Fun with the "Newbie!"

Hey Everyone –

It’s been a great week.  One of the highlights is that I found out some cool news that a member in my ward actually taught a woman that my dad baptized on his mission!  Pretty cool! I have been waiting for a connection like this my whole mission! Unfortunately she lives outside my mission, so I cant get in contact with her.

Training has been pretty interesting! It has been fun, a little
stressful, and a little tiring, but overall worth it. In our mission
the newly called trainers and trainees are overnighted in a hotel the
night before they are paired off, so that’s where I was on Wednesday
night. As I was lying in my bed I just kept thinking to myself how
strange it was that over a year ago I had been the one being trained.
I’m getting old! In the morning we were all pretty excited to hear who
we would be spending the next little while training. My companion is
Elder Sommer, and he actually has ancestors from Germany! His name
means summer, if that is a surprise! We have been getting along just
fine and dandy, and I’ve been having a lot of fun showing him around
Germany getting the privilege of getting him his first everything. It
is sometimes pretty strange because I have to explain even just simple
things I say because I denglish all the time, or because something is
a missionary joke, but its been pretty fun bringing a newbie up to
speed.

Before I turned in Elder Draper for my new guy, we had one last
appointment together with Greg and Ajda, which went pretty dang great.
They decided that they do want to be baptized, and asked if it could
have the possibility of happening in the next few weeks. We will see,
but for right now we are pretty pumped. There is still a lot to do,
but we are really hoping and praying that everything will work out, so
please keep them in your prayers if you would, they are such wonderful
people.

I wish I could write and say that my week has been super eventful, but
really all it has been is bringing Elder Sommer up to speed, getting
him settled in, trying to get him legal, and a project or two. It is
kind of weird though, because I told Elder Sommer that we would be
using German a lot, but we have ran into more Americans in a period of
3 days than I have in probably the past 4 transfers. I keep promising
that he will actually learn and use German.

One last thing. This week we had our ward mission leader
conference(Gemiko) at a members house, and guess who showed up? Elder Arts! Elder Arts just finished his mission this week and it was so
good to see him and have one last dinner appointment with him. He
actually brought his dad and his sister too, and it was just so weird
to think that he won’t be a missionary by the time this gets sent out.
I miss that kid! But we had a real good time at this member’s house and
he made this incredible meat with some classic German foods, and Elder
Sommer absolutely loved it! So far I would say his favorite thing
about Germany is probably food because I keep taking him to get good
stuff like that and to get chocolate and ice cream.

Pretty much sums up my week in Germany. Its been quite different being
a trainer, but I’m really hoping to see some miracles and have some fun
with the newbie spirit that comes with training. Hope everyone has a
good week back home, love you guys!