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Elder Nelson - The Kids are Coming!

Dear Family,

Mission News

This was Zone Conference week. We had Zone Conferences Wednesday, Thursday and Friday. This meant that the office was quiet because the other two missionary couples are gone most of the day doing car inspections. Mom and I went for part of the day on Friday. The theme was “Finding through Members”. These missionaries get a ton more training that I got.

At the zone conference that our neighbor that moved a few weeks ago, went to Church last Sunday. But it appears that he was not overly impressed. We will see. We told the Sisters that if they wanted us to come to a discussion, we would gladly come.

I went to a district council to the Old Towne district in Mt. Vernon. This district is a Spanish speaking district, but they spoke in English while I was there. I left early so they could do their practice teaching in Spanish.

On Friday we went on a teaching meeting with Nancy. This meeting was good. The missionaries taught most of the discussion on the Plan of Salvation. Lucas, the 10-year-old boy did not attend, but he had a buddy there that participated. This little guy quoted verses from Isaiah and Romans. Rosella, the 18-year-old daughter participated. The Elders brought a white board and see drew pictures of the Plan of Salvation and annotated them too. She enjoyed doing it. Mom thinks that Nancy, the mother, has some learning disabilities. There was a good spirit there.

Rosella loves to sing, and she sings in the choir at the Catholic Church. This is a barrier for attending Church with us. Nancy likes to go and support here daughter.

Fun Stuff

We went to a baptism yesterday and the brother that was baptized is a paraplegic. Two brethren held him up in the font while one said the prayer. Then they both immersed him. He bore a tender testimony at the end of the baptism. It took him 5 years to decide to make this commitment. Again, there was a very good spirit.

WES News

My partner made me an offer to buy him out. The offer was not fair from our perspective. I don’t know what we should do. I will think about it in our spare time.

Family News

Derek and Family will be here in an hour.

Chelsea and Kent will be here in 12 days.

Susie St. Pierre helped us with a couple of tax questions. She was very helpful! I hope she will help me with a couple of more.

The weather is warming up and Mom turned on the air conditioner in the car. It was 70 outside. There are buds on the trees. In a few weeks things ought to get green again.

We have been on our mission 6 months today. In some ways it seems like the time has gone fast and, in some ways, not so fast. We are enjoying our mission more now that we know the younger missionaries better and are participating more in “missionary work”. It feels good to me to be actively engaged in building the Kingdom. Our alarm goes off at 5:55 and we usually go to bed around 10:30 or 11:00. Our days are full. Missionary work is work. The work is not always so glamorous or exciting, but we are contributing even if it in just a small way. That feels good.

Mom struggles with the current systems in place for the finance. She works longer by far than any of the other seniors and runs into more “hair-pulling” problems. There is a computer guru in our stake that will be able help overcoming some of the hurdles. We ask him to come after Derek and family leave.

Love,
Dad

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