December 11, 2017

Hello Family!

Woooooo!  Disney Land!  (We just returned from Disneyland for Maddie's 18th birthday)

That looks so much fun!  

I’m so happy to see all of these great pictures and to see all of your happy faces! 

I seriously cannot believe Maddie is turning 18!  She’s a full blown adult now???  What the... and what is this "lit sauce" you guys keep talking about?  

Well, you guys just made my week!  Thank you for sending those awesome pictures!  

Well, I had a pretty great week!  I LOVE NORWICH!!  It is quite the change of pace from central London!  I seriously love it.  You could really help me out if you google some facts about Norwich and fun things to do on PDay and also look up some facts about the University of East Anglia.  (That’s where we spend a lot of time looking for Uni students to teach!)

My companion is Elder Leone!  He is such an amazing guy!  He is from SLC and went to Highland High School.  He loves baseball and American Football, is going to the UofU, and is just an incredible guy!  We get on really well!  We have had so much fun and worked so hard this week!  When I got here we weren’t really teaching anyone, and the area was a bit slow, but we put our shoulder to the wheel and saw some amazing miracles!  By the end of the week we had 7 people in our teaching pool who are preparing for baptism!  It was really amazing!  5 are UEA students from China, Philippines, and Thailand, (Chen, Sun, Chrystal, Amyson, and Jolene)and the other two are an older English pair.  (Stanley and Sylvia) (Sylvia's Mother by Dr. Hook has been referenced a lot this week, thank you Dad!)  plus it snowed really hard all during Sunday and English people can’t handle the snow, so lots of wards in the Zone and the Mission got cancelled because of the snow.  Unfortunately here in Norwich it snowed, but nothing stuck.  Its just too wet and rainy for snow to stick.  

I love this time of year!  I love the coats and the cold weather, and how people’s hearts seem to soften to the gospel light as we turn our focus to the reason for the season.  I know that Jesus Christ is our older brother and our friend.  He loves us and he died for us.  I’ve come to know him a lot more than I did before here in England, and I’ll be grateful for that forever.  I know that we wouldn’t have Christmas without Easter and without the amazing victory over death and sin.  I know that our sweet family will be together forever.  

I love you all so much!

Till next week, 

Elder Draper