With All Our Love

Dear Tanner,

Your letter last week was very interesting to say the least! We're excited you're out of Tupa! You worked hard, you're looking too thin, and I hope you can recoup some of yourself while you're with this district leader. I'm sure the amount of strength you give will fluxuate up and down over the course of your mission, and I expect you left Tupa pretty drained, and would ask you allow yourself to be refilled. That being said, I'm sorry you had to spend your carefully saved money on a bag. I had planned on mailing you one, as I know you were tight leaving, and knew you would have more to bring home. I'm not sure what kind of bag you bought, but let me know if you will still need something bigger.

I will write your former companion. I bet it was hard for him to see all your mail, and get none himself. Are you going to see your packages? Will they pass everything along so you'll get it someday?

Your former companion's letter gave us a few more details about your transfer: "There was an emergency transfer this week in the mission because two missionaries went home...one chose to go and the other had medical issues. Elder Schenewark got transferred and is in some other city in São Paulo. He got lucky. "

Your CTM companion wrote: Sister T. did a surprise inspection this week. Our house had a reputation for being the worst house in the mission, but Sister T. said it was the cleanest house in the mission and talked with us personally to congratulate us for our house!! He's set the bar high...how are you doing in apartment cleanliness? Aren't you thankful you were taught how to clean toilets over and over and over... ;-)

Another missionary mom sent me this email: "Amy, this is what a member of a branch where your son is serving said about him. "Elder Schenewark is an awesome Elder. He visited my house ..." When I asked her how she heard this tidbit, she said she asked a member there. Her son baptized him and she is friends with him on Facebook.

Your cousin Naomi Hutchins received her mission call to Lyon, France. She leaves May 15th. How cool is that! Uncle Aaron won't be the only French speaking missionary in the family now!

Uncle Ben is finishing his basement. He sent out his "Dream Big" floor plans, which include an apartment with bedroom and kitchen, and a new deck with a hot tub. It's been unusually arctic cold in Utah this year, for almost two months. The bell tower walkway/bridge is a sheet of ice, and everyone slides their way to school. Roger returned to BYU this month for the new semester.

Your sister has been very busy this week. She now pushes chairs across the kitchen to help me wash dishes. All.the.time. She loves water. She takes two baths a day, one in the morning, and one at night. She's trying to speak more, and combine two words together. She finishes a cup, or bowl of something, and would run to the downstairs toilet and put her dirty dishes in there. We started hearing the lid "bang," and knew we needed to check for her latest toilet donation. One night, after hearing the "bang," and running into the bathroom, I found a mug in the toilet with a few frozen blueberries floating. She was on the stairs, watching me find her treasure. When I told her that was "naughty," she smirked, and continued her climb. Forty minutes later Cooper found my cell phone in the upstairs toilet. So we are no longer mobile. When I told Grampy, he just laughed. Good for him. Someday I'll have his eternal perspective.

Monday the boys were home from school because of Martin Luther King's birthday celebration. But there was not a whole lot of sleeping in. We had Porter's surprise 15th birthday party, and I was up early cooking all 15 breakfast items. It was a huge success! Not because it was an amazing party, but because it was a fun thing to do on a day when not much was going on. Shortly after the party, Porter had a freshmen game in Ironton that Breyer and myself drove to see. He played most of the game, and although they lost, if he wasn't in, they pushed ahead. When he was in, they didn't score. Dad had everybody else at the annual Optimist Club's basketball shoot-out at the YMCA. Miller was able to participate unofficially, and Sawyer and Cooper officially. They took a younger brother from Porter's birthday party, and Sawyer gave him a basket ball he won; Cooper won another bicycle, and sent him home with two bikes from our garage.

Tuesday at cub scouts we had stations again, and this week built wood sailboats, courtesy of Home Depot; wrote thank you cards to our grandfather who's helping us with wood projects, and did six arm-to-arm muscle strengthening exercises. Those boys make me smile. I love their enthusiasm for life, learning new things, and being with friends. As usual, Larry does a stellar job with Breyer, as Dad's late night class at Marshall is also on this night.

Wednesday Dad was at the church filling in as scoutmaster. He brought string and rings, and had the boys learning knots for tying on weights and flies and threading fishing poles. He came prepared with his "scoutmaster minute," and had a lot of interested boys and leaders. This week he'll finish up the fishing merit badge.

Friday was our first snow since October, beginning after school had started. The boys were sent home by 12:30 p.m. Larry-the-neighbor-who-makes-living-here-wonderful knew the boys would be coming home early, so he brought two large pizzas over for them, and chicken nuggets for the Princess. Happy tummies over here! Almost as good as Grampy's early morning doughnut runs. Friday was the deadline for the Optimist annual essay contest. Hunter was the only one who got one written. 

Cooper asked a long time ago if he could go to a Lego event held at Toys'R'Us and I told him I would take him if he wrote an essay. He didn't. Saturday morning rolls around and he realizes his dreams of going might be squashed, so while I was busy at a few other events, he spent the morning vacuuming the entire house, and cleaning sinks. One such event was the Relay for Life kick-off breakfast at the Fairgrounds. It was held in the Monty Pizza building, which has closed, and now belongs to 4H groups. I made a huge batch of cinnamon rolls to bring. I left a little early to go to Sawyer's tournament game hosted by Fairland this week, and brought another batch of rolls for them. He's so fun to watch. He's one of the bigger boys on the team. Because the league went to grade divisions this year, and all the other schools play by age, our boys are 3rd graders (8-9 year old) playing in the 9-10 year old bracket. I don't mind at all. The harder the competition the more they'll learn and the better they'll become. 

We left his game and headed back to the pancake breakfast, wrapped that up and went home to collect the boys. This is where Cooper's efforts paid off. Dad appreciated his self-motivation and ran him up to the mall while we cleaned the church. We also had to shovel all the walkways. Knowing we'd be outside for a bit, we brought Ranger on his long leash, and let him play with us. We'd shovel a scoop, and chuck it at him. He loves biting all the snow "balls." Breyer was so happy to finally be outside, after a long arctic spell. She was a bit too enthusiastic and when hitting an icy spot fell and put her tooth all the way through her upper lip. Any mouth injury bleeds a lot, and when Miller saw her, with her lower face covered in blood, dripping on her shirt and coat, he cried, and said, "Is my sister dying?"

And since we can never have just one adventure, Dad took my church key I left in the outside lock, to open an office, and forgot to return it. When he left to take Sawyer to his second game, we had no way to lock up the church! When Dad felt the key in his pocket, after dropping off Sawyer, he turned around and drove all the way back to lock up the church. Sawyer's second game was just as exciting. He was up in the air on a rebound or shot, and had his feet knocked sideways. He landed on his knee. It was a big bang, and I knew he had been hurt. That was right before the half. He still played quite a bit, but was funny looking as he hobbled up and down the court. (We had our orthopedic specialist Stan-the-man look at it today in church, and he said it was just a big bone bruise.) We finished off the long day with six boy haircuts! Those always make me tired, but throw in BIG vacuuming and snow shoveling, and I was really tired.

Today in church Porter and the Nicelers spoke. They came home last week, and today he was sustained as scout master. Everybody is SO excited to have them back! They absolutely loved their mission. They kept saying how it was the perfect mission for them, and that Heavenly Father does know each of us. Sis. Niceler spoke about how much she grew to love reading her scriptures, looking forward to her study time so much. Even after being seminary teacher, she grew in ways she didn't expect. 

Porter did a wonderful job, speaking on the Holy Ghost, probably the most mature talk he's given. While he had me look at his talk last night, I realized we had failed miserably. We had been asked on Wednesday if Porter could watch their dogs for them, starting Friday night. So the dogs had been in the house since Friday morning, and now it was 11 p.m. Saturday night. I was just sick. I got Dad up, and all three of us, with fear and trepidation, opened the door. We were so blessed. It's because of you and your mission! Barely anything to clean up, and all three dogs still alive. Thank you! Thank goodness!

I think it not a coincidence my thought last week was on saying goodbye to those you serve, and then to find out you left! My seminary thought for you tonight? We were reading in 1 Cor. 1:27, and speaking of how Heavenly Father chooses the "foolish things of the world to confound the wise...the weak things of the world to confound the things which are mighty." That's you. Weak and simple ;-) No power or authority, no education or degrees...a missionary endowed with the priesthood power and authority called to preach the gospel. We love you! We're looking forward to your letter! 

Love, Mom and Dad

P.S. We were finally able to figure out how to open your pictures...thank you!