On December 10, after two years, the day had finally arrived for our missionary to come home. Even though we were still in the fog of jet lag, we could hardly wait for 6:30 p.m. to roll around! We put out a few Christmas lights, yellow ribbons and a sign. We could hardly contain our excitement!
We arranged for a babysitter to take care of our new boys so they wouldn't be traumatized by going back to the airport. We were nervous about leaving them so early on but we had someone explain it to Louie in Chinese and he was fine with it. Liam did great, too.
There was a mixture of rain and snow by the time we left for the airport. The freeway had backed up and traffic was slow . This prevented the Rigby's, Bachers and Larsens from being able to make it to the airport, though they were planning to come. Grandma and Grandpa Fillmore, Teresa and Kevin were the only ones who made it besides us.
We made it with just a few minutes to spare. Landon's flight had arrived early. As we waited for him to come down the escalator in Terminal 1, though, he never showed up with the other passengers on his flight. Just as we started to worry, we heard a voice behind us.
"Looking for someone?"
There he was, our handsome, grown-up missionary. Oh the emotions that flooded our hearts and minds. Nothing can describe the feeling of having him in our arms! Two years is such a long time to be apart.
Landon gave the most incredible talk in sacrament meeting! He chose to talk about faith and he shared several stories of miracles that happened on his mission. I was so frazzled when I left for church that I had forgotten my cell phone. So it didn't get recorded. Grandma Hinton was really sad about that, and so was I because it was so powerful and moving!
Sadie was also asked to speak that day. She spoke on Elder Russel M. Nelson's conference talk Called Joy and Spiritual Survival from conference in October. She did great as well! Louie and Liam sat quietly just taking everything in during their first ever sacrament meeting. I was really worried that it would be too overwhelming for Liam but he ended up going to sleep half-way through. We couldn't have asked for a more perfect meeting.
Because of the timing with our boys coming home just two weeks earlier, I decided not to host a big open house that night. Landon did invite his friends to come over for some lunch, though. A few came after sacrament meeting and a few came a few hours later.
I'm posting this almost two months later, and can I just say how incredibly wonderful it is to have him in our home again? He is such a ray of light in my life right now. I love his hugs when he comes home from work or school, and just the positive energy that he has now. Plus, it's just so fun having a "young adult" in the family now. This is our first experience with it. We love that he has so many friends around that he can go on double dates with and play basketball with. And he's been so patient with all the chaos that happens here at home. He just started a job at doTerra working in the customer service department. He works there in the mornings, then he comes home for lunch, then goes to school at UVU in the afternoons. He's hoping to save enough money to move into an apartment with his cousin this fall.
We love Landon!
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