He's Home From Hong Kong!

After two years of diligent study, teaching in Mandarin, constant sweating in the heat and, most of all, 

loving the people by serving the Lord on an LDS mission to Hong Kong, 

Josh is home!

Roger and I drove up north the day before so we could be at the SLC airport when he arrived.

He was coming in at 1:23 pm,

 having a three-hour lay-over in Seattle.

But I get ahead of myself. 

While we were getting ready to go to the airport, we received the following text 

from our long-time friend, Jane Madsen: 

(Our friendship dates back to when we taught school and carpooled 

 to South Cache Junior High School every morning together. 

 After we have both lived other places until about the last fifteen years, we both now live in St. George.)

Guess who I met in the airport in Seattle.  I was at McDonald's and missionaries were there too - said they were returning from Hong Kong.  I looked at his name tag and asked if he was related to Pam and Roger .  Small world in the church.  I bet you are in Salt Lake to welcome him home.  We have been in Spokane with Amy's family to ride the Hiawatha bike trail - on our way to San Diego to high school graduation for Daniel's daughter.  Talk to you soon.

Isn't that cool?

It's finally time!

 I don't think I have ever seen each of the members of this cute family so excited!

And they weren't the only ones!

Roger took a panorama of everyone waiting at the bottom of the escalator 

for their returning missionaries to arrive.

There he is!

Mom went running into his arms!

Dad's turn!

Now Blakey!

 Hi, Bro!

These are happy tears!

Now it's Grandma Pam's turn. . . 

. . . and Grandpa Roger's!

Then we each took a turn for a pic with our handsome, happy to-be-home missionary.

Brother Blake

Sister Abby

Sister Katie

Sister Sadie, who will be leaving for her mission to Cambodia in August.

Mom Jodie

Dad Rick

Grandma Pam and Grandpa Roger

These missionaries also returned home from Hong Kong on the same flight.

They were so tickled to be together and you could tell how much they loved and respected each other.

Returning back on the walking sidewalk to get in the car.

In went Josh's luggage, the posters and the balloons.

What a happy crew!

Are you hungry? What would you like?

Evidently they didn't eat many sandwiches (Josh's favorite) in Hong Kong,

so we made a stop at Spanky's.

So good to be home!

Josh opened up his suitcase and showed his family a couple of ties with Chinese characters 

and a little battery fan. 

Those were his souvenirs. 

This kid is about the most unworldly kid I know. 

His souvenirs he keeps close to his heart 

and he has shared some of them in his emails every week -  

his experiences, his enlightenments about the scriptures and his love for the people.

Josh couldn't wait to get his fingers on the keyboard of their piano.

What a thrill to hear him play!

We also brought Blake's birthday present.

He loves books and his shirt says, "I dominate the field."

That evening, Bart and Kathie picked up Mandarin take-out on their way from Ogden, 

and three of Josh's returned missionary friends came over. 

Mindy, Jeff and family also came to see Josh, 

and the walls of their home rang with noisy happiness!

 We returned home Saturday afternoon, after stopping to shop in a few of our favorite up north places.

All of our family members who live up north had other plans for Father's Day - 

Rick and Jodie and family left for Hawaii Sunday morning 

to celebrate Jodie's parents' 50th Wedding Anniversary with all of the Nilsons, 

Lois was going to attend a farewell for a relative and Mindy and Jeff wouldn't be home,

so we celebrated Father's Day together in St. George.

After our block of what were very special meetings, we barbequed steak and marinated shrimp on the grill 

and had baked potato, asparagus and ice cream pie.

Our children were fortunate indeed to have this fine man as their father, and I thank Heavenly father every day that he picked me to help him raise a family.

This was a very, very special weekend!