Elder Findlay Under the Sun: Week #8 on the Mish...

Hey guys!

Well this week was a roller coaster haha. We had so many good things planned with our investigators and so many of them cancelled. That is honestly the most frustrating thing in the mission but what can ya do. One of our YSA members is L. and he is a recent convert and got baptized in February. He received the Melchizedek priesthood this week and it was super awesome because his grandpa gave him the blessing. He is soooo sick haha, my kind of friend! He loves hiking and hammocking so we get along pretty well. He also took us to this one place called Pho for lunch. It was Vietnamese soup and it was interesting.... I'm just going to say that I'm glad I'm in Mesa;) (and not in Vietnam!)

Another cool thing that happened this week was that I got to give my first blessing!!! It was probably the scariest moment of my life but it was really cool. This random lady just texted us and asked if we could give her son a blessing and so we did. Their family is less active and so we are planning on getting them back to church:) We teach a TON of less actives here. Most of the referrals we get are less actives. Its kind of tricky teaching them. We are teaching this lady P. and she is an inactive member. Every time we teach her an awesome lesson she looks at us and says, "Oh I know that it's true, I just get lazy and don't have time to go". Its super frustrating because she knows that it is true but she just doesn't come. Ahhhhhhhh! Speaking of less actives, we also teach the V. family and they are my favorite!!! The dad Carlos was less active but we got him coming back to church. He has been coming to church for the last 5 weeks or so and now we are teaching his family. His wife is catholic and her ex husband is a minister. They have 2 boys of their own, A. an J. who are both under five, and they love me haha! The two older boys B. and C. are from the wife's previous marriage so they are obligated to go with their dad to the catholic church. But we have been teaching them and they both really want to come to our church really bad, but they can't because of their real dad. Its kind of funny because Carlos thinks that we are only coming over to teach the boys but really we are there to teach him too haha! After 2 weeks of church he thought he was full on active again so that's why he thinks that we are there for the boys haha!! I love their family so much!

We had a bunch of lessons planned for each day of this week. We at least had 4 or 5. Unfortunately, when we have a good day planned like that it sometimes falls apart. Each day we had 3 or 4 of the lessons cancel:/ So it was a hard week but luckily it had a great ending. General conference was really fun!! We went to a family's house in one of the wards we serve in. They are the B. family and they are pretty much the best family in Mesa haha!! We watched all of sessions with them and it was a blast! We had a huge breakfast with german pancakes and bacon and it was so good. Oh it was the best breakfast that I've had in a long time. I think my favorite speaker was Juan Uceda. It was really cool getting to see him speak because he came to the MTC while I was there and he gave the best talk!!! I feel like I relate to him so much. He really speaks to me. Conference was super fun but then again it was also hard because I wanted to watch it with you guys. I got a little homesick during it because I knew what you guys would be doing. I'm super jealous that you guys got to go to the Sunday morning session!! That's so awesome that you could be there in person, especially with Grandma and Grandpa and the Evans! It looked like a ton of fun!

Hahahahah I totally called it that Kaitlyn and Brett were going to get married. I could just see it in their eyes ;) I am super happy for them and also super duper bummed out that I can't be at the wedding. But it's ok, I am where I am supposed to be. I can't tell you how excited I am to have Brett part of our family, he's such a stud and I know that he will take care of her!! And one thing I am super excited about is that I will be able to talk to you guys 4 days before they get married (on Christmas)!!

Oh yeah and the food down here is not a problem at all, I practically have steak every other night ha! I can't complain one bit! I love you all! I hope your week is full of sunshine and happiness!!!

Love always, Elder Findlay