A SHETLAND PONY!!!

This week was pretty crazy. Crazy awesome!

Tuesday 24: We started off the day by tracting a street named Brian Court because Brian is Elder Shepherd's first name. Nothing came of it and it was pretty short. We met a Catholic woman who's friends with the James' (members) and she was interested in reading the Book of Mormon which was cool. Then we went to see Marcela with Brother Dimond (because they speak Spanish) and he bore his testimony in Spanish. It was great. Marcela has such a strong testimony and she just wants to tell others about the Church, it's great!

Wednesday 25: I actually did exchanges with one of the zone leaders to Ypsi. It was pretty cool. We had lunch at Chipotle (first time I'd been to eat at a restaurant since becoming a missionary). We went tracting and a couple people talked with us, which was cool. Then we went to talk to an investigator about the Book of Mormon. Then we went to a member's house to talk about one of her daughters, who isn't a member. Her house borders a horse rescue farm and we got to see some of the horses there. There was one Shetland pony that came maybe up to my knee. I would have taken a picture but there was an electric fence in the way and I didn't have my camera. It was tiny. And awesome. I didn't stay the night in Ypsi.

Thursday 26: We woke up at 6a this morning and went to the seminary class. It was really early but we got muffins. We bore our testimonies about the Book of Mormon and challenged the students to give one away by the end of the year. Then we went to the Veteran's hospital to do an orientation so that we could do service there. Then we had a dentist appointment because Elder Shepherd needed a root canal. I had to wait in the waiting room for nearly 3 hours. It was crazy. And it's only half done. We need to go back this Friday. Then we had a Book of Mormon class at Waiting's house (one of our investigators). Marcela and Brother Garett showed up. The class was on Lehi's dream and it was really good. Waiting is so amazing. Even though she's really sick, she just wants to help other people and feels bad when she can't. Marcela brought her daughter Najey (I think that's how it's spelled). They both really liked the part about the iron rod.

Friday 27: We rode our bikes really far south to drop of a couple of copies of the Book of Mormon but when we got there, no one was home and we had to head back for our dinner. We had dinner with the Buss family. Sister Buss speaks Chinese and Brother Buss speaks Portuguese, both languages are very helpful to us. Then Brother Buss came with us to speak to a lady from Mozambique who speaks mostly Portuguese. It was pretty fun to practice the language. Then we just talked with some of the members around there.

Saturday 28: We had a correlation meeting with Brother McNaughtan, our Ward Mission Leader. Afterwards, he went with us to teach Quincy. It was really good, we talked about prayer and prophets. Before this, Quincy would just pray for the birds, the rivers, and the Earth because he thought praying for himself was just selfish. He's awesome. Then we did some yard work for an investigator family named the Nagel's. I trimmed some bushes into "something like a cloud shape" and we took out weeds. We had a short lesson and they gave us lots of brownies. It was good. The Nagels' niece is a member and they went to church with her once. They really like the standards of the church and we've been subtly teaching them since. We headed back home to have dinner with one of our neighbors named Nikola. He's from Serbia and he's the coolest guy ever. He's working on his PhD studying stroke prevention. He made this really good dinner with pork/chicken, some kind of pasta-loaf, and a Mediterranean salad with tomatoes, onions, and feta. Then we had a two hour lesson with him about the Book of Mormon which he enjoyed. Then we went to see Waiting and Jianming. They taught us about Chinese chess and Chinese tic-tack-toe and we taught them about repentance.

Sunday 29: We had a meeting with the ward missionaries before church at 8a. Then we had Church. Six of our investigators came, Marcela and her daughter, her friend Oscar and his daughter, Albert, and Cindy. The talks were on tithing and fasting and the blessings that come from each. It was pretty cool because the day the missionaries found her was right after she had been fasting for guidance for the first time and then the first time she went to church, it was about fasting. And there was a great musical number. Then in the 3rd hour, Albert gave a quick 5-minute talk that was super good. He talked about how accepting and welcoming the Church is. It was really cool. Then we went to the Wendt's for dinner. There was a really good pot roast and lots of very good rolls. Then we rode over to another housing complex to find a member to help us. The seat on Elder Shepherd's bike was coming off and he needed an allen wrench to fix it. All the members' doors we tried weren't home, until the last door and everybody was there. Someone was having a party and we just caught the end of it. We got his bike seat fixed and had a very good lesson with them. We went home and planned and all that. Then we were chillin' in the apartment. I was reading Jesus the Christ and Elder Shepherd was playing the guitar. We hear a knock at the door and think who could it be? We open it and it's our neighbor, Nikola. He just comes in and we almost have a lesson, right there at 10:17 PM in our apartment. It was just funny. He's just a chill guy.

Also, a funny story that I forgot to mention: another person asked me if I grew up outside the US. I'm always confused when this happens because it happens quite a bit. Apparently I sound a bit foreign. Elder Shepherd thinks that it's because I'm very dictious, like I always pronounce the t's and d's at the end of words. I never really realized it before but I really do.

I love all y'alls,

-Elder Michael Carlson