEALAND. The very same mission LaVar went to as a young missionary! We will be what is called "member and leader support". We are to report to the Mission Training Center in Provo January 30 and the itinerary says we leave Feb. 6 from Los Angles and fly non-stop, 13 hours to Auckland. We are excited! WOO HOO!
At first it seemed like a long time to "wait", but the time is filling up and after getting all we need to complete our VISA applications, we will do well to get it all done in time.


A mission call and a new grand baby all in the same day!! Day to remember