Special Olympics

August 28, 2011

Dear Jared,

Sunday was a busy day for missionaries. Mike carter and Rob Thompson both had their farewell talks, and Stephen Sellers returned home. It's exciting to see all these missionaries going out and coming home. Steven, who used to be really overweight has lost over half of his body weight and he is so skinny now. We went somewhere in South America. He looks so different.

The bad news of the week: Steve Cox, our snow plow driver, died suddenly and unexpectedly. Wow, we just never know when it's our time.

The Cache Valley Century Bike ride was Saturday. A group of eight of us, including Taylor, rode it. It was a brutal ride. It was in the high 90's, with a strong wind for much of the ride. Taylor and I called Dad at mile 73 and he came and picked us up. We were done! I hope Taylor will try another ride when it is not so hot. He did great and I am so proud of him. Everyone else was able to finish, but they all said it was pretty rough. We did learn a lot from all of our mistakes so hopefully it will be better next time. But hey, there were no accidents, so I am pretty happy about that. :)

We are already planning trek for next summer. It's going to be a lot of work and planning to pull that off, but I am really excited for that. I love having things to look forward to.

I was reading in the Ensign and came across this quote that I just love:
"A good character is something you must make for yourself. It cannot be inherited from parents. It cannot be created by having extraordinary advantages. It isn’t a gift of birth, wealth, talent, or station. It is the result of your own endeavor. It is the reward that comes from living good principles and manifesting a virtuous and honorable life."

We are happy that you are having success. Have an awesome week!

Love, Mom



Hey,

We had a really busy week. We had a lot of meetings, exchanges, a Zone Conference, and we volunteered at the Special Olympics. It seems like this week we were in Indianapolis longer than we were in Plainfield. After all the meetings and cancelled appointments (lots of them this week) we only taught three people this week. We got a new investigator though! Her name's Deborah.  Some of the other Elders found her and started teaching her, but turns out she's in our area. She is awesome. On our meeting with her on Tuesday she had the pamphlet for the lesson we were teaching and it was filled with notes. She could have taught the lesson to us! We set a baptism date for September 17th with her. She's ready for baptism, so ready that she sent us a text last night saying she wanted to get baptized on the 10th instead! It's really exciting, but we've got a lot to teach still. We're going to have to meet with her three or four times this week to teach the rest of the lessons.

        On Friday we had our Zone Conference, where Elder Lynn G. Robbins spoke. It was fantastic. I learned a lot about missionary work from him. I look forward to implementing some of the things he spoke about. It's been a lot like Christmas this August. At Zone Conference, we got new phones and a portable DVD player, and we're moving out of our apartment in the next few weeks. Hallelujah!

       On Saturday we got to volunteer at the Special Olympics in Indianapolis. It was a lot of fun. Elder Bair and I helped with the skill tests, like how far they could throw and hit a softball. There was one guy named Ronnie that was running as fast as he could around the bases, and he tripped. He fell like a board and hit the dirt flat on his face. I felt so bad for him... He got up though and kept playing. I guess that's what counts. 

Hope everything's going well


Love, 

Jared