Week 71

AREA: Tucson—Midvale

COMPANION: Elder Blacker 

Family & Friends,

Monday: Pretty typical pday other than the fact we didnt go to sports.
This morning our laundry card wasn't working which was annoying so it
took an hour just to get it started. After all that we did all the
usual stuff... cleaned, ate, showered, and shopped. Went to the
library for a couple hours before dinner. Had dinner at Buffalo Wild
Wings with some sisters from the ward. When we got there a member came
up to us and asked if he knew where the ward meets which was pretty
cool. After that we spent the rest of the night just doing whatever...

Tuesday: Super fun day:) instead of having a typical Tuesday, we had
the Christmas Conference. Had a lot of fun there and got to see a lot
of missionaries that I haven't seen in a long time. At the party we
had a few fun activities such as making snowflakes, writing notes to
the temple construction workers for the temple, socializing, and
eating a bunch of food. At the conference, President and Sister Passey
invited everyone in the mission to read the Book of Mormon by Easter.
While reading it, we are to pick a principle or purpose behind our
study. Excited to get started on that, I just need to pick the topic
to study. After the meeting we went and saw the temple site and it is
looking beautiful. Nothing has changed much on the outside, but I'm
sure the inside changes everyday. We then went home, went to dinner
with Sister Dilley at Fry's, who by the way is AWESOME!!! She gave us
two giant bags of grocery's too!

Wednesday: Happy first day of winter! Haha kinda a joke, it rained on
and off all day. This morning we were kinda just bouncing around
trying to find things to do. We met with Sister Cole and she was super
nice and gave us each some money:) such a big help:) we then helped a
potential investigator family move stuff out of a storage unit into a
U-haul and it took a lot longer than we thought it would. It made it
so we were about an hour late for our dinner. After dinner we just
went home for the night.

Thursday: Today was a pretty good day. I had a doctors appointment
with my psyche and had a pretty good appointment with him. After that
we wanted to try this authentic Philly cheesesteak place which was
very good. They import there bread in from Philly and you can
definitely tell, its stale ;) jk Its amazing. After that we headed
over to someone's house to help them move some things. Picked up a
package from Savannah at the office:) and then had dinner with sister
dilley again but this time at Costco. We then helped a new family move
into their house.

Friday: Today was a pretty awesome Friday. This morning was kinda
disorganized because we had to pick up some dry cleaning. After that
we went home to do some studies and then planned until we had Kim's.
Went and visited her and shared about forgiveness. We then went home
and planned for a little before then having to go to Sells for a
fireside they were having down there. That was a lot of fun and we
were able to meet some of the natives and hear the stories of their
ancestors.

Saturday: This morning was pretty good, we went over to the Olives's
house for breakfast. They are Tongan and they cook ALOT of food. It
was great and they even got us some presents for Christmas. They made
us work for them though, each package had a scripture on them that
related to what was in the package. We would read the scripture and
then guess what was inside the package. Most of the stuff was just
like toothpaste, soap, "cheer" detergent, and a few other things
pretty sure. Not sure if they were trying to send a message or not
haha. After that we went home and did studies before going out to the
Provstgaards. Learned that sister Provstgaards bother was the guy that
Leonardo DiCaprio played in the movie "Catch me if You Can". Super
crazy and that kid was a genius. After that we went to our Christmas
Eve Dinner at the Freeman's, had a lot of good food, talked with some
of their family, shared a lesson, and then went home. Elder Blacker
took a nap while I did some extra studies before heading over to the
Shulls home. Sister Shull wasn't feeling well and wasn't able to wrap
gifts for her grandkids so we helped her with that. We then went and
visited with Gary and had some very good Gospel conversation.

Sunday: Merry Christmas!! Started off the morning opening presents
from family and friends. Got some wonderful gifts that I am very
thankful to have gotten. The presents I got sent from my mom was an
sandisk xpand flash drive I can plug into my ipad, an electric shaver,
scripture cases, and some candy:) Savannah's mama sent me a pillow
case with a picture of Savannah and I on it. Also got a giftcard which
is so handy:) #poorascrap Savannah's package was super cute, it was
decorated for Christmas on the inside and had cute messages to me.
What she got me was a new sweat shirt, a bracelet, a super cool plant
growing inside of a dinosaur, a copper bracelet that she has one of as
well, and some smelly stuff:) I absolutely love this time of giving:)
Yes I could have been perfectly fine without these gifts but then I
wouldn't be smiling. Haha We had a great sacrament meeting singing a
lot of songs and listening to people sing. After church we were able
to skype our families which was a lot of fun and it was great to see
such familiar faces. Very blessed to have such an awesome family:)
After that we had dinner at the Rees's home and had a great time
there:)

I hope you all had an amazing Christmas. Now that Christmas is over
and the #lighttheworld challenge is over. Doesn't mean you stop
serving the best you can, trying to be a more Christlike person. I
want to invite you to commit to going out of your way to serve
someone, everyday this year. In the process, record the experiences in
a journal expressing the way you felt when doing it. These acts of
service could be as simple as going out of your way to open someone's
door or even pick up some garbage. Find something and do your best. I
love you all, I miss you all, have a great week!

Love,

Elder Smith