November 24, 2010

HAPPY THANKSGIVING TOUT LE MONDE! Well, how is everyone doing? Well, this week has been great. Well, as everyone might have guessed, tomorrow is Thanksgiving. It is sad I will have to miss it. They do not have Thanksgiving in France. It is only an American holiday. Well, what we will be doing is working, because it is not a holiday, but it is ok. There are some other elders or missionaries who our going over to members houses for a dinner and stuff, but for us, we will be working. I think though that we will make some potatoes and gravy and try to do a Thanksgiving dinner with us. Hopefully it will work out though.

Well, things here are great. We have been doing a lot of port à port lately or door to door. We have been working in a little town just right out of St Lo. We are trying to knock on every door in that city. It has been going great. We have knocked on about half and we have found 3 potential investigators out of it, so that is really good. The work is a little bit slow but we are having a great time. We may have another baptism date here also. We already have two, the mom and here 9 year old daughter. They are doing great. We have a rendezvous with them today and we are planning to teach them about the atonement. We also have to move the baptism date back just a little bit because they couldn't come to church last week and they will be in Paris this Sunday. So, we will have to move is back but they are doing great. We also have another one named Sonya who is doing awesome. Her parents are members and last week they told us that she has read the Le Live de Mormon or the Book of Mormon and knows that it is true. So, we were very happy about that. We taught her the big two commandments on Monday. The word of wisdom and the law of chastity. They went well and she knows what she needs to do to change. We have another rendezvous with her tomorrow, so that should be great.

This past Sunday we had district conference. It is like stake conference but when you have just branches it is called a district. So, we all went to Caen and President Staheli was there also. So, we got to talk with him and it was great. He talked about the missionary work for members and how that they don't need to do missionary work, but just be missionaries. As in they should be an example and should invite people to come to activities. Then if they are interested, give them to the missionaries to teach them. And he encouraged every member to have a Preach my Gospel. The book is not just for missionaries, but for everyone to help them know the gospel more and help them with a lot of other things. President also talked about the miracle of 2010. For our mission, two years ago, 2008, they had about 105 baptisms. Last year the mission had about 120 baptisms. This year up to right now, we have about 230 baptisms. We have about 70 or more baptisms dates before this year ends. Our mission is shooting for over 300 at the end of the year. It is so cool. The work here has just exploded and it is just going to keep getting better. Our goal for our zone, the Normandy zone, was 12 baptisms. Last year we got 6 so they made the goal of 12. Right now we have 13 and another 7 more baptism dates here. It is so cool. I am lovin it.

Well, that is just some things that our going on with the work. Now on to the other stuff. Last Saturday was awesome. We were going to do some service with the elders in Cherbourg and we had some extra time before the service. So, we went and played football. And I mean football! American, not soccer, with a team in Cherbourg. This was like football and everything with pads, helmets and all. It was not a game but just practice, so we practiced with them. It was awesome. Their coach was in the army and he kicked our butts into shape. The next day we were all sore. They said we can come back so we are planning to go again this Saturday. Well, the service was cancelled and we were in Cherbourg with our ward mission leader. He took us to go see the world's largest nuclear sub. It was cool. It doesn't work anymore but it was awesome. I also found out that Cherbourg was the last stopping place of the Titanic before is sunk. Last week they had the Queen Elizabeth at the boat docked there, so that is cool. Well, we were coming back and we stopped by this church because we where with our ward mission leader lives. We stopped at this church, the St. Marie Eglise. I think that is what it was called where the 82nd air born landed in World War 2. There was a guy who got stuck on top of the church for two days and was not killed. So, at the church they have a manikin hanging by a parachute on the church. It was funny.

Well, those are just some things that are going on here in Normandy. Things are going great. Well time is short. I love you guys and hope you have a great week and a great day. I hope you are loving the snow. All it does here is rain and rain and rain some more. I think it has rained everyday since I have been here. Well, I love you. TTFN LOVE ELDER WALKER