Dear Mom,

Awwwwwww, I miss you too.  And I don't like having to wait till chooseday either to write emails.  They're kind of a really exciting time of the week.  I'm glad you guys had a real holiday though, and not a bank holiday, whatever the heck that is.  Dad probably would've liked you to spend money on something other than flowers, like Book of Mormons to give out, but I bet he still liked the flowers.

Don't tell me that I'm coming home to chocolate mousse pie being gone.  I may not come home.

Stop verging, you wussface.  Just watch some more HGTV and you'll be fine.  Maybe tell Hank that he's an idiot.  He doesn't seem to care, and actually, he'll probably just like the attention.  Thanks for taking him on a walk.  I know he's an old fart, but I bet he liked it.  And he was probably tired the rest of the day, so it was probably nice for you anyways.

Hey! It's my birthday soon! Woooo! Don't worry about all the letters getting to me on my birthday, you know I've always liked a birthfortnight rather than a birthday. So I'm going to be nineteen! I can go on a mission now! I guess I'm a pretty old fart as well. Tamworth has a zoo, so next Monday, that's where you'll find me, and Elder Lewis and a couple more Elders that are our mates. (Elder Bass and Elder Hess) (Elder Hess lived across the hall from me at Utah State.)  It should be really fun, then I'll take your money, and Elder Lewis out to dinner.  Probably at a Chinese Buffet.  Dad'll probably come too.  He likes that kind of stuff.

My mission president is kind of teeny.  But his spirit is HUGE.  I would say he's probably 5'6'' or 5'7''.  That might be a little generous, I have no idea.  But he's awesome.  He told us not to put our arms around him cause it would make him look even smaller haha.  He ended up speaking for about twenty minutes in sacrament, because some one backed out at the last second.  So he had like zero time to prepare, but he gave a very powerful talk  on ordinary people doing extraodinary things.  He said, and I think this is a quote, "Don't worry about doing hard things, just start them, and be amazed when you've completed them.'' Something like that anyways.  I thought it was cool.  And Sister Rasmussen is the bomb.  She spoils us with sweets all the time.  She brought us a big bag of goodies when they came, and we had zone conference last friday, where we celebrated some birthdays, so I got candy last friday too.  Sweet. Haha get it?  That's one good thing missions are for, practicing your Dad Jokes. 

I'm glad you get to hang out with your children every once in a while.  I'm pretty busy for the next two years.. so I'm sorry, but I'll call you like.. twice a year.  That seems reasonable.  Adrienne can call you twice a day, I'll call you twice a year.

I'm glad tutoring is over.  You probably have like one million antiques roadshows to watch, and HGTV can never we watched too much, right?  I bet you'll just bum around and watch the telly all day, now.  Sounds nice.  I'm also glad that you're getting all boys.  Boys rule and girls drool. Wait, here's another one.  Boys go to Mars to get more candybars, and girls go to Jupiter to get more stupid-er.  Nice.  You have Lone Peak Elementary to thank for those gems.  It's my birthday this week, I'm turning nine. Again.

Okay.  I'll tell you all about Sue.  Sue was found about seven months ago by some Elders named Elder Filipe and Elder Graydon I think.  She's been in some sort of accident, I think, and she suffers with memory-related problems.  She's a single mom in her.. maybe fifties.. or late forties, she has a couple daughtors, and a grandson, I think.  She is a very very nice lady, she lives on benefits in a counsel house on the North side of Tamworth.  (Called Leyfields.) (I live in Glascote.)  She's had a few baptism dates, but either she wasn't ready, or she forgot.. haha yikes. but this one is different.  She's been coming to church every single week, and is excited to be baptized on June 8th.  The spirit has really been helping her learn lately and things are finally starting to click, she says.  She's very shy, but loves to learn.  So the baptism is only going to be us (Elder Lewis and I), the Bishop, and the Robbins (who is the ward misson leader and his wife, and her ward-fellowshippers.)  She loves learning about Christ specifically, so we read a lot of the Gospels with her, and teach her about His miracles.  She's great, and I really do think she's going to get baptized next week.  Elder Lewis has been trying to subliminally persuade her to choose me to baptize her, but I really don't care who it is, as long as she gets it done.  We're excited about Sue. She's awesome.  Pray that she wont be nervous and that she can remember the things we're teaching her.

We did sort of find some one else.  His name is Allen, and he's awesome, he's an artist and he's very Christian.  He does strange abstract art, but I tend to like it more than I dislike it.  He's a former investigator, and was found a couple years ago, I don't know how.  But I guess it ended up with him throwing the missionaries out of his house.  Haha, we can kinda see why.  Our first visit with him, he told us a story about getting stranded in Siberia, knowing no Russian, with no translators, and feeling very very alone.  He ended up leaving the room to cry, and audibly sobbed for about a minute out in the hall behind us.  It was almost humorously loud, so we almost laughed.  But both of us held it in, and realised that he must have gone through some pretty serious stuff.. We learned later that he was held at gunpoint, and they took his passport, but he got it back.  It's a long story, but anyways, I bet at some point something similar happened with the missionaries that found him, and they probably laughed.  He likes us, and we haven't been able to teach a lesson yet, but he wants to hear our beliefs, so I think we're going over there on Thursday morning.  He's going to love the gospel so much, if he accepts it.  He's cool, and I really like him, but I'm going to have to be very mature around him, cause he's pretty.. emotional.  And I think, probably easily offended.  Pray for me.  I'm probably going to need all the help I can get. 

Like I said, President spoke.  His wife didn't. Our district is in three different wards.  (Tamworth, Walsall, and Wylde Green)

And I absolutely loved hanging out with Houston and Megan.  That was soo so fun.  It was crazy talking to them, it made me feel like I was back in the States, and I was just out for a fun night with the family.  She brought me some Cheetohs and I love her for that.  We had a really good time together.  I hope she sent you the pictures.  I'll try again today, but only certain computers let me send pictures, and even then, only sometimes. 

The Rape is in full bloom.  It's really cool, we'll go on train rides and most of the way to places will just be completely yellow.  I have some pictures of that as well.

Kasandra and Jessica will be awesome.  You're right.  Two very opposite ends of the personality spectrum, but they're both going to be great missionaries.  (Tell Kasandra to write me, or get her email from her Mom, and tell me!)(You can do the same with Jessica, but.. I don't really think she'll care as much as Kasandra.)

What else?  We're getting a lot of less actives back to church! So that's awesome! Uhh.. I went on an exchange with one of our new zone leaders (the other two were transferred, one to AP.)  The name of the elder that I went on exchange with was Elder Eppel, and he's from Jo-Burg, South Africa.  He's really a cool cool guy, and we're excited to have these new zone leaders.  Before you ask, he's white. Haha but he has a very smooth accent and was just plain cool, I really liked him.

I love you! I can't think of anything else to tell you!  I'm going to try and send some pictures, but I'm sorry if they don't make it.. You'll see them someday.

 

Lerrrve you,

 

Elder Smart

 

PS Your baby is going to be 19! You must be an old fart like me and Hank.