I laughed when I found a cute little paper heart taped to our pumpkin door sign.
The Lateys are the type of people I aspire to be...not just builders who help people feel loved, but true friends that listen without judgment and show up when it matters.
So....we were thrilled to hear they were coming to Utah last week for BYU homecoming and extra glad that their responsibilities as alumni directors for the Philly area didn't keep them too busy to come visit us.
And of course we had to share the story of the paper heart with them (which I'm totally leaving up as long as possible)...
I still don’t know all the reasons why we needed to live in Pennsylvania for two years, but meeting the Latey family was definitely one of them!
It took me a minute to remember where it came from, but when I did it made me smile even more.
Here’s the story…
As most of you all know, we lived in the same house in Virginia for 20 years. Moving to Pennsylvania in 2019 was a HUGE leap of faith for us, but we felt strongly that that’s where we were supposed to be, and we went with open hearts, ready to embrace our new community. Six months into our new adventure, COVID kicked in and Pennsylvania locked down hard. We had already struggled to find our footing with the new social landscape of PA anyway and we found that COVID made it infinitely harder. Then our landlords came home from their overseas sabbatical and we found out that we had to move yet again.
That’s where the cute paper heart comes in. In the summer of 2020, we moved to the new house in Phoenixville…just 20 minutes away from our old one….but in a whole new ward and community. Honestly we were feeling quite lonely at this point and pretty discouraged at what our prospects looked like—with almost nothing happening in person to give us the opportunity to get to know people and me having some strained/weird social things going on with the old ward.
As most of you all know, we lived in the same house in Virginia for 20 years. Moving to Pennsylvania in 2019 was a HUGE leap of faith for us, but we felt strongly that that’s where we were supposed to be, and we went with open hearts, ready to embrace our new community. Six months into our new adventure, COVID kicked in and Pennsylvania locked down hard. We had already struggled to find our footing with the new social landscape of PA anyway and we found that COVID made it infinitely harder. Then our landlords came home from their overseas sabbatical and we found out that we had to move yet again.
That’s where the cute paper heart comes in. In the summer of 2020, we moved to the new house in Phoenixville…just 20 minutes away from our old one….but in a whole new ward and community. Honestly we were feeling quite lonely at this point and pretty discouraged at what our prospects looked like—with almost nothing happening in person to give us the opportunity to get to know people and me having some strained/weird social things going on with the old ward.
That’s when the dear Latey family swooped in and made sure we knew we were loved and welcomed. I think we initially bonded over sweet sister missionaries starting their missions only a few weeks apart and both getting reassigned to Utah, but the connection definitely went beyond that and they made sure we didn't get lost in COVID anonymity. They sent us letters, they invited us for socially distanced walks, and one day we came home to our door covered with hearts and sweet welcoming messages. They didn't let us feel forgotten and it meant the world to us.
The Lateys are the type of people I aspire to be...not just builders who help people feel loved, but true friends that listen without judgment and show up when it matters.
So....we were thrilled to hear they were coming to Utah last week for BYU homecoming and extra glad that their responsibilities as alumni directors for the Philly area didn't keep them too busy to come visit us.
We had a lovely visit together and enjoyed catching up and renewing our friendship!
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