Tuesday, September 15, 2009

WE'RE ALL A LITTLE CRAZY

[Background editorial note: Chris has been randomly selected as a potential jury member for Culpeper County Circuit court. We have to send him a form to fill out in order for him to be exempt from this experience. Among the possible options are: having been convicted of treason or felony, being over 70, being a mother of a nursing child, being mentally impaired,or being personally responsible for a mentally impaired person--here at home we were having fun deciding which one Chris would choose as an excuse...the fact that he is simply not living here for the next two years is way too boring. We also got a notice that Chris owes $10 in overdue taxes for a little business selling toys and games online that he and Jeffrey started a few years ago. Clearly, Chris is a troublemaker.]

Hey, Family, whats up?

Yes, that is correct, I am a juror. I think I'll use that as a title from now on. Too bad I'm unable to fulfill my duty... I believe the "personally responsible for a person with a mental impairment requiring continuous care" is the option I'll take. I've already informed Elder Muro. He's not as crazy as Elder Gurrola, but still... c'mon, we're missionaries, we're all a little crazy.

Dad, just fork over 10 bucks. As CEO of Boompf Enterprises, I can't take the business to a bigger market with the history of offending a small farming county government like Culpeper. No one will respect the company. Plus someone might find out the business actually started in our basement in said farming community. If Boompf does go down for tax evasion, though, it would get me out of jury duty for sure.

Good job on your talk at church Amy! and Holly! That's really cool! And Happy Birthday again Ames! Hope Fred the frog gets along with the guppies. Fish are the best pets I think, because they don't make noise, don't smell... we did service for a family that RAISES dogs in their basement, and, well, it smelled, and there were like 50 puppies barking like crazy. They also had chickens. Holly would have loved it...

Speaking of birthdays, THANK YOU to EVERYONE - people have been quite jealous of the 5-6 packages and tons of letters I've gotten... it's all been great! Magura family, thank you for the recipe book! And all who contributed to it! It looks great, and I think I'll be trying it out today for P-day dinner! I'll see if I can use some of all this food we have in the fridge - people give us tons of stuff here, probably 4 bags of peaches, a bunch of fresh corn, cakes, trout, etc etc etc in our fridge. Hey, its Utah, remember? Also, thank you Aunt Jill--as ALWAYS, thank you for the letters and all you do to keep me updated. I always laugh when I read about Erica ("you are a TOY!") and all the adventures you all have. Kayla, haha, thanks for the box. Cd is sweet, and I'm finally gonna use them candles... lol. TO all, thank you for the cards and everything! It was a sweet continual birthday!

That's cool about Neil Anderson coming to your conference. He's already one of my favorite church leaders. Make sure to go meet him! And that's CRAZY about Steven and President Monson. That is definitely a once in a lifetime opportunity! Hope Steven ASKS QUESTIONS. I probably could think of a couple...!

Ha, this week we got to meet with some Church representatives (besides us I mean)- there is a council that works with the Mission President and the General Authorities over this area, and we met with them with one of our Branch councils. It was cool, they taught the Branch leaders how to do ward missionary work, and what they need to do to help us here in this area. It's a sweet plan Elder L. Tom Perry made for this area, and they are putting it into effect immediately. SO we now have a full crew of like 10 branch missionaries - like half of the adults from the ward basically - and a branch mission leader from the Dominican Republic (Hermano Luna, he is a host of a spanish radio station in the area, they call him the "Mayimbe"). We're teaching them how to give discussions and help us teach. This of course is a little nerve racking since, well, they aren't exactly trained in teaching skills, and tact, and....help. We began trying to teach them how to teach something easy on Sunday night. We got as far as the Creation of the world. We explained very carefully that they only have 20 minutes to cover it all, and to pretend they are teaching children - SUPER simple. You'd think, anyway. They made it about as complicated as you could imagine haha. Well, their hearts are in the right place.

Of course, not an hour later after we explained all that, a well-meaning couple comes with us to help teach a lesson with some investigators and, when they asked a simple question about Adam (as in Adam and Eve), the husband we brought said (in Spanish), "Oh yes, ADAM! VERY IMPORTANT..." and launches into a huge dissertation that didn't make a lot of sense, in Spanish or English. Our investigators were very kind about it, though, and politely nodded now and then with fairly blank stares. I love Utah.

Despite all of this "help" we're getting, we're doing well! We had 10 investigators show up at church in one branch on Sunday! Plus about 15 children that tagged along with the parents! Looked really good with the representatives from the mission being there and all...

Haha, and I think the other noteworthy thing is that we taught a Family Home Evening lesson in "Little Mexico" last night - a trailer park in Hyrum. I love trailers. We taught a member family, their 3 brothers' families, and a nonmember family. And all their tons of kids. Imagine, one room of a trailer. TWENTY THREE PEOPLE IN ONE ROOM.

Mom, I am GOING TO SEND THE PACKAGE and I have the contact prescription and info in it. I PROMISE IT'S COMING.

Yeah, about the new edition of the Spanish Bible you want to get me. I think we are going to go buy one next week, and see how much they cost and which is best. I don't know anything about the different ones, so we're going to go next week and get a ride to the store and stuff - maybe someone will buy one and we can check out theirs. Um, so if I pick it out, you can just, maybe put the money on my card? Sounds good. We're excited for it, since the current Spanish version we have is less than perfect without all the cross references or footnotes and stuff, plus very small print.

Well, I love you all. I hope all is going well, and everyone is happy and enjoying life. I know this gospel of Jesus Christ is true. I know the Spirit bears witness of its truthfulness. I am indeed amazed by the faith of all good Christian people - mom, you are right about that. We are all blessed beyond reason with light and truth. This gospel, this plan, requires faithful work from all. "For everyone to whom much is given, of him shall much be required." -- Luke 12:48

Well, gots to go! Love you all, tah tah for now!

-Elder Christopher Juror Thelin the Old.

PS. Sweet Jeff, 5k in 18:46 is a sweet time, how many miles is that? - keep it up, just don't wear yourself down! "It is not meet that man run faster than he hath strength..."

PPS HAPPY BIRTHDAY GRANDMA!!

PPPS [Enroute to Uruguay...] Just then the plane shook. "What is THAT?" Holly yelled. Amy saw out the front window. "Oh, it's a Pterodactyl!" (I can't remember how to spell it, I'm not 6 anymore...) "A WHAT?" yelled the girls. "WOOF WOOF WOOF?" barked the dogs. The plane shook again. Luke tried to steer the plane straight, but it was too late. The dinosaur grabbed the plane and steered it straight DOWN... into a small Pacific Island off the coast of Costa Rica. Just before they crashed into the trees, Heidi saw three things: fences, old buildings, and some animals with REALLY long necks...
PPPS2 Took pics at Logan temple, sweet, will send package I promise...

PPPPPs Any ideas on how to teach someone how to read? One of our investigators can't read Spanish (his native language), and we're trying to teach him, but we're kinda just making it up... teaching the alphabet... we pretty much figured we don't have time to really teach him, so we're going to have faith and read the Book of Mormon out loud, and have him point to the words and say them after us. Someone said that it is easy to help teach children to read from the Book of Mormon (remember hearing some of the homeschoolers do this), and they will learn. Maybe it works on adults? Any thoughts for an easy way to teach might be useful... definitely interesting working with a grown man, pointing to letters and trying to get him to learn them. "That's "jota". "Oh, ok. S, right?" No..... "De." "S?" .... "A." "Oh, ok. S." sigh....

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