October 29, 2018
Hi Jon. I hope you're doing well and that all your investigators came to church yesterday. It's cool that you have a new comp and get to show him around your area.
We've had a beautiful fall week. The colors are amazing and it has been pretty warm. I got my skis tuned up at Nymans and bought my season pass at Sundance so I'm ready for the snow to begin! Just kidding, I like the warm weather more so I don't want it to end. Aimar has been crazy about frisbee golf lately so I've been out there practicing and getting better. It's pretty nice to have great weather and be able to walk around the park throwing the frisbee.
We carved pumpkins yesterday. Usually mom does that stuff but I never participate so this year I got determined to do my own pumpkin. A few weeks ago I went shooting with Nate and we passed a farm that had pumpkins so I bought some for us to carve. But these pumpkins were huge! More than 35 lbs each. I carved a vampire Pac-Man with fangs about to chomp on a ghost and I think it turned out pretty good. Emily and Mom made more elaborate carvings but I'm not that good.
They put your missionary plaque up in our ward and every time mom walks by it she starts crying. I think she misses you a lot. We all do but I think the rest of us are dealing with it better. Yesterday we played your Christmas videos for the past few years so Aimar could see what you're like and afterwards I realized that it was a really stupid idea because all of us were really sad. I asked Russ Barnett to take your missionary plaque down because I don't want mom crying every time we go to church but then she texted Russ not to. Don't worry about Mom it's just something we all go through and we all have to get through it.
Aimar had a soccer game on Saturday and he kicked a goal so he's super excited about that. I kayaked the Provo River on Saturday from the Dam down to the Railroad bridge but the water was so low that it wasn't much fun at all. Some friends asked me if I wanted to go and I said yes but I wouldn't do it again when the water is so low.
Chance is in a Timpview production of Into the Woods and his rehearsal schedule is getting crazy because the actual shows start in a week or two. He's spending 11-12 hours at school every day and another 8 hours on Saturday. Chance is on the Stake Youth Council and he spoke at the stake youth fireside last night. I'll tell you that Chance does not lack confidence. He's about the most confident guy I know. He's pretty popular with the girls too. He hangs out with Macy Gwynn 3 or 4 days a week and he's often bringing groups of other girls home to watch scary movies on Netflix. I don't think he is romantic with anyone and Mom and I continually warn him about the perils of dating a "wardie" but I think Macy is really great. Chance should be getting his drivers license in 2 weeks but something tells me he has flaked on taking his drivers exam so it probably won't happen. Not my problem - I'm trying to step back and let Chance take responsibility for his life however that works out. I have asked him about 10 times to register to take the next ACT and yesterday I asked him straight up if he was registered or not and he immediately got this sheepish look and said no. At least he was honest about it. Then I made him register online before he was allowed to leave the room.
My spiritual thought for you this week is You have it good!
When you are out there in the mission field, you may start to wonder and think about how hard you have it – or maybe even what a big sacrifice you are making. Well I have got some sobering news for you. I saw a letter that was copied around in the MTC that was unfortunately called “It sucks”. I wished I could find it and include it here for you but can't. It was full of stuff that basically said how hard life is and a mission is nothing compared to the rest. The moral of the story is this: Life is hard.
Life is not fair and you get out of life what you put into it. A mission is really an easy thing when you consider all other areas of life. I will explain. While on a mission, you have no bills for what may be the only time in your life. Most of the world would call this easy street. No bills!
You have children all over the world praying for you every day, when you are working hard or not! People are praying for you in every prayer circle in every session in every temple every hour of every day around the world! You have what may be the only chance in your entire life to stay entirely focused on one thing. And it happens to be a really important thing – the Gospel! More than likely, everyone you’ve ever known is supporting you emotionally, spiritually, and temporally. You may not realize it, but later in life decisions become hard. You may do things that others will not approve of or support. But right now you have their full support! In a way, all your decisions should be easy. The question “do I keep finding more people today?” is a much easier one to handle than “Brother so-and-so has cancer and we need to find some way to help him”.
While you are in the mission, everyone that you know back home supports you. That may not happen again in your lifetime. You have money that just comes in each month like manna from above! Your life is more structured than it will ever be. How cool is that? In many ways it really doesn’t get any better than this.
So forget about how hard you think you may have it. Life will be a lot worse and you should soak in all the good things around you now. Sit back relax and ponder how good you have it and then get to work!
Love,
Dad
We've had a beautiful fall week. The colors are amazing and it has been pretty warm. I got my skis tuned up at Nymans and bought my season pass at Sundance so I'm ready for the snow to begin! Just kidding, I like the warm weather more so I don't want it to end. Aimar has been crazy about frisbee golf lately so I've been out there practicing and getting better. It's pretty nice to have great weather and be able to walk around the park throwing the frisbee.
We carved pumpkins yesterday. Usually mom does that stuff but I never participate so this year I got determined to do my own pumpkin. A few weeks ago I went shooting with Nate and we passed a farm that had pumpkins so I bought some for us to carve. But these pumpkins were huge! More than 35 lbs each. I carved a vampire Pac-Man with fangs about to chomp on a ghost and I think it turned out pretty good. Emily and Mom made more elaborate carvings but I'm not that good.
They put your missionary plaque up in our ward and every time mom walks by it she starts crying. I think she misses you a lot. We all do but I think the rest of us are dealing with it better. Yesterday we played your Christmas videos for the past few years so Aimar could see what you're like and afterwards I realized that it was a really stupid idea because all of us were really sad. I asked Russ Barnett to take your missionary plaque down because I don't want mom crying every time we go to church but then she texted Russ not to. Don't worry about Mom it's just something we all go through and we all have to get through it.
Aimar had a soccer game on Saturday and he kicked a goal so he's super excited about that. I kayaked the Provo River on Saturday from the Dam down to the Railroad bridge but the water was so low that it wasn't much fun at all. Some friends asked me if I wanted to go and I said yes but I wouldn't do it again when the water is so low.
Chance is in a Timpview production of Into the Woods and his rehearsal schedule is getting crazy because the actual shows start in a week or two. He's spending 11-12 hours at school every day and another 8 hours on Saturday. Chance is on the Stake Youth Council and he spoke at the stake youth fireside last night. I'll tell you that Chance does not lack confidence. He's about the most confident guy I know. He's pretty popular with the girls too. He hangs out with Macy Gwynn 3 or 4 days a week and he's often bringing groups of other girls home to watch scary movies on Netflix. I don't think he is romantic with anyone and Mom and I continually warn him about the perils of dating a "wardie" but I think Macy is really great. Chance should be getting his drivers license in 2 weeks but something tells me he has flaked on taking his drivers exam so it probably won't happen. Not my problem - I'm trying to step back and let Chance take responsibility for his life however that works out. I have asked him about 10 times to register to take the next ACT and yesterday I asked him straight up if he was registered or not and he immediately got this sheepish look and said no. At least he was honest about it. Then I made him register online before he was allowed to leave the room.
My spiritual thought for you this week is You have it good!
When you are out there in the mission field, you may start to wonder and think about how hard you have it – or maybe even what a big sacrifice you are making. Well I have got some sobering news for you. I saw a letter that was copied around in the MTC that was unfortunately called “It sucks”. I wished I could find it and include it here for you but can't. It was full of stuff that basically said how hard life is and a mission is nothing compared to the rest. The moral of the story is this: Life is hard.
Life is not fair and you get out of life what you put into it. A mission is really an easy thing when you consider all other areas of life. I will explain. While on a mission, you have no bills for what may be the only time in your life. Most of the world would call this easy street. No bills!
You have children all over the world praying for you every day, when you are working hard or not! People are praying for you in every prayer circle in every session in every temple every hour of every day around the world! You have what may be the only chance in your entire life to stay entirely focused on one thing. And it happens to be a really important thing – the Gospel! More than likely, everyone you’ve ever known is supporting you emotionally, spiritually, and temporally. You may not realize it, but later in life decisions become hard. You may do things that others will not approve of or support. But right now you have their full support! In a way, all your decisions should be easy. The question “do I keep finding more people today?” is a much easier one to handle than “Brother so-and-so has cancer and we need to find some way to help him”.
While you are in the mission, everyone that you know back home supports you. That may not happen again in your lifetime. You have money that just comes in each month like manna from above! Your life is more structured than it will ever be. How cool is that? In many ways it really doesn’t get any better than this.
So forget about how hard you think you may have it. Life will be a lot worse and you should soak in all the good things around you now. Sit back relax and ponder how good you have it and then get to work!
Love,
Dad
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