The Stake President hit the button!

We've had our interviews with the Bishop and Stake President and our papers are really in now!  We've given them our favorite scripture and picture... our scripture may not be our really favorite scripture but it struck a chord with us for right now. 

"Lift up your heart and rejoice for the hour of your mission is come..."
       Doctrine & Covenants 31:3

It will be 4 to 6 weeks before we get our letter.  We've been able to get tons of stuff done.  We are pretty much ready.  When we find out where we go there will be some things to do but at least we've considered the options and know if it's domestic we go this way, and if it's international we go that way, if it's a cold place, we need these things, ...  Now we're going to relax and know we won't be racing up to the last second.  It's a good feeling.

We hit the button!

Tonight we submitted our application!  The online system is still having serious problems but we believe the actual data we have input (repeatedly) is correct.  Cameron was able to help the developers identify where the problem was but it is not fixed yet.  We are very comfortable with our application, preferences, and the approach we've taken.  Now we wait and see.  After talking with some of the people at headquarters who are involved in the decision process, it appears that if we go international we probably will not report before mid-November at the earliest.  If we go domestic, it could be earlier.  Our availability date is 21 September.

Challenges

There certainly have been challenges during this application process.  Last week we couldn't load our applications at all.  In a few days that was fixed, or so we thought.  Today we were ready to submit our papers but when Pam printed, Cameron's pages were displayed.  Then, Pam's partially showed but she was a male and had some of Cameron's characteristics.  And even later, Cameron's disappeared entirely and Pam's was displayed twice, evidently she is both husband and wife.  At this point Cameron can't even submit his application.  He talked with someone at headquarters who said they had had similar reports.  So, I guess we won't be submitting this weekend as we thought.  Patience, patience... but in the meantime we will be talking with some senior missionaries that just returned from the London Center for Young Adults.

Almost there (again)

This past month has been filled with appointments and more appointments.  We are waiting to pick up one last (I think) report so we can turn our papers in.  We still have some appts that we thought would be a could idea but aren't required.  We've had shots and boosters, our teeth are good, our eyes are good, our ears are good, our general health is good, our labs are good, our hearts are still beating... they didn't check our brains.  So if we can just get that one last med report we should be okay.  The rest of our papers have been filled out forever it seems like!

Our lists have grown.  Every time we check off 1 thing, 2 more things are generated!  The level of detail that needs to be attended to is amazing.  We've met with a CPA for our taxes, we're in the process of getting local POAs taken care of, and we're closing the business.  I'm pretty sure I won't be working again (!) and if Cameron wants to when we get back we'll just do it on a Sched C.  Simplify, simplify.

We learned that there is generally at least 1 month after receiving your call to your report date, and may be up to 6 months depending on where you're going, visas, shots, etc.  We plan to put our papers in this weekend or next week (depending on when we get that last report), be available in September, and then wait to see what happens!

We found some cheap flights ($360 taxes included, RT pp) to Hawaii so we are going on 24 Aug returning on 1 Sep.  That will be a nice change of pace... things have been super busy.  I did get my Family History done to the point I wanted so that I could make a presentation DVD for Gil, Linda, Tom, Tess, and Stacy and her family.  Everything has been scanned and I feel like it's in good enough shape to leave.  I know it's never done, but this part really needed to be organized to pass on to others.