Josh's Mission Call!!!

Since Josh has been working and waiting for his mission call he has had time to come up to the institute and take mission prep.  One day I was up there to watch some of Andy's peer to peer teachers and we all ran into each other and decided to have lunch together at the Institute Deli.

I just love these two guys!

Three weeks after Josh turned in his mission papers the call came.

Andy had been able to watch the status through his current calling so we knew that morning that it had been assigned.  I texted Josh at work and told him to look at his email on his break and let me know if it had come.  I was actually going in to Macey's for some groceries right as he texted me back and told me he had it.  After I was done shopping I went and spied him in the deli (he moved from the meat department since they could give him more hours in the deli...it was his second day there) and blew him a kiss.  He looked a bit embarrassed bless him.

 I had butterflies all day!  

Josh finished up work, picked up Matt and Abby from school and came home and did his job.

Then he got cleaned up and went up to the temple to open his call on his own.

He came home and I couldn't tell for sure if he was truly happy or just pretending to be so I took him aside and without prying too much asked how he was.  He said he was excited and that he thought I would be as well.  We invited all who could from the family to come to our house that night.  Mom and Dad and Jo were able to come and Nancy and Merill, Lyndi and Todd and some of their kids, Jenny and Mike and their kids, and Angie and James were all able to chime in via Zoom.  (Jo Face Timed T on his phone).

Josh read the letter and confidently declared he had been called to the Washington D.C. South mission English speaking!

This is truly incredible!

When Josh was a little boy he told us more than once that he wanted to serve in the Washington D.C. ASL mission.  I don't know where he got the sign language idea from but that was a thing...and we all remembered it so to have half of that little boy's dream come true is a beautiful tender mercy and a testament to God's mindfulness of us.

Josh says that looking back, he feels like a seed was planted when he was young and that this is definitely not a coincidence.

I love him!

Another cool thing is that Andy and Josh just got back from that area on their trip the month before.  He visited his mission without even knowing it :)

Here he is talking to the family on Zoom...

We enjoyed visiting for a while and talking about all the cool details and things!

He starts one week of home MTC on Dec. 27th.  So that most likely means he will only be missing one Christmas which is nice :)  It looks like his mission president was just put in a few months ago so he will mostly likely have him his whole mission.

So grateful for the support from loved ones in person and digitally!

This is the perfect call for our Josh!

We are so excited and thrilled for him!

September Odds and Ends

My cute dad came to me a few weeks ago and told me he would love to come and have some regular time with Ben a couple of times a week now that he is retired.

The first day he came they went outside to play ball and Ben ended up having a seizure.  Dad had him rest on his lap until he recovered...it made such a sweet picture.

I have been trying to use the time that Dad has afforded me by coming and being with Ben to declutter more of the house.  One day I brought up all the Running for Ben stuff.  It has been sitting in my basement for approx. 10 years and I figured it was time to get rid of it all...well, at least most of it.  I had to save a few things.

I literally had thousands of flyers and stickers left.

And then there were all the posters and T shirts and banners.

I know it seems silly that I would take pictures of all of this stuff before I threw it away and even more so that I would post them but it was such a big deal for me.  I have such a hard time letting go of sentimental things.

I'm not quite sure what this activity was that Ben's class participated in a few days ago but he came home with crazy hair, a new t shirt and a medal :)  I just had to take a picture of this cutie!!!

Andy's parents invited us to come to Salt Lake to a benefit dinner for Cambodia.

Once again, I should have taken more pictures...it was a really fun night!

Matt and Savanah Shaw (a cute Father/Daughter duo) sang for the entertainment.

It was a great date night!!!

Flowers...and Flower Cookies

 Laura and I went out to a dahlia farm in Smithfield.  It was pretty cool!  I should have taken more pictures!  I was miserable though...that morning I had a sneezing attack that lasted for quite a while.  I thought it was just crazy allergies all of a sudden but by the end of the day I realized I was sick :(

We gathered a bucket full and the owner let us just take them since there had been a frost the night before and he didn't know how well they would hold up.

That weekend we had our most local high school's homecoming so we were swamped with orders.

We had our first order for a pocket boutonniere so Laura had me try it out...

It was actually pretty fun to make!

Here are some others that I did...

The bouquet Laura had me put together for her mother's birthday...

The kids were having a bake sale for their youth activity and I signed up to make cookies.

I took the opportunity to experiment with a couple of styles I had been wanting to try...palette knife and folk art flowers.

The bake sale ended up being cancelled but they were fun to make anyway :)

Andy and Josh Go East

 Andy took Josh on a church history trip for a week just as school started for the other kids.

 I don't have much insight into these pictures since I wasn't there so I will pretty much just put the location with a few minor details...

Also, sorry for the long post...I didn't want to break it up into multiple.

   Restoration of the Priesthood Site Visitor's Center...Harmony Pennsylvania

Hale Home in Harmony

Joseph and Emma's Home in Harmony

Priesthood Restoration Site...Sugar Maple Grove

Susquehanna River

Taughannock Falls

Whitmer Home

Sacred Grove

Joseph Smith Senior Home in Palmyra

Hill Cumorah Visitor's Center

Erie Canal

Niagra Falls

The Maid of the Mist

Newel K Whitney Store

Kirtland Temple

John Johnson Home Hyrum Ohio

They flew into D.C. and worked their way west, then came back to D.C. and did some sight seeing before they flew home.

Gettysburg Museum

Observation Tower at Gettysburg

National Air and Space Museum

This was Josh's favorite place in D.C.

Walking around D.C.

Monuments by Moonlight bus tour...

MLK Monument

Holocaust Museum

I was sad they didn't get more of themselves here...this is the closest we get :)

Museum of American History

Elephant and Castle Restaraunt

(Andy said it was like an English pub :)

Museum of Natural History

We missed them and were happy to have them back home.  They had such great experiences and seemed to really enjoy their time.

And how incredible that just a few short weeks later, Josh would get his mission call to the area of some of the very places they visited!