Breakin' the law! (With permission, of course)

The last 18 months have been torture for Sarah.  Ever since our trek through life has led us to Texas, she has been missing her family.  They live so far away...except for her youngest sister, Elizabeth, who is currently serving a mission in Dallas, TX for our church (the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints).  This is something that I did as well, though I served in California with the hispanic migrant workers.  For the time that we serve, however, as a general rule, there is no contact outside of letters and packages with family and friends (with exceptions for calls to parents on Mother's Day and Christmas) in order to allow the missionary to focus their entire effort on the work of the Lord.

Once in a while, however, the person who directs the work in that area (the Mission President) will make an exception.  A missionary has one day in a week, called preparation day, where they do mundane work (such as laundry, house cleaning, shopping, etc...) in order to allow them to focus on their primary work of preaching the gospel the other 6.  Today, was Elizabeth's last P-day (preparation day) in her mission prior to going home.  With her Mission President's permission, we made the trek down to Dallas to visit her for a few hours.

For those of you not familiar with Texas geography, Texas might as well be a country in itself it is so big, geographically.  The trip was a 6-hour drive, one-way from Lubbock to Dallas, and that's not even close to a "cross-state" drive.  The trek started at 5:45 in the morning.  We arrived at about 12:15 and as it was lunch time, we took Elizabeth and her companion to a Japanese Restaurant that they had wanted to go to but were unable to the time that they tried (it was closed).

Liz, adventurous soul that she is, opted to try all kinds of different varieties of Sushi... which my daughter promptly offered to help her with.  Yes, Meagan likes raw fish.  Thank you, Caprock Ward Young Men and Young Women.   You've corrupted my daughter... 

I on the other hand, am not so adventurous, though it's not from lack of trying, as I did, many years ago with a good friend who is also a sushi-lover.  No, it was not Sarah.  She still hates fish even when it's cooked.  I WILL break her of that one day, however...  I have an eternity to work at it.  Muah ha ha...

 So glad that Sarah was able to see her sister again before she flew home. 

One last picture before the trek home.  I was good...Liz only got a handshake from me even though there were hugs from everyone else.  Another long drive back put us back at home right about midnight, with the next day being a work day.  Needless to say, I was kinda tired, but it was definitely worth it.

- Josh