Farewell and Open House

(I am so disappointed I didn't get any pictures during the open house. I was so busy, I didn't even think to get my camera out. Boo.)

Aidan's farewell was on Sunday, June 28, 2015. It was an awesome day and couldn't have gone more perfectly. The church no longer does "old school" farewells, where the entire meeting is about the missionary. The focus is kept on the sacrament and the gospel (as it should be). However, our bishop ended up asking Rob and I to give the opening and closing prayers, Andrew to be the youth speaker, I provided the musical number, and they sang Called to Serve as the closing hymn (with the congregation standing up). It was as close to an old school farewell as I've seen in a while, which I was sort of embarrassed about, but I do think the spirit of the meeting was strong and it didn't feel like the focus was on Aidan so much. It was a great meeting.

Andrew did a great job with his talk. He is such a funny and natural public speaker. He is a little unorthodox in his approach, but it just adds to his charm. He mentioned in his talk that Aidan is "risking his life" to serve a mission (gulp - LOL). And talked about my concern with Honduras being the murder capital of the world (true story). It was a great talk and he was very sweet as he talked about Aidan and what a great example he is.

Lynette Diaz was the other adult speaker with Aidan and she spoke on missionary work. She has a missionary out and some of the things she said were very comforting to me and EXACTLY what I needed to hear. I still need to thank her.

Richard, KaraLyn, Thomas and Marianne did a string quartet rendition of Come Thou Fount of Every Blessing and I accompanied it. It was amazing! They are so incredibly talented and the spirit was so strong.

Aidan was the closing speaker and did and incredible job. He is so humble, yet confident. And he has such a strong testimony. When he testified of Christ and spoke of his knowledge of the Atonement, it was amazing. I had so many people mention to me later about how strongly they felt the spirit when Aidan was speaking. I will post his talk to the blog in a bit.

After church, we had friends and family stop by all day. It was such a fun day and I was thrilled that so many people came to support Aidan. He is so loved! He had a few people come who he has met on social media or through other friends, but had never met in person. I loved watching him socialize and visit with everyone. He's such a sweet and thoughtful young man. He will be a GREAT missionary!

Here are the dismally few pics I took of the decorations for his open house. This is halfway through me setting them up so this is definitely not the finished product. But oh well... you get the idea. :)

I loved this idea I found on Etsy. We gave these packets to everyone who came to the open house. It had four stamps, and the mail pouch address so he can get mail. If he ends up getting one letter out of it, it was worth it to me!

It was such a great day and I was glad so many people came to love and support Aidan.