My uncle John

I flew back to VA this last weekend with my family to attend the funeral for my dear uncle John.  He passed on January 3rd from stage 4 Glioblastoma, a rare brain cancer.  We miss him so much already.

We all found out about John's diagnosis in October 2013.  Just to give you a look at how John and Cindy are, I thought I'd share this.  I was newly pregnant with Janie and had just gone to my 11 week appointment.  This was October 16th.  I got back to my mom's and sent the text announcing our pregnancy to any family I had #'s for in my phone - cousins, aunts, uncles.  The texts started pouring in and Cindy was one that sent her congratulations and well wishes.  Not even an hour or two later my mom called me, crying, and said John was in emergency surgery to have a tumor removed from his brain (I hope I have the details right).  And that's where it all began.  I burst into tears and was in complete and utter shock.  And then I told my mom, through tears, how kind Cindy had been to text me back earlier, when she was sitting in the hospital having one of the worst days of her life.  I love you Cindy.  You have been such an example to me through all of this.

Just thought I'd share that because it's a day I'll never forget.

Last week my mom gathered letters with memories of John from any of the family that wanted to participate, and we presented that book to Cindy and the girls after the funeral.  I thought I'd take a minute to write some of those down here, as well as some that I've thought of since then.  We lived by the Lund's for as long as I can remember.  They moved to Virginia when Jordan was just a toddler, so I was 3 or 4, and we lived by them until my parents moved to AZ right after Trent and I got married six and a half years ago, so I have A LOT of memories with John and the Lund family.  I'm sorry if this is long winded.

It's funny because, although we lived by the Lund's, my biggest memories with John are from being at my grandparents' lake house on Canandaigua Lake in New York.  He was THE boatman.  We learned at the funeral when John's sister spoke, that they all learned how to swim before they learned how to walk, so John has always loved the water.  And that definitely showed at the lake house.  He was good at everything!  He pretty much taught ALL of us cousins to water ski.  I think I was 10 or 11 when my grandparents got the lake house, and our first summer there, John took us all out on the boat and offered 10 bucks to any of us girls who would get out and try skiing and stay up for 30 seconds.  We were all nervous, but that gave me just the nudge I needed ;)  And John was right there, out in the water with me, helping me get in position, encouraging me and cheering me on.  He was one of the most patient men I know.

John was most definitely the fun uncle.  He was the one that would take us out on night boat rides and do crazy things.  One of my favorite memories is from the last time I was at the lake house, end of July 2013, when John took a whole bunch of us cousins down to this huge home that has a high diving board on top of their boat house dock thing.  Some of my cousins had spotted it during the day and decided they wanted to jump off it, but we had to do it at night so we wouldn't get caught..haha.  I did not participate in jumping off, but I was back on the boat with a handful of others, and John was just as giddy and excited as the rest of us.  I will never forget the smile on his face and his laughter.  Seriously, he was so much fun!!

I do have this great memory from high school.  My junior and senior year of high school we spent a lot of time with Jordan (and Melissa too).  Those were great times!!  One year we were all getting ready to go to a family reunion and it was a cruise departing out of Florida. The Lund's headed down earlier than the rest of us because they wanted to spend a few days at Disney World (I believe) before the cruise.  Well we thought we had this brilliant idea to go heart attack Jordan's bedroom.  We were with a friend, Josh, and I think Devin too, and Josh told us he knew the garage code.  He punched it in, the garage went up, and then he went to open the back door, but their house alarm went off!!!  We were mortified!  My oldest cousin, Dan, was living with the Lund's at the time, interning, and by some miracle, he came driving up just a minute or two later, so he called John to figure out what to do.  Needless to say, we were very nervous to see John when we met up with everyone in Florida for the reunion, but I don't even remember John saying hardly anything about it.  He was never quick to anger and I'm sure he just laughed it off..haha.

The summer after my freshman year of college, I was only home for a few months before I headed back to Utah to start summer term at BYU (I had transferred from, then, UVSC).  I didn't really have any prospect for a job because I was home for such a short time, but then John offered me a job.  To be honest, I don't really know if he needed my help or if it was just a little job he made up to help me out.  Nonetheless it was so kind of him and so perfect for that short time I was home.  I was so grateful to him and will never forget it.

John also put tons of work into his backyard for our wedding reception.  If you've seen the Lund's backyard, it is spectacular, and I would have been happy with it just the way it was, but I guess John worked really hard on it on the weeks leading up to our wedding. And after all of that hard work, it ended up raining the whole week prior to our wedding and we had to move our reception inside (which was still so beautiful)!!  He was always one to serve with a genuine smile on his face.

Here are just a handful of pictures from our reunion at the lake house in July 2013, just months before John was diagnosed.

Letting Aiden "drive" the boat :)

That summer John was teaching us all how to wake surf.  Here he is showing us how it's done ;)

This is a dorky picture of me, but there you see John, right there on the back of the boat, coaching me.  He was the best!

Here's John skiing with his 3 oldest girls - Jordan, Melissa, and Amanda.  I love that he and Melissa were holding hands :)

We got a whole bunch of pies one night and I was getting a photo of them when John jumped in.  Seriously, he was so much fun!!

The funeral was so beautiful and I was so grateful I made it back.  I would have never missed it.  A big thanks to Trent for staying behind with the kids.  Trent would have loved to come, but naturally, it was a little last minute.

We all arrived Friday evening and pretty much headed straight to the visitation with Cindy and her girls.  We were all so nervous to walk into the funeral home and see them that evening, we were just feeling so heartbroken for them, but it was so good to see them.  It seriously felt like they were comforting us more than we were comforting them.  They all inspire me.

Saturday was the funeral.  There was the most beautiful slide show going with all of these pictures of John and his family right as you walked into the church.  I don't think a single person went by that without crying.  John lived such a beautiful life.

As I mentioned earlier, John's sister was the first to speak.  She started off by saying something to the extent of, "Now all of you here know the East Coast John, but I'm here to tell you about the California boy."  It was very sweet and we loved hearing about John's life growing up.  Next up was one of John's coworkers.  He talked about how they'd be in a business meeting where John had printed the agenda and this friend always noticed notes and diagrams on the backside.  After a few meetings, and noticing this every time, he confronted John and John just mentioned that he doesn't like to waste paper so he always uses both sides..haha.  He also talked about John's service as bishop of his ward (John was called as bishop just months before his diagnosis and served for over a year).  Then each of John's five daughters spoke.  Brittany started, then Amanda, Melissa, and Jordan.  They were all so beautiful sitting up on the stand and gave very touching talks.  They had us all laughing and crying.  They talked about John as a morning person, his famous pancakes (which he made all the time at the lake house), dance parties in the kitchen, his passion for Animal Planet, his wonderful example, and so on.  He was the most amazing father and husband. And then Courtney read John's testimony to all of us.  It was very sweet.

After the funeral, we headed to the cemetery and my uncle Cary gave a beautiful prayer to dedicate the grave.

Thank you to my mom for all of the pictures.

John's most beautiful family.  Look at his adorable grandson, Adler :)

Then we all headed to their Church where the Lunds' ward put on a luncheon for us all.

My mom, Jordan, and Tori all have the same coat!

Every immediate cousin made it back to the funeral, except for Samantha who's serving a mission in Germany.  Only Richard, Trent, my kids, and Rach's 3 oldest kids didn't make it.  Love this family of mine.  Truly my best friends.

The six siblings.

Our family.  It had been so long that it was just the 7 of us!  Don't get me wrong, we missed you Trent and Richard ;)

During the luncheon we (all of John's Whitmore nieces and nephews) presented Cindy and the girls with a portrait of Christ hugging a little girl.  We each signed the back.  Thank you to Rach and the Whitmore family for organizing that for us.

Later that evening we all met back up at the Lund's home and presented them with the memory book that I mentioned earlier.

John was the most wonderful husband, father, uncle, friend, and example, and I'm not just saying it.  John, you are already so dearly missed.

To Cindy and the girls -  I can only imagine the pain of losing your spouse and father.  I know he will always be near.  Please know that we are all here for you always.  Thank goodness for the knowledge of the gospel, that you will be reunited again soon.  We love you all so much.