It’s really cool to see all these little kids coming to church

(Note from Mom: It doesn't look like Jordan is ever having any fun on his mission, poor guy! Ha Ha!)

HEY THERE!!!

My hand is doing good. Just peeling, but good.

Church went pretty well this past week. The primary kids were pretty out of hand,but hopefully it won’t be the same next week. But it’s really cool to see all these little kids coming to church. You would think that their parents bring them. Oh no! I don’t even know who their parents are! We will try and see if we can visit with some of the kids' parents because pretty much none of them have been baptized and they are all 8 or 9 years old. So we shall see if we can find some neat families to teach through that.

First off, my interview with President went really well. Elder Toolson went right before me and hyped me up to President and told him that I am studying Kekchi on my own. Then I went in and he asked if I had met a lot of Kekchi people in Sayaxché, and well, there are TONS of them that live here. So I went off on that for a little bit and told him that it would be really nice to be able to teach them and to be able to communicate with them. So we shall see where it goes from there. I'm pretty sure that one of us will have a change too. I am almost positive I will be a senior companion next change, unless I go to the Chik. So I guess we will find out what happens, right?

Zone conference went really well and I took a lot of good notes in my planner. But then my planner was lost in transit going back to our area, so that was pretty disappointing. I found a new one in the house though, so that’s good. I really enjoyed Zone Conference and we learned a lot to be able to work with the members and to be able to strengthen the weaknesses of our branch. We are getting a microphone/speaker system put in and fans installed that should be done by next week too! We are uber STOKED for that. But we still have a lot of work to do to get this place back into shape but we are working hard with President Ponce to be able to fix it all up. So the future is looking brighter for little Sayaxché.

Elder Toolson wrote: "The branch is growing but we need more priesthood holders so we can buy a chapel of our own and not this house/church we meet in. Things are progressing here and it's going good. We had some investigators come to church and 45 people showed up so that's a good sign. This past Saturday we held our own little activity at the place where we have Internet. We held a mini general conference for all the people that couldn't go the first time and like 21 people showed up! So it went a lot better then we thought. For some people, it was their first time seeing the prophet speak, ever! And they've been members for about 10 years. It was amazing to see the interest they had when they were watching it. A very good spiritual moment for me. I just hope they got as much out of it as I did. We only watched the morning session of the Saturday one, but that one was amazing! "

Toolson actually cut a lot of his friend’s hair before the mission and cuts his own hair too. So my hair looks pretty good! Ha I guess you will have to find out with the pictures I am sending... (I think he meant "buzzed" not "cut" hair. Good thing Jordan's hair has always grown so fast!)

Oh I actually do have a couple more Christmas requests if that is ok. I would like a pair of gray pants and a pair of black pants. My pants are really getting beat up. So it would be nice to have more. I would also really love new scriptures. My quad is getting really worn out especially along the binding since it's so big. So nice, sturdy scriptures would be amazing. It will also allow me to get nice single leather scripture covers up here. That would be just super amazing!!!! Oh and PEANUT BUTTER!!! Yummy. Oh and if grandma could send me up some more guat stamps that would be completely amazing!!!

I sent home my bank signature cards for the bank with Elder Winn. And I sent home my big black raincoat with him too. Hopefully that will all get there to you soon.

I sure hope we have a big mission wide Christmas activity. All I know is that if I am still up here in Petén, we will have our own activity but if I go somewhere else that would be fantastic to see Bronson again! Ha! I really love that kid!

Yes that ATM withdrawal was legit because I ran out of mission money and I needed it to buy food.

The 3 new sisters, Hadassa, Maya, and Jessely, are doing well. They were busy when we went by, but we scheduled an appt. with them for tonight. They seemed excited to have us come back. So they are still doing great. I really think that if we don’t get the chance to baptize them, someone else will. They are truly really special.

Well nothing else has really happened this week. We have been working really hard and having fun together.

I love you all and I hope you have a fantastic week!
Stay Strong
Keep the Faith
Love
Elder Jordan Smith