Aug 5, 2012

Good day? Who starts off emails like that?

Haha sorry Mom, but you probably do miss me winding you up all the time. And I just remembered I don't actually call you mom, I only called you mother. And for a while I got in the habit of calling dad Joel. Haha he didn't really like that.

I loved the waterton challenge. I will need to set the record one day.

And sounds like a crazy hailstorm. That time I had with Grandpa to do the shingles was a good bonding time for us. Maybe Riley can go down and help as well and get to spend a weekend with those guys before he leaves. I really enjoyed getting to do that. Enjoy the rest of your summer away from home, sounds like it will be pretty good.

So this week was good. Probably the hardest part was fasting. I think on average we cycle around 10-15 miles a day. I am still losing weight and feeling really good, I have a 6 pack on the way even. I do sit-ups in the morning. But so this week it was like 20-30 degrees every day and not much rain. We had our usual Sunday roast at Odilia's at 1 after church. Since it was fast sunday, we started our fast at around

12 on saturday. We then went out and worked all day. We had to do two massive hill climbs. We had a busy day and put in a lot of miles on Saturday. All with no food and no water. Erickson like shut down. I was barely keeping moving as well. We made it to church Sunday morning on the bikes, and after church we just had to get to this lunch appointment. But it was a big hill climb. And I was in my suit jacket.

It was scorching hot and we were both like delirious. I think I had reached the point where I couldn't even sweat anymore. We barely made it to her house, and Erickson was way behind me. We finally got there and just like collapsed on the couch while she got the meal ready. She knows I love Dr. Pepper and buys a 2L bottle every week, and I seriously drank like at least a litre and a half. As well as downing my entire water bottle and just devouring all the food. I think we were both really dehydrated. I didn't (couldn't) go to the bathroom for like 2 days. But we are feeling better now. Back home I would usually just sneak downstairs and eat food in the storage room right after church. That was the hardest fast of my life.

Something good happened as well this week. We have been teaching this Ursula lady. She is really cool, but just wasn't seeming to understand everything we taught. And she had committed to come to church for the last 2 weeks but both times she cancelled last minute. She has a lot of anxiety about crowds and new people and stuff. But we have gone there quite a bit and she has an 8 year old daughter who really likes us, so we got her daughter to really pressure her to come, and we did a lesson about church and everything and amazingly, she came! That was yesterday, and it went so well. A member named Shirley gave her a lift, and when Shirley knocked on her door to pick her up, she had bought her a big boquet of flowers to say thanks! And when she got to church, she had bought us each a banana milkshake and reeses peanut butter cups because Erickson casually mentioned he loved them like 2 weeks ago. The ward was really good, people talked to her and sat by her, and then at the end Shirley invited Ursula over to her house tonight to have an FHE evening with us and some other branch members.

Ursula's daughter seemed to enjoy church as well. So things are going really good with her. And last week she accepted to be baptized on Sept. 8, and now she has come to church that is actually a possibility. And her 8 year old daughter could as well! We are both really excited. I know that a month is a long time and there are always going to be issues as someone moves towards baptism, but she really wants to and she says she knows this church is true and the BoM is true and everything. The first few times we taught her she was saying she couldn't understand what the BoM was saying. This week we assigned her to read 2 Nephi 9, and the next day she sent us a really long text telling us all about what she learned, and she pulled a lot out of it. And then when she got to church she had her BoM with her, and she had pages and pages just full of notes she has taken and things she has been learning as she has read way more than anything we have assigned her. And she is saying she knows it is God that has helped her to make sense of the Book. So it's all really good. The only problem is she smokes about 10 a day. I took all her toabbaco last week but she bought more a few hours later. We just need to help her conquer that last hurdle.

Aside from that, just tons of knocking. We have stayed happy by knocking what we call 'Chav madness.' I might have told you about chav's before. Well in this country if you don't have a job, the government gives you a house and a bunch of money. So all these council houses are all in the same area, or what we call estates. You get these massive neighborhoods of unemployed, uneducated, no ambition, no future chavs all living in the same place. It is just like a breeding ground for everything wrong in the world. All the houses have tons of rubbish in the front yards, it is always just dirty, these chav kids are always running around causing havoc. But we just both find it so entertaining and people just say and do the funniest things.

We taught more lessons this week than I ever have before on Guernsey, so our teaching pool is getting a bit bigger and some of the finding is paying off. Still a bit slow, but Erickson is getting used to it and this Ursula thing has him pretty excited as well. Holly also has introduced us to one of her friends, Hannah. Hannah is pretty interested but has a pretty shady lifestyle.

I can't belive that this transfer is already over. I think it has been one of my fastest ones. I think I got a bit better at training. I've learned a lot. I would love to have the chance to train again and see what I would do differently. So Wednesday is transfer day. I really want to stay here for 1 more transfer and then move. I am pretty sure that neither of us will transfer, because training is supposed to last for 12 weeks or 2 transfers. And we are getting along great so there is no need to seperate us. I have been blessed with really good companions. Most people have that one or maybe two tough companions they serve with at some point. Maybe I am that companion or something.

So ya, that's our week.