Good-bye to my friends and colleagues at Aon Hewitt! After nearly 28 years (27.8042 to be exact...per my actuary friends) I have grown quite fond of these folks. I also appreciate how supportive they, and my many clients who are also friends, have been over the last few months. Not to mention over the next three years.
Good-bye to our home of 16 years.
Good-bye to Murphy...who will live with a very nice family whose Dad is from Ecuador!
Good-bye to In-N-Out...very sad...but there are Burger Kings in Quito!
What was very hard was to say good-bye to these cuties. They will be very big when we get back.
On June 22, we were invited to the office of Elder Quentin L. Cook, one of the Twelve Apostles of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (pictured in the middle behind me to the right), and he gave us some counsel and then a special apostolic blessing, that we would be able to perform the challenging assignment that we have before us.
Both my parents (seated) and Dana's parents (standing behind her) were able to be there. My parents presided over the Brazil Campinas Mission and Dana's parents presided over the Texas Houston Mission, both in the 1980's, so this has been a particularly meaningful calling for them.
The following day, as we entered our training, we got a customary picture by the world map.
For three and a half days we were tutored by leaders of the church, including the First Presidency, each member of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, and others. It was a faith promoting and uplifting experience, gearing us up to head to Quito.
Our official picture is hanging in the Missionary Training Center, along with the pictures of the other 419 mission presidents serving around the world.
We arrived this morning at the Salt Lake City airport to catch our United flight to Houston and then on to Quito, we were greeted with this message...flight cancellation...
So, instead of a decent 12 hour trip, we will take 24 hours...rerouted on Delta to LAX...then the red-eye on Copa Airlines through Panama City and on to Quito!
While we'll be a little more tired, we are very excited to arrive and get started!
