One Year

One year of our life.

A question from a General Conference talk by our prophet, President Russell M. Nelson, really hit me today:

To whom or to what will I give my life?

So far, we have given one year of our life to God (that’s our “whom”) and to being missionaries (that’s our “what”).

And what have we received in exchange for that life? So, so much! We would like to think we have served with our best effort, that we have given all we could, that we have made a difference here. I can say that we have tried. But in reality, we have received SO much more than we have ever given. Isn’t that the way the Lord works? We give a little bit, and He returns so much more!

We still have six months to go, so we’re not done yet—we have more to do, more to give, more to love, and more to learn. We know the countdown will come all too quickly, so we’re just putting it out of our mind, moving forward and making the most of each day.

But first, back to our regularly scheduled programming of reviewing the last month, with lots of random “bits and bobs”. :)

If you thought England was done with Christmas lights, you would be wrong. Well, at least, London is not done. We started January with a visit to Kew Gardens, one of my favorite places. It was the last day of their Christmas lights show and it was spectacular.

And speaking of light, this amazing young man is the definition of light! This is Pam, one of our legal coordinators, and her family. We were able to be at the temple with them when their son, Cameron, went to the temple for the first time to receive his endowment. It was a joyful experience, as you can tell by the smile on his face!

And just a week ago, their joy multiplied! Their first granddaughter, born in China, finally returned to England with her mom and the other grandparents. It was the happiest day as they met their darling granddaughter for the very first time.

This is our wonderful group of senior missionaries, along with one of our area managers. While we're all smiling, this gathering was bittersweet as we bid farewell to our dear friends, the Browns, who were leaving to return home. We cherish our time together, even though we know it's only for a season. It's always hard to say goodbye.

Let’s talk about weather—when we arrived last February we were told that it hadn’t snowed all winter, and we never had any snow last year. We were also told by locals that it hadn’t really snowed in a few years, but that if it did, everything would come to a standstill because Brits don’t like to drive in the snow and there are a lot of hills to navigate. So we were surprised one Sunday morning to wake up to snow! By Utah standards, or by California Sierra standards, this snow wasn’t much of anything. But it was enough to do just what we had been told—bring everything to a standstill, at least for a few hours. Which meant they cancelled Church! A snow day! While we missed seeing everyone, I have to say it was kind of nice to just stay in and be cozy. The snow was pretty much melted and gone by midafternoon.

This is the snow at 8:00 am. :)

A few weeks ago, we drove about an hour away to the town of Winchester and visited the beautiful cathedral there. This town has a lot of history (like pretty much everywhere in England!), including King Alfred the Great and Jane Austen, who is buried in Winchester Cathedral.

We immediately noticed the unique stained glass window inside the cathedral. It was beautiful, but the design didn’t seem to represent any specific scene as is typical of most stained glass in churches. Instead, it was a mosaic of thousands of pieces of broken stained glass.

You can read more about the history here, but I loved the reminder that beauty can come from brokenness.

And here I am paying my respects to someone I admire and hope to meet someday, Jane Austen.

She died in relative anonymity, never becoming famous in her lifetime or earning a fortune for her writing. She didn’t even get credit for being a writer on her grave. But what she did get credit for is probably more valuable. This is what her memorial says:

In memory of Jane Austen…The benevolence of her heart, the sweetness of her temper, and the extraordinary endowments of her mind obtained the regard of all who knew her; and the warmest love of her intimate connections. Their grief is in proportion to their affection, they know their loss to be irreparable, but in their deepest affliction, they are consoled by a firm though humble hope that her charity, devotion, fiath and purity have rendered her soul acceptable in the sight of her Redeemer.

Well, that wasn’t enough Jane Austen for me! And since 2025 is the 250th anniversary of her birth, there will be ALL things Jane Austen in the area around where she lived, which is about an hour from where we live. So I went with a friend to the Jane Austen House (now a museum) in Chawton where she lived when most of her books were written.

Another gathering of people we love—our OGC office out for a lunch.

And another visit to the temple, this time with a new convert. She was also beaming! The temple brings out the best in people!

More lights in London, these ones were at Canary Wharf, an area that we hadn’t been to before. Very cool, very modern and posh, almost futuristic feeling. I love London in all her seasons and ages and stages! Such an amazing city!

Last Saturday we went on a little ramble nearby. It was chilly and gray and muddy, but still beautiful. Loved the name of this boat: “Flipping Heck Tucker”!

These snowdrops are my favorite—a sweet little reminder that spring is coming! We also stopped and chatted with this darling Scotsman out on a ramble in the mud. He was showing us pictures of lots of cool hiking places in Scotland. They’re on our list!

And just yesterday we went back into London for a quick visit to Covent Garden where there was a pop-up event of the LEGO botanical sets called “Le Florist”. Our son didn’t design any of these (he’s on the Disney team), but we love all things LEGO so it was a fun outing.

Some of you may have seen this picture below on the Church newsroom website. This is a shoutout to a project that Elder VW has been able to be a part of. One of his favorite parts of what he’s doing as a legal support missionary is to be able to help with the legal work for the humanitarian projects for the various countries. This one is a collaboration with Muslim Aid to fund a giant London-based food bank called The Felix Project, providing millions of meals to those in need.

And finally (that was a lot more bits and bobs than I thought!)…we were sent a picture of our missionary plaque that hangs in the Roseville 3rd Ward building, next to a bulletin board of pictures of all the missionaries from that ward. So fun to see that all the other missionaries on the board are ones that I taught in seminary. What an amazing group to be a part of! We also have a plaque hanging in our Walnut Creek ward, so we feel extra loved by both! We miss our ward families!

And here we are, one year in, six months to go. Still smiling. So grateful. So imperfect. Still trying.

♥ Until next time, we love you! Cheerio! ♥

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