Happy Thanksgiving

Today is Thanksgiving and it is kind of somber at our house. We are all missing Tyson. But, we have Graham and his is so much fun. He is 16 months old now and gets into everything and is talking more and more. In the picture that is Chelsea lying down with Howie on top of her. Graham can say Howie and follows him all aroung calling his name and barking at him. Happy Thanksgiving to our family up north we wish we we could be there.

Our first Letter

We finally got a letter from Ty. He said that he was doing better than his last letter, but this is the first letter that we have received. Tyson is not a guy of many words. (I just can't call him a man yet. )

He said that he has not got a companion yet and loves the Portuguese language and is getting it down well. He said that the spirit is really strong there. He wants details of life at home and treats. We sent him the rest of the stuff that we weren't able to get by the time we dropped him off at the MTC. I wrote him back a letter with fill in the blanks so I get a little more details of what his experience is like. We don't have a scanner at home so I will have to paraphrase his letters.

Eldler Tyson James Pettegrew Brazil, Curitiba Mission

It has been a crazy last couple of days. We have gone through a world wind of emotions. I had to call all of our family and tell them that there would be no farewell. Hotel reservations had to be cancelled and all of our family except for Dave's brother live up north. They arranged their schedules so that they could come, took off work and school.

I think that is what was really the biggest disappointment was Tyson wasn't able to see them and to say goodbye.

We want to thank all those who made plans to come to Tyson's farewell talk and party and we will celebrate in two years when he comes home.

Tyson had a really good attitude about the whole thing and Spencer told him that if he did all he could to do whatever he is ask, he will have a great mission. We don't know the reason for his early departure, but we know that the Lord needed him and we were able to get him there on time thanks to our office staff and friends who pitched in to help.

We were able to meet both Grandma Afton and Grandma Lois in Provo with Aunt RaeLynn and Aunt Ruth and have a bite to eat before we went to the MTC. We stopped at the missionary mall and picked up a few last minute things and went to the MTC. I was amazed at how big the campus is and how many missionaries were checking in at the same time. The gospel is true and is moving forward. Needless to say I wasn't the only one crying.

This is the same place that I took Tyson's picture when he was baptized.
Tyson was supposed to leave Tuesday November 25th from the St. George Airport and fly directly to the Sau Paulo MTC in Brazil. I got a call Monday November 17th from the Bishop about 6:30 pm while I was grocery shopping. He ask me if I was sitting down and I ask if I should be and he said yes. I tried to find someplace to sitdown when he said that the stake president called and had an e-mail from the missionary office asking if Tyson could report to the Provo MTC on Wednesday. I was quiet for a moment and then I ask if he meant this Wednesday as in the day after tomorrow and the Bishop said yes!

I told him that Tyson wasn't home, that he was in California and wouldn't be home until late that evening. I ask him what about his farewell? and the Bishop said He won't have one. Then I proceeded to tell the bishop that he hadn't gone through the temple yet. He said talk to Dave and Tyson and let him know if Tyson could make it there by Wednesday at noon.

I called Dave and told him and he said we needed to get ahold of Tyson. He called me earlier that day and told me that they had tickets to the Jay Leno show and wouldn't be available until after the show. They would be leaving for home after that. We couldn't get ahold of him until 9:30pm. Dave talked to him and told him that he was needed there by Wednesday and all Tyson said was o.k.

We called the Bishop and said that we would do our best to have him there and ask why they wanted him there early. All he knew was that they ask all the missionaries leaving the same time in Tyson's group to get there as soon as possible and that none of their visa's had arrived yet and they wanted them all to fly out together when their visa's got there. So we don't know when they will go to Brazil.

Tyson got home at 2:30am and I ask him how he felt and he said he was ok with the whole thing. He said that he would'nt miss talking in church but would miss seeing some of his friends and family before he leaves.

Dave called the Temple at 6:00 am the next morning to see how early we could get him in and they told us to be there at 9:00 and they would fit us in. We weren't able to invite anyone to come, but we had an awesome experience with Tyson. I was worried that Tyson would fall asleep during the session because we got him up at seven to cut his hair. I didn't do too bad if I say so myself even though I have never had a lesson on cutting hair.

We ran all day long trying to finish what shopping we still had to do. We had to get Tyson's glasses and a lot of last minute things. We weren't able to get them all done so we decided to stay in Salt Lake and finish up with the rest after we dropped Tyson off at the MTC.

Tyson same pose as his baptism picture 11 years later. He grew a little.