October 14, 2013

Dear Mum,

   The weather chilled so much in one day! The wind shifted to bring in the Scandinavian frigid air from the north and it dropped the temperature by 10 degrees Celsius in one day. The season is changing. But its beautiful too, I'll send a photo with this. 

   We're teaching more than ever, finding a lot of people to teach and progressing with Linda, her daughter, and now even her son who will all be baptised on Saturday! I haven't given her the talk yet but I will. 

   Heather got the comic! Ok oddly enough the part I laughed hardest at when drawing it was in the background on the river, especially the woman shouting "eureka" and then catching on fire in the next slide. I'm kinda weird like that. 

 I have a flood of more ideas as well. I don't want to spoil my next one! 

  Happy 65th to grandma and grandpa! What an achievement! It's quite rare to see that in England! Then again, old british people are among some of the best and funniest people to be around! Maybe they get on each other's nerves too much haha. 

 I got your package! It was excellent, I'm a sucker for those sour sweets! I think it would be better if, perhaps, UPS was used to send the packages. I think Royal Mail gets a hold of packages sent through any other carrier and charges us for their service as well! The temple holds money against my account because they pay the difference. I know that UPS is used in both countries though. Otherwise we are paying double! 

  I'm doing well though, Elder Poulino and I are having fun with the work and now are in an unspoken competition with the zone leaders who are also in our district. Anything to spice things up! Tonight we will be having a cottage meeting/ FHE with president Hawkins (Do you know brother Dudley in the other ward? He was my seminary teacher and has a heart of gold. Now imagine a British version of him). Linda and her family will be there as well as Christiana and Arthur hopefully. 

  Want to hear an incredible miracle in our area (other areas are having such miracles as well!) ? We were looking for a less active member just after finishing an appointment and we did not have a ward list. That means we have to rely on my memory which is pretty good but not brilliant. Elder Poulino remembered a number, 26, which he firmly believed was the one to go to. I directed us to the correct street after a few tries and we approach this home, number 26, which has Caribbean looking figures in the window (a good sign, seeing that this less active was from Jamaica-mon). We knock on the door and the guy who opens the door is completely unfamiliar to me. He's white british and has two boys scampering around with toys by his feet. I'm caught off guard, but because I've done it a thousand times I introduce myself, Elder Poulino introduces himself and we get talking. Long story short, missionaries had passed by his door several times before (turns out we were looking for his neighbour) and this time he accepted a Book of Mormon and we will be dropping by on Saturday to answer his questions. One of the morals of the story: it often takes more than one try for someone to accept the gospel message, and our Heavenly Father guides us to those he prepares. Not every time (probably to keep us humble), but He sure does a lot! 

   Love you Mum!

         Elder Cooper