We are Here!!

We left our home in Sandy, Utah on Monday June 29 at 8:30 a.m.  We originally planned to drive to Great Falls, Montana to spend the night, but then decided we wanted to get into our mission!  So we pressed on for another 2 1/2 hours to get to Cardston.  When we got to the border crossing the guard was a little stern and was asking us if we were planning on seeking employment here and things like that.  We showed him our missionary papers and then he informed us that his little station didn't have the ability to process them.  So he directed us to another border station about 45 minutes away.  He told us we had to hurry and get there or there would be a warrant for our arrest!  Wouldn't that be crazy--the first mission president to be arrested!  But then he softened a little bit when he realized we really didn't know what we were doing, so he extended our time to get there for another hour.  So we followed his directions and drove to the other border crossing where they took our papers and passports and processed everything and we finally made it across the border into our mission!
By this time it was about 10:15 p.m.

We have learned here in Canada it stays light until almost 11:00 p.m.!
Cardston is famous for being the city where the 'plains meet the rockies'.

We were pretty hungry by the time we got to Cardston, so we stopped at a DQ!  Then we found a little motel called the Flamingo Inn to stay at.
The next morning we thought it would be fun to find some of our missionaries, so Steve went out walking for some exercise (I stayed in because I didn't have any workout shoes! they are packed away in our shipment) and he happened upon a woman who was the wife of a branch president in Cardston.  She gave us what she thought was their number and we called them and told them who we were and asked if we could come visit them.  It was Sister Freeman and Sister Durrant.  We drove to their apartment at 8:30 and just said Hi and got to know them a little bit.  They were darling, and it got us so excited to meet all of our missionaries.

After meeting with them we drove back up to see the Cardston temple.  We had actually gone by it the night before--this picture is it in the nighttime. It is a very unique temple--it looks like a fortress.

We  decided to go in and try to meet the temple president.  He wasn't there, but we were able to meet his counselor, President Strong.
We then had a little breakfast and drove through the beautiful countrysides on the way to Calgary.
They were beautiful--it is true prairie country.  There were thousands of acres of beautiful yellow canola fields.  It was so fun to be driving through our mission.

We arrived in Calgary about 1:00 and drove straight to the mission home to meet President and Sister Nicholas. They took us to a nice little Italian restaurant for lunch and then we came back to the mission home where Steve met with President Nicholas for a couple of hours and I met with Sister Nicholas and went over things in the mission home, and some medical details, phone numbers I would need, etc.  We then took President and Sister Nicholas to their hotel, hugged them good-bye and from that moment on it was an absolute whirlwind!  Steve's phone began ringing and the excitement began!
Wednesday morning we went to a pancake breakfast at the meeting house by our home in celebration of Canada Day (which is like our July 4).  There we met 4 more of our sister missionaries, Sister Dente, Sister Joseph, Sister Trimble, and Sister Kolodisi. They were helping to serve pancakes!  They were so cute, and so excited to meet us.

We already love these cute sisters!

After the pancake breakfast we met with our assistants, Elder Kelly, from the UK, and Elder Smith, from Selah, Washington.  They are fabulous elders and have been our right arm!  We planned our two 'Meet the new Mission President' meetings for Thursday, and our Mission Leadership Council meeting for Friday.  Along with a million other things!  We literally didn't stop for a break until it was time to fall into bed each night between 11:00 and midnight. 

Our meetings to meet our missionaries on Thursday were so wonderful.  We have now met all of our missionaries serving in the main Calgary area, and the Banff area.  On Monday afternoon we will drive to BC to meet our missionaries there, and from there to Lethbridge to meet our missionaries serving there, along with the Medicine Hat, Magrath, and Raymond area missionaries.  

We had our first Missionary Leadership Council on Friday from 9:30 to 3:30.  It was so fun to meet these zone leaders and sister trainer leaders.  They are incredible young people and have such a desire to serve.  It was just neat to sit back and watch them plan and prepare for the upcoming month for the mission. There was a great spirit there, and we enjoyed teaching them and planning with them.

Today, Saturday, is the first day where we have not had a set schedule...so we caught up on our laundry, and actually had time to put up a few little pictures!

paintings from our grandsons!