Alaska and the Completion of our Family Visits

During the family reunion Grant mentioned to Bryce that we would like to visit him and his family in Alaska again, and Bryce began immediately to make plans for such a visit.  Before the reunion was over he talked to us about the things we could do together.  As soon as we made our plans and bought the airline tickets he began to make final plans.  We got to go to the Anchorage temple two times because Bryce is a temple worker there.  It is a beautiful building. 

Anchorage Alaska Temple

Grant and Bryce by Bryce and Sandi's
motor home

Even though it rained a lot while we were there, we had a very busy schedule including a two-day trip in their motor home up to Denali (once known as Mt. McKinley) which is the highest mountain (20,000+ feet) in the USA.  Bryce arranged for us to take a tour bus into Denali National Park with a guide to help us enjoy spotting the animal life.

Here is a close up of a brown bear on
the mountain foraging for food.

  The park is so big that the mountain peak isn’t really much of a feature of the tour, but at the visitors center we were able to see videos that showed the peak and what was most interesting about it.  On the nearly 8 hour tour we saw several brown bears, Dall sheep, and some moose.  A female moose came up to within just a few feet of the bus and all of us passengers were quietly holding our breath and watching her until she ambled off. 

This female moose almost came right
up to the bus to check us out.

It was quite fun to see.  We also learned about the plant life – especially the tundra, which was a new experience for Grant.  Walking on the tundra is really a strange feeling as it is so spongy. It was quite freaky, actually.

Picture of Alaska on the wall of the
museum where Garth built the
huge aquarium.

Riding with Bryce in his motor home as we travelled the Alaskan roads was a very special experience.  He has lived there for over 45 years, and he knows a lot about the history of the state’s development.  His son, Garth, has been a civil engineer there for about twenty years, and Bryce often would point out a bridge or dock that Garth had designed.  After the first trip to Denali we made another trip in the opposite direction down to Seward where he showed us the Sea life visitors center which contained an aquarium that was 27 feet high and about 30 feet across that Garth had engineered.  Life inside could be viewed from three levels:  above the water where the sea birds were the main attraction, just below the surface, and down at the bottom.  The views were through glass panels that were 14 inches thick.  Garth is a great engineer.  Everywhere we went Bryce was able to show us what was interesting. 

Bryce in his living room,
probably exhausted from
hosting us.

Sandi with granddaughter, Krystal

Sandi didn’t go on either of these tours because she wasn’t up to it physically, but before and after each one she talked with us about it.   It was clear that she had been in on the planning, and wanted us to have a good time.  



Near the end of our stay in Anchorage, we got a chance to spend some time with Garth and Jeanna and their family.  Jeanna looked fantastic since having her kidney transplant and their family is doing great. Their oldest daughter,  Jessica is married to James Esplin and they have one daughter, Katie.  James is going to Penn State.  Garth and Jeanna's next girl, Alona is away at BYU.  So they only have the two boys at home, Jonathan and Andrew. 

Garth and Jeanna Howlett's family

 Later we took a little road trip with Bryce and Sandi both to see some of the local area.  Then we went out to see Corey and Melissa at their day care, which seems to be thriving.  Corey is also still flying all over the world with his job.  They have 8 children.  The oldest, Amy just married Matt Reece, and their second child, Tyler is serving a mission in Toronto, Canada.  That leaves Kyle, Gregory, Krystal, Zachary, Skyler and Phillip at home.  All the grand-kids are doing well and growing up fast.

 Corey and Melissa Howlett's family

Everyone was interested to hear about how our son, Eric was doing as he has entered the field of aviation now.  Of course they know enough about the occupation to ask good questions. So our trip to Alaska was also a very special experience.

************

Pat by Corey and Melissa's day care.

The result of all this travel was that we have visited with every one of Grant’s brothers and sisters and their wives or husbands with several of their children.  We visited with each of Pat’s siblings including her step sister, Sharon, though we did not get to visit with John’s wife, Jan, nor with Sharon’s husband, Smitty.  The visits with each of them were long enough to really become re-acquainted, and we loved it.  We also have been able to visit with all of our own children and their spouses, and all of our grandchildren except for Brandon who is in Brazil as a missionary.  We may never again have the opportunity to visit so many in so short a time (just over two months), and it is quite possible that we may never again have the opportunity to visit with some in this life.  What a marvelous goal we set for ourselves, and what an accomplishment!  We figure that we have driven over 8000 miles since we were released from our mission, and that doesn’t include the trip to Alaska and all of the driving there and in Washington in other people’s vehicles.  But it has been worth every minute of it for us and our family.  

Our Family Visiting Continues on to Arizona and California

The next segment of our family visiting odyssey was to go on to Phoenix, Arizona and then down to Southern California.  However to get there we decided to back track through some of our children's homes in Idaho and Utah.  Therefore, from Washington, we returned to Idaho about 8 August 2012 and spent some more time with Karen and Dan. Dan arranged for Grant to spend some time visiting with a member of their ward who operates a huge farm on several thousands of acres. 

Grant was able to ride on a huge harvester
belonging to a member of Dan and Karen's
ward.  They were harvesting barley that day.

 That day they were using two combine harvesters to harvest some large fields of barley.  Dan and I each got to ride in one of the harvesters for an hour or so.  The conversation with the farmer was extremely interesting as we spoke a lot about how he had built up his farm.  There was much that we had in common (He grew up in the Salt Lake Valley in an area where my dad had cooperative agreements by which we supplied manure from our chicken business to be used as fertilizer for the farms, and they supplied the labor.  Then after the harvest they supplied us with straw for our chicken pens.)  He had moved to Idaho when his farmland in Utah had become too valuable to be used for farming.  His success in Idaho came as he followed Church teachings in running his business.  We shared a lot of Church interests and experiences, and it was a highlight day for Grant.

Karen and Dan's son Benjamin Felt had
his third birthday while we were in Idaho.
Ben's sister, Claire is looking on here.

From Idaho we returned to Utah where we spent more time with Jacob’s and Susan’s families.  We helped get the stove from Karen installed in Susan’s kitchen, then we drove South to visit Grant’s sisters’ families in Phoenix.  His sisters had come up to the reunion, but neither of their husbands had come.  We wanted more time with them.  On the way down, we stopped in the reservation lands in Northern Arizona to see where we had lived the first years after we came home from the islands.  We were amazed to see the progress that has been made there.  It is good to see that the old tribal traditions that restricted property ownership have changed, and that the people now are progressing much more rapidly than they were when we lived there.

Here in the picture is Howard and Joyce
in their home.  He is over 90 yrs. old now
 and still coherant but he is slowing down
considerably now. It was fun to visit
 with them.

 
In Phoenix we stayed with Mary and James, but were able to go over to Joyce and Howard’s house for visits.  Howard is certainly getting old, and we cherished the opportunity to visit with them.  They asked us to help them with a problem they were having with their sprinkler system in the back yard, and after gathering information, I was able to talk to a repairman and arrange for him to come and fix it.  The rest of the time we just visited.

 



L-R clockwise: James Marble, Grant, Pat and Mary Marble.
We really enjoyed staying in their home while we were in
Arizona. 

Mary took us out for a few excursions, including one to the site where the new Phoenix temple is being built.  A senior missionary serving at the site came and spent more than an hour with us explaining the history of the project.  It seems that there were those who opposed the project, but the Church made adjustments to the plan to meet their objections.  In the process of these negotiations, the plans changed from a small temple to a fairly large one.  The construction was well under way, and much of the steel framework for the building was in place.  What a lot of fascinating information we learned.  There is a branch of the Deseret Book Store not too far away, and we really enjoyed going there with Mary.  We were finally able to get some Church-related books that we have wanted.  We also went to a store that sells Ham Radio stuff, and we got a few books and catalogs.  Back at home, Mary invited her children to gather for a dinner together, so we got to visit with them too.  It was a wonderful visit.



Grant, Pat's sister Sharon, and
Pat are standing in front of the
gravestone of their brother, John
Michael Butler.

We had seen Pat’s sister, Kathy, in Idaho as she had been there visiting a son living not far from Karen and Dan, but we hadn’t visited with her husband, David.  We wanted to do that, and since we were so close, we decided to go from Phoenix to California to visit.  Once arrangements were made, we left Phoenix driving west.  We didn’t find California to be as much to our liking as other places where we had been visiting,  it was so crowded and fast-paced.  However, we certainly enjoyed visiting the people there.  In addition to Kathy and David, Pat’s step-sister, Sharon Smith, lives close by.  While we were on our mission in Kansas we had been informed of Sharon’s finally having been told of the whereabouts of her brother, Michael, who was then suffering terminal cancer in Florida.  Then we heard of his death, and eventually his burial in Southern California. 


The gravestone of John Michael Butler,
Pat's step-brother, Mike, who died in
2012.

 We were able to meet Sharon at the cemetery and hear the whole story in first person.  This was a wonderful experience.  She later came to Kathy’s house for more time together, and it was the answer to our hopes and prayers.  We didn’t see her husband, Smitty, which meant there were two in-laws that we wouldn’t get to visit with, but our trip to California was well worth the time and effort spent.

Three Merrill sisters: Kathy Whitford,
Pat Howlett and Sharon Smith

Eventually, after more than five weeks of travelling around, we turned homeward.  As we drove through Northern Arizona and into New Mexico toward the East we decided to go back to Garden City, Kansas to visit the people we loved there.  For the first time we got a motel room there in the city where we served for 18 months, and went out to visit as many as we could.  In the day and a half that we were there we were able to visit 27 families, spending anywhere from a few minutes to an hour or so with each.  We even got to meet the senior missionary couple that had taken our place, and we were able to answer a lot of their questions.  It was another case of “going back home” for us on this trip.

Grant and brother-in-law David
Whitford in David and Kathy's home
in California.  Jesus Christ is always
foremost in their lives and families.

 

After arriving home again in Ohio, we worked on plans to go to Alaska to visit with Grant's brother Bryce and his family.  We had seen him at the reunion in Utah, but none of his family.  That was the last visit to complete our Family Visiting Odyssey.  Things had to be done to prepare, but we must do it.  Doctors appointments, callings and other things would need to be completed, it would be done!

Mission Finished and Our Family Visiting Odyssey Begun

Our Release date from our mission in the Colorado Colorado Springs Mission was on our wedding anniversary, 10 July 2012.  We had spent the previous day picking up a U-Haul trailer and loading it for our trip home.  We also visited many of our special friends in Garden City, Kansas.  So we were ready to depart at 06:00 in the morning of our release date.



Elder Howlett standing by our car with trailer

The trailer was not heavily loaded, but filled quite full, and though it followed our car well, we kept the speed down so as to travel safely.  As we crossed Kansas and got into Eastern Kansas we noted how green things became.  South-Western Kansas had been a dry, gray-brown place.  The Missouri border area isn’t as remarkable as the last part of Kansas, but once we got past the city area we found Missouri to be beautiful in its nearly continuous green trees.  As we were approaching the Illinois border, we stopped at a nice restaurant to enjoy an anniversary celebration dinner, then continued on until we crossed into Illinois before stopping for the night at a Motel.

It was great to back in home state of Ohio!

 

The next morning we again were early on the road so that we could finish crossing Illinois, Indiana, and half of Ohio. The trip had been made much more enjoyable as Pat read an interesting book while Grant drove.  When we arrived home we unloaded the trailer, put a lot of the load into the garage for temporary storage, then we went to meet with our stake president for our release.  We knew that we wouldn’t be in town very long and we wanted to get our release before leaving to visit our family, so we had made contact with the Stake executive secretary far enough in advance to make it possible for us to get the release as soon as possible.  It turned out that we could do it that night.  Michael and Harmony wanted to be there, so we met them there at the church, and it was great to be able to see them.

A fun get together of Ohio Howletts at Eric's house:
L-R: grandson Karlton, son Michael holding our grandson Tyler,
son Eric, Grant, grandson Peter, son Wayne

 

We had made only one plan for what we would do after we finished our mission, which was that we would attend a family reunion for Grant’s family scheduled for his brother, Glen’s birthday, 21 July.  With our release complete, we were free to do that.  There were a few days before we needed to leave, and we used those days to work hard at cleaning and straightening up things in the yard and in our home.  There were a lot of weeds in both the back and front yards, and we started an effort to get rid of them, including spraying along the fence-line to kill the ones that were not subject to the lawn mower.  By the end of a single day of work, we had made a tremendous difference in the appearance of the yard.  We also worked in the house to straighten up and put things away.  But the most important activity during this time was to visit with family members living here in Ohio. 



Around the table L-R: daughter Emma, son Adam,
son-in-law John, son Michael, daughter-in-law Chris, son
Wayne, daughter-in-law Molly were some of us enjoying the
meal in Eric and Chris' kitchen.

 

Our daughter Emma, her husband, John Oberting and his 17 yr. old niece, Chloe are living with us.  It has been good to get reacquainted with all three of them again.  They have been living in our home and taking pretty good care of it while we have been on our missions. 

On Saturday, our son Eric hosted a family dinner at his house to which almost all of our Ohio Howletts came.  Wayne’s two older children were not yet home from a youth conference trip their stake had planned, and Chloe never comes to family activities so we didn’t see them there, but we have been able to talk with Chloe here at home, and Wayne’s kids came a day or so later.  All the rest of the family was there at Eric’s house, and it was a great pleasure to talk with them if even for just a few minutes.  Later in the week we got together again with Michael’s family to celebrate his birthday, so we were able to have additional time to talk with them.  We value such time with our family very much.  On Sunday evening Eric invited us to again be with them for their Sunday popcorn evening, and that gave us a chance to meet with shirt-tail relatives and others who have been friends in times past.  What great fun to catch up on our special family in Ohio.

 

 

Grandchildren enjoying the pool:
Corey, Alex, Eliza and Minda

 

Others around the table: Molly, Missi,
Tyler, Harmony and Grant

In our efforts in the house we became aware of the many broken clocks that no longer did any good in helping us keep on schedule.  Two, in particular, were a concern, because they were both hand-made gifts that we valued, and so Grant began trying to find a way to replace the clock movements in them.  A carriage clock that Jim Scott had made for us needed a new movement and also a new face and hands.  The school-house clock that Eric had made for us in his high school shop class needed a new pendulum movement, and Grant wanted to add chimes to it.  He was able to order on-line what was needed, but it didn’t arrive in time for him to do anything with it before we left.  We also identified several places on the walls where we needed to patch and fill to improve the appearance.  Grant was able to start that and make it look much better, but we couldn’t get to where we could do any painting. 

This is the clock our son Eric built
in a high school shop class. Grant
ordered new parts and refinished the
case to make it a beautiful clock again.
It has the Winchester chimes.

This is the clock Jim Scott built for
a Christmas gift to our family one year.
Grant ordered a new face and clock
mechanism.  Now it works great!

On Sunday we were able to go to our ward’s meetings, and renew acquaintance with people we had known before.  Many questioned us regarding our future, and wanted to know if we were going to go on another mission.  We had decided that we’d like to stay at home at least for a little while, and we told them that there were things we could do from home that we were interested in – particularly, we could serve in the temple, we could help in the Bishop’s storehouse, we could serve in the mission as office support, or we could serve in the Family History Center.  Some people may have been disappointed that we weren’t going to leave again, but others seemed to be pleased.

Utah and the Golden and Ada Howlett Reunion

 

We had dinner in a little Mexican restaurant and store with
our son Jacob and his family.  From L-R: Jacob, grandson Ethen,
daughter-in-law Melanie and Grant

After being home only about a week we were off again to drive to Utah for the reunion for the E. Golden and Ada S. Howlett family reunion.  Our first stop in Utah was at Jacob and Melanie’s house in Bountiful where we really enjoyed getting to know how they are doing now.  While there we learned that family members had succeeded in obtaining tickets to attend a Tabernacle Choir Concert celebrating the Pioneer-days.  Our tickets were for the Friday night production.  We were going to meet Susan and Nels there, so there was to be six of us, but then we learned that Melanie’s parents had also obtained tickets, and as the evening came closer we learned that Joyce, Lois and Mary were also in Salt Lake City, and they had been offered tickets.  Later we learned that Bryce was also there, and he also had a ticket, so in all there were eleven of us that were there for that concert.  Alona Holm, our cousin, daughter of Uncle Jack and Bertha Garfield, was hosting the two from Arizona, and she got a ticket too, so there were twelve in all of the family in the conference center, though we didn’t get to see any other than those we came with.

What fun when Pat got to hold
her newest grandchild, Miriam
for the first time.  She is our
daughter Karen's youngest child.

Gathering for the Golden and Ada
Howlett reunion. 

All the children of Golden and Ada Howlett, from oldest to
youngest and L-R: Joyce, Elaine, Glen, Lois, Bryce, Mary
and Grant.  They all were there!  How special!

The reunion was on Saturday, 21 July in a beautiful park in the foothills East of Sandy.  Shortly after we arrived, others also arrived so that eventually we had every one of Grant’s brothers and sisters together.  This was the first time for us to all be together in several years.  It was a wonderful thing to be able to just talk to each one.  Glen had brought some “boondoggle” to give the younger ones something to do, and that was a real hit.  We had a lunch together, and some of the girls presented a couple of songs including one that Mary had written.  Later in the afternoon, a bunch of local friends of Glen and Carol showed up for a “surprise” birthday party  for Glen.  The whole day was a wonderful feast of family.

 

The fun impromptu gathering at Lois and Jim's house on
Sunday where many of the Howletts gathered.  Sarah
Broderick Rowse was standing in the middle as the "it"
in our game of "Button Button..."

Lois invited us all to come to her house for a gathering the next evening, so we attended Church with Jacob and Melanie, then drove to Draper for this family gathering.  Again we were all seven there in the place where we had all grown up.  It is no longer our hometown, as it has changed from a poultry farm to a ritzy housing area, but we had a wonderful time together with the family.  Sometimes feasts can be too much all at once, and we wished for more time with individuals.  We began planning to visit each individual family in their home if possible.

We were deciding what to do just the day before we did it, and on the next day, Monday, we went with Susan to take two of her boys to scout camp in the hills east of Mount Pleasant, Utah.  Howard and Joyce had lived there for several years, so it has always held interest for us. 

Our daughter Susan with her beautiful
family, the Beckstrands. 
Clockwise from top left:  Kimberly,
Susan, Nels, Gregory, Jason, Jonathan,
and Samuel.

We stayed with Susan and Nels’s family for the next few days, visiting, doing a little repair on the lawn mower (nothing really necessary, but Grant was able to get acquainted with how a Honda mower was put together – very interesting) and a garage door.  Susan has often had little projects to work on, and he is always pleased to be able to help when he can.  He hasn’t always been able to do what she needed, but he got along okay this time.  On Wednesday their ward held a “Block Party.”  (Their whole ward lives in three city blocks.) 

What a choice time to get all the children of Golden and
Ada Howlett together in Draper, Utah again.  It was still
possible in Lois and Jim's back yard with the Draper mountains
in the background.  Seated: L-R Joyce, Elaine, Lois, Mary. 
Standing behind:  L-R Glen, Bryce, Grant with several
grandkids enjoying dessert just behind.

 

Each day we arranged to spend several hours with one of Grant’s family members.  It was a time for just talking and renewing acquaintance.  We had one day for Lois and Jim, another for George and Elaine, and another for Glen and Carol.  These were wonderful visits.  We reminisced a lot, but also learned of new things that were of interest to us all.  From these visits our desire to be able to spend such time with each of our family members increased.  We were planning only one day ahead, but we began to formulate plans to visit everyone if we could.

Idaho in Rigby area

 

This was a fun treat to see this International
Dance Festival of many young dancers
from six countries performing their
native dances.

Eventually we left Utah to go to Idaho to visit Karen and Dan’s family.  What a wonderful visit that was. We spent one evening at the BYU-Idaho campus watching a program put on by young dancers who had come to America from several foreign lands to put on a series of dance festivals showcasing the traditional dances of their homelands.  We enjoyed that.  

 

Our daughter Karen and her baby,
Miriam are enjoying the story-telling of
Karen's husband, Dan Felt.  Our other daughter
Susan, is looking on as he has all of
us spellbound in his exciting tale.

It was fun to also get to visit with Pat's
sister and her son's family.  From L-R
Our daughter Susan, Pat's sister Kathy
Whitford, Grant, Pat, Dan, Karen with
baby Miriam, Andrew Whitford and
his wife Amy.

Dan was preparing to take a group of scouts on a 50+ mile hike in the mountains, and he had planned to provide all of the food for the whole group, so after Church on Sunday we spent some time packaging all of the food items for the various meals for each of the participants.  Susan and her younger children came up as Karen had an unneeded stove that Susan needed.  While they were there we spent a day at a beach by a reservoir and also got acquainted with the irrigation system that the early LDS members had built to provide water for their farms.  Dan is very active in emergency and medical support in the community, and he provided a lot of interesting information about how things go in that area.  They kept inviting us to move to Idaho. 

 

Washington with Mark and Sherlyn's family

 

This is Mark and Sherlyn's lovely home.
Notice the lake in the back.  They love
living in this charming place.

We decided to continue from Idaho on to Washington State to visit Mark and Sherlyn and their family.  Brandon is not at home as he is serving a mission in Brazil, but we got to see all the rest.  This was a first for us in a long while, for we had never seen them since they had moved back from Texas to Washington.  They are renting a home up in the hills at the side of a small reservoir.  It is a beautiful setting, and we enjoyed visiting and walking around in the area.  Pat’s brother, John, also lives within the greater Seattle area, and we had been in contact with him in hopes that we could also visit with him and his wife Jan. 

Just before we left Washington we were
able to visit Pat's brother, John Merrill
at a restaurant. It was very nice to spend
a couple of hours renewing our love and
friendship with him and catching up on
his family. L-R: John Merrill, Pat and Grant

It didn’t look like we were going to be able to do that until he called and said that some appointments had been cancelled so he would meet us for breakfast.  We left immediately to get there, and enjoyed a pleasant visit with him.  Jan wasn’t able to come, but John was able to fill us in a little so we came away knowing a lot more about them, and it was the fulfillment of our hopes. 



What a beautiful scene from their back
balcony.  Here their youngest daughter,
Sara is looking out at their deck on the
little reservoir that the property is a part
of.  It looks like a movie set with all the
lovely houses nestled around the lake.

                                                                                                        

While in the area we were able to go to the Microsoft campus where Mark works and see the company store and eat lunch at the cafeteria.  The big activity, however, was a trip through the forested areas of Western Washington up almost to the Canadian border where we visited an “Alpine village” that was reminiscent of Germany and Switzerland. 



This town of Levenworth was a fun
place to visit.  Our daughter-in-law,
Sherlyn is standing in front of several
stores with lots of beautiful flowers
decorating the front.

 After a few pleasant hours there we drove eastward and found a Columbia River valley where we stopped for dinner and a night’s rest in a Motel.  The next day we drove into Eastern Washington (which looked a lot like Kansas but not quite so flat) then south into the Cascade mountain area to see Mount St. Helens.  We got up to the visitors center where we were able to learn a whole lot about the area, and its history before and since the eruption in the 1980s. 

Mark and Sherlyn's family standing in front of Mt. Saint
Helens.  Notice the peak is gone from the volcano which erupted
about 22 years ago.  L-R: Taylor, Mark, Sherlyn, Sara,
George, and Cassaundra.  Their oldest son, Brandon is serving a
mission in Brazil so he wasn't in the family picture.

 

It was a hugely enjoyable two-day tour.  We even got to go to church with their family, then enjoy a Sunday evening contributing to a scripture study letter to Brandon.

Elder Santana and Elder Brandon Howlett
with a young girl in Brazil

Our grandson, Elder Brandon Howlett, is serving a mission in Vitoria, Brazil.  He is doing well and loves his mission.  With about a year left Elder Howlett has become a well-trained missionary and has learned to speak the Portuguese language quite well.
 



Our Mission Is Finished!

Visiting many of the wonderful people we worked with in Garden City, Kansas took up much of our time the last four days of our mission. 

At left is Deanne Peat, a recent convert who was always helping the missionaries or involved in any service project.  At right is Dinora Becerril with her new baby daughter.  She is a Returned Missionary who is married to the Garden City Ward mission leader, Roberto Becerril. 

We were also asked to speak in church.  Sister Howlett spoke on the need to help us all to continually be “re-baptized” by partaking of the Sacrament weekly to recommit ourselves to follow all God’s commandments the rest of our lives. 

 Emma Curnette at left here is a recent convert whom we helped a lot with her Family History and other things.  Emma is a grandma who's always helping her family.  She was called to work in the Primary just before we left.

A plea was made to the active members to continue the important work of finding and ministering to the less-active members and recent converts.  Elder Howlett filled the assignment to encourage all parents, teachers and members to help others learn by unlocking “The Lesson (which is) Inside the Learner”, taken from an article in the July Ensign given by Russell T. Osguthorpe.   This is a way to teach as the Savior would do.  It was very good to give talks to our friends we had made there, even though many were out of town on vacations that week-end.  Nevertheless, it was a choice way to say good-bye. 

Cassie Bribriesca, pictured at left with her daughter, was a recent convert we taught new member lessons to.  She was a joy to work with as she was so excited to learn everything she could about the Gospel of Jesus Christ and His restored Church.

We also had the "graduation" of the English class that we, Elder and Sister Howlett, had been teaching.  The class had many different students attending at different times in the year and a half that we had taught it, some of whom were non-members.  We used the "Daily Dose" program but we also added 10-15 minutes of reading the Book of Mormon, with each student taking turns reading each verse of the three to ten verses we read that day. 

Our graduating English Class, from left to right:  Cristina Aguilar, Jasmine Ramirez, Sister Howlett, Bernadina Benitez, Miguel Benitez, Elder Howlett and Daniel Gonzales.

We eventually had four days a week for the class so some who worked during the week could attend on the week-ends.  All of our students were Hispanic and it was so wonderful to see the progress they were making.  At the graduation we only had 5 students complete the course, but those five had learned so much, some of them already understanding a lot of English when they started, but improving their speaking and reading skills tremendously.  It was a joy to work with these very special people. 

President Miguel Benitez was the former president of the Spanish Branch which was merged with the Garden City Ward just before we arrived, because of lack of Spanish Priesthood leadership.  Pres. Benitez couldn't do it all.  He began attending the English class to help support some of the other Spanish brethren who wanted to come and eventually he and his wife,Bernadina, became some of our best students.  They really learned a lot.  Also Cristina Aguilar came a lot toward the end of the last 7 months.  She understood English, but needed help learning to speak it better.  Her 10 year old granddaughter, Jasmine Ramirez, often came with her.  Jasmine spoke very good English and could read it quite well, but she helped a lot in the example reading of the Book of Mormon.  Also Daniel Gonzales, a new convert attended a lot the last 4 months.  He actually began attending before he got baptized and we like to think our Book of Mormon reading and fellowshipping in the class helped him want to join the Church.  He also had great missionaries who found, taught and baptized him.  So our class was a great success. 

Elder Howlett standing next to our car with the small U-Haul trailer attached to it. 

In order to take home a desk and an exercise bike we had purchased there to help us, we needed to rent a U-haul trailer to pull our stuff home.  However, the closest place to find the small trailer we needed was in Ulysses, a town about 50 miles south of Garden City, Kansas.  So Monday morning, 9 July, we traveled down to get the trailer.  It followed very nicely behind our Saturn sedan as we drove back to Garden City and we were able to finish loading it all that afternoon.   Thanks to the Zone Leader, Elder Toolson and his temporary companion, Elder Silva, we got the things loaded into the trailer. (Elder Franklin was the other Zone Leader and he was finishing his mission too and going home the week of our Senior Missionary conference.  There was a delicious breakfast scheduled at the IHOP in GC for some of his contacts and all the missionaries the day he left.  It was fun to meet together.)  

At left is a photo of having breakfast together at IHOP in Garden City just before Elder Franklin and Elder Williams left to go home from their missions. Pictured from left to right: Elder Howlett, Elder Williams, Elder Buys, Elder Anderson, Elizabeth Santiago(a new convert), Shauna Santiago (Elizabeth's mother and an investigator), Adrian (Elizabeth's brother and new convert), Elder Jesmer, Elder Toolson, and Elder Silva.

It wasn’t until 9 pm that we finished packing and cleaning the apartment, but we finally were able to get into bed by 10:30 pm so we weren’t too tired to drive all day the next day.  We left Garden City about 8 a.m. on 10 July 2012 saying good-bye to our wonderful friends.   Since it was our 48^th wedding anniversary we enjoyed being together and reminiscing about lots of things we had done during our many years of marriage.  When we think of all the different things that we have done during these years we ask ourselves, “Did we really do all that stuff?”   It is wonderful to be married when we are willing to totally sacrifice things for each other.  True joy comes when we forgive and forget all the little things that can irritate each other.  We just try not to get upset at little things.  D&C 121:41-48 is Godly advice.

Below and to the right you can see lots of trees which began showing up when we reached the Eastern side of the state of Kansas, and grew thicker as we crossed Missouri and into the state of Illinois, where we spent the night.

Tuesday night we stopped, celebrated our anniversary with a delicious steak dinner and spent the night at a motel in Pontoon, Illinois which is just east of St. Louis, Missouri.  Our room had a wonderful king-size bed which gave lots of room to stretch out.  After a tasty and hot complimentary breakfast the next morning we drove on the rest of the way into Columbus, Ohio arriving home about 4:30 pm on 11 July2012.  We really began to see the trees and green everywhere along the highways in Missouri, Illinois, Indiana and Ohio and we remembered how green it always was there.  But also we remembered how humid the air is, which makes  it so verdant.  Thank the Lord we can afford good air conditioning in this very humid part of the country! 

Our journey was finished, and that evening we would head up to the stake center near our stake president’s home so we could be released as full-time missionaries.  We really enjoyed visiting with him and recapping some of the great experiences of our mission.  However, it was very final when he told us we should now take off our missionary name tags.  Our mission truly is finished!

We are done with our mission, but not with our traveling, as we are leaving next week to drive to Utah for a Howlett Family Reunion of Grant’s brothers, sisters and all our families who can come.  But this will be a personal mission to enjoy!