Mid April

Apr. 10, 2011

Dear Elder Alex,

It was a good Sabbath here. Started with an early morning stake meeting, went to Sacrament where it was Derek Hansen's homecoming. You can tell he really enjoyed his mission and he's still an emotional speaker. Kimi Anderson was right there in the front row and rumor has it that they've been looking at rings together. In his talk he spoke of how each day, at the end of each day he would ask himself if he could see the hand of the Lord in anything that happened that day and inevitably he could, every day of his mission. I believe that to be true even when you're not on your mission. He also talked about when people are prepared and ready to hear the gospel, miracles will happen. He said to tell you hello.

The other missionary who reported today was in the Eagle 2nd ward-Jordan Potter. Kirk went to that meeting and said he did a good job. Still the same old Jordan, outgoing, friendly, never worrying about what people think, but a little more mature.

I went to a wedding shower for Lindsey Roberts (cousin) this past weekend. She said to say hi. It's still so funny to me that she's marrying Dustin Hadfield. At the shower I saw Penny Rozsa and their son Jake is having his farewell this next Sunday. He's going to the Washington DC mission. They're having lots of family coming in to town, so I'm hoping we get to see most of them.

Also today the exchange student who's living with the Purnells got confirmed a member of the church. Yesterday she was baptized. She's from Peru and the Spanish speaking missionaries help teach the lessons and also gave her her blessing today. The Elder told me it was his first time giving a blessing. I told him it sounded very nice to me from the little bit I could understand.

We also have another lady in our ward who's taking the lessons. She lives in the house at hte corner of the McCauley's lot. She's so fun to have in Sunday School and Relief Society because she always participates and is so excited to hear anything new. I'm sure she'll be getting baptized soon.

This past weekend was the open house for the new church building on Floating Feather in Star. I was in charge of the refreshments, so it was fun to be there. 16 non members(that we know of) showed up, some pastors, city council members and 2 or 3 left with Books of Mormon and wanting to talk further with the missionaries. One of the biggest impacts of them was the room where they were showing Mormon.org video messages. Several people were very touched by those. Another person(less active for several years) felt the spirit so strongly in the chapel that they were motivated to talk with the Bishop and return to activity. So overall it was a wonderful evening. The building is like a mini version of our building and now the Beacon Light ward and the Star 2nd ward meet there.

Dad's having a meeting with the the homeowners with the VP and secretary right now. Fun, fun. He's been working a lot of hours lately and it's really wearing on him, so I'm thinking he should cut back a bit. There seems to be a lot of work in Ontario, OR and only one doc on at a time, so it's a tough shift when he's out there.

Kirk is busy getting ready to go to Uganda for the summer. He's going there to do his internship for BYU-I and he'll be going with one of his roommates so it should be pretty fun. They will be working in a small village helping a dentist and an eye doctor and running clinics there. He's leaving May 4th and will be gone until the end of August. Dad is really wanting to go there and visit while he's there, but we'll have to see what else is going on this summer.

Sean is taking finals this week and then he'll be home for a week or two and then back to Provo for Spring semester. I'm hoping he gets a job for the summer, but who knows. His track record with jobs is not the greatest.

Kristina is pretty busy with her lacrosse season now and her team is undefeated so far, even beating BK, the big whigs in the lacrosse circles. She's really hinting heavily about getting her license now. She's had her permit for 8 months but hasn't done a lot of driving, so now she's volunteering to drive all the time. We're even getting the tires fixed on the Mustang and she's anxious to drive it around town. Actually, I could really use another driver around here especially with Kirk leaving town.

Leah is also busy with lacrosse and getting ready for ISAT's. We're helping her study fractions, etc but she doesn't understand it, but we're helping her memorize things. Her friends are starting to go into Young Women's now and she's anxiously waiting for her turn in November.

Nikki is Nikki. She's a bit of a drama queen lately and I'm hoping it's just a phase. She's still very funny and Kirk's always laughing at stuff she does. Her singing is getting better and better and she loves it. Cooking, eating, singing, cooking, eating, singing. etc, etc.

I'm still high from General Conference. I'm watching reruns on Tivo and I had a really nice talk with Pres. Stafford this week at our meeting about different aspects of this past conference. There's a lot to study from the talks and I'm looking forward to it. The word on the Meridian temple at this point is that they don't have the land purchased yet, but it will probably take 3 years for it to be complete. It's just fun and exciting news here.

I've been busy helping Jan get ready for the next quilt market which is in Utah in May. There are so many details to work on. It's fun, but it's a lot of detail work. I'm also trying to come up with fun games to do at the Living the Legacy. They've asked me and my presidency to come up and do a little something. I have some fun ideas thanks to my many years of hearing what you guys did at your academies.

So how are things going for you? Kirk occasionally tells us that he makes a comment or two on your Facebook. How are things going there? Since it's a pilot program, I'm wondering what your opinion of all that is. I'm so impressed with how technologically current the church is, they really seem to have their fingers on the pulse of things and I'm continually amazed.

Not much else going on here. How are your investigators coming along? What do you do as a Zone Leader? Are you training, motivating or what? Do you get to see Jaime Goodwin very often?

I'm excited to hear from you-as usual :) Here's a scripture that made me think of you today.

Moroni 8:3.

I love you,

mom

XXOO