Phase Yellow

We have entered the yellow phase of recovery in most of Utah. While that may be the case here, that doesn't mean that's the way it is in other places around the world. Our girls Hawaii trip was supposed to happen the end of June so I looked at Hawaii to see if our trip might still be viable. Not so. If you go to Hawaii, you are required to quarantine for 14 days in your hotel room. That doesn't sound too fun.

This is what it looks like for us. We wear masks when shopping in stores. We are to keep a six foot distance. Hair salons have opened back up. I finally got a haircut but was required to wear a mask the whole time. Dine-in seating has opened in restaurants that can do so safely. We have yet to experience that and are sticking to our curbside/drive-thru delivery options. We can gather in groups of no more than 50 although church is starting back up for us in a couple of weeks. Our ward will be attending once a month for the next three months, sacrament meeting only, and with three different times to attend to keep social distancing. Our time is 10:30.

Lots of disinfecting, hand washing, and sanitizing happening.

This week we've allowed Alex to hang out with Ian if they do so outside. Ashlyn has reunited with Allison and will be doing some tennis clinics in a few weeks. Nate will be working at those clinics and starting piano lessons back up.

Things are easing into normal, kind of.

Then I turned on the news last night to watch the weather and instead witnessed a peaceful protest in downtown Salt Lake that turned criminal. They were protesting the unlawful death of a black man in Minneapolis by a white police officer; however, when your protest turns violent then you've lost any credibility. Graffiti, burned cars, looting, items thrown at police officers. A curfew was finally ordered until Monday morning. Salt Lake City has a lot of cleanup to do. And Salt Lake is not the only city. There have been dozens of protests across the nation. Our world on a macro scale is a mess right now.

But . . . the Leary microcosm is doing just fine. I got to meet our baby last Tuesday when Kiersten woke up with a very high fever and needed to go to the ER. Grandma came to rescue little Oliver, and we had a delightful time snuggling and chatting with Grandma Ellis.

Kiersten was pretty excited to be reunited with her baby. They discovered blood clots that needed to be cleaned out.

Then on Thursday the rest of the family got to meet him. He is the most perfect thing around. We are all so in love.

Good to be back

This was my first week back in Deltona after having to stay in Deland for about 3 weeks. It's nice to actually live in the area that you cover. And I have a companion that covers the same area as me again. Things are normalizing. 

My new companion is awesome. His name is Elder Duarte. He's from Brazil and he is hilarious. Actually he thinks my mannerisms are funny, so he'll just be looking at me and start laughing out loud because I do something funny, then I start laughing because he's laughing, and then we just laugh for a bit and can't stop. It's been fun. Or maybe we're just going crazy. I'm not sure.

We are meeting as many members as we can. That's been super good and we've been able to meet lots of cool people. As far as teaching goes though we are still struggling. We aren't sure how to teach people over the phone if they won't answer their phone. 

This week was also my birthday. I'm no longer a teenager which is crazy. We had a district party and ate Tijuana Flats, which is a super good Mexican restaurant chain similar to Chipotle that I absolutely love. I also got some goodies from my mom and a puzzle from my grandma. Thank you guys so much! But by far the best part of my birthday was that my sister had her baby the same day. So now I'm an uncle and I share a birthday with my nephew! Greatest present ever. 

So yeah this week was pretty great. I also used a crock pot for my first time. Not sure why it took me so long to learn to use one. It was so easy and it was delicious. 

Alright I'm out of things to say. Have a good week! 

Missionary letters that I got behind on

May 11, 2020

Pizza Pizza
Well another week of quarantine has come and gone. It was a good week though. We're allowed to get food from members again, which has been super nice. I also had some success reaching out to people from my past areas this week. 

    

I'll throw a picture in at the bottom, but since member meals have been okayed we've had 10 pizzas dropped off. All in 1 week. I'm kind of sick of pizza, but I can't really complain because it's free pizza. 

I also started contacting people I used to work ith in my past areas. It was super good. I called a lady I taught in Rockledge last night and wished her a happy mother's day. She broke down crying and said how grateful she was for my call because nobody had called all day. We talked for about an hour and it was a super cool experience. 

I was thinking this week about how I was thinking this week about how we sometimes have a tendency to think "I didn't sign up for this." Things happen that we don't expect and then we decide that since it isn't what we expected or wanted that we will just give up. Like with me right when quarantine started, I didn't expect to be quarantined for months of my mission right when I was at my best. And for a little bit I decided I wasn't going to try to adapt because it was too difficult, because I didn't know exactly how to do online missionary work, and because of a bunch of other stuff. But I realized that that's what life is about. As soon as we get in a groove we start to get complacent, and then we get thrown a curveball that makes us stretch and grow. That's the whole reason we're here. To be tested to see if we will choose to do what's right even when things get tough. So anyway, that's my thought for the week. This is exactly what we signed up for. Keep pressing forward and doing what's right. 

May 18, 2020

Quick Update

Hey this will probably be my shortest email yet. I'm getting moved back to Deltona tomorrow and getting a new comp. He's from Brazil and I've heard he's fun. So I'm excited. 

We also had a mission-wide zoom meeting with Elder Bednar. He is a cool dude. It was great and we all learned something from it. I wasn't sure what to expect, but we all really enjoyed it. 

We also can now teach people at the church. So that's a big step. Maybe we'll be able to set some things up to start meeting in person again with some people. First we need to find people to teach though, which is definitely a challenge right now. 

Anyway, that's all the info I got for yall. I'm still here. I'm doing good. Life's OK.

And Tyler and I have graduated to . . .

Grandma and Grandpa!!

Thursday could not have been more happiness-filled. It was the last day of school . . . technically (we were SO done a few weeks ago), Erik was celebrating his birthday in Florida (threw himself a little party and got some take-out for several missionaries on my dime), and baby Oliver decided he would like his own birthday party.

Kiersten's water broke at 3am, she messaged Erik to tell him he would be an uncle on his birthday and NOT to tell anyone else yet, went to the hospital who told her that her water DID NOT break and sent her home, went to her regularly scheduled doctor's appointment at 8:30 where her doctor told her that her water DID break and sent her back to the hospital.

This little guy was born at about 5pm, weighing just 5 pounds, 6 ounces, and is about the size of a 20 oz bottle of Coke. 

I had to go to school for a last-day-of-school reverse parade to say goodbye to students, and just as I got there, Nate called to say Kiersten was in labor. I got to share my good news with all my good friends at school. After our parade, I came home and sent the three kids off to Grandma's (Great-Grandma now) house for a few days. They all needed a quarantine break, and Nate needed a graduation celebration.

Later that night we were all able to join in on a Facebook Messenger chat and meet little Oliver for the first time.

This little guy has filled our hearts with so much love.


All three of them went home yesterday to meet Great-Great-Grandma/Grandpa Ellis. How lucky are Grandma and Grandpa to be the first to meet this baby.

Our third high school graduate

I feel like my mother. She had four children in quick succession, and I, being the oldest, graduated from high school and three others followed soon after. My mom went from having six kids at home to just two in a matter of a few years.

That is my life today.

As of last night we have three high school graduates. Time surely does fly on wings of lightning. It was just yesterday that my kids were all babes, and now the oldest is getting ready to be a mom herself.

This graduation certainly was anything but typical. Nobody anticipated or expected a graduation quite like this. As the quarantine slowly dragged on through March and then April, our hopes of a "normal" graduation soon faded. Expecting life to always turn out the way you want is guaranteed to lead to disappointment because life will not always turn out the way you want it to. This meme pretty much sums up the whole of humanity at the moment.



Nate has had his up and down moments during the quarantine. It's been difficult as reality slowly set in that he would not be experiencing those "typical" end-of-school senior events. And my heart has broken for him and every other senior who had their dreams ripped out from under them. Coach Bob and Robyn came by to deliver senior tennis paraphernalia for a season that ended as quickly as it began.

Last week they handed out caps and gowns. Honors students typically wear a silver gown to distinguish them. Those would not arrive in time due to factory shut downs. Instead all graduates wore a black gown with either a black cap or gray cap for honors students. We did a little photo shoot around the house.

 

Monday night the high school held a graduation "walk." A time slot was assigned to each group of graduates, and when we arrived, we found we had to wait in our car for about 20 minutes. Each graduate was allowed up to four people, so Alex and Ash got to accompany us, masks in hand for everyone.

After that we were escorted into the school where we maintained social distancing as we made our way down the hall. Along the way they had various photo booths.

Upon entering the auditorium, Nate went one way and we went another. He was handed his diploma cover, stood on stage while we clicked away and cheered, and then we were escorted out. 

This was streamed live to Facebook so Erik got to watch from afar and snapped a screenshot for us.


Tuesday night there were fireworks and then Wednesday was the prerecorded graduation ceremony streamed to different platforms which we got to watch from the comfort of home.

It was all a little strange. At one point the camera panned the audience . . . of no one.

There were the typical speeches and in between they showed each graduate's photo.

I was impressed with the musical number that they were able to arrange from various places.

And with that, it has come to an end. Nate is off to great things. One day he'll look back on this whole experience and will see that is was nothing more than a little bump in the road. This graduation may have been different, but I thought the school did a fabulous job making it as special as they could while at the same time doing their best to follow health guidelines and keep people safe. We were able to celebrate with Nate a little more intimately rather than him just being part of the masses.

I sure do love this middle child of mine.


To view his graduation video: https://drive.google.com/file/d/13PCTP5znBi8UYfQ1_Je9_AfqVFioNgy7/view?usp=sharing