Our goodbye with Elder Winters

We said goodbye earlier this month to an incredible missionary - Elder Winters. This was the first missionary since Elder Nicholas (the missionary that was in our ward when Bryce had his accident and came back to church) that he has really bonded with. The kids loved him as well. He was such a great example to them. Evan was especially attached to him, they were best buddies. We miss him so much already, and miss the Elders stopping by a few times a week to read scriptures with our family before we put the kids to bed. It was such a great experience for our kids to see the missionaries in action.

His most recent companion Elder Robinson from Chicago.

Elder Winters is from Washington, so hopefully it wont be too long before we get to see him again.

Our family = Missionaries

About 3 years ago, Bryce met a guy at work named Tony. He was working for the flooring company as their forman. They became friends. He found out that he and his family were baptised about 6 years ago. They had a bad experience with a family in their ward, and stopped going to church. They had no desire to go back when we first met them. Over time, we started talking to them more and more about the church. Finally, a few months ago, they called and asked if they could come to church with us. That same day after church, Bryce gave Tony a blessing, as he was getting ready for major back surgery later that week. When he was done, everyone in the room was in tears. It was such an incredible thing to witness the power of the priesthood, especially with this family.

They have since started going to their own ward, and are starting the temple prep classes. We have had them over several times for dinner, and have been to their house for FHE with the missionaries. One night, we were talking and they were saying how they would love to take their girls to Temple Square to see the lights. Since we have family up there we could stay with, we all decided to make it a road trip. So, that is what we did this weekend. Thanks mom and dad for letting us take over your house for the weekend.

I don't know why I didn't get any pictures of Tony and Brenda on my camera, just their girls:) We went to see the Joseph Smith movie, walked around temple square, went to the visitors center, and saw a choir sing from Dixie State College. Their family had such a great time. We're glad we had this opportunity to go with them.


Now, check out Cade's blog here for the story on how he managed to get this wristband from BYU's head coach Bronco Mendenhall. Thanks mom, you are awesome (even if you are a UTE fan:)