The Journey Begins

Leaving Benicia

On August 5th we said goodbye to Benicia and to Michael.  Mark and Barbara Thomas took us and our six pieces of luggage to the Oakland Airport.  What a great service by them.  They took their son's truck and we loaded the luggage into its bed.  Our Ford Escape couldn't handle the load.  They helped us schlep the bags to check-in and then we said goodbye to them before security.  Thank you Mark and Barbara for willing to do some heavy lifting to get us on our way!

Six pieces of luggage - Friday night before we left

Packing started...

Reuniting With Long-Time Friends

We then flew to Salt Lake City where our good friends Van and Elizabeth Gessel picked us and our six pieces of luggage up at the airport. They were generous in their hospitality.  Elizabeth is a wonderful cook and Van is a great sous chef and dishwasher.  We reminisced, talked about family, laughed and cried.  They did a really good job in preparing us for going on our mission and what to expect.  We introduced them to a new TV show from England - "Midsomer Murders" which is a favorite of ours and they really enjoyed it.  You can find it on Netflix by the way.  On Monday morning they took us (and our six pieces of luggage) to the Provo Missionary Training Center (MTC) and dropped us off at 10:30 am.  Thank you Van and Elizabeth for a memorable week end and for your enduring friendship and love.

Van Gessel waiting with us and our six pieces of luggage at curb side...SLC International Airport  for Elizabeth and the van (no pun intended).

Key Lime Pie courtesy of Elizabeth Gessel

Greetings from Ukraine

Hello from Ukraine.  This is our first blog post of hopefully many more to come.  I finally have the blog up and running.  This blog is a private blog.  My understanding is since it is a private blog there is no notification sent by Blogger to let you know I've posted something.  So, the plan is to send a group email to let everyone know that either Vivian or I have posted something.  I am not going to hold myself to any particular schedule.  We will post as we have something interesting (we think) to share and hopefully you will enjoy it too.  Sometimes we may post something just to see if we can connect with our family and friends.  So....

A brief summary

We arrived in Kyiv on August 15 after spending the previous week at the Provo Missionary Training Center.  More to come on this in a subsequent post including pictures.  We've spent the past month getting settled in our apartment, learning how we can get around using public transportation and a lot of shoe leather.  Also, figuring out where to get our groceries, dry cleaning, hair cuts and a myriad of other details regarding daily living that we've taken for granted.  We've gotten to know the other senior missionary couples a little, the office elders and the missionaries, Elders and Sisters, in our district.  They have all been life savers for us as we get settled in a very foreign country...more on the country in future blogs.  

Thank you

The last time we saw most of you was at the sacrament meeting we spoke at and/or the farewell open house later that day.  That day remains for us an incredible experience.  Any time I'm feeling a little blue I think back to a month ago and my spirits are picked up.  The Temple Hill Choir's flash mob will be a hard one to top.  Thank you so much.  Vivian and I hope to share this adventure with you.  We value your love and friendship.  So...look for many more blogs as we chronicle our experiences.

After sacrament meeting on July 30th with a few of the notibles...Rojohn & Merilee Rieta, Tom Farris, Vivian & Gary Foley, Aimee Roylance and Ron Pickett