Life Of A Missionary & Never Forgetting 8/3/12

"Hola familia how's it hanging ? It is officially the greatest day of the week today - P DAY WHAT WHAT ! Hahaha So how is everyone doing ? Based on mom's letters' it sounds like everyone is doing good, but people come on - it's summer , and let's be real right now, you have time to write me. Get signed up on Dear Elder asap because, I only have 2 and a half more weeks of being able to hear from you everyday ! Hopefully I'll be able to get my letters to you guys out today - I have so much to write !

     So James, how's Ralph's ?!?! Is everyone there like the chillest people ever . I love 'em so much, could you do me a favor and tell them I say hi and hope everyone is doing good and that I miss 'em . And if they want they can talk to me on Dear Elder. Jeez I sound like a walking advertisement. Which reminds me. I can't believe you sent me my work shirt, I feel like every time I wear it I'm breaking mission rules because I'm advertising hahahahaha. Oh and could you send me my grey pants please, and hahaha I meant the other blue shoes of mine, the dark blue with brown shoe laces from h&m (Anna ;)  hahaha) but these ones are fine :) Thanks for sending me the package ! I literally got it right after I sent the email last week , it was SO CRAZY ! hahaha I guess you were really holding on to it until I answered your questions.

MTC Food

Ok, so the life of a missionary at the MTC. There's normally a highlight of everyday of the week, Monday is workshops, Tuesday is devotionals, Wednesday new people (orange dots) come in Thursday is p-day eve and cleaning of our classroom, Friday is p-day, Saturday isn't anything really , and Sunday is church and firesides. So basically on a normal day we wake up, normally 6:25 so we don't have to wait for a shower get out and breakfast at 7:10 and you gotta be ready for the day. Normally breakfast sucks, actually it's sucked every time except when they have breakfast burritos and something like mom's "breakfast". After breakfast we have to be in class by 7:40. It's a three hour class and we do language study, gospel study, and teaching investigators. after that depending on the day we have gym. Love gym- volleyball or soccer everyday, and since the gym's been closed I am just now getting back into the groove of volleyball I could have had like 3 more kills but I hit it out of bounds my last three - so lame anywho so we also have our own personal, companionship, and language study without a teacher during the day. Normally I just read through the scriptures or pmg in English and Spanish so I'm doing it all at once. Then lunch and dinner and after dinner we have another 3 hour class with a different teacher along the same blueprint. By the way my teachers are awesome and we have other teachers come in that are soooo chill. And everyone has like their own catch phrase. So my real teachers are hermano johnston-tengo fe en ustedes (I have faith in you guys) hermano larson- comments,chistes, chispes, cacahuates, elefantes somethin' somethin' somethin' I don't know all of it but basically just rhyming in spanish haha. Then we have hermano painter- pues pues pues mira quien es (well well well look who it is) hermano johnson - es lo maximo verdad ! or poderoso verdad ?! (it's the best right ! or it's powerful right) hahahaha hey james AYALOOOWAY !!!!! hahahahaha what was the other one ? en serio ? either way hilaruious. SO then we finish class by 8:30 study more, plan at 9 back to home by 9:30 , quiet time at 10:15 and lights out 10:30. Lather rinse repeat. So that's our life.

Paisley ties!

Study space

     If you send the grey pants could you send the other blue shoes with it ? Ok so this week we had an amazing devotional by a former seventy I believe sorry left my notes at the residence but anywho the thing that touched me the most about it was he told us a story of a misionary who wasn't having any success and his mission president, the guy talking, promised him that if they looked through the area book they would find someone to teach. So he did and found this lady who the missionaries had gone to, but never came back although she wanted them to. So they came over and she was so excited to answer the door and said ," I was afraid you guys had forgotten me" I never want to forget anyone. Every single child of God deserves the opportunity to hear the gospel and change their lives now, and have happiness - real happiness now.

     The other day we got on this conversation about the word of wisdom with our teacher and he said that some people had such bad addictions to drugs or alcohol and stuff that it was physically impossible for them to quit or they could die, or other problems. Too addicted that they couldn't change. Too addicted that they couldn't accept the fulness of the gospel. So they had to "drop" a lot of people.The thought is unbearable to me, I want to get there before anyone goes too far. Everyone deserves a chance. And I know that there is nothing that is too far beyond the infinite reach of the atonement. There's nothing beyond the reach of the savior's infinite love. So I need to get to them ! I ONLY HAVE 22 MONTHS !!!! That's not long at ALL !!!!

      Anywho no time left but I love you family, love you Sally, and your family ! I hope you guys are doing good ! READ YOUR SCRIPTURES EVERYDAY AND PRAY K LOVE YOU BYE !

-Elder Hawkins"