Called to Serve

Matt opened his mission call Thursday night. We made a whole family party out of it. All the siblings came over to our house and we got my parents on Skype. Since it was also the night of the big BYU Sweet Sixteen game (which, by the way, we're not mentioning to prevent Jeremy from crying big tears of sorrow), we made it a mission call opening/BYU watching party. It was a lot of fun. Any excuse to all get together is always welcome, but an event as exciting as a mission call just makes it that much more wonderful!

Josh got stuck in traffic and was the last one to arrive. We were all so anxious and nervous, especially since this he's the first one to go on a mission in my family. We had all made our guesses as to where he'd be called to, most of the guesses were foreign.

So anxious to open it!!! :)

He's going to... drumroll please.... the Arcadia, California mission... speaking Armenian!!!

Look at that big grin!

We are all so thrilled! I really feel like he's getting the best of both worlds. He gets to experience people from a culture vastly different from his own-- talking about both Californians as well as Armenians ;)-- but we can still send him packages without totally breaking the bank!

We are all so proud of him and his commitment to serve the Lord for 2 years. He is such a great kid and brother and I'm going to miss him terribly. One of my favorite sayings is "a missionary is someone who leaves their family for 2 years, so that others can be with their families for eternity." I love that, and I think it really helps keep everything in perspective. We'll miss him, but he'll be doing something far better with his time. Good job Matty-Moo on making the right choice! We couldn't be prouder!


Also, just for your information/entertainment.... this is the language he's going to be speaking. Here is the Armenian alphabet. Good luck Matty (you're going to need it...), we'll be rooting for ya! ;)