The past two weeks have been filled with a lot of great experiences and a lot of work. We enjoyed a visit from Rod’s brother and his wife (Carl & Shanna) from The Woodlands, Texas which gave us a good excuse to do some sightseeing. We sent our VC sister from Uganda home after fulfilling a great mission here in London and welcomed two new sisters—one from mainland China and one from South Korea. We’ve enjoyed several leadership meetings including a visit from Elder W. Craig Zwick and his wife Jan.

We were able to spend almost two full days with Rod’s brother and his wife. They arrived in London on Monday, August 29^th, but toured on their own until Friday when we were able to take a preparation day and do some sightseeing. We took the train out to Windsor Castle and enjoyed a great day out there. We experienced the ancient history that Windsor Castle has had and were told about the current history as the Castle still is home to the Queen and other royalty many times during the year. 

On Saturday, after our weekly training meeting and doing some work at the Visitors’ Centre we were able to join them again for a walking tour of London. We went to St. James’s Palace, St. James’s Park, Horse Guards Parade, the Banqueting House, Big Ben, Parliament Square, Westminster Abbey, the Sky Garden, Ye Olde Cheshire Cheese Pub, St. Paul’s Cathedral, and the London Wall. 

Flowers at St. James's Park

Big Ben at Night

On our walk we came across a large barge in the Thames River that had a newly made wooden replica of the London skyline of 1666.

 It turned out that the Great Fire of London that burned much of the city to the ground happened 350 years ago. To recognize that anniversary the city held many events including a domino event where thousands of concrete blocks about 3” X 6” X 20” were lined up throughout the area where the fire burned. At 6:30 Saturday night they started the dominoes falling. They covered 7 kilometres and were quite a sight (we only saw them set up waiting for the event but watched the event on the internet). On Sunday night they set the wooden skyline replica on fire and burned it to the ground in the middle of the Thames River. Again, it was quite a sight to see (we saw the wooden replica on Saturday night and watched it burn down on the internet on Sunday night).

On Wednesday, September 7^th, we welcomed Sister Zeng from Sichuan, China and Sister Jung from South Korea to our VC staff. They are great sisters and add to our international family at the VC. That same day we said goodbye to Sister Apiyo who returned home to Gulu, Uganda after serving a wonderful mission with us here in London at the Visitors’ Centre. She returned home to meet the ten recent converts in her home ward (see previous post) that she had a role with as she taught one of them online and was Facebook friends with several others. Our sister who has been in the hospital was also able to return home to Utah where she can be with her family and receive medical care there.

This past weekend we were honored to have Elder W. Craig Zwick and his wife Jan visit us. They spoke at a multi-zone conference for our missionaries held in the Hyde Park Chapel. Sister Zwick told us about their experiences as mission president in South America years ago. Elder Zwick told us about meeting with the First Presidency and the Quorum of the Twelve on the fourth floor of the Salt Lake Temple just ten days earlier. He said the Brethren pray for the missionaries every week in their meeting in the temple. Sunday morning we were able to greet Elder & Sister Zwick as they arrived for church at the Hyde Park Chapel. Elder Zwick spoke at the Hyde Park 1^st Ward sacrament meeting today. Elder Zwick’s twin sister is our mission secretary and she and her husband complete their missions next week.

We had four convert baptisms at the Hyde Park Chapel last weekend. Our sisters continue to teach a lot of people and we still have many people come into the VC who want to know more about the Church. Our sisters also continue to do a great work online as they respond to requests from Mormon.org and teach people all over the world. We had online baptisms in Ogden, Utah and in North Carolina last week. What a privilege it is to be involved in this great latter-day work!

Another month is almost completed and it seems like we just finished last month’s report. The last couple of weeks have been difficult but rewarding. We have spent a lot of time at the hospital with one of our sisters who has had some serious health problems. Our mission president and his wife have been incredible with their love and time devoted to this sister. We have shared the responsibility with them in visiting the hospital every day. The good news is that she is improving and we are optimistic that she will be released from the hospital soon. In the meantime, our visits to the hospital will continue to take up most of the time that we are not serving at the visitors’ centre.

The past couple of weeks have been rewarding as we have seen several more people enter the waters of baptism. Our sisters have had online baptisms in Washington, D.C. and Uganda. Another was scheduled to happen in Holland today (we hope it happened). The baptism in Uganda is an amazing story. One of our VC sisters is from Uganda (Sister Apiyo) and she chatted with a man online some time ago who lives in Uganda. He was interested in the church and she requested that local missionaries go teach him in Uganda. It turned out that he lives in her hometown of Gulu and is in her ward there. She taught him online until local missionaries finally met with him. She stayed in touch and learned that he had scheduled to be baptized. She was excited but then the baptism didn’t happen. He set another baptism date but that one didn’t happen either. Last month he told her that he was going to get baptized along with nine other people in her ward. Once again she was excited only to be informed that those baptisms didn’t take place either. Sister Apiyo will be completing her mission in less than two weeks and will be going home. Last Friday night she learned that her online friend got baptized with three others and that the other six people were being baptized this weekend. What a way for her to end her mission! She will be returning home to these new converts that she has never met but has played a role in their conversion and baptism.

We have also had baptisms at the Hyde Park Chapel. Yesterday an 11-year-old girl was baptized by her father who had just been baptized two weeks earlier. We also had a man from Jordan baptized last month and this past month his older brother got baptized here. Now our sisters are teaching the older brother’s 14-year-old daughter and she is set for baptism next Saturday. It is such a thrill to see our sisters having success as they welcome guests and teach the gospel.

Our sisters are also doing incredible things with their online work. Since the church changed the process this past February for handling Mormon.org requests for missionaries or for receiving copies of the Bible or the Book of Mormon, our sisters have continued to increase the number of referrals that they are sending to local missionaries. The first full month after this change they sent over 100 referrals to local missionaries (before they can send local missionaries to someone our sisters have to make contact with the requesting individual and make sure that they are willing to meet with missionaries). In June they sent over 200 referrals to local missionaries and last month they sent 298. This month they have already sent over 400 referrals. That’s 400 teaching opportunities that are just given to local missionaries somewhere in the world without them having to do any finding at all. What a great work this is and what an honor it is to be a participant in it.

We have continued to welcome many guests to the Hyde Park Chapel VC. Last week Sister Julie Beck, former Relief Society General President, and her daughter stopped by. We had some great friends stop and visit us here as well. Dianne (Munson) Knight and her husband Lyle stopped by. Dianne lived in our neighborhood in Upland before she got married and was our ward and stake Young Women’s President. Then Miles and Jann Peterson from the Upland Stake came by for a visit. And today Carole Olson who used to live in Upland many years ago came by with some friends. Carole’s husband, John, was our first bishop when we moved to Upland. What a treat to have all of these great people come visit us here in London.

We can’t seem to keep up with reporting all of the great things that we are involved in and are seeing here in London. Hopefully, these occasional updates will at least give you a flavor for what we are experiencing here.

Since our last entry we have had another round of transfers in our mission. Until now, we have been blessed to have had relatively little change with our VC sisters from these past changes. In six months we have only had two sisters go home and two new sisters come out. However, this past transfer we had two more sisters complete their missions and two new sisters come out. So on Tuesday, July 26^th, we had to say good-bye to Sister Lung and Sister Wai. Sister Lung returned home to Hong Kong and Sister Wai returned home to Irvine, California. Both sisters were our Chinese (Mandarin) speakers and both served great missions. On Wednesday, July 27^th, we welcomed Sister Yau from Hong Kong and Sister Teng from Malaysia. Both speak Mandarin and Cantonese as well as English. Sister Teng also speaks Malay and Taiwanese. On their first day here they gave tours of our VC to Chinese guests and did it by themselves. Their American trainers could only watch and smile as they had no idea what their companions were saying. But they apparently did a great job as our guests took copies of the Book of Mormon in Chinese and gave us contact information so that we can help them learn more.

Some more changes for our mission were announced last week as we are one of fifteen missions in the Church to pilot “Online Proselyting.” Online proselyting involves finding, teaching, and following up with investigators using technology. Our missionaries have had ipads for about a year now. They are now authorized to use Facebook to find new investigators and teach them and follow up with them. They also can use Skype and Oovoo too for online video teaching. This change will not affect our VC sisters much as they have already been using the internet to contact and teach people all over the world. But it will be interesting to watch how the work goes forward here in the England London Mission with this change. The potential for reaching many more interested people is huge.

We continue to witness many great experiences as we serve in the VC. People come into the VC for all kinds of reasons. We had two baptisms last Sunday. One was a lady named Raquel who came into the VC on May 30^th with another lady who was befriended by one of the mission office couples. The friend who brought her has since moved and isn’t really interested in the gospel. But Raquel has embraced the gospel and acknowledges the Lord’s hand in how she found the church. The other baptism was of a Chinese young lady named Nicole. She came into the VC on June 23^rd after going to Mormon.org and requesting missionaries to teach her more. These two ladies took very different paths to find the church but both paths included our VC.

We have managed to take a few more walks and have seen some more sights of London. We walked through Battersea Park that is along the Thames River. It has lakes and ponds and more beautiful greenery. Another day we again visited the V&A Museum which is next door to the chapel. We went to the “Castings” exhibit which displays many casts of famous sculptures like Michelangelo’s David and Moses. We have walked through St. James’s Park, Green Park, and Hyde Park again and enjoyed the scenic views in all of those parks. 

We can’t believe how the time is flying by. July is almost over. What a month July has been for us at the Hyde Park Chapel Visitors’ Centre. We have welcomed many guests to the centre, have had a good number of people interested in learning more about our church, had some incredible visitors to the Hyde Park Chapel, and we’ve had a small hand in a record number of baptisms. What a blessing it is to serve here in London at this particular time.

We are on pace to have over 4,000 visitors to the VC for the month. This is by far the most visitors we have had in a month since we have been here. And based on reports of months prior to our arrival it is probably the most that have ever visited in a single month. I’m not sure that this is anything that we are doing as it is summer vacation time and the Lord is just prompting many people to come into the VC. Getting people in the door is one thing but helping them to come closer to Christ is what our work is all about. That’s why when we have guests who are interested in learning more and we can send a referral for missionaries to teach them then we have a great feeling of success. In the month of July our sisters have sent over 250 referrals to local missionaries. That means that there are likely over 250 sets of missionaries who are going to have someone to teach without knocking on a door or talking to them on the street. They have requested missionaries to come and teach them.

We have seen the fruits of having many visitors come into the VC and sending many referrals all over the world. We have already learned of 12 baptisms in July where our sisters have had some role in the convert’s progression. We have had baptisms in Canada, Florida, Virginia, Wisconsin, Utah, Madagascar, Australia, Malawi, Taiwan, and London. There are even some more scheduled for this week.

We’ve had a number of prominent visitors to the Hyde Park Chapel recently. Yesterday President Clark Gilbert of BYU-Idaho came to church at the Hyde Park Chapel with his family. The previous Sunday Neill F. Marriott, 2^nd Counselor in the Young Women’s General Presidency of the Church, came to the Hyde Park Chapel with her husband (you will know Sister Marriott when you hear her strong Southern accent). She and her husband spoke at a fireside here in the chapel that evening. We also have had numerous visits from Brother Marvin Gardner, a former member of the Church Music Committee responsible for our current hymnbook, and his wife. Brother Gardner is teaching a BYU Study Abroad class here at the chapel so he comes in several times a week. It has been a great blessing to be able to visit privately and casually with these great church leaders.

Although we have been busy, we haven’t just worked the past few weeks. We went to the musical entitled “Beautiful” which is a Broadway show about the life and music of Carole King. The show was great and the music even better. We visited the Tower of London for a third time and continue to find very interesting and historical things to see there (like the Bloody Tower where two child princes are alleged to have been killed and the White Tower where the history goes back over 1,000 years). We also continue to enjoy walks in the parks. On one of our recent walks we stopped to look at the wild parakeets that live in Hyde Park. Rod held out his hand and you can see the result in the pictures below. 

We had another busy two weeks since we last posted. We had shifts at the VC for eight straight days as we filled in for some sisters who went on exchanges with their Sister Training Leaders (STLs). We're not complaining about serving everyday but it gets difficult to do some of the other things (like interviews and planning meetings) that we need to do at the VC if we are on shift every day.

Last week we were privileged to have Elder Patrick Kearon, General Authority Seventy and Europe Area President, with us at the Hyde Park Chapel for three days along with his wife, Karen. They did a mission tour which amounted to all of the missionaries in our mission coming to the chapel. It was great to hear them teach and interact with the missionaries and leaders. Last Friday we were able to attend a meeting with President & Sister Stevens, the Assistants to the President, the zone leaders of our mission, and STLs of our mission where Elder & Sister Kearon instructed us. It was a remarkable morning as they shared some very personal and powerful things. In an intimate setting like that you get to experience the human side of these leaders.

The month of June ended with some great results at the Hyde Park Chapel Visitors' Centre. We had 8 baptisms for the month of June and welcomed over 3,500 visitors to the chapel (we don't count members who live here and come to the chapel for church or other regular meetings nor do we count full-time missionaries. If we counted those we'd have reported over 5,000 coming to the chapel). Our sisters sent out over 200 referrals as a result of guests coming to the VC and wanting to know more or interactions they have online with people wanting to be taught the gospel. The worldwide nature of the work here in London continues to amaze me. We have visitors from all over the world come into the VC and our sisters teach people all over the world online.

As you might guess from our schedule of the past two weeks we didn't get many chances to go sightseeing or exploring. We did go on a few walks, however, and the parks and gardens are still beautiful. We have been told that summer does come in London but so far it has only been winter- and spring-like. Our high temperatures have only been in the low 70's and we find that we are wearing coats or jackets most of the time. So while many of you in the U.S. are sweltering in heat we are wondering if we'll ever be able to put our coats and jackets away. Again, we're not complaining because it really is very nice but it is a bit strange to see that it is the 4th of July and we are still donning our jackets. And speaking of the 4th of July, this is just a regular day here. There doesn't seem to be any celebrating going on. Go figure;>).

We have enjoyed a memorable couple of weeks. We were told before we came to London and the Hyde Park Chapel that a lot of the leaders of the church came to the Hyde Park Chapel. It seems this month that has been the case. The last Sunday of May we were surprised to see Elder Douglas Callister (emeritus General Authority) and his wife walk in the door to go to church on Sunday. It was fun to chat with him about his visits to the Upland Stake and the Rancho Cucamonga Mission. On Tuesday, June 7th, Elder Dallin H. Oaks, of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, and his wife; Elder Patrick Kearon, Europe Area President, and his wife; and Elder Clifford Herbertsen, Area Seventy, and his wife came to the chapel and spoke to over 400 missionaries. We were asked to be in charge of ushering for the event so we had a chance to be heavily involved. We organized all of the missionaries to walk by and shake the hand of these brothers and sisters. Elder Oaks spoke about teaching repentance and shared the impressions he had received on the subject the night before. It was very powerful. Yesterday Elder Robert C. Gay, General Authority Seventy, attended the sacrament meeting of the Hyde Park 1st Ward. It was an honor to have Elder Gay, who presided at stake conference where Rod was released as stake president last year, come over to Rod in the chaos of the VC after sacrament meeting got out and give him a hug and chat for a few minutes.

As nice as it was to have these great church leaders visit the Hyde Park Chapel, a true highlight has been the past four days as Brother Mark Lusvardi, Director of Public Programs for the Church, came to do some training for us in the VC. He is in charge of all visitors' centres and historic sites for the Church. But he also does much, much more. He shared with us many of the exciting things that the church is doing or working on in the area of missionary work. He is not a General Authority but he is the trainer of General Authorities. He interacts with the First Presidency and the Twelve Apostles weekly. His involvement at the highest levels of this Church is remarkable. While the other Church leaders who came visited the "multitudes," Mark visited our VC family and the two of us. On Thursday night he took us and the Stevens (mission president and wife) out to dinner. Friday morning we met in our 20-seat cinema and he taught the 16 VC family members along with the Stevens for over three hours. We (Connie and Rod) then went to lunch with him by ourselves and spent over two hours receiving more instruction and training. Then Saturday morning we met in the cinema again and had two more hours of instruction. Yesterday he attended church at the Hyde Park Chapel. What a thrilling and humbling experience it has been to be taught by him. We now have a lot of work to do to live up to what the Lord has given us.

We continue to have remarkable experiences with missionary work at the Hyde Park Chapel VC. We had another convert baptism yesterday at the chapel and had two more the week before. Our VC sisters have had six baptisms so far in the month of June and we hope to see many more. Yesterday just before the baptismal service a young lady walked into the VC and said that she had been "wandering" around Hyde Park for the last three hours wondering what she is supposed to do with her life. She came here and was introduced to the gospel and invited to witness the baptism, which she did, and is meeting with missionaries this Thursday. These kind of miracles just seem to keep happening.

We also welcomed another new VC sister to our family. Sister Fuhriman from Wisconsin came in on Wednesday. She is a beautiful, talented sister and we look forward to her great service. She is an excellent singer and fits right in with the talented sisters that we already have. After we sang the opening hymn for our meeting Friday morning with Brother Lusvardi he exclaimed, "Wow!" as our sisters had sung beautifully.

Once again there hasn't been a lot of time for sight-seeing but we did make it on a couple of nice walks. We walked through Regent's Park to see the roses and other flowers. They are beautiful. Another day we walked to Green Park to see the festivities celebrating the Queen's 90th birthday (her birthday was in April but this was her "official" birthday celebration). We saw lots and lots of uniformed soldiers, a military band, and a 41-cannon salute. Another day we went to the John Wesley Chapel where the founder of the Methodist Church lived and preached nearly 300 years ago. There is so much history and beauty to see here. It is a great blessing to be able to have two years to explore.

Roses in Regent's Park

Queen's Birthday Celebration

Time is flying by too fast to keep up sometimes. We have intended to post more often than every three weeks but it seems that is becoming the norm. A lot has gone on in the past three weeks. We had an incredible month at the Hyde Park Chapel Visitors' Centre in May. We ended the month with 10 baptisms, 136 referrals sent, and over 3,000 visitors. Four of the baptisms took place at the Hyde Park Chapel and the others took place in Poland, Nigeria, Sierra Leone, two in Canada, and one in Middlesbrough, England. The six baptisms outside of the Hyde Park Chapel were of people that our sisters taught online. The way the gospel is being preached to all the world is absolutely amazing.

We had a man come into the VC yesterday who said, "I have been living with an LDS family in San Francisco and would like to get baptized. I got married a week ago and I'd like you to teach me and my new wife so that we can get baptized before we return to our home in China." He came in later in the day with his wife and a business colleague who also wanted to be taught. We had our two Mandarin-speaking sisters arrange to teach them at the chapel. They went to church today and will be back to be taught more this week.

Today, amidst the chaos that occurs every Sunday when two wards are getting out of church and another ward is arriving for church which included over 250 visitors from out of town, we had a family of four come into the VC from Romania who are in London on holiday. They wanted to see our exhibits but it was too noisy to even talk in the VC so our missionaries took them into our cinema and showed a video. They had lots of questions and came out wanting to be taught by missionaries in their home country when they return. These kind of experiences seem to be happening nearly every day.

A huge highlight of the past three weeks was the visit of Matt & Kylie and Addison. They arrived from Virginia on Saturday night, May 28th at Heathrow Airport. We took the tube out to meet them and accompany them to our flat. We worked at the VC from 8:00 until 3:00 on Sunday where they joined us for sacrament meeting. Then they went sightseeing and we joined up with them at St. Paul's Cathedral for Evensong and then we all went to Westminster Abbey for a Sunday organ concert. We covered our church bases with the Hyde Park Chapel (LDS), St. Paul's (Catholic), and Westminster (Anglican) all in the same day. Monday Matt rented a car and he, Kylie and Addison took a couple of days exploring some of the country part of England (Bath, Stonehenge, Oxford, Highclere Castle). We worked at the VC on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday. We joined together again Wednesday evening and went to Abbey Road Studios, Camden Town Market, and Platform 9 3/4 (Harry Potter). We spent all day Thursday and Friday together and went to the Tower of London, Shakespeare's Globe, the Museum of London, Borough Market, the British Museum, and Hamley's (toy store), the London Eye, Big Ben, Parliament, St. James Park, Buckingham Palace for the Changing of the Guard, Green Park, Harrod's (store), Hyde Park and Kensington Palace to name a few. It was an exhausting couple of days but was great fun and we made some great memories. Addison was such a trooper and she is so cute. We appreciated tremendously their visit. It came to an end all too quickly. Saturday morning we accompanied them back to Heathrow and said our goodbyes. We love them sooooooo much and look forward to other family members coming to visit us.

Gramma Hulet & Papa Hulet with Addison in front of Queen Victoria Statue by Kensington Palace

Matt, Kylie & Addison with Big Ben

The London Eye from St. James Park

Now it is back to work. We are looking forward to a visit this Tuesday by Elder Dallin H. Oaks of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles to the Hyde Park Chapel. He will be meeting with all the missionaries from our mission and the England London South Mission. Over 400 missionaries are expected to come to the chapel for this special visit. We also are looking forward to a visit to the Hyde Park Chapel Visitors' Centre by the head of all the VCs and historic sites in the church. He will be coming to do some specific training with us as well as our VC staff. And then the month will be completed by a mission tour by Elder Patrick Kearon, Europe Area President. All told we will have church leaders at the chapel 7 days of the next month. It's time to polish our shoes and comb our hair. It is an honor to be in the full-time service of the Lord.