Mission Call

We received our envelope from Church Headquarters and were so excited. We called all the family and opened the envelope with everyone here with us. We have been called to the Columbus Ohio Mission and will report to the MTC in Provo, Utah, on February 4th. We are really excited and anxious to serve this mission and know it will be a wonderful experience for us and for our family. They all support us in this although it will be a long 18 months to be away from all the activity and events that will be taking place here at home. We love our children and grandchildren so much and know that they will be blessed. We will miss out on some important events such as babies being born, baptizms and school acitivities but we will be with them in spirit. We thank them for their love and support in this mission call for us.

We just returned from a week in Playa del Carmen, south of Cancun, Mexico. It was wonderful! We were able to visit the Mayan ruins at Tulum and Xel Ha and spend a day on Cozumel where we went diving on the coral reef in a submarine, going 108 feet down. We saw some beautiful sights and had a wonderful day. The rest of the time we just soaked up the sun, ate some great papaya and pineapple and rested. We were glad for the vacation but equally glad to return home. Now we just wait for our mission call to come in the mail, hopefully sometime this week!

Thanksgiving 2007

We had a great Thanksgiving weekend with all the kids and grandkids here! We ate 24 hours a day and visited a lot! Thursday afternoon Shawn blessed his new son, Ethan Kyler Owens, with permission from his Bishop and Stake President. The kids all had a wonderful time playing together. We won't be able to be together again as a family for a couple of years after Earl and Kelly get home from their mission so this weekend was especially nice. We love our family and are thankful for the love they show us and each other.

This was another great trip we had with six of our dear friends to Guatemala. We went to the ruins of Tikal for the day and saw and heard some interesting things. This truly is the land of the Nephites and Lamanites.

I started my own blog!

I can't believe I'm actually trying this out!! I looked at some of my niece's and nephew's blogs and thought they were really cute. I just don't know if I can be creative enough to interest anyone! But I'm going to try. Everyone knows how much we have loved to travel this past year since retirement so I'm going to share some pictures with you of our travels. This picture was taken in April 2007 when we went on a cruise to the Eastern Carribean. It was wonderful! The ship had everything you could want and more. We had a great time and did a lot of relaxing as well as sightseeing. We have decided that we are "cruisers"!!