The Mission Call

This is the entry I made in my journal the week of our mission call:

May 20-26

This week has had a few events worth remembering.  Of course, there were some rather normal days with the usual activities of cleaning, laundry, shopping, etc.  We did decide to go ahead and sell our first American Fork home to the renters that are currently there.  Since we are going to finance the loan for them, we had an appointment on Monday to visit with a real estate attorney for some help in drawing up the proper papers and legal documents.  After that visit, we decided to go golfing at the South Gate course.  We had a very enjoyable time playing the back nine holes. 

I spent a lot of time sewing this week.  I made a western shirt for Aspen which was actually a trial show shirt to see how the size runs on a new pattern that Misty bought on the Internet.  I also made a simple costume for myself to wear while performing the accordion with Nyra at the Scandinavian Festival in Ephraim.

Thursday evening we also worked on some floral arrangements to take to both Richfield and Mona cemeteries for the Memorial Weekend.

On Friday morning, we left home around 7:30 and stopped at the St. George post office to see if our mission call had come.  A couple of workers looked and checked for us, but couldn’t find any letter.  So Mac Niel left his name and number, just in case they should find it later.  We drove on to Richfield and decorated there.   Then we went to Nyra’s home to get organized for the festival.  We didn’t really have time to practice which made me feel bad because I was depending on running through some music to see what songs we could do the best. 

When we got to the program place (at Snow College), we found out they were behind schedule so we had to wait nearly an hour.  (If we had only known….we could have practiced after all).  Two of my best girl friends, Sheryl Andersen and Radene Sunderland came to the program.  They live in Sanpete so it was great to see them shortly.

We hurried to Mona from Ephraim so that we could do the decorating there.  We also visited with Kevin and Janice for a while.  Then we rushed on to Midway so that we could get to the cabin in time for a scheduled board meeting of the Swiss Alpine Water Association, (home owners association).  The meeting was held at our place and we got there about three minutes before the other people arrived.

Mac Niel got up before me to work out side.  When I got up, I went out to see what he was doing.  When I came back in the cabin, I heard his phone notification that he had missed a call.  I decided to call back to see if it was anything important.  The man that answered said he had not called us.  It was difficult for me to understand him, but I finally caught that he was at the St. George post office.  So, that was a great clue that someone had seen our mission letter and was trying to let us know.  I called Randy to see if he would go check our mail sometime in the afternoon.  He told me he was already planning to do that.  Later on, he called and said that he had the letter and he was going to take it to his house and read it on a video conference at 4:30.  So we let the other kids know, but Ryan was the only one available to do the conference.  But Misty listened over the telephone, and so did Hayley.  So Randy opened the letter for all to see and then started to read:  Elder Mac Niel Ogden, you have been called to serve in the New Hampshire, Manchester Mission.  You will be assigned to the Joseph Smith Memorial visitors’ center in Sharon, Vermont!  My mind could hardly comprehend where in the world that is.  The more everyone talked about it, the more excited I became.  I am especially excited to have the opportunity to study and learn more about the Prophet Joseph Smith.  His life and mission is so incredible and important! 

Shortly after closing the video conference, LeIla pulled into the cabin parking lot.  She was bombarded by our exciting news.  Of course, we had a number of calls to make to people that we had promised to inform as soon as we knew our destination.  When things started to settle down, we realized it was getting dinner time.  I suggested that we take LeIla and drive over to Heber to get something to eat.  About that time, David called to see if Mac Niel would ride with him to the Harbor Freight store in Orem.  He was planning to drop off Misty and the kids at the cabin.  Mac Niel asked him to just meet us in Heber so we bought some Little Caesars pizza and went to the city park to eat.  Then LeIla, Misty, the kids and I all rode together back to the cabin and Mac Niel and David went to Orem.  It turned out to be a very enjoyable evening!

It was nice to be able to tell our friends in the Midway Ward where we will be serving.  The block time schedule in Midway this year is 11:00-2:00.  Of course, this is probably everyone’s favorite time so the Sacrament meeting was filled with Memorial Day visitors.  After church we had some lunch and then drove to Rhett’s for a little visit with his family.  We took ice cream and root beer to make root beer floats.  We told Rhett that was his prize for winning the contest guess of where our call would be.