Pre-mission gathering in Utah

We were set apart as missionaries on Wednesday evening February 24 about 8:00PM. We left for Utah Thursday morning about 10:30AM. As we were leaving town we stopped in to visit Aunt Hazel (Grandma Walker's older sister) in Surprise, AZ. After fixing a flat tire outside of Kingman, we stopped in Mesquite, NV for the night. Then on to Utah Friday. Pat and Dean organized an open house on Saturday at their home. We were touched that all of Mom's siblings traveled down/up to see us off. In addition Lisa, Ashlee and some of Lisa's friends form Idaho were there; Connie and Daniel surprised us with their youngest 5 kids; most of the VanUitert nieces and nephews were there as well; Leonard, Laura and 5 members of their family came too; and a good friend from Mesa (now living in utah) was there. Including us there was a total of 49 people. We were only sorry that we did not have time to visit with each one longer. It was a very nice feeling of family support.