Getting Ready

This is the first email regarding our mission.  I am writing this for those of you who want to keep up with what has happened and what will happen. 

We turned in our papers sometime in May of 2011 and received our call to labor in the South Africa Johannesburg Mission in a letter signed by President Monson, dated June 7, 2011.  This letter is included as an enclosure.  We were told that our report date was October 31, 2011 in the Provo MTC.

We have spent several months getting our shots, FBI clearance, drivers license, passport, visa requirements, etc. and are now ready to leave Santa Clara this Wednesday, October 26, 2011.  

We spoke on the 16th of October in the Santa Clara Ward and were honored to have all of our children and grandchildren there. 

Prior to that a number of sisters in the ward had taken Alice out to lunch and presented her with some money to buy a few things for the trip. Vince Sa and all of his children had a special dinner for us at Darnelles, and had invited several of our friends to join.  Two of our neighbors  also took us out to dinner, the Modines and Jones during the past week as well.

On Sunday, October 23 the ward had an open house for us and many of our friends came and said good bye and wished us well.  This was very special.

We are going to leave a few days early to visit with some of our family members and friends in Utah before departing.  We will be staying at Ray and Rosemary  Rawlins.

Our cell phones will work while in Utah, but they will not work in Africa.  We will be getting new ones.  We will be able to talk on Skype at boyd.alder or alice.kay.alder for those of you who have that service.