Well, it’s almost New Year’s now but I can’t get the pictures from the London trip off the little camera, so I thought I’d do some catch up about Tim. (Click on the photos to enlarge them.)
We had a lot of back and forth as to whether he was being set apart as a missionary and leaving officially from Ireland or Indiana, but we (and he) wanted our old Stake President to do it. So with the necessary permissions, because Tim’s records had been moved to Cork, President Sinclair set him apart on Sunday, August 30th, and we left Monday morning for Utah.
Turned it into a bit of a family reunion – Mom, Dad and Michael came out from Oregon and Elizabeth and family came down from Montana. They all camped in Provo, while we stayed with Rick and Leslie in Sandy. Made time to see Dave & Sherri, too. SO good to see everyone. Did shopping, hung out, went to see the Sizzling String Jensens perform. (awesome!)
MTC day wasn’t quite as bad as I thought. It’s dump-and-run now, not the family presentation time we had with Bryan, so I was a little nervous. But we knew we had to say goodbyes and take pictures before we pulled in to the MTC, so we did, and then it wasn’t the 15 seconds I had been warned about. Current MTC missionaries were there to greet each incoming missionary, gave them a big, excited welcome, and us too.
We did have a couple minutes for final hugs, then sent him onward. The unexpected nice thing was that as we drove down the drop-off lane to leave, other missionaries waiting to greet other newcomers grinned and waved and shouted congratulations and encouragements to us. Made me feel good and put off my tears for a bit. <g>
After three weeks learning to be a missionary, Tim shipped out to the Denver South mission. He was assigned to an area called CedarEdge, with an apartment in Austin, not too far from Grand Junction. His weekly emails are very short (which I expected, but don’t quite meet my motherly needs), but he seems to be doing well. Teaching several individuals and families, seems to get along with his companion. Doesn’t say much about what he’s thinking or learning, or how he’s changing, but he seems happy. Got to go to Thanksgiving Dinner with four different families!
He got transferred into Grand Junction itself the week before Christmas. Don’t know much about it, but we got to talk to him Christmas day. Like Bryan’s calls, 40 minutes never goes so fast! But he is happy, excited about what he’s doing. He’s had a bunch of snow, got his winter coat a while ago (not really available when he left in the summer), and I had to prod him to go get his winter boots. His companion now is from Thousand Oaks, Calif., and Tim was surprised that I knew where that was! We filled him in on stuff here, and he misses everything, but is glad he’s serving the Lord. And so are we!
I googled denver colorado south mission and came across your website. We just took our son to the MTC yesterday. He has been called to your son’s mission. I was glad to read about how your missionary is doing! Sounds like a good mission.