Week 17 - Christmas in Canada

​​This week was great!!! I don't have too much time to email today because we're gonna go play hockey later!!!!

We performed in the choir for the Christmas program. I didn't really like that, but the choir would be too small if the missionaries weren't in it haha. So, I endured that well!!!

Also, on Christmas we went to a member's house and watched Elf (with permission) and ate dinner!! We did a white elephant exchange at the end, and I brought a Justin Bieber poster. One of the elders in my apartment actually ended up with the poster in the end, so we'll have to find a way we can use that haha.

Well, I hope you all had an awesome Christmas! It truly is a wonderful time to honor and remember the Savior. Let's all just try and keep that attitude throughout the year, and we'll be golden.

Have a good week!

Elder Haslam

Profile Picture for Skype

Week 16 - Zone Conference

Hi everyone! This has been an awesome week!

I'm going to start off by saying that it has gotten really cold. On Wednesday, it got to -38 degrees (Celsius) with the wind chill. But my puffy coat kept me warm!!

Tuesday we had our Christmas zone conference! I got to see Elder Ipson again because our zones combined for the conference. The conference was sooo fun! We played a lot of Christmas games and had a talent show. It was also a wonderful reminder that we truly celebrate Christmas to remember the wonderful and glorious gift of Jesus Christ's Atonement.

The past few days we've gone caroling a lot! We went through a bunch of neighborhoods and old folks' homes. It's awesome to see how happy it makes people. We were handing out candy canes with mormon.org cards as well so hopefully that pays off.

Friday we went and volunteered at a soup kitchen and helped feed some of the homeless people in Fredericton. We get to go there almost every week, and it's super rewarding! 

On Sunday we had freezing rain, so they had to cancel church. We got permission from the bishop to have our own mini sacrament meeting with the 7 missionaries in Fredericton. So we made the dangerous trek up to the church and had our own testimony meeting with just missionaries. It was a cool experience. 

This week during personal studies I read a talk by Elder Wirthlin titled "The Great Commandment" There was an awesome quote in there that I'd like to share with you all. It says:

 "Oh, it is wonderful to know that our Heavenly Father loves us—even with all our flaws! His love is such that even should we give up on ourselves, He never will. We see ourselves in terms of yesterday and today. Our Heavenly Father sees us in terms of forever. Although we might settle for less, Heavenly Father won’t, for He sees us as the glorious beings we are capable of becoming." 

No matter what our circumstances are, we must always remember our divine heritage as sons and daughters of God and our potential to become just like him. We are able to do this when we access the power of the Atonement and God's grace everyday in our lives. I hope we all take advantage and remember, especially during this time of year, of what an amazing gift the Savior gave us when he atoned for our personal sins. I hope we all can use this remembrance to become better people in all aspects of our lives. 

Love you all! Hope you have a Merry Christmas!!!!

Week 15 - Fredericton, New Brunswick

Hello! 

So I'm in my new area now! I'm in Fredericton, New Brunswick. I won't have a ton of time to email though because there are 7 missionaries and only 3 computers. 

So, on Wednesday I flew from Newfoundland to Nova Scotia, and then on Thursday we drove from Halifax to Fredericton. I'm super excited to work here. Apparently Fredericton is the 3rd largest city in the mission. We have opportunities to street contact instead of just knocking, so that is awesome! Our apartment here is super nice too, so that's a plus. 

It was weird attending church in an actual church building yesterday! I had gotten so used to meeting in the apartment back in Newfoundland. I almost forgot how real church works! 

On Thursday, when we were driving to Fredericton, I got to stop by Amherst to drop off Elder Ipson's new companion! We got to see each other again, so that was sweet!

Anyways, I'm stoked to get to work here in Freddy-town! Hope you all have a good and safe week. 

Happy Holidays!!!! 

Love you guys!

Elder Haslam

Week 14 - My First Transfer

Hi everyone!

It's transfer week and we just got a text saying that I'm leaving Newfoundland, but I don't know where until later tonight...So I'll let you guys know exactly where I am next week. I fly out from Newfoundland tomorrow. 

Last P-day, after emailing, we went with all of the St. John's Missionaries and we went laser tagging. It was awesome. The place we went to was huge and it had such a cool setup. Then we went on a little hike and we got to see an awesome view of the city. St. John's is a pretty cool place! The whole city kind of smells like weed though. 

On Thursday, we went to Glovertown to do some service with one of our members up there. We stacked wood for about 2-hours for a non-member, and it was super fun! Then we went and delivered cookies and cupcakes to all of the neighbors! Yeee. #LIGHTtheWORLD

Then, on Saturday we were in 2 parades!! We handed out over 400 Light the World pass along cards! We decorated our van with lights and stuff. It was awesome! It was like -6 degrees Celsius during the night and I gave Elder Hovey my gloves, so that was kinda crappy haha. 

Well, I'm running out of time and I need to go pack. Hope you all have a good week!!!!

Love Elder Haslam

Week 13 - Thanksgiving

Hi everyone!

This week was a pretty average one! We did a ton of knocking trying to introduce people to the Church's Christmas Initiative. People seem to like it!! Also, one of our promising investigators pretty much dropped us. We're not really sure why but she just told us that she didn't want to meet anymore. That was a really big bummer, but we're hoping to meet with her and resolve her concerns this week. 

On Wednesday, some of the senior couples in our district made us all a big American Thanksgiving dinner after district meeting because they don't celebrate Thanksgiving in November here in Canada. It was refreshing to have a American Thanksgiving because Newfoundland Thanksgivings are really weird and they don't have rolls and mashed potatoes and stuff.  

Then, on Thursday, we had exchanges and we all went to a wing place for lunch and I got to watch about an hour of SportsCenter and it was amazing haha!!!!!:) We also asked this guy who owns a huge electronic billboard on one of the main roads if he would put up a graphic for the Initiative and he said he would do it for free! We all got super pumped when he told us he would. In a few days he should have our graphic up on the billboard!

On Friday we went to a Bible study with a bunch of Pentecostal people and they talked about how their church plays street hockey every other Saturday. So we plan on going to their church this week to play some hockey with them. When we asked them if we could come, they didn't really seem all that excited but we're going anyways because it sounds fun and it'll help us introduce the Initiative to them. 

Yesterday in Church we Skyped into the Corner Brook branch and they were having their primary program. Primary programs over Skype are amazing!! Especially when there are like 4 primary children and the microphone makes them all sound like Darth Vader when they sing :)

Well that's about all for this week. Hope you had a wonderful Thanksgiving! I'm Thankful that I can be out here serving the Lord and sharing the message of his restored gospel.

Have a wonderful week!

Love, 

Elder Haslam

P.S. Thank you to my family for that picture you guys took up at the lodge! You're all the best!

Week 12 - Found Grant

Hi everyone! This week was extremely busy.

We flew to Halifax Wednesday morning and went on exchanges with the APs for the rest of that day. Then on Thursday, we drove to New Brunswick for MLC (Mission Leadership Conference). On the way back from MLC, I received a huge tender mercy!! So we were driving back an old car to Halifax, so it could be sold. A few minutes into the drive, we got a call from the APs saying that we needed to drop off the bike rack on the back of the car in Amherst! I started freaking out because I knew that was where Elder (Grant) Ipson is. When we got to Amherst, I called him and surprised him. It was awesome! We got to hang out and take a few pics before we had to leave. Not very many people get to say that they saw one of their best friends while out in the mission field. I'm very blessed!

That's about all for this week. We didn't really have too much time to meet with our investigators because we were so busy flying and traveling. We plan on meeting with them a lot this week, hopefully. 

Thank you all for your support! Hope you all have an awesome Thanksgiving. Make sure you take time to thank our Heavenly Father for all he has done for you. We truly have so much for which to be thankful!

Love you all and miss you!!

Elder Haslam

Week 11 - Great Week

Well this week has been great!

We had a couple of solid lessons with our new investigators! One of them, Rachel, is just struggling to find out if God is real. She wants to find out, but she just isn't sure of anything. So we're just gonna work on helping her find that! The other one, Johanna, is a pretty active Catholic but she's really open to us. She loves having us over and learning more. We just have to turn that desire to learn more into action. So that's where we're at with our gators!

This next week is going to be crazy. Tomorrow, we have exchanges with some other elders. One of them is my MTC buddy, so I'm stoked for that! Wednesday, we're flying out to Halifax and going on exchanges with the APs. Thursday, we're going to the Mission Leadership Conference, which I'm a little worried about because it's going to be me and a bunch of super old missionaries haha. Each missionary has to prepare a 10 min training, so hopefully they don't pick on me. We fly back to Newfoundland on Friday. Then on Saturday, we have a zone training and my companions asked me to conduct and help them with a training. So we're really busy!!!!!!!

Other than that, It's been a pretty average week up here in Newfoundland! Hope all is well back home. Love you all!! 

Elder Haslam

P.S.  Cathy graduated this week so she had us take pics with her in her gown and stuff. :)

Week 10 - Good Things Happening

Hi People!!!

This week was really great. All the days were pretty average except Friday and Saturday. Friday we had zone conference at Hotel because no church buildings are big enough here on Newfoundland. We got a ton of awesome training from President Pratt. We talked a lot about the Doctrine of Christ and how we need to stress it in our teachings. Later that day, President and Sister Pratt took my companions and me, the STLs, and the APs out to dinner at this nice diner place.

Saturday was awesome! President Pratt went on splits with me and my companions, and we got some work done! We stopped by this lady's house, and she had a bunch of questions about the church. At first, she wasn't interested at all, but by the end of the lesson she told us that she wants to believe in our church and she wants to meet with us again! Then, later, we went knocking and some lady let us in and we taught her a Restoration lesson. At the end, she seemed interested and pretty much asked us to come and teach the Plan of Salvation sometime this week. So on Saturday alone we got 2 new gators!!! It was great. 

I also was told on Friday that I'm going to be flying to Halifax with my companions for the Mission Leadership Conference instead of staying in Corner Brook. So that'll be cool! We fly out next Thursday. 

Thanks for all your support and prayers! I love you all! Have a great week!!

Elder Haslam

P.S. Sister Borden finally got her G.E.D. this week! She dropped out of school when she was like 12 so this was a big week for her! Also, we haven't had to take any pills from her this week! I just hope she's not stashing them somewhere......Also thanks mom for the basketball hoop. I took a selfie with it :)

Week 9 - Transfers Completed

Hello everyone!

This week was really busy with transfers and stuff so I don't have too much to talk about. Elder Hovey and I said goodbye to Elder Larson this week and that was pretty sad. But we're excited for this next transfer! We're going to get some work done! We also got news that there will be a new senior couple coming to work in our area this transfer. So that'll be a big help because we do everything for church on Sundays. 

I love the people in this branch. They're soo funny. I don't know if I've mentioned this in a past email but they all call me "Foxy" because of my hair. Whenever someone says it they can't stop laughing because they think it's so funny. 

Well that's about all this week! Hope you all are doing well. I know this Gospel is true and I also know that it's the true way to find real happiness in the world. Thanks for the support! I don't have any pictures this week. Sorry mom. 

Love Elder Haslam

P.s. I almost hit a huge coyote while we we're driving this week. I swerved and missed it barely. It was nuts! 

Week 8 - Transfers

Hi Everyone!

This week we did a lot of traveling. We drove almost all the way across the island to go on exchanges in St. John. It was almost 10 hours of driving round trip and I drove most of the time so that was a blast. I got to see a ton of the island though and it was pretty cool. We also got to go to the only Wendy's on Newfoundland so that was wonderful. This place is so beautiful! It's awesome. I tried taking pictures but they weren't that good because the car was moving really fast. 

On a sadder note, the promising potentials we got last week turned out to not be that promising. They either changed their minds when we called them or they just wouldn't answer or respond to texts. Some of them wouldn't even answer their doors even though we knew they were home. We'll find more people though. We're starting to get more and more potentials each week so eventually we'll find someone to teach. 

Well that's about all I have this week. Sorry I don't have much. 

Thanks for all your support! I love it here! 

Hope you all have a good week!

Elder Haslam

Week 7 - It's Getting Cold!

Hi everyone! Not much happened this week so I'll be pretty brief. 

We've gone knocking a lot this week and we've gotten a few people who seemed a little interested and took a BoM. We plan on following up this week with them so I'll let you know if anything cool happens with them. Hopefully we can start to see a little bit of success!!

Anyways, it's starting to get cold here. I bought my coat and I wore it a few times this week. Also, on Thursday Elder Larson was talking about how he wanted a shake from McDonald's so he was trying to convince us to go. We wouldn't go because of the contract that I sent you a picture of a few emails ago (see below).

When we went back to the apartment we read over it to look for loopholes. However, we read and we saw that one of the points on the contract was that we couldn't try to convince others to go to McDonalds. It also says that if one person fails to meet the contract then all of us get punished haha. So, basically we broke the contract.

 The contract says that if we break the rules, then the next day we can only eat a head of lettuce and water. So, on Thursday we had our "last supper" at McDonalds before our lettuce-cleanse. Then on Friday we ate just lettuce. For each meal I would just put a bunch of lettuce on a plate and eat it with a fork. It was actually really funny.

Well, I hope you all had a good week. Sorry for not having any cool stories this week. Hopefully there will be more next week! Just remember to love everyone like Christ did! Thanks for your support!

Love,

Elder Haslam

Week 6 - Contacting

Hello everyone!

This week was pretty eventful so I'll get started.

On Tuesday we went door knocking in Bishop's Falls which is a town about 15 minutes away from Grand Falls. We knocked on this door and a lady named Julia answered and she let us in. She disappeared into the back of her house and grabbed her Bible. My companions and I looked at each other and we knew that she wanted to "Bible bash" with us. So we sat there and listened to her rip on us for about an hour and half. The whole time we just smiled and laughed, but in a respectful way. We would try to defend ourselves and she wouldn't even let us talk. She was basically just telling us that we were such cute boys and how she's depressed that we're going to hell and how we all should become Pentecostals. She and her sister asked if she could pray with/for us and we said yes. So they grabbed our hands and started praying for our salvation hahaha. They were bawling and shouting "hallelujah" and "praise Jesus". So after listening to her rant for almost 2 hours (!!!!!!), she said how she was sorry for ranting and she invited us over for a Canadian Thanksgiving dinner this weekend (FYI, Canadian Thanksgiving is in October and not in November). So we ended up eating dinner at her house Saturday night! It was just a really strange situation but it was fun.

Then on Thursday night, we were out knocking and a man answered and told us how he and a few members from his church were having a Bible study and it just barely started. So they kindly let us in and we were able to study with them. It was really fun and the people were really nice. It was refreshing considering what had gone on earlier with the other lady. I think we're gonna go back and study with them this week too!

On Friday, we went knocking in a town about 30 minutes away from Grand falls. Some guy let us in and wanted to bash with us, just like the other lady. He told us how none of the religions are true and how he's starting a new religion. His new religion basically just follows the Law of Moses. He also told us that we're cursed because we celebrate Christmas, and how Christmas was established to worship Pagan sun Gods. So that was cool!

Elder Larson was telling me how he had bashed as much this week as he had during his whole entire mission up to this point. We all started commenting as I've experienced more bashing sessions than actual restoration lessons. The bashing isn't really common but my companions say that it'll happen every once and a while.

Further up that same street, we knocked and a lady let us in. She was really sweet and she told us how she always tries to be welcoming to people out sharing the word of God. We taught her a restoration lesson and left her with a Book of Mormon and a first vision DVD. We told her we'd be back in town later this week and she told us to come stop by. So hopefully we can keep teaching her and hopefully she reads!!

So that's about it! Things are starting to pick up and the weeks are going by quick!

Love and miss you all!

Elder Haslam

Images on our way to Bishop Falls:

Week 5 - Success!

Hello everyone!

This week was awesome! I ended up doing a lot of work in the Corner Brook area while we were on exchanges. I got my very first potential investigator while knocking there this week! It was awesome. I'm a little bummed that I don't get to see it all the way, but it still felt good.

We left Corner Brook Wednesday afternoon and were driving the rest of that day. Since my companions went to Nova Scotia for a Zone Leader Conference, they picked up a new car for some Elders on the other side of the island and drove it back to Newfoundland via the ferry. We had to drive about 6-hours to the Bay Roberts area, passing through our area while doing so to exchange cars, and then we had to drive 4 more hours back home. That was a really long day, but I got to see a TON of Newfoundland...and it's amazing. There are so many lakes up here. We passed about 20 of them while driving.

Once we got back to our area, we went contacting and we got another potential investigator! He told us to come back again sometime this week so hopefully we can start teaching him. We also received a referral from one of the members here. His name is Zhivago (pronounced Shervago..???) and we contacted him and invited him to come to conference on Sunday. We were kinda bummed because he told us that he'd think about it and we assumed that was just a polite way of saying no. But he actually showed up and watched with us! We were really excited. We also invited him to family home evening this Monday, which is just playing games at the church, and he accepted! So hopefully we can finally start teaching people this week.

Well, I hope you are all doing great. I miss you all a lot. Heavenly Father loves you very much.

Here a some pics from the week...

[Cathy Borden is a member and she really likes pills. She just really likes taking pills. So we basically police her pill consumption. She knows when she's being bad, so whenever we ask her for her pills she gives them to us. We keep all of her pills in this bag - haha.] 

[Fog]

[Eating Cucumbers for snacks during Conference haha!]

[Contract we all signed because we were going to Mcdonalds too much. The bottom print is too small to read but it basically states that if we go to Mcdonalds, the next day we can only eat a head of lettuce and water. ]

[Twewve! Nuff Said!]

Love you all. Have a great week​​!!!

    Elder Haslam​

Week 4 - Cornerbrook

Hi everyone!

Not very much happened this week. We went contacting a ton this week and we didn't get any potential investigators at all. That's been a little frustrating but I'm sure it will get better. It is nice to talk to all the people here because they're so unique. I've been staying in the Cornerbrook area for the past few days because my companions had to go to Nova Scotia for a meeting. It is so beautiful here. I'm really bummed because I forgot to bring my camera so I couldn't take or upload any pictures. I'll maybe upload some pics from google.

The whole town is on a bunch of hills surrounding a big bay. There are a ton of trees here and they're all starting to change color and it looks so awesome. There's this big paper factory here and there's a massive pipe that shoots out steam. Everyone around here calls it the cloud maker. It makes the town really humid and wet but it's kind of cool to watch. I love it here. I'd totally move here if I could.

But on a spiritual note, I'd like to share a scripture with you all. It's Matthew 10:39. I invite you all to look it up and see how you can apply it to your life. I know that it has made my life as a missionary much easier and I believe that it can help us all. I want to let you know that this gospel is awesome. It brings me a lot of happiness and I can't wait to find someone out here that I can teach and share that happiness with.

Thank you all for your prayers! You are all in mine.

Love you all, be safe, and be happy!

Elder Haslam

Week 3 - Newfoundland

Good morning everyone!! I've arrived in Canada!

We left SLC about 11:00 am on Tuesday September 13, 2016 and I got in to Nova Scotia at about 2:00 am local time, and we didn't get to bed until around 3am. Luckily, President Pratt let us sleep-in for like an hour. That morning he took us on a walk around a lake by the mission home, and that was awesome. This place is so beautiful!

Anyway, I'm now in my first area, Grand Falls-Windsor, Newfoundland. I flew  from Nova Scotia to Newfoundland - solo! That was really weird because I've had a companion or another missionary near me for the past 3 weeks. So it felt strange to be alone.

I was picked up at the airport by my companions, Elder Larson and Elder Hovey. I love them so much. They are probably some of the funniest people I've ever met. They're both zone leaders so they made me the zone secretary, even though that isn't a real thing. My responsibility as zone secretary is taking naps while they deal with all of their zone leadership business. It's a pretty sweet gig.

My area is very green and it rains a lot. Everyone here is really kind and almost everyone smokes. Also, almost everyone here is on some type of welfare program. The branch here is tiny, and we have about 3 or 4 active members in our branch. One of those members is Cathy Borden. She is so funny and she is really faithful, but we are pretty much her parents haha. I'll talk more about Cathy in a later email. I have some funny stories about her.

This Sunday, we had about 16 people show up to church!! That, apparently, is an amazing turnout here. Church here is interesting to say the least, as the actual church building is an apartment. We Skype into another branch about 3 hours away for our sacrament meeting. Everyone that comes is really old and they're all kind of crazy. But I love them all, they're so awesome. They're really fun to talk to.

A lot of people here have a heavy "Newfey" accent. They basically sound like they're from Louisiana but they talk a gazillion-kilometers (haha) an hour. Sometimes I wish that they had subtitles so I could actually understand them. Also, since everyone here is so poor, and there are so few members, we likely will never have a dinner appointment in this area. My cooking skills will be tested 😀 ! This past week I've mostly survived off Nutrigrain bars and vegetables. I'll get more food once we've shopped.

 We only have a couple of investigators, so aside from teaching them, we will be doing a ton of finding this week. I'll let you know how all of that goes.

I love you all so much! Talk more next week!

Elder Haslam

Week 2 - MTC

Hello Everyone,

Wow I can't believe it's been 2-weeks already! This week has gone by so fast that I hardly remember it. So, I'm sorry if this is brief. 

This Sunday we heard from Elder Christofferson. He gave an awesome talk about how we know God loves us, but does He trust us! He went on to say that God's trust is much more desirable than his love. I hope you all strive to earn God's trust by doing the things that He would have you do.

I got my travel plans now! I leave for Canada this Tuesday morning, and my flight leaves at 11 a.m. I fly to NYC and I have a layover there for 4 and a half hours. That's kind of a bummer. But then I go from there to Halifax. I should arrive in Canada at 12:15 a.m. local time, so that'll be rough hahaha. 

I'm so excited to go and get started! I'm getting tired of being in a classroom all day. But I've become expert at some dumb things. I can throw a push-pin into a bulletin board from 6 feet away. Also, someone's mom sent them puffed cheese balls, so we've been throwing them into each others mouths and doing trick shots and stuff. Also, one day when we were bored, I convinced the Sisters in our district that if they stared at their hands and said cantaloupe over and over, that there was a riddle for them to discover. So after 20-min of them shouting cantaloupe at their hands, we finally told them that it wasn't a riddle at all. As you can tell, we're really productive sometimes! However, we actually do focus and study most of the time though, and I'm learning a lot. I'm getting pretty confident with my teaching skills now. 

Lanny (Elder Landon Malo) got here yesterday and I've been searching high and low for him but I haven't seen him yet. I'll find him eventually though!

Anyway, I'm running out of time. I just want to let you all know that I know this church is true and I can't wait to bring it to others and help them feel the joy and happiness it brings me. 

Thanks for all the support. 

Go Utes!

Love and miss you all. 

Elder Haslam

Week 1 - MTC

MTC Email - Week 1 - Elder Tyler Haslam

Howdy y'all. I finally have my first P day. I had to wait 8 days! That was kind of hard. I'm not sure exactly where to start. The first couple of days were super tough. I had that one experience in the MTC that everyone talks about, when the first night you're laying in bed and you're just like, "What the heck am I doing". But I prayed over and over and I can say that I'm actually having a ton of fun now. Each day just gets better.

My companion is Elder Hamblin. He's a really cool guy. We get along really well. We've started teaching our TRC investigators this week and I think we teach together effectively. I'm starting to get the hang of teaching. I can teach the first lesson with ease now. 

My district is the absolute best. We're all like family. A bunch of elders in my district have gained a bunch of weight since they've gotten here. One elder has gained 10 lbs since coming to the MTC. I'd like to officially announce that I'm the only elder in my district to not gain any weight haha!! I eat like 4,000 pieces of broccoli every meal so..... We're joking around all day and laughing almost all day. 

I'm learning so much about the Lord and the gospel. I get to play basketball every morning and it is wonderful. Sunday night we watched an amazing video called Character of Christ by Elder Bednar. It was amazing. They make all of the missionaries watch it. It talked about how in order to be like Christ, we need to turn ourselves outward when we desire to turn ourselves inward. We need to be serviceable when we personally need service the most. That's something to strive for!!

The MTC is wonderful and all, but I already want to go to Canada. I'm definitely counting down the days until I get there. Thank you all for the emails and the support. It means more than you know. I miss you all so much and you are all in my prayers. If you want to know anything more, email or write me please. I'd enjoy that. 

Love you guys very much,

Elder Haslam (12)

Missionary Drop-Off Day - by Jim Haslam

We drove to Provo Utah this morning (August 24, 2016) at 10 AM and arrived about 11 AM. Tyler, his mom and dad, and Grandpa Don were all present. As we were driving down, Jill (Tyler's mom) announced that she had left her cellphone at home (more on that later!)

We went to the local Brick Oven restaurant for a quick lunch, where Tyler got his meal for free as a new missionary entering the MTC. Our waiter, Chris, was from Australia, and really helped make Tyler feel more at ease. Tyler had the soup. pasta and salad bar, and we were all quite full.

Next we drove to the Provo Temple grounds to take some pictures. The Temple grounds were beautiful and peaceful, and we sat on a bench under a tree to rest and wait for Tyler's drop-off time of 1:00 PM.

When the time came, we left and drove to the drop-off area where we waited for 20 minutes for traffic to enter the MTC. Once past the guard shack, we went to the South drop-off area to give our final goodbyes and unloaded Tyler's luggage. Tyler saw one of his friends from school who was helping new arrivals to unload luggage and help them into the MTC. It was good to see that Tyler knew someone, and my last view of Tyler was him hugging his friend in greeting. I was instantly put to ease knowing that he had someone he knew to help him to adjust to missionary life.

Dropping off a missionary is bittersweet. You know that they are doing the right thing, and they are in the best of hands. You know the Lord will bless and watch-over them, and that they will have the experience of a lifetime. All things you would want for your son or daughter. However, our emotions from our mortal life take hold, and you know you will miss them dearly.

All I can say is that this was one of the hardest days of my life, to let him go. But it is also one of the most rewarding knowing that he is doing something that he wants to do, and that he is doing the Lords work. I know that I will adjust some as time goes on, but I will miss my son and I will be praying for him every day, every hour, and he will always be in my heart.

Before leaving home this morning, Jill had some last minute items to place into Tyler's luggage. She gave them to me to put into one of the side pockets of his big suitcase, which I did without looking at the contents. As I said earlier, Jill couldn't find her cellphone as we were driving down, and she assumed that she had left it at home.

Upon arriving at home, we searched the house everywhere, but could not locate Jill's cellphone. We called the restaurant to see if by chance it fell out of the car in the parking lot, but they were not able to locate it. We continued to retrace our steps of the morning, reflecting on when we remembered having the phone and where we were at in the house. Still no phone surfaced.

Then Jill remembered handing me the packet of items to place in Tyler's suitcase. We thought...could we have inadvertently placed the cellphone in Tyler's luggage! We called the MTC and asked the attendant who answered if they could check Tyler's luggage for the miss-place cellphone. They said that Tyler was in a big meeting, and they would check with him once the meeting let out and they would call us back with the results.

Shortly after 5 PM the MTC attendant called and notified us that the cellphone had been recovered in Tyler's luggage, and that it would be at the front desk for pick-up. So we jumped in the car and made our second drive to Provo to get the cellphone.

Embarrassingly that cellphone must have rang several times while in the luggage as we were calling it to try and hear it ring to find it. We don't know what was happening on the other end, but if anyone was around the luggage they must have thought something crazy was going on since cellphones are banned at the MTC. Our only hope in this story is that Tyler wasn't completely devastated when he had to go back to his luggage to find his mother's cellphone. We hope he had a good chuckle over this, and realized that his parents were total nut cases and put the phone in there by mistake. It will be a story he can tell on us over and over again as he reflects back on his first day in the MTC.