Mom,

Well, we had a wonderful Thanksgiving. We went to a family in the Scotch Plains English Ward for it. It was the Caycho family. Brother Caycho was born in Peru and grew up for half of his life in Brooklyn or the Bronx. I can't remember which one. He has been a member pretty much his whole life and has had to sacrifice a good amount. He's a great member. Sister Caycho is as American as it comes. Great family! Cooked really good food and had a lot of family over. Way fun! We also met up with a bunch of other missionaries in Princeton Stadium to play some turkey bowl. That was a lot of fun. For some reason, Princeton University doesn't lock their stadium!

This last Saturday's service got canceled for the day because there were so many missionaries from out-of-state that were helping out. President Jeppson told our zone and another that we could go out and do regular missionary work if we wanted to. Well, we had nothing planned so we went with a couple members in Scotch Plains to go do service for the day. Turns out that they were going to Brooklyn for the day. So I got to go to New York again! We drove through Staten Island and over the Brooklyn Bridge! Way cool experience. The Brooklyn Bridge has been in so many movies and is so famous. But to all the members and everyone else it's pretty normal to go over the Brooklyn Bridge. All the missionaries were amazed! Haha. New York is so much more condensed than New Jersey. I took a few pictures of it, but I forgot my cord to download them onto the computer to send them. I did print out a few pictures from last week's service that I'm going to send home. Pretty cool pics! I have to say, Brooklyn is an ugly city! I don't know how Tyler Nielson loved it so much. But I'm sure that other missionaries say that about New Jersey.

By the way, New York and New Jersey drivers are crazy! I think I'm picking up their road habits. I'll come home a crazier driver, but hopefully better since my reaction time is increasing.

So last Saturday night, we went over to the Branch President's house. He told us that a few of them were going to go do service the next day, so they don't know who is going to give talks during church the next day. He asked if we could. A Saturday night and a Sunday morning to prepare a talk. Wow! Welcome to missionary work. Well, I was tired Saturday night, and Sunday morning we went to another area for a baptism for the sister missionaries. We returned back to our area 10 minutes late for church. I prepared a talk about the Sabbath Day in just a couple minutes and hardly anything written down. I took up about 20 minutes and I thought I did pretty well! I'm improving! This is great.

President Jeppson told us today in his letter to the missionaries that this next weekend will probably be our last week to do service. It's been several weeks now since the hurricane and mold in houses is starting to build up pretty bad. That's dangerous. And President Jeppson is very concerned about our well-being. We always wear masks when going into houses anyways, but I think it's getting pretty bad. I'm a little sad because I love doing service like this, but it could only last for so long.

Anyways, that's the last week. Lots of fun. We're finding several less-active members that want to come to church! That's always very exciting.

Q of the W:

1.  Do you know what day we can skype you at Christmas?  Will it be Christmas Eve or Christmas Day?  Can't wait...:)

Probably on Christmas Day. I think we're going over to the Caycho family for that.

2.  What will you be doing for Christmas Eve and Christmas Day?

Probably just visiting members. Get out and work!

3.  Have you heard from Luke lately?

We're emailing each other! He's doing great. He always adds some Spanish too. I can't wait to talk with him after the mission! It's going to be so much fun!

Love you mom! Thanks for the Christmas CD! I'm loving it. One song that I wanted was Mary did you know by Donny Osmond, but I love all the songs on it. Great pick! Thanks Kelsie!!! Love you. Write me.