FELIZ VALETINOS DIA!

Happy Valentine's Day!,

Hah, well for all the stuff I've heard about Obama from people on my mission, he certainly gets 10 coolness points in my book for being a world leader and using the word "Snowmageddon". Ha. Here in Utah the snow seems to have stopped in a record timing, and the snow that has been around since Novemeber is actually melting a bit... weird. Everyone's telling me that Virginia is permanently an arctic zone, and it seems like that's true, wow. Glad everyone is surviving and enjoying the snow, good luck! Bacon and sticks were my first concern as well Amy. I was immediately thinking when I heard about it all, that you guys sent me possibly the world's best bacon at Christmas, and would thusly now be baconless to face the elements. (btw, was that really safe to eat? I got scared from the reviews...)


Speaking of pork products, I tried one of the first things I couldn't eat on my mission. After Church on Sunday, we went over to a sweet family's house and had a meal, and after some spicy meat stuff, the mom got a crazy look and started making something. "Tostilocos." Crazy toasts? doesn't make sense, but she poured out a bag of chips, cucumbers, sevreral cans of tomato juice and salsa, and then "cuerditos." Yes, I asked what that was and no one could answer me. I found the can and its... pickled pieces of pork skin? I think maybe people eat something like that in the States, but this was too much. I coud not eat it. They were little white strips, you could see the pores and yeah... very chewy, pig skin... about a 1/4 inch thick. We just had to go right home afterward. Ugh.

Hmm, other news... my watch broke, and I held it together ingeniously with dental floss for a week, but have now repaired it after an hour of work on P-day...

There is a family - the Bucaro family, and they have a crazy dog. Like Beethoven crazy, running all over a small aprtment, ate stuff off my plate at dinner yesterday, etc. I mentioned that Holly likes all animals, and they are making plans to ship it to our home. They beg you to take it Holly, and love it. It slobbered all over my pants too. Yup. Named Rocky.

I have been thinking about Grandma and Grandpa's baptism. I do actually talk about it every once in a while. People ask "You were just born into this, etc etc" and I can say yes I was, but my granparents weren't and this is what happened... powerful story. I'm curious to know more, actually, about when they knew the book of mormon was true, or how it was going to Church for the first time, or if it was hard to accept new ideas and such. What their friends thought, and how they changed from before and after... would be interesting. Might help some.

Carla didn't get baptized yet- she got a double job and is working like mad, BUT she declared firmly she wouldn't work on Sundays, and isn't now! In two jobs! And I'm not sure if we mentioned, but we taught a FHE there with her kids, and they said they want to be baptized too!! All of them will be baptized together on the 20th as a family. Sweet family, happy, they help each other out, and every commandment, Carla accepts it firmly. We taught tithing, and she told US "I want to do that, that would be right. We could help other people with it." Yes exactly!

We also found a 20 year old from El Salvador that will be baptized the 27th - also named Carla. And many more people on the verge. Exciting, just need to make it happen now...

Well, certainly glad to hear that all the medical situations are improving, and Colton and Robert are doing better.  Superbowl? hah. No one in the Spanish world watches that, World Cup is where its at.

Thursday I hit one year! I honestly cannot believe that. It feels like a week or two, and yet I remember things from last summer that seem like an eternity ago. Crazy. I realized I've probably shaken hands with several thousand people by now from all over the world. And I still am relatively healthy. Cool.

I hope the snow stops at some point and you can go skiing for real before the spring, and that someone makes some good Calvin and Hobbes snowmen. I love you all, and think about you often. The Church is true. I've exmined a lot lately about how Christ is the fruit in Lehi's vision, He is the end of the seed of faith we plant that Alma talks about, and He is real. Coming to Him is the goal - coming to know Him, be healed and rescued by Him, walk with Him, be like Him. I feel like I'm at the very start, but it comes. He lives. Crazy that some people think we aren't Christians.

Take care!

Elder Thelin

Ps yes I laughed mom.

PPs Someone nabbed the packet of pics and stuff and hasn't been able to deliver it to me yet. Soon.

Ppppps I'm in process of sending pics too

Pppsneijhgosihsssss ...pulled to safety just as a terrible roar shook Tokyo. What could it be? asked Amy. Heidi cried "LOOK!" as a ginormous monster rose up over the skyscrapers breathing fire down on the city. "GODZILLA!!!!!"