Dropping Sister Siepert off at the MTC!

As keeper of Katie blog(Katie's mom) while she is away I thought I would share with you the "drop off experience" at the MTC.

June 5, 2013

12:30 pm

Provo Utah MTC

At 12:30 sharp we drove up the light by the MTC and were greeted with a long line of cars.  Once through the traffic light we were stopped by a greeter and asked what Mission Katie was reporting to.  Katie smiled and said the Brazil Sao Paulo Interlagos mission.  The man responded awesome.  You have a beautiful smile.  The will love you in Brazil.  He handed us a yellow post it note to put in our window.  How appropriate since that is her favorite color. He had three or four different colors of post it notes.  I guess yellow meant Foreign or Foreign Language.  We turned left as directed. Lined up on the right side of the car on the sidewalk were hundreds of missionaries smiling and waving at the brand new missionaries reporting.  We drove to the last groupings of stopping spots.  Katie hopped out and immediately this beautiful sister came up and gave Katie a hug and introduced herself to Katie and Kash and I.  katie was worried that two large  and one small suitcase was to much.  The missionary said "nope I had three too".  Katie was so relieved. This sister was heading to the San Francisco Mission in two weeks.  Then a warm hello from a group of young Elders standing about three feet away. They proceeded to ask where she was going to serve.  She told them and they hollered that is awesome!! They made her feel so comforted:)  katie then turned to her dad and gave her a big hug and turned to me and gave me a big hug.  I was crying uncontrollably by now. Not Katie she was so excited!!  Earlier she said she couldn't wait to put on the Black badge.  In fact she said she was going to sleep in it!!  She waved goodbye and off she went.  Not even looking back. We later found out that 963 missionaries reported that day.  The largest amount ever entering the MTC on one day.

 She will be missed terribly but she will bless so many lives!  Thanks Katie, your family loves you more than anything!  See you in 548 days or as Jessica Walker says two Novembers!  May the Lord bless you every single second, minute, hour, day, week, month and year!

Later that day I got an email from a dear friend Pat Gausnell who is also in the MTC with her husband preparing to leave soon to Australia for a mission. Senior couples can email anytime.  Much more freedom than the young missionaries.  Anyway she said she saw Katie at dinner that night. Made this mom very happy.

The next morning I opened my facebook and staring back at me was a picture of Katie and her two companions.  Pat had taken a picture after breakfast and sent it immediately to me.  So here is the Picture:

I don't know who the sister in the middle is but the one on the right is Sister Jones from Joplin Missouri.  I only know that because there is a closed group on facebook called moms of Sao Paulo missionaries.  We had connected through that and we became friends on facebook.  She immediately messaged me to tell me she was so happy to see her daughters face.  Evidently they had a rough day when she left.  Bad weather, two missed flights and a lot of stress.  She was so happy to see her smiling:)  What a blessing to live in such a wonderful time!