Our ward has organized the parents who have missionaries serving to get together and share pictures, stories, and ideas with one another on a quarterly basis in each other’s homes.
This past Saturday evening we hosted it in our home and started with a pot-luck dinner where each set of parents (some are single parents) brought a dish representing a food from the area in which their missionary is serving – a great conversation piece in itself!
We passed around pics we have received from our missionaries and shared information. We also forward our emails from our missionaries to each other. Our Bishop also sends the emails to the Priests in the ward in hopes it will encourage them to prepare to serve.
We then discussed what others have or are doing for their missionaries for Christmas. One couple who has their second missionary serving said they took a piece of blank newsprint and set a length for each missionary serving in their ward on a long table in the cultural hall and announced in sacrament meeting and other meetings that they were all encouraged to write a note to the missionaries to wish them well.
On the top of each page was “Happy Holidays (missionaries name) from your ward family!” They had a few weeks and when it was time, they folded it up and sent it in a manila envelope and got very positive replies from the missionaries who received them. The family with their 2nd missionary out said that the Father received such a Christmas gift while he was serving and both he and his first missionary have kept theirs and they will always be treasured. Some who wrote thoughts for them may never be seen again, but they will never be forgotten either!