I hardly know where to begin. It has been a whirlwind of activity of being constantly baffled, exhausted, and overwhelmed. After leaving Provo we checked into the Hyatt in SLC for 4 days of medical advisor training. We learned all about filling out forms, whom to call for help, what is expected of us, and that out of 70,000 missionaries around the world, Jim will be over 7,000 of them (10% in case this didn’t sink in). When we pointed this out to the leaders they were even a bit surprised. Of course I did fall asleep occasionally in all these meetings, but I’m sure that comes as no surprise to those who know me. We met more great people, many who had been on 5 or more missions. That is mind boggling to me. I think I will stick to the plan of one for us. We were able to meet with Kathy and Berrett for dinner and had a wonderful visit. So fun to be with them. We did a live session in the SLC temple and it was amazingly beautiful. I guess we were on spiritual overload for the last 2 weeks. I don’t know if I can handle so much goodness all at once!!!
The next step in this great adventure was to head to California to connect with all the California Heders (plus my brother, John and sister, Meg). The most important reason was to see the latest member of the family, Harrison Robert Heder (yes, Harry Heder)! Absolutely perfect and soooo tiny! Dan and Sarah make cute ones! It was a joy to hold him, and hold him, and hold him, and kiss him, and kiss him, and kiss him! But it was fabulously wonderful to be with all the other California grandkids. Got to walk the girls (Josie, Lu, and Clem) to school and get lots of snuggles from them too.
There were lots of special events there. We got to spend Friday with Doug’s family and go to their piano lessons with them and hear them all play. Utterly fantastic!! Watch out world, the musical Heders are coming. Olivia absolutely nailed a Bach piece and Eric, Conrad, and Camilla also all played brilliantly. Their teacher is Polish and doesn’t put up with anything that isn’t perfect. It was a real highlight and I am very proud of all of them. The next morning we went to the Nethercutt museum with Doug and older kids. I had never heard of it, but it was amazingly interesting. It is a private collection of antique cars from all over the world, in addition to music boxes, nickelodeons, and orchestraians, which are giant music boxes that recreate entire orchestras that were very popular in Europe around the turn of the century. I have never seen such beautiful cars. In the early days of automobiles there were thousands of different automobile makers throughout the world and they all made distinctly different autos with unique colors and interiors. So fun to see. Eric seemed to know every detail about every car.
After that we all headed down to Long Beach to visit with my sister, Meg, where she hosted all of us plus her son and my brother and his girls to a great swim and “Mexican food” dinner. Rachel, Clara, and Max were there too to join us all. Meg’s place is the perfect place to get away. When I get back, that is one of the first places I will go!
On Sunday we headed over to Jon and Kirstin's where we went to church and then Jim cooked a traditional “Heder Japanese” dinner. They were gracious to host the great mass of us, but it was so fun. I just love this crazy tribe of mine!!!
On Monday Jim and Doug (Doug was able to get some free tickets) treated everyone to the newly opened “Wizarding World of Harry Potter and Universal Studios”. (Doug’s kids had just been a few days before and had music lessons that day so couldn’t join us). We totally lucked out and the day was perfect and there were few lines. We had a blast. A great way to spend our last day in the good old USA for the next year and a half. We left the next morning for Mexico with our 6 suitcases and other assorted carryons. On to the next adventure!!!!
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| Max was chosen from the audience to participate in an animal show. Here he is a human hurdle for the dog. |
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| LA Airport |
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| Our first meal in Mexico at a seminar for Mission Presidents. |
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| Elder/Dcotor Stevens passing the phone to the new Area Medical Advisor for Mexico. |
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| Helen had to take a picture of the local trash truck. There is a man on top with a pole lifting up any low hanging wires. |
3 comments:
Wow, just love your comments and all the exciting preparations for the mission. Now comes work time, but you'll love it so much that it won't seem like work!! Love hearing from you. The garbage looks a lot like what we had in Brazil.
Your adventures sound good so far! Glad to know what's going on!
I am thankful and happy for you. You sacrifice, which is not small, seems insignificant compared to the joy you are describing. Quite a caseload,too! Abrazos to you y a todo Mexico.
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