Hello fambly,

Family: How is ERRbody?? How's Samsam? I'm sorry I didn't do this last week, but HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!!!!!!!!! I feel like a jerk for forgetting to write that :( I'll write you a nice handwritten letter today and you'll get to read some birthday greetings about 2 months after your actual birthday ha ha ha. I got some letters from home recently, and I loved the pictures from Caleb and Hopey. I love hearing from you guys! I hope everything is going well in school. Dad said in his last letter that you guys are doing pretty good in school and whatnot. I just realized a couple days ago randomly that Seth plays trumpet and it weirded me out. That's going to be crazy to see all those differences in a year and a half. You guys are probably getting back into school, now that the holidays are over.

No biznass which makes me feel good. Except I sent those pictures and didn't explain them AT ALL ha ha ha. I was wondering why you guys were so confused about the snake picture until I realized that I didn't even tell you about it. I went to a non-active's house to teach him a lesson and he's got a whole wall of cages with weird exotic pets. He's got geckos and tarantulas and a hairless cat and cocroaches and stuff. And a huge boa constrictor. So we taught him a good spiritual lesson about the Holy Ghost, and then Bro. Yuri started showing us his aminals and then he pulled the snake out, said something really fast in Russian and the plopped it on my shoulders. Then Elder Barton took pictures for me. It was super great, except the whole time I just kept imagining all the things that could've gone wrong, namely the snake flexing until my head popped off. That thing was super strong...

...and Mission life: Well things are crazy, which means it's a regular week. We've made some major changes in our area over the past few weeks. We kind of did a whitewash on our own. A whitewash is where the two missionaries in an area get pulled out and two other missionaries who are completely new to the area come in. Kind of a clean slate for that area. Well, this cycle ended (P.S. I'm already done with my first cycle in Russia hubba-WHAT?), and me and Elder Barton are still rockin' in Old City Togliatti. We took a look at all of our "progressing" investigators and we realized that we've been spending so much time pulling teeth with these guys to try and get them to keep commitments when we've got other potential investigators who could be ready by the end of this month for baptism. So we switched our focus to finding, and we've had so much success, meaning we've got a huge list of potential investigators that we didn't have before, all of whom are saying they want to meet. Once we showed the Lord that we're willing to do something hard (namely give up on 5 lessons a week that could help our reporting numbers), he started showing us miracles. One of these: We're sitting there planning at night, and a guy named Roman calls out of the blue and says he wants to meet. He said "you probably don't who I am, but I got your number, and I want to meet and talk with missionaries." And we give out cards all day long and NOBODY ever calls us. We always have to call them. It was bomb. Then, we stopped by a lady's house who we haven't put a ton of focus on as an investigator, previously. She lives far away, and we decided to start doing more to work with her. We found out she's super ready. She previously investigated the Jehovah's Witnesses (by the way, who knew there were Russian JWs? Crazy, right?), but she thinks they don't live the doctrines they teach. She knows the Bible extremely well and has been reading the Book of Mormon, and she said this: "I have found Jesus, but I don't think He's found me, and I think that's because I'm not baptised. I just want to make sure I'm getting into the right church." Could you ask for an investigator more ready? It was amazing. She has questions about us, though. So we're going to meet with her and help her get on the path.

And I've got about ten minutes left, so I'm gonna get some pictures up real quick.

Peace and love, you guys are awesome! The Church is true! This is the best experience of my life! Live for it! Caleb, Seth, and Patrick, you guys will be amazing missionaries. Just listen to Dad, do the little stuff. You have awesome parents and an awesome bishop. Don't let anything distract from getting ready for a mission. Sam, you're an amazing missionary, I love your example and your love for the work and the people you teach! Can't wait to hear about more of your miracles in the mission field in Chile. Love you guys!

BYE alexs.

P.S. Dad said in his letter that he wants to hear more about my companion. Well I forgot to write more about him, but he's the best trainer ever. Forces me to contact and listens to my opinion and we get along perfect and everything.