3-18-20

The mission president called this morning and said that there was a chance that they would be sending all the senior missionaries home because of the coronavirus. Later that afternoon he called and said we were going home.  That afternoon the sisters (Van Hoff and Sonnenburg) came home from transfers and said they were being sent to Bismarck.  It was a very terrible, sad day.  Lots of tears on our part.  The missionaries had to leave for Bismarck in just a few hours.  We made a meal for them while they cleaned and packed.  We ate and just like that they were gone.  We will clean and pack tomorrow and then leave on Friday.

3-19-20

Today was a very sad day.  We went and said good bye to all of our friends.  It was so hard.  We cried and hugged and promised we would be back as soon as we were able.  Valerie called her two sisters and was crying so badly that she couldn't talk.  It was worse saying good bye to them than it was to our family when we came out on our mission.  Our hearts are broken.  Tonight we had a baptism for Flora Little Thunder from Cherry Creek.    Elders Brown and Elder LaVin (Elder Anderson had been transferred out to be a new district leader in New Town) helped us pack .  They are good elders.  We especially had a hard time saying goodbye to Elder Brown.  He was our favorite.

3-20-20

Today we finished packing and said goodbye to the rest of our friends and left about noon.  We took our picture right before we left and I couldn't help but have tears running down my face.  We were very sad and tired.  We felt very run down.   I was afraid we might get the virus just because we were so run down.  That night we spent the night with Kathy and Kerry.

3-21-20

Today we came home.  We stopped by Susan and Robert's, then Ryan's, then Jared's, then Jenni's, and then Lucy's.  Loren was in the mountains so we didn't get to see him.  Gary posted a bunch of pictures on the senior chat of us with our family.  Gary Degraw called and asked what we thought we were doing.  We were supposed to be under quarantine for fourteen days.  I guess we missed the memo.


3-29-20

Friday the 27th the missionary department called us and asked if we would like to go back to our mission when things settled down. We said we sure would!! We both had a tear in our eye as we think about going back and (finishing our work) (It truly will never be finished) We continue to teach our people the temple lessons. It is pretty awkward teaching over the phone. It doesn't seem like the spirit is quite as strong., but it works and we still have people progressing.