Honduras, The Final Countdown (May - July 2021)

Well, we were down to our last few months of this 13 MONTH deployment - finally!  It has been a long haul, to say the least.  

In the last couple of months, many people were changing out and going home.  Here are some pictures of Chris with his CSM at his (the CSM's) change out ceremony.

The Honduran Government also held an awards ceremony and it seemed that Chris was the belle of the ball.  They gave him tons of awards and recognition - he even got a sash!!  I am grateful that some of Chris's efforts and hard work were recognized.  Being a leader is often a thankless job where you get nothing but the problems and headaches.  This job has stretched Chris in many different directions, but he has given his all and, frankly, prevented a lot of chaos in a chaotic environment, even if it meant being the bad guy who made everybody obey the rules.  So hey!  He may not have won the popularity contest at SOTO CANO, but he did get a sash! 😉

Here are a couple more pictures of Chris officiating at the Army's birthday party.  Man, they sure do like their cakes!

This is just a snap shot of Chris in his day to day meetings, looking "official".

 

Chris's Change of Command Ceremony was on July 9, 2021.  I was able to watch it  remotely on Facebook live, which was awesome.   

Chris did a great job showing appreciation to all the people he worked with and acknowledging their hard work and contributions to making SOTO CANO a success.  I could tell they felt it, and not just from his speech, because when he was done they gave him a standing ovation.  Chris said he'd never seen that before.  The people he worked with also gave him tons of unique going away presents.  This diorama says, "Col. Christopher W. O'Gwin. 7 JUL 2020 - 9 JUL 2021.  Thanks for exceptional leadership during the year of birds, storms, and masks.  You made a difference for the future of SOTO CANO."  I guess that about sums it up.  You work hard, do your best, and then pass it off to the next guy.  O'Gwin out!

The next day Chris said good bye to beautiful Honduras and got on a plane to head home - FINALLY!

He was greeted with a warm welcome by his family and a chill weekend of belated Father's Day gifts, peach pie, a family movie, and just hanging out.  It feels so good to have our family together again!!

Hermana Fleitas (June - July 2021)

 

After 3 months of training out in a rural area, Aly was getting transferred to the big city, Asuncion (more specifically, to the Coasta Bonita ward, 15 minutes outside of Asuncion).  Aly said traveling back up to the mission home was a little sketchy with all her luggage, first on a bus and then using an Uber, where her luggage didn't quite fit in the trunk and so it was hanging out as they were driving. 😬  But everything made it okay and they had an evening dinner with the other Hermanas getting transferred and doing President interviews.  Love the picture below of group evening prayer. 

So, Aly's new companion is Hermana Fleitas, another native Paraguayo.  The kicker is that Aly is the senior companion  because she has been on her mission one month longer than Hermana Fleitas.  AND they are white washing again because the area used to have elders.  Crazy!  

Some random gigantic fruit that even the guy giving it to them didn't know what it was?!?  She uses it as a weight to work out with. 😆

She managed to find Acai again, of course. 

Just because it's a city doesn't mean there won't be cows!

Seeing some of the abject poverty and how humbly some people live.

It is actually winter in South America right now, and humid cold can be biting!  They look a little frigid.

There have been LOTS of growing  opportunities this transfer.  Aly was overwhelmed with this new assignment, to say the least, and there has been a lot of learning and stretching during this transfer - learning a new city, learning that each city has it's own dialect, learning that she didn't know Spanish quite as well as she thought (which is definite proof that her Spanish is getting better!), learning how to deal with different personalities, learning how to lead and be self motivated, learning to humble yourself and trust in the Lord.  A lot was put on Aly's plate this transfer, but her talents of independence, hard work, and determination have served her well.  She is moving forward and doing great and I'm so proud of her. 

But the best part of this transfer, of course, has been finding good people to teach and seeing joy and peace come into their lives as they learn about their Savior.  It is such an amazing experience to realize that, through all the challenges and our own failings, this is ultimately the Lord's work.  But if we humble ourselves and give our all, we get to be a part of it.  And that is the best feeling ever.

It's Independence Day (July 2021)

 

Since the 4th of July was on a Sunday this year, we had an awesome BBQ/Pool party with some friends on the 3rd.  There was 4 square volleyball, swimming, tons of good food, and of course fireworks!  It has been really rainy for the past couple of weeks, luckily the rain quit for the evening and we were able to have a great party.  

Here's Kate being a pyro with her friends.

On the actual 4th some friends invited us over for dinner and then we did sparklers.  Good times.  It is so good to have a community of people that you love to get together with and who support you and your family.  This move is going to be a hard one, as it always is, especially with teens, but after being in the same place for 5 years, I think this one is really going to hurt.  I have really been thinking the past couple of days about how we are blessed with such good friends.  We have such a good group of not just friends, but families that all like to get together and have a great time together.  We are really going to miss all these wonderful people when we move.  

Preppin' to Move and June Birthdays (June 2021)

For the rest of June we were kind of just doing the summer hang out thing while also low-key planning for Chris to come home, sell our home, and move.  

In May we dropped the price on our home, and that's when things started to pick up and we started to get offers.  We went under contract with the guy renting the house next door, but he still needed to sell his home in Swift Creek.  So while we were kind of under contract with him, we were still having showings with the understanding that if we got another offer then he would have 48 hours to remove his home selling contingency or remove his offer.  While I was at girls camp, we got that other offer.  As nothing was happening with his home, our neighbor ended up removing his offer, so we are now under contract with a new buyer, closing on July 26th.  This new buyer also needs to sell their home, but their home is also under contract, closing the same day we are closing with them.  The inspection has come in and apparently we need a new roof because insurance companies are no longer insuring homes with roofs older than 15 years due to all the hurricanes we've been having, even though our roof has 30 year shingles on it 🙄.  So we had to renegotiate that a bit.  Still waiting on the appraisal to come in.  Man, selling a house is just so involved and stressful.  So many hoops to jump through.   It's been consuming a lot of my mental energy.

Meanwhile, also while at Girls Camp, I got a call from housing at MacDill, saying they had a house for us.  Hooray!!  They actually had a couple of houses coming available in the next month so we discussed our timing with her and are going to get the home on 8225 Constellation Blvd on July 20th.  As we are coming into town on the 22nd, the timing is perfect!  Woot, woot!  So, so, so, grateful to have that huge piece of the puzzle in place.  (As you can see, I am so excited that I've already planned where we're going to put our furniture in the new floorplan. 😂

 Also while at girls camp (man, when it rains, it pours!) I got a call from the company that's handling our move to do our pre-move inspection.  There have been major labor and truck shortages, causing moving havoc across the board, but the lady I spoke to said we are on their schedule and  good to go, that they have their own trucks, and that our door to door delivery date for the 23rd looks good too.  Fingers crossed everything goes according to plan!!

And finally on the move front, due to my lunch with the Young Women's president in April, the new ward is aware we are coming and "eagerly awaiting" our arrival. 😅  It's good to feel loved and wanted, we just need a minute to tie up our loose ends here, catch our breath, and get settled before jumping in to the next thing!  I'm sure they are an awesome ward though and I am excited to get there and meet new people.

But anyway, in the middle of all the exciting, stress-filled craziness, commonly known as moving, the girls were doing things like helping deliver food to Sharing and Caring, the local Food Bank and painting rocks at Young Women's Activities.

 

Kylie spent a week at Drama Kids summer camp, where she got to be a counselor in training and help the younger kids with improv and put on a mini play.  She also decide to randomly buy some fake fingernails to help her stop chewing her real ones.  They lasted about a day.

At the end of June we always have the privilege of celebrating 2 birthdays.  Kate turned 14 this year and spent the day making homemade raspberry ice cream and having friends over to play games.  That night she chose for us to go to Bamboo Sushi for dinner - and Kate actually got sushi!  Love that girl.  That night we had Strawberry shortcake with presents and watched a Hunger Games movie.    

Lise, as a mature 17 year old, spent the day with friends up at Vortex Springs.  Love that her friends gave her a shout out on Instagram as well.  Love watching Lise thriving with friends and school and life.  Love that girl.  That night was watching the sunset at the beach for young women's, so we went out to dinner for her birthday later.  She chose Panera, which was also scrumptious.