Blessings!

The blessings of serving a mission have already started. The same day that we received our call, our daughter-in-law also received some wonderful news. She was having a conversation with her ex-huxband - the first conversation in over a year - when she got brave enough to ask him again if he would give permission for their daughter, Jayden (12), to be sealed to her and my son. It was about a month ago that she had a very strong feeling that she needed to press this issue. To her surprise there was no argument about it this time. He simply said that if it was that important to Jayden - and it's what she wants more than anything - that he wouldn't stand in her way. We all feel like this is a blessing from our Heavenly Father because of Jayden's worthiness as a valiant daughter of His and because we know that when someone in a family serves a mission, the whole family receives blessings. Angee's hoping to get the paperwork and interviews all over with in time for the sealing to take place on Sept. 27th which is the day before we will speak in church prior to entering the MTC on Oct. 6th.

We will also get the privilege of attending two of our granddaughter's baptisms before we leave in October. Abby Barfuss (Julie) and Navy Nelson (Chris) will both be baptized on Sept. 6th in separate stake baptisms. Abby's will be at 10:00 am that day and Navy's will be at 5:00 pm.

Elder Leishman and I will be spending the day getting all the documents that we need to take with us to the West Indies. So I guess I'd better go get ready for the next adventure of our life.

WE HAVE OUR CALL!

We have been called to the West Indies Mission! Hooray! The call finally came. We report to the MTC on October 6th. We will serve a 23 month mission. We had all our children and most of our grandchildren present when we opened our envelope. It was an exciting time. Now we've got a long list of things to do to get ready so we'll get started tomorrow.

I had surgery on my right knee yesterday to repair a tear in the meniscus. It was an easy, same day surgery and I'm doing great. I anticipate a complete recovery before we leave for the MTC.

I post updates on our preparation progress but probably won't get to this much until after we are in the West Indies. I would welcome any comments about how to prepare for this mission from anyone who reads this who has "been there, done that".

It's been almost a month since my last post. It took me 10 minutes to figure out how to get on my own blog. I had to reset the password for the 3rd or 4th time because I don't get on enough to remember how to sign in. To tell you the truth, I'm still not sure I can do it again tomorrow. But, I sure hope I get the chance. We expect our mission call any day now. We started our paperwork in December after our 1st Bishop's interview. Now after months of delays because of medical issues, we are within days of getting our call so we'll now when and where we are going.

I got one piece of bad news last week that will mean one more medical delay which may mean an adjustment in our departure to the MTC but, if it had to happen, I'm glad it happened before we were in the mission field. I don't even know how I did it but I tore the medial meniscus in my right knee, my good knee. I had a total knee replacement in my left knee in Sept. 2007 so I would be ready for a mission this summer. I've had a good rehabilitation and thought I was ready to go until 3 weeks ago when I started having excruciating pain in my other knee. It felt just like a knife being jabbed into my knee. When the MRI showed a torn meniscus, I knew that it would require a same day surgery to repair. So, I'll be having that surgery on Thursday and will expect a 3 to 4 week recovery time (at my age). I'm just hoping the call gets here before Thursday so I can enjoy it without being wiped out by anesthesia.

In the meantime, Truman is healthier than ever. He managed to lose about 20 pounds this spring and summer helping our son build a house across the street and our son-in-law and daughter build a house next door to us. He's been fishing and camping with 4 different youth groups this summer and taken his metal detector out into the hills looking for treasure. Seriously. He hasn't found any yet, but he keeps looking.

Stay tuned - good news soon.