Hello M!
It’s great to hear from you. There is rarely a day that goes by that I don’t think of our wonderful experience with the FH team and the life altering course it propelled me on.
I’ll start with a picture of the family taken last year.
The kids are growing up. Emma is a freshman at New Mexico State University. Jared is a senior in high school. Ethan is in the 8th grade. Jordyn in the 7th.
We have not been without our struggles, and I realize more and more everyday how very little time we have with our children before they are off on their own.
Since your visit I spent nearly 3 years as a volunteer at the temple. I’m on my 3rd year of early morning seminary teacher, and in October I added on-line seminary as well. Those 3 callings have been a major source of strength in my life.
On the FH front. Some pretty cool things have happened. It all started with a DNA test. I took the test. Got the results. Was overwhelmed by the results. Didn’t do anything with the information. A few months later I received an email from a cousin living in PA. What made the connection so extraordinary is that I hadn’t had contact with this side of my family in 30 years- when I was last there to visit when I was 12 and my Nana died. This cousin, Chris, is the son of my Nana’s sister’s daughter. Our common ancestor is a Troop.
My first 2 experiences in the temple involved a Witman and a Troop.
I got bold and asked if I could come visit and learn about my family from them. Turns out that Chris is a major genealogy and local history buff and he’s not a member of the church. I decided to ask my father if he wanted to join me and possibly see his half sisters while we were there. He hated his father and lost all contact with his Witman family. Surprisingly he agreed and Chris’s mom knew how to find all the sisters and set up the meeting.
This is my Witman and Troop line reunited. My dad’s mother Olivia Troop married Tobias Witman. That’s how the 2 lines are related. My dad and his step mother are in the middle. I can’t even describe what the meeting was like. For me to see people with my features. To see personality traits that I acquired from them. To look through and scan tons of photos. For my father to make peace with his past and hear their side of the story. To find out that his father mourned for the loss of their relationship until the day he died. I have never experienced such a strong sense of belonging. It was celestial.
We were there for a week and spent our time seeing where our ancestors lived and visiting every cemetery that had our ancestors in. To stand on the literal spot my family members were, made it all so real. I even found an ancestor that I was looking and looking for- Emma Witman’s husband. She had died at the age of 25 and had a son. I couldn’t find any trace of them. When I was just about to leave one of the cemeteries, my eye caught a tombstone that was leaning against another. When I pulled it away (and let the bugs scatter) who was buried there? Emma’s husband. His new wife and their children were next to him. I started jumping around. I had so many cool experiences like that - which was cool to share with my family who aren’t members. In many cases we were literally guided by the Holy Ghost to parts of a cemetery to find ancestors.
If that’s not cool enough, a few months ago I received a letter from Chris saying that he had met another Troop. This man had flown to PA to meet him and he had lots of information for us for our shared line. He told me that this person lived in NM somewhere and that maybe I should give him a call. Well, I hate doing that. So I hadn’t gotten around to it yet. Until I received a text from my seminary supervisor who said “Hey, I’m sitting here eating lunch with my brother in law and you’re related!” I started crying. So, we had to meet and it was the best early Christmas present I could have received this year- we met in November.
Turns out my great great great grandfather and his great great are brothers. His grandmother is the one that joined the church (and has her own amazing story). All this time I had been thinking I was the only member and here I had been living in the same state just miles away for 17 years. His name is R.W, and is a very loved member of the church who was a stake president. Turns out he also knows a friend of ours who is the Stake President of the Rio Rancho stake and he asked if he knew me. Fun connection- he told R that he needed to watch my FH video (which I didn’t even know this friend had seen). R is so proud of my video and said he shows it to everyone and says he’s related to me. He had been searching for years to figure out the hole in his family history that meeting Chris and I filled in.
I was able to talk about it with Chris and tell him the connection and he sent me this picture of their visit together.
It’s hard to adequately express how deep my feelings of love and awe go for the deep and abiding knowledge I now have of the plan of salvation and my role in this great and marvelous plan, and most days I feel completely unworthy of the experiences I’ve had. I laughed with R that my poor Troop ancestors are stuck with me and they’ve had to take charge to make things happen since I won’t. I’m truly not deserving of the blessings I’ve had.
I hope this brings strength into your life like it has to mine, and you can be assured of your great role in the plan as well. You are doing a great work!
Love Always,
Heather Ivey
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