Birmingham, England

A mixture of old and new, canals reminiscent of Venice, industry, commerce and history.  The highs in the summer are around 68 degrees F and in the winter 40-50 degrees F.  Humidity is very high (average of 90% when we arrive), a lot of rain and December and January average 1, yes one, hour of sunshine a day.  There will be much to learn to see and to do.  Good stuff!

So Many Possibilities

There are so many possibilities.  What will we be doing in the England Birmingham Mission? Will we be in Birmingham and the surrounding area?  Or will we be serving at the University of Birmingham which has an international student body of 26,000 students?  That would be truly amazing, but we will do whatever we are told, of course.  I understand that the mission president is Dick Moffat.  He is from Salt Lake City and I have friends who know him.  That is comforting.  I am so excited to learn everything I can about Birmingham, the surrounding area, and indeed all of England.  We have been studying "Preach My Gospel" and we haven't forgotten why we are going and what is important.  

The Pictures Tell the Story

The Call

It happened.  Our call arrived on Wednesday afternoon, 20 August 2008 and we couldn't be more thrilled.  We will serve as CES (Church Education System) missionaries for 18 months in Birmingham, England.  It couldn't be more perfect.  

We had Julie, Tom, Cherie, Kari, Hayden, Paige, Mom, Dad, and Shawna with us as we opened the call, with Kim and Chantel on the speaker phone.  Warm fuzzies all around and Mom cried, of course.  She was the one who guessed England. It will be hard to leave Mom and Dad and I feel selfish going off when they need us. 

We have been  so happy to receive such good wishes from so many of you and appreciate your sharing our joy and giving us encouragement.  

Mission Photo

Waiting for the Call

When Claudine retired in April we were both available to serve so we met with Bishop Kent Larson in May and told him we were ready to serve a mission.  After filling out the application forms online, completing our physicals and dental exams, getting the required shots, and renewing Wayne's passport we filed our application on July 3, 2008.  President Jamie Dester interviewed us on 27 July and was very nice and complimentary, as was Bishop Larson.  It has been fun because there is so much interest in our ward (and with everyone else we talk to) in our serving a mission.  Elder Aldin Porter has shown a special interest and given a great deal of encouragement.  

Where will we go and what will we be doing?  There are so many possibilities and senior couples are allowed to state a preference of where to go and what kind of mission they want to serve.  Some of the guesses are:  Julie - CES in Germany; Tiffany - Montana; Mark Brooks - "Good luck in Guam.  Suckers."; Andrea Grasteit - Spain Madrid Temple Mission; Duane Grasteit - Idaho or Italy; Mom - England or Frankfurt, Germany; Dad - Spain Madrid; Kari - the South (US); Shawna - NE USA (maybe around DC); Jack - San Francisco Cambodian Speaking; Claudia King - Ghana or Japan; Karl & Maureen - Brazil or probably Formosa; Jennifer Lange - Prague; Douglas J. Parry - Africa; Lauren - Germany, "I think you would be stinkin amazing and the Germanian people would be more than lucky to get you!!"; Suzy Larson - Paris but probably Africa; Wayne - Guatemala; Claudine - Latvia Riga Mission; Chantel - New Zealand or Australia CES but wishes it were Member Locator in St. George; Julie new guess - Nauvoo; Kathy Brooks - Prague CES; Steven - Samoa English speaking or Germany Spanish speaking; Kim - Palmyra, New York; Cherie - Nashville; Paige - Africa; Katelyn - Jamaica; Dan Olsen - Florida Tallahassee Dan's fried David - India Humanitarian; Wayne has changed his guess to Bolivia La Paz .  Who knows.  We said we would go wherever they wanted us to go and do whatever they thought we could do.  

I had hoped we would get the call on my birthday (August 6th) but it is now the 15th and we have heard nothing other than that we are "approved for assignment".  It seems like we have been waiting much longer than we actually have.