LINDA

The lovely lady in the blue is Linda Shelley. The other is Amy Paun - one of my amazing counselors.

Linda was diagnosed with colon cancer in November. She went from walking 6 miles a day & working full time one day to finding out this news the next & never being able to return to work. She went downhill fast & I still can't believe how quickly it all happened. She passed away on January 16th. (The day after Lane's funeral) And this was a funeral neither I, or my counselors, wanted to handle. Yet, how could we not for someone we loved so dearly.

She was a true example of faith. She felt it was her time & she came to terms with it to the point that she was ok with everything. It was amazing! Linda was from England & was extremely organized! She started slowly stockpiling toiletries about a year before her diagnosis & had them overly organized in a closet. Just preparing for whatever may come. Once she knew what was happening she wanted to donate everything. She worked with Amy to gather everything & invited all the sisters to donate items at our Relief Society Christmas party . The response was overwhelming. Everything was donated to a local women's shelter.
During one of my lessons in RS I noticed Linda was wearing a beautiful giant pearl necklace. I stopped my lesson & commented on how much I loved her necklace. She came to church a couple of weeks before her passing. Barely able to move & needing a lot of help to get around with that necklace in her hands to give to me. I was very touched. Having that experience during my presidency is one I'll never forget.

VT CONF

In November we had a visiting teaching conference brunch. It went quite well I think. Thanks to my amazing presidency! I really can't take ANY credit for this one. We had a theme of "What Kind of Shoe are You?" These were our little programs:

We had a little shoe fashion show where one of the ladies in the ward narrated for us. She came fully dressed and prepared for fun - which we knew she would! We had a pair of gals dressed to model shoes for each category as she spoke about that particular type of shoe. I really want to remember how this went & of course lost my sheet on it already, so I'll paraphrase each one briefly:

{SLIPPERS} They slip in & out each month.

{FLIP FLOPS} They flip flop around each month & you never know if they're going to come or not.

{RUNNING SHOES} They run in and out each month as quickly as possible.

{BOOTS} They're the ones that come in each month to talk & talk & talk until you want to boot them out the door!

{HIGH HEELS} These are the stellar visiting teaching. They always reach your needs & go above the call of duty.

This is a really bad explanation, but you get the idea. Anyway, it was a lot of fun & a darling idea! Wish I could take some of the credit for this because it was so cute, but I can't!