My darling, sweet 91 year old mom passed into heaven peacefully on the morning of November 13th.  Just a few days before her death, she and I had walked around Hobby Lobby to enjoy the Christmas decorations and then enjoyed a little Frosty at Wendy's.  Just the night before she passed, she had gone to a program at Legacy Village in Layton where she's lived for the past two years, and enjoyed singing and clapping along to the music.

She had a beautiful, full life and I feel so privileged to be her daughter and to have been able to be with her so much over the past 10 years since she and dad moved to Davis County.  It's fun to think of the fabulous reunion that she must have had with her two brothers, two sister, mom, dad, and countless other friends and relatives who've gone on before her.

I will miss her so much, but am grateful to have enjoyed her for such a long, long time.  LOVE YOU MOM!

Malaysia has filled our hearts, heads, stomachs, eyes, ears, and noses with all the beautiful and wonderful things we could every imagine.  We love this country and these people so very, very much.  We've been blessed to work with three fabulous couples:  E/S Howell in Kuala Lumpur and Kota Bharu, E/S Allen in Kota Kinabalu and Kuching and E/S Weichers who are the Public Affairs missionaries for Malaysia.

 The Allen's                                  
                                                           The Howell's

Our fantastic new friend and soulmate, Sukiati Lotuin who we've LOVED so much as she has been our co-trainer during these four trainings in Malaysia.

The Weichers

Sometimes I have to pinch myself when I start to think of our 15 times around this beautiful planet since the beginning of our LDS Charities Mission in June 2010! It's hard to believe that we've been able to meet so many wonderful people on three continents and in 14 incredible countries of the world.

People often ask me "What amazing things have you seen on your travels?"  I always tell them "PEOPLE......people who lift and inspire me to want to do better with the blessings I've been given and complain less about things that don't really matter in the eternal scheme of things."

We just returned from Vietnam this week and rubbed shoulders with another awe -inspiring bunch of people, but this man touched my heart to the very center....

His legs had been blown off by a land mine in the Vietnam War many, many years ago.  His current "legs and feet" are two small, but heavy, wooden stools tied to his stumps.  He walked in to our clinic with a gigantic smile on his face and was thrilled to receive a brand new 3 wheeled trike from LDS Charities so that he could go out and make a living for himself.   He shook my hand and said "thank you, thank you, thank you....good life!"

I pinched myself!!!

Fabulous 4th

We had a FANTASTIC 4th which was bittersweet as we remembered the 10th anniversary of the passing of our sweet daughter, Jodi:

but celebrated our joy in being proud Americans by attending traditional 4th of July events of a neighborhood breakfast and parade in Hyrum, Utah:

 

 

 Then finished off our fabulous day with a swim in the backyard and the Kaysvillefireworks .  Couldn't get much better than that!

Can't believe my BABY BOY is 22 years old!  We're loving having him home for the summer.  I made Mitch's "dream cake" with a picture of his head on Gordon Hayward's body!!!!!

A special day of celebration for Kimball Jamison's blessing and Bonnie Mae's 5th Birthday....

Then our May girls had birthdays...
Baya Maree turned two and Brooklyn Marlee celebrated birthday #4!

BIRTHDAYS, BIRTHDAYS and more BIRTHDAYS!
Seems like ever since our return from Myanmar, we've been spending lots of fun time celebrating birthdays....

Noah Wayne turned 7

and Gwenyth Jean turned 7 too!

Two New Grandboys!!
In the past four months we've been blessed by the births of two beautiful grandsons.  The first was to Aaron and Ann in December and the most recent, was the birth of a bouncing baby boy to Kirk and Brynne.

 OH HOW WE LOVED OUR ADVENTURE IN MYANMAR!
We had a wonderful training class composed of 15 of the hardest working people on the planet.

 We attended the Yangon Branch and enjoyed the musical number presented by the Primary children and their teachers.

The darling girl in the red sweater, Olive, served a mission in Idaho and knew my cousins the Merkley's when they served their mission in Myanmar.

Our dear friend, Andy Schnebly, was Kim's co-trainer.











Sister Haymore was a good sport and helped with the "measuring" module.

We fell in love with this young man named Martin who helped us with translation and a myriad of other tasks.

 I celebrated my 59th birthday in the company of Kim, Andy, E/S Haymore and E/S Hobbs.  It was great!!!

We had just enough time to make a quick trip to see the Shwedagon temple in the heart of Yangon.  What an amazing and fascinating city.