The Final Frontier

Family,

Well I am highly unmotivated to email today seeing as how I will see you all in just a few days, but on the off chance that an asteroid slams into the airplane and everybody dies I guess I should tell you how my week went. The week was excellent, a lot of fun and very effective. Thanks for all the Birthday wishes.

Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday must have all been fairly typical days, I can't think of a single thing that happened on any of those days worth mentioning. On Friday though we had a lot of fun. In the morning Pres. and Sis. Hendricks called and wished me happy birthday, and then Gisselle and Kim called and sang happy birthday to me! Well that was fun, I especially appreciated the call from the Hendricks. Elder Lee and I celebrated our 2 year mark by busting out some carbonated juice and spraying it everywhere...then we cleaned up the mess all over our house. Well went and taught Gisselle, it was good; she is doing good, progressing towards baptism. She also made me a birthday cake so that was delicious! Finally at the church in the evening I was organizing some different things and all of a sudden out of nowhere Elder Kraus threw a huge bucket of water on me and then Elder Lee threw a few pounds of flour all over me, so I was a big sticky doughy mess....it was good laughs though. So that was my birthday, it was nice.

Saturday Elder Lee and I burned a bunch of stuff that was no good at this point, so that was amusing. Sunday church was nice, got to teach a nice lesson in gospel principles. Elder Allen called later in the day and wished me a belated happy birthday, he is awesome, I am so glad that I got to serve with him.

Gisselle is doing very good! She gets interviewed for baptism this Tuesday and then baptized on this upcoming Sunday. She is a great investigator, I am glad that Elder Ostrin got to teach someone like her so early-on in his mission. It was great that she took another week off of work so that we could see her again everyday and help ensure she is ready for baptism. It has been great teaching her, I am excited for her to be baptized! Rashane is also doing excellent, he should be baptized next week Sunday, he is also considering going on a mission, so that would be awesome! It has been a good week of teaching with two prepared investigators that we can see every day.

With Gisselle we have been struggling with her all week with baptism, she wants to be baptized but at the same time she has somethings she wants to change first (like getting a new job). Well most of her reasons were pretty lame and weren't really going to stop her from getting baptized. Yesterday in our lesson with her we were teaching her about something or other (not related to baptism) and then she cut me off mid-sentence and said she has made up her mind to be baptized next Sunday! That was amazing! She has been taught everything and is ready, she just needed to make up her mind. Another member's testimony in church really touched her and it made her decide to get baptized! So that is great! She is going to make a good member and a good addition to the branch here.

Elder Ostrin is doing good, his next companion will be Elder Packard (if you don't recall I served with him in T&C). So that should be good, they will get along really well. They have an awesome area at this time too. We have so many great investigators right now.

Well I can't really think of what else to say....the week has been pretty typical. It is weird to think that I will be home in just a few short days, I can't believe how fast the last 2 years have gone by. I am going to miss Jamaica sooooooooo much! I love this place! I am excited to get home too, it should be good enough. On Wednesday Elder Allen and I have plans to go and eat lunch with the Flakes and anyone else they invite! I am very excited to see the Flakes again! They are so great! And hopefully I can see the Herberts one more time too! If anything I will at least find time to call them when I am in Kingston and say hi/bye! I am so grateful for senior couples! They are so helpful and awesome. It is too bad that I doubt I will have time to see Akeilah one last time before I go home, she is without a doubt the best convert I have had on my mission, she is so awesome!

I think that is about it for the week. Things are going great, I am excited for the next few days! especially Wednesday and Thursday! I look forward to seeing you later this week. Take care, I love you all!

-Elder B. Kent Talbert