Waiting on a Transfer - 4/15/14

Hey there my wonderful family! How y’all doing? Well I know you all are dying to find out where I am getting transferred to. I am dying too! I will not know until Wednesday. That is the day of transfers. I am excited and I am ready. This week has been great though. It has been pretty tough saying goodbye to the members and the people I have grown to love so much. 8 and a half months really is a pretty long time. This is almost like my second home. Everyone has told me it is weird I am leaving after being there for such a long time. I have said goodbye to some of my favorite members. On Saturday we spent a lot of our day with the Peays.  I helped him change out his breaks on his car then we had dinner with them. They are awesome people and I am excited to see them again later on. We also said goodbye to another one of my favorite families. The Neilsons family. They are awesome. We helped their grandma move and then after had dinner with them and played pool. It has been so much fun just hanging out with the people down here that I absolutely love. Today we are saying goodbye to Sister Marino and Mama Heart. That will be tough. It's all good though, because I know I will see them again. 

Well this week sure was a crazy one!! On Wednesday we had a district meeting with the mission president and his wife. It was such a long meeting. I was getting pretty bored! Our district leader has such long meetings. They are only supposed to be an hour to an hour and a half, but it went for 3 and a half hours. It was ridiculous.  Then President Wall gave his little lesson and then told us his entire plan for the Westbank. He said he is taking all of the English Elders out and putting in 1 more set of Spanish missionaries. They are going to do both Spanish and English work. It will be good because everyone down here has been struggling with keeping busy except for 1 companionship. Guess who that companionship is... Yup  you got it! It is us. We have the most lessons and service every week. It is great. They thought about keeping us here, but he then realized how long I have been here for and they don't want to leave Elder Jenson here in case he gets his visa. So I was pretty excited after that meeting. Then we got a call from Jennifer Thurgood (Jens good friend) saying that she was in town and wanted to take my companion and I out to dinner! We were really excited so we left to go out to the Dry Dock Cafe which is on Algiers Point right by the Ferry. We got there pretty early and just sat on the bench on the levy. Not going to lie I was a little nervous!! haha I haven't really ever talked to Jenn before. Then they show up in their taxi so we ride down and say hello. This place is pretty much a bar and we had never been inside before, but it worked out great!! We only had a few people give us some funny looks, but we are for sure used to that!! It was a success. We had so much fun and it was nice to see someone I knew from back home. Her friends were awesome!! Those girls sure are smart. Elder Jenson said man we are sitting with some very intelligent people! And then there are us 2 dumb little missionaries haha. It was pretty funny. They all gave us some good advice on school and what we should do after we get home. Jennifer is awesome! You’ll have to thank her again. That really made our night! Then she had the idea to take a little video and send it home. I had no idea what to say so hopefully you could hear me! After I thought about everything I wish I would have said “ I love all of the family too”! haha. Oh well. It was a great night. 

So that is about it for this week. We have been doing a lot of service and have had a lot of meetings. We had our Zone Meeting on Friday then we went out with Brother Neil. He is an awesome guy too! It was so hard to say goodbye to him. He moved in like my second week and we both became really good friends because we both had no idea what we were doing. Haha So I had him add me on Facebook. Thank goodness for Facebook. Oh yeah we asked President about the iPads and he said he doesn't want to deal with them. So in July when we get the new Mission President we will probably get iPads. I am excited for that. This week has really been a good week though. I am sad to say goodbye to the people, but I am excited to meet new people and move on. One thing the mission really teaches you is how to say goodbye. I am thankful for that because it has been hard leaving y’all, but it has made me stronger. 

One other thing I forgot to mention is this past week we dropped Brother R. our investigator and told him that when he thinks he is ready and he wants to hear from the missionaries again then give us a call. He didn't take it good at all. We both felt like it was the right thing to do. Now we are going to be handing him over to the Algiers Spanish Elders. We will see what happens. Hopefully everything will work out. I am hoping I go up to Gonzales and get out of New Orleans. I want to get into some country and get a car for this summer because it is going to be a hot one. That is where I am hoping to go, but as you always say mom. Come what may and love it right? :) 

Thanks dad for the Sports updates on the Masters!! I am so happy Bubba won. He is one of my favorites. I am sad Phil didn't make the cut though. I wanted either Phil, Bubba or Dustin Johnson to win it this year. I am glad Bubba did though. Sister Walker called me on Sunday night and told me who won. She is such a sweet heart. I am really going to miss her. She is like my second mom. Mom she is really excited to meet you and dad. I was really sad though because Sunday we were all supposed to go to the church and eat dinner with her, but she ended up being sick with Kidney stones. I am hoping I will be able to see her one last time. She took us out this week for lunch. She took us to a sushi place and it was off the hook good!! 

Well I am doing great y’all! I am excited for this upcoming week and I am excited for Sunday. I love this time of year. I love how everyone is thinking more about Christ. I wish that is how it always was. I am trying to be better at it myself. I know Christ lives. I am thankful for his perfect example to all of us. I am honored to be a representative of him. 

Well y’all I hope you have a great week! I will try and let you know this week where I am at and who my companion is going to be. Y’all are the best!! Keep up the great work! Love Y’all!

Love Elder Smith

PS Congrats on winning Best of State again this year!! Hey that isn't missionary blessings at all.. That is all hard work Yall have been putting into Get Away Today!

PSS Hey mom I sent home some stuff I have collected out here. It is going to be hard to pack everything up that is for sure!