Busier Every Day

It has been a very busy week and pretty crazy as well. We have had some great new things happen and I am excited for the coming days.

On Thursday the other Elders here in Aalborg moved into our apartment because the sisters moved into theirs because their apartment is getting repainted. So it's been pretty crazy in our apartment the past few days.

Elder Halling has also been sick the past few days so we have been switching off with the other Elders so we could still teach all of our lessons. We had two lessons with new people and they went great. Both of them want us to come back and teach them so I am excited for that.

We had a zone training on Friday and it was great. I'm sure most of you have heard that they came out with a new missionary schedule and we will see how it goes. It is taking some adjusting. The rest of the training was really good and I got a lot of new ideas on how to be a better missionary.

Our mission set a goal for this transfer to give out 2000 Books of Mormon. It has really helped us focus on the special message of the restoration and the Book of Mormon. It is what makes the LDS church different and it is the keystone of our religion. Our mission President challenged all of us to read the whole book within the next two months. I'm not very fast at reading, but I'm going to do my best to read it because I have done it before and the things that you learn from it are amazing. Every time the book is opened something special happens. Like Joseph Smith said "It will bring a man closer to God than any other book." I hope you would all take some time to read something from the Book of Mormon every day and really find out what it is and why it is so important. I know that you will learn something amazing.

I love you all and hope you have a fantastic week. Thanks for everything!

Love, Elder Smith

To Mom:

Hi! Sorry about the dropbox thing. I finally had my card thing to put pictures on from the past few weeks so I went to put them on and the whole computer just froze up and then I pulled out my card and it did something weird and all the pictures were gone. So that's awesome.

Haha yeah those are good pictures. I promise I wasn't flirting with the sisters or sleeping.
How is your challenge going? Are you winning? I haven't been so good at being healthy right now. It's hard. The other Elders moved into our apartment and Elder Preece likes to make deserts and things so it's pretty bad. I haven't been running lately for exercise. It's too cold. I just try to do some pushups or bicycles.

I always choked on water when I did backstroke too. So that's okay. I miss swimming.

Things are good with Elder Halling. He is very different from all my companions but he is great. We have pretty similar personalities with some things. Not a ton of common interests though. He is a hard worker. I don't know if he likes to run. Most people don't like it.
Sorry you couldn't find a perfect bow. I guess you'll have to keep looking. If you keep trying three at a time, you will always have 3 different bows to use.
The schedule isn't super different. We just have a shorter lunch and can move things around more. Like have studies in the evening if we wanted to.
My clothes are holding up alright. One of the pairs of CTR pants ripped by the pocket again. I'm not impressed. Everything is holding up though. The only clothes I have bought are a couple ties.

My toe is doing a lot better. Almost completely healed.

I am staying warm enough but it is pretty cold.

I did get my scripture case back and I still love my scriptures.
I love you too! You're my favorite mom!

I like the story about Aubrey. :)

Love, Ældste Smith

To Dad:

Wow. It sounds like the superbowl was a fun one to watch. Did you figure out how to watch it on our TV?

It hasn't been warming up here. It has been feeling a little colder actually. It snowed all day today. None of it stuck but it never stopped.

That is cool what Grandma told you. Maybe one day I will be the mission president here. I wish there was a way to find any family I have here and contact them. That would be cool.

I have looked through some of the family history stuff but there isn't that much. I really wish I could find a lot of the Danish resources from it. Like grandma sent me a autobiography written by Lauritz Smith, but it is translated to English. I want to read the Danish one.

Sounds like that would be a good Book of Mormon class. I love those chapters in 2 Nephi. I just studied chapter 4 on Tuesday. It was good. It is extra good when you have a hard time with temptations or feel that you aren't worthy.

I really liked the broadcast. It really made me think of some ways that I can teach better. I feel like I have been getting better and better at teaching. I love when our investigators seem interested and when they understand. The hardest part is getting them to do the things that we want them to do. I have been thinking of ways to entice them so that they want to do those things and try them. It's pretty hard though, because it's not really something that most Danes are interested in finding out about.

Thanks for everything. I love you lots. Have a good week. Be happy.

Love Elder Smith