Farewell Ann Marie!

Today, I had the great opportunity to take my dear friend Ann Marie Wise to the Missionary Training Center (MTC).  She will be serving as a missionary for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints in Ecuador.  She flew into Salt Lake this morning at 9:10, where Morgan and I picked her up.  We came back into Provo and hung out for a bit at my apartment.  Ann Marie found this kite that we had and wanted to fly it...so she put it together and we went outside.  Well, we unanticipated the height that the kite would go and it ended up breaking after hitting three trees, while AM was running.  It was great!  Here are a few pictures at my apartment:

We walked down to the MTC (for those of you who don't know, my complex is kiddie corner to the MTC) about a half hour before AM was to report.  We took a few pictures and a video before we went inside:

The MTC is still being cautious with regards to the Swine Flu.  They asked us if we had been sick recently before we entered the building.  They also alerted the missionaries that there was to be no handshaking between missionaries in the MTC (this comes into play later in the post).  

We got inside and AM got all checked in and got her missionary tag.  And we took more pictures:

Before the meeting began, AM was asked to say the closing prayer at the end of the meeting.  As she was giving the guy her info so he could announce her (they said her name, where she was from, and where she's serving her mission) she shook his hand.  When she remembered about the Swine Flu precautions, she said to the guy in all seriousness, "Oh, sorry.  We're not supposed to shake hands."  And then she wiped her hand on the arm of the guy's suit!  She then turned around and sat down.  It was so funny!  I was cracking up! For those of you who know Ann Marie, I'm sure you can picture this!

After the meeting, we hugged and said goodbye.  She's on to bigger and better things.  I know she will do much good work in Ecuador.