Going West!

Our original plan was to leave Bentonville and travel to Topeka, Kansas, to meet up with some friends from Syracuse who now lived there.  However, as we were leaving Bentonville, Marie called to tell me that they had to head to the hospital with her mother-in-law who lives with them and they wouldn't be back in time to meet us.  (Her mother-in-law is doing well now after a few days in the hospital being treated for a pneumonia,)  That meant we could reroute our trip and go further north and take I-80 through Nebraska, Wyoming and then Utah (and actually it also included a bit of Iowa).  We spent the first night in Lincoln, Nebraska and the second night in Rock Springs, Wyoming, and arrived in Syracuse on Monday afternoon--September 23rd.  We had great traveling weather with overcast skies much of the way and only a little rain as we entered Nebraska Saturday night...

Bridge across the Missouri River in Kansas City area---

The River

The clouds start to darken before the storm hit.  Not sure why there is a dark spot in this photo...

On to the plains of the Great Plains--not many hills to be seen.

Sunday......

As we entered into Wyoming, there was this huge flag flying and of course, it was windy as it often is in southern Wyoming.

We stopped again at the Lincoln Rest Stop in Wyoming--the highest spot along the I-80.

And look, they have round hay bales here in Wyoming as well.

We are sporting our Bluey shirts which Jessica and Elessia and family gave us for Christmas, I think.  We are getting closer to home.

I missed the entering Utah sign but Echo Canyon is a familiar place in our many drives from Texas to Utah and back again.

And unlike Arkansas, Utah had already started showing its fall colors.....

Frankly, as we traveled, I was mostly in the "heartbreaking part of the goodbyes."  There were so many memories and people and things that I will miss and my mind was full of those things.  In fact, I wondered at times if I was really ready to go home at all.  However, as we drove into Davis County, I teared up and felt the overwhelming feeling of HOME.  This was our home and it was time for us to be here again.

WE ARE HOME!!!

It is now October 13 and we are still adjusting in so many ways and I have no idea what I am going to do next with my life (other than the remodel project we are hoping to start soon.)  But just like being in Arkansas was right for that part of our life, I know that Syracuse is right for this next part of our life.  Isn't life a grand adventure?!!!!

Last Looks From Our Apartment

Thursday and Friday were dedicated to the packing of the car and the cleaning of the apartment, although those tasks had begun in the weeks prior as we tried to prepare the best we could for this task.  It is hard, physical work and also emotional.  This was a place we lived and served for 18 months.  We were so blessed to have been here.

There were little mementos like this old phone case that I loved but didn't fit my new phone.

My white board with some of my notes about the Desires of our hearts--a current topic of pondering for me.

Grateful once again for the white table which helped us organize the stuff for packing.  That table was so useful during our stay in this apartment.

Jena helping with the sweeping outside as well as inside as we try to get things ready for the Summers.

In the master bedroom, there was a narrow mirror.  It became the collecting spot for the different things we acquired over the 18 months...little mementos of our time with the young adults or from our family as well.  Jessica's kids sent the t-shirt with notes to us and Liam made the tie for Gary for Father's day. 

Things like flowers for a lula, programs from baptisms, cards from Jena, and other things that represented activities and sweet experiences while we served.  Thank heavens for photos to keep these things without having to pack them to bring them home with us.  (Literally, no room for them!) Well, except the t-shirt...and a few other things. Sh...don't tell Gary!

I loved this apartment but the small kitchen was not my favorite, especially considering how much cooking I did during the 18 months.  It was always an adventure finding space for things.

Living room/dining rooms done--checked.

We updated the calendar for October so that Summers would know a bit about what was coming up.

The clean kitchen...

Jena's closet really became the kitchen pantry after she moved her stuff out.

And Gary did a great job packing the car.  We only shipped three boxes home--two boxes of books and one box of games.

We only had one small problem--if we turned too sharp, a box would slide onto Jena, so we had to warn her each time to hold the box in place during turns.  It kept us paying attention throughout our drive. Fortunately, in freeway travel there aren't as many turns as the country roads of Arkansas.

Finally remember to take a photo of the packed car in our garage in Syracuse, before we unloaded.

And that is what cleaning and packing and remembering looks like when you leave a mission after 18 months.  Heartbreaking, but also so sweet!  How blessed we have been to have been here!

Facebook Post--"Leaving..."

On our journey home, I posted the following on Facebook along with many of the same pictures from our last week in Arkansas.

"On Friday in the middle of cleaning our missionary apartment, two different people texted me and asked if we are going to serve another mission. That is not the time to ask....when you are in the middle of all of the good-byes and the "lasts" of leaving somewhere you have loved and been loved. We left a piece of our heart in Arkansas and will be forever grateful for the experiences we have had there, the beautiful things we have seen, and most of all the people we have met and served with.

We had somewhat of a regular last week...Church, district meeting and bowling for Family night with the branch, and Institute on Tuesday and Wednesday...and then a visit to the temple in Bentonville with the branch on Saturday. In-between all of that, we cleaned and packed and cleaned some more. The only difference was that i needed pictures and we had those last moments of saying goodbye...til we meet again.

Thank you to all of the young adults in the Ft. Smith branch, to the leaders we served with, the friends we made in Ft. Smith, and all of the missionaries...young and senior..in the Arkansas Bentonville Mission. We love you all and are so grateful for the honor of serving with you. And truly, may God be with you until we meet again. Never forget that Christ stands ready always and forever to offer His love and mercy to you."

The Miracle Of the Hay Bales (September 18)

More accurately, the miracle of the painting of the hay bales--but that is a bit long for a title.  Let me show you how much our Heavenly Father loves us and prepares the way to see that love expressed in our lives and in the lives of others.

It is a bit of a story, so settled in:

It all started in the month before our mission to Arkansas.  I told Gary while we were traveling around the western states that I wanted to buy one "nice" piece of art of an Arkansas landscape as a memento of our mission in Arkansas.  He agreed.  Immediately, upon our arrival in Arkansas, I started looking for that certain piece of art work.  Early in our time in Ft. Smith, we went on a P-day activity to a local art museum and I looked through their prints to find that "perfect" landscape, but no luck.  I talked to the volunteer there and she suggested that I come back often and review what they have because it changed from time to time.  Most of their prints were done by local artists which made that even more appealing.

And the search continued.  After a few months, I fell in love with the hay bales--as you know if you have read this blog over the last 18 months.  I took hundreds of pictures of them at all different seasons.  It so reminded me of Arkansas and I determined that my landscape piece of art must include these hay bales. So, our search got a bit more specific.  I started asking people who lived in Ft. Smith if they had any ideas.  Some sent me web sites of local artists, but none were quite what I wanted.

I started telling the other senior missionaries about my quest and asked them to also look.  Some of them were much more interested in stopping at local flea markets and art shows than me, so people throughout our mission were on the hunt for THAT picture.  Months rolled by.......

When we had been there almost a year, I found this picture hanging in a restaurant we went to with the Ellises--

I loved it although it was bigger than I wanted and didn't have the greens and blues of Arkansas that were such a part of our love for this pretty place.  I got the artist's name and discovered that he was a somewhat famous Arkansas painter who was based in Little Rock.  He didn't have anything similar in his current prints for sale on his site and his style had changed a bit since this painting was done.  But I might be able to get a smaller print of this one if I needed to.  At least, I might have an option. And we continued the hunt.....

Then, near the near of May of this year, we transported the Van Buren/Alma Elders up to Centerton for a doctor's appointment.  On the way home, we were talking about member meals and the interesting things that they had eaten.  In a roundabout way that these types of discussion can happen, Elder Tonks made a comment about the house where the wife was an artist.  "Wait, what?  There is an artist in Alma??" By the end of the car ride, he had reached out to her and got her permission to share her number with us and I had reached out to her.  She sent me this and asked if this was like what I wanted:

YES, YES, and YES!!  I told her that if I had seen these in an art store I would have bought them.  They reminded me of the prairies and fields of Arkansas with the wildflowers (a bonus) and the hills and the blue sky with clouds.  It was what I had been looking for this entire time.

Over the next couple of days, we talked about details and she agreed to paint one for me (and a few weeks later, one for Sister Ellis as well.) She asked me what size I wanted and I said 16" by 20" or so and I told her when we were leaving and she thought that would work for her.  This was the end of May of 2024.

I couldn't believe it.  I had found "my" painting and the artist was a member of the Church in the Ft. Smith stake.  What a perfect memento for our service in this sweet stake of Zion!  A sweet tender mercy for me.  Isn't our Heavenly Father so GOOD and so mindful of us! I was already planning my blog post when I picked up my painting--this live example of how God loves me!  

Have you heard the scripture in Isaiah 55: 8-9:  "For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, saith the Lord.

For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts."

While I was focused on a tiny little desire of my heart being granted by God--He had something else entirely in mind.....

The summer past by--sometimes slowly and other times quickly with very little contact from the artist other than some casual updates about when the canvas she ordered arrived and that life had become unexpectedly busy for her.  At the beginning of September, we exchanged texts and I reminded her when we would be leaving and she was hopeful to be done with both paintings in time for us to pick them up.  She would let me know...

Gary was worried about how to fit these paintings in our car but I reassured him that they would probably just roll up into a tube that we could slip into our car somewhere.  I didn't want to ship them home.  This was my "sought after" painting!

The Friday before we left, she reached out to set a time to deliver the paintings to us before we left.  I felt a great desire to see the place where she had painted "my painting" and as politely as I could ask if it might be possible to pick the paintings up at her house and perhaps take a picture of her in her studio for my blog.  She agreed although she said she didn't want to make us "come all the way out here to pick them up."  She didn't know that we loved "coming way out" in the countryside of Arkansas.

We set pickup at noon on Wednesday, the 18th.  I was so happy to being getting "my painting."  She lived in a cute neighborhood outside of Alma, Arkansas, and we enjoyed the pretty drive and the railroad tracks that we got to travel by for some of the route.

The Childers have a lovely home and Cheryl was warm and inviting when the three of us arrived.

Her studio-- (we forgot to take a picture with our painting on her easel):

There is the small hay bale that she shared with me
over text.

She is currently focused on bird pictures and typically she makes small works of art not larger pieces like the ones I wanted.  However, she had wanted to try doing bigger pieces and loved the challenge of it.

She was wrapping up our painting in the entry way, while I had stepped back into her studio to get some photos.  As I stepped back into the entry way, I caught her saying to Gary that she and her husband were getting approved to foster/adopt through the state.  At first, I thought she was talking about dogs, since she had a few dogs already, but as I listened, I realized that she was talking about adoption.  Gary said later that I returned at just the right time, because he wasn't used to "adoption" conversations--that was more my thing.  It turned out that they were going to have their home visit--the final step in their approval process with the state--in a couple of days. With Jena, we are somewhat a walking commercial for adoption but when I mentioned that we had four children who were adopted, she asked if she could ask us some questions.  Gary said--Don't get her started--she can talk about this for hours.  She wasn't scared off and said that she actually had some questions she was wondering about that she would love to talk to an LDS family about. And this began an hour long conversation about adoption, sealings, and other topics on her mind.  I shared a few stories with her that I have rarely shared but felt strong promptings to do so.  There were tears and as we hugged at the end--we knew that it was not an accident that we were there together on that day.  The spirit was unrestrained in that time together and when we left, we knew that we had been about the Lord's errand that day.

I don't know how God did it---His ways are not my ways!! But I felt His hand in it again and again... and the painting will always remind me of this holy experience.  (And we are now Facebook friends and connected through texting so I will keep up with her adventures as they hopefully are able to adopt a sibling group meant for their family in the future.)

And that, my friends, is how God loves me and Cheryl and all of us! And that is a miracle of the hay bales!

And a final note: this is how they traveled home with us,,,

But we made it work!