Bucket List Check!

Dear family and friends,

Happy Birthday on Tuesday to Ron’s dad (it’s a BIG ONE and they are celebrating it right with a cruise to Hawaii), and Happy Birthday to my brother Mike, and also to my friend and neighbor Marilee on Wednesday. Remember last week I wished our grandson, Luke, an early Happy 9th Birthday? Well . . . he’s turning 10 . . . time is really just flying by. Sorry Luke!

As we heard from many of you last week, it sounds like there is a lot of sickness going around. Here too! We have managed to stay healthy, but so many in the office and at Church are coughing and sniffing. I hope the cold leaves soon and we all get some good air to breathe.

A place of love & beauty...

Thank you to everyone for your concern and prayers for my mom. She continues to struggle and was back in the hospital this past week with a painful blood clot in her leg. We continue to pray fervently for her. My family is taking such good care of her and I am so grateful.

Our daily work at the office this week started off slow but then revved right up and we put in some long hours towards the end of the week. We have a very exciting event this week in London, the first of its kind, and the final preparations are time consuming. I will fill you in on more details next week, after it takes place, in case any of you are leading a double life as a spy.

Monday night we took the Elders to dinner to say good-bye to our Elder Boehning who has been with us for the last seven months. Oh . . . it’s so hard sometimes. Today we met Elder Murray, and he will set Solihull on fire! I can tell he’s just that kind of missionary. After our goodbyes we went to the Wills’ home for FHE with them. They are always good company.

We had some banners to take to our London office, so we only worked a couple of hours in the office on Friday, then drove to London. We hadn’t done anything cultural for a while, nor had we been to the temple, so we made a weekend of it. We dropped the banners off, then we went to the London Temple. The temple is actually in Newchapel, Surry, about an hour outside of London. It was our first time going to that temple while on our mission, and it was so nice. I needed it. I will never again take for granted how close we are to so many temples in Utah. That night we stayed at a nice Marriott down in that area, thanks to a friend who shares his employee ‘Friends and Family’ discount with us.

The beautiful white cliffs of Dover!

Saturday we crossed off another ‘bucket list’ item for Ron as we spent a good share of the day in Dover, touring the castle, the underground tunnels, and of course, viewing the beautiful white cliffs of Dover. The underground tunnels were especially interesting after seeing the movie ‘Dunkirk.’ The operations room for the Dunkirk rescue was in the tunnels, along with living quarters, hospital, and mess hall. The castle is the largest in England. It was a chilly day, but we dressed for it. It was a great Saturday.

Ron spoke in Sacrament Meeting today on forgiveness and judging mercifully, a subject that is a concern in our Ward and the Bishop asked him specifically to address. When he was done, Alise, sitting next to me, said “WOW”. I’m not sure what kind of WOW she meant! It’s not an easy subject, but he did a great job. He then taught the Gospel Doctrine class as well, and I went to Primary. We had 22 children again today and it felt more like Primary and less like playtime. We met with the YSA reps after Church to plan the next activity. We are so blessed to have the ‘assignment’ to work with them. We just love them.

So tomorrow morning is a big one for Ron. After months of study and practice, he takes his final driving test for his British license. Since our right to drive in the UK expires one month from today, let us pray that the person testing him in the morning gets up on the right side of the bed. Ron has prepared himself well, but it is suppose to be the most difficult driving test given in the world. We will be celebrating when he passes, that’s for sure.

We have a big week this week ahead of us, and hopefully lots of fun things to write about next Sunday. Until then, thanks so much for your love and prayers. We sure love you also.

Cheers from the cold (but bearable) England!

XOXO,
Ron and Marie