Almost Time To Go

Been an interesting couple of days. Been saying a lot of goodbyes.

Saturday night, we attended our farewell party from the senior couples. It was a fun night with a great potluch dinner. And we played a couple of games -- something the seniors enjoy doing. One was a Mongolian ankle bone game and the other as a game called 'Dork'. Sister Caldwell won one of the ankle bone games and I won the Dork game (keep your comments to yourself, ya' all!)!

Then today, we bid a final farewell to our Nalaikh Branch. The first picture is of Sister Caldwell as all her Primary bid her a goodbye. She has grown to love those children and they her, as well. She will be missed there.

Then they held a little going away part for us. They moved all of the chairs over along the wall (this is one of those phase one buildings where the large area serves as Chapel, Cultural Hall, etc.) sang a few songs, read a poem or two and then gave us these wonderful gifts shown in the picture.

This seemed to sort of make it a bit more final for us. We left feeling a bit more empty, as we headed back to Ulaanbaatar and our apartment. We had been able to sort of ignore the going end to our experience, what with all the work it has been taking to get things ready for us to go. But today . . .

Only two and a half days now before we will be on that outbound airplane. We are going to miss much, not the least of which will be the missionaries (old and young) we have worked with, cried with, laughed with, fed and grown to love.

But we haven't lost sight of the good things, either. We are really anxious to see our children, grandchildren, freinds and neighbors. It will be good to see them again.

We will arrive Wednesday night and they already have us scheduled to speak in our ward on Sunday.

Boy, they don't give a body much time to rest in this Church!!
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