"Wherefore, how great the importance to make these things known unto the inhabitants of the earth, that they may know that there is no flesh that can dwell in the presence of God, save it be through the merits, and mercy, and grace of the Holy Messiah."

Book of Mormon, 2 Nephi 2:8

Monday, April 30, 2012

Oxib' Po Chik

Well,

Last Saturday I hit 21 months of being in my mission. It's hard sometimes because I can see the end coming. Sometimes I get discrouaged because I feel like I haven't changed as much as I need to and I don't have very much time left to be able to do it. But I know that the mission is just the beginning of a lifetime's worth of changes. The mission in the MTC of life, right? So I've still got a long ways to go. But at the same time I feel sometimes like my weaknesses are still pretty weak. I was hoping that my weaknesses would become strength, but right now it pretty much feels the same. Change is hard! But I'm not giving up. That's what the gospel is all about. Everyone has to change and be born again. For some of us it takes a lot of falling down and getting back up and falling down again to make the change. But the point of the Gospel is that you can get back up and you can keep going. The difference between those who make it to heaven and those who don't is that the ones that make it to heaven get back up when they fall and keep going. The ones who don't make it are the ones that fall down, accept the fall as their destiny and then allow themselves to keep falling without trying to stop. Like when I fell in the river. I took a bad step that led me to fall and be sucked into a tube and shot out the other side. When I came to and realized what had happened I knew that I had fallen and felt the pain of falling, but I didn't say "Well, I guess I might as well keep going down the river since I've already fallen."  I held on and sat still waiting for the help I needed and calling out to be rescued. If I had just let myselft keep going I would have fallen down a waterfall to my death. What I'm getting at is that that is the miracle of the Gospel and of Christ's love. No matter how many times we fall into the river, if we hold on and call out for help, Jesus Christ always comes to pull us out. That's why He's the Savior. So I'm not giving up even when I've fallen so many times in the same river. At the same time, you can't just jump in the river and say "Well, I know He'll save me". That's like driving your car off a cliff saying "Well, I know there's a hospital and doctors that can save my life if I do this!"  It's just life. It's hard but we just have to not give up, seek the help we need from those that can help us, and keep moving on. The hardest part is that there are times in life where we have to cross the river and we do take a bad step and get sucked in. But I love the words from the hymn "How Firm a Foundation" in Spanish. I'm not sure if they are the same in English. They say:

Y cuando torrentes tengáis que pasar, (and when you have to pass over the rapids)
los ríos del mal no os pueden turbar, (the rivers of evil cannot disturb you)
pues yo las tormentas podré aplacar, (because I will be able to calm the storms)
salvando mis santos, salvando mis santos, (saving my saints, saving my saints)
salvando mis santos de todo pesar (saving my saints from all sorrow)

Well, I guess I kind of poured out my soul a little bit there but that's what I felt to write. Hopefully it can help some of you as much as it helps me.

Alright well my times almost up. Here's some quick shoutouts

Kinzie- GREAT JOB!! On your ACT score! Wow that's awesome! Looks like you will break the family record!! Really good job sissy I am proud of you :) Now that we all know you are intelligent you have to keep up on your studies and homework. Being intelligent doesn't mean you don't need to study or do your homework. Intelligent people are SMART when they do their studies and their work. Work hard and you'll be at BYU soon enough with me! :) Love you!

Jack- GREAT JOB!! too with your ACT score! That's a great score for only being in 7th grade! Wow. You have to work really hard and you'll be a star athelete at BYU! Keep it up buddy. See you in a few months! :)

Dad- hey dad sorry about the money shortage again...I'm trying to be more financially responsable but because of some activities that I ended up having to pay for and stuff and because I still haven't been reimbursed for some things here in the mission I'm completely out of money. Thanks a lot though dad. I promise that after my mission I won't be such a money sucker. I'm going to work and work HARD for myself and my family. I promise. To answer your question they are going to tell us changes this Sunday. So next week I'll let you guys know if I have a change or not. I'll also know by next Monday if I am going to train or anything like that. Thanks for the bball update. Too bad about Derek Rose. I kind of wanted them to win. Anyways, thanks for your prayers dad. Please keep praying for me. I am going through a rough patch as I come close to finishing the mission. It's a hard thing to do! Well, Love you tons dad. You're awesome. Talk to you soon!

Mom- thanks for the pictures! :) What a beautiful temple. Can't wait to go there with you guys!!! Thanks for the package :) I should be getting it maybe this week since the zone leaders just went down to the capital this week for concilio. Don't worry I'm not looking for anything too special, I'm just excited to talk to you guys on the phone. I'll let you all know next Monday exactly when and what time but it will be NEXT WEEK!! It will most likely be either Thursday or it will be Sunday. So I'll let you know next Monday the deets. I'm so Happy! (King Cuzco) haha wow that IS baggy mom. That makes ME really baggy! WEIRD! Alright love you!

Alright folks well, oxib' po chik (three months more.) (if you are like me you are probably singing the song "One Day More" from Les Miserables in your head with the words "Three months more!" haha :) ) Love you all tons and I'll talk to you all next week!

Love,
Elder Norton


Tuesday, April 24, 2012

A Normal, Good Old, Hard Working Week!

Hey guys!

Thanks for the letters. I would say that I hope you are all doing well but I'm pretty sure I say that every email. So I'll try to refrain from saying that this time. Anyways, things are going really well here. There's actually not a whole lot to report for this week. It was just a normal, good old, hard working week. We are working a lot right now with our investigators to get them to read the Book of Mormon. We have about 4 couples that aren't progressing anymore that we are going to work a lot with in the upcoming weeks. We are planning on focusing a lot on the Book of Mormon and it's power to help them change (2 of them have addictions they need to get over) and it's power to help couples to grow closer together. So we're been reading a lot lately the first 3 chapters of First Nephi haha. It's going to be a neat experience though I think. With one family we are planning on going every single day this week to read with them. We hope it will have an impact on them.

Other than that, we had our zone conference this week in Sacsuha. It was a good conference. I got a candy bar for my birthday which is coming up soon. It's weird because I hadn't really remembered that my birthday was coming up so soon. I hope I'll still be in Sacsuha!! We'll see though. The zone is still having a lot of success and we could all feel President Watts' sense of respect for us and his love. He talked a lot about how honored he was to be with us and how he was impressed with our work. But he helped us to realize that it's not over yet and we all still have a lot more work to do! The goal for the mission is to have 4 baptisms per companionship every month. This month we had 5, so now we need to keep looking for at least 4 more for May. I really want to try and consistently complete the mission goal for the next and last 3 months of my mission. So please pray for us to be able to find the people that the Lord is preparing for us to be baptized in May, June, and July! We talked a lot about the Book of Mormon in the conference and how to work more with references. It was an uplifting conference and was good to eat normal, good, food for a change. (we had sack-lunch type meals that were just like a sack-lunch from the states.) We also talked about how us North Americans have to teach our companions English, so I'm going to be working on that too. Elder Escorcia already has a pretty good foundation for English. He can already pronounce words pretty well with "th" and he knows how to count to 100. He's pretty good actually. Speaking of which I wanted to let you guys know that his parents don't ever email him. His biological father for sure doesn't write. His mom is less active and she doesn't know how to use computers so she never writes either. His sister ocassionaly writes, but for the most part just friends write him. Poor guy. So I don't know if maybe you guys could write him every once in a while? He'll be able to understand a lot of what you write.  Thanks!


Alright on to some personal comments:

Mom-thanks for the comments and the article about the temple. Wow. Sounds like the church is gaining a ton of respect in the KC area. I'm excited to get back from my mission and just be able to talk to people about the Church! It is such a big deal to have the temple there. I'm sure the missionaries in the area are LOVING it right now. They are probably getting a lot of references and a lot of new people to teach. I'm also really excited to do lots of family history work!! What's the scoop with our family history? Last time I checked we hadn't gotten very far with certain branches of the family. That's cool that Grandpa Jack was from Great Falls. Elder Ware says he knows exactly where it is. His dad/grandpa possibly could know family members of Grandpa Jack he says. Cool right? I'll have to ask Elder Dilworth now if he knows where it is. That's cool about the Cockriels not going to South Africa. I hadn't heard that plans had changed. And I love my little Ford Explorer. I'll be actually kind of sad to see it go. It's a good car! I kind of want to keep it....it wouldn't probably sell for that much anyways. Anyways, say hi to Mimi and fam for me. Love you tons mom!!!!

Dad- hey thanks for the email dad. Yeah, I see what you mean. I've felt that way sometimes too looking back now. I really want to try to help the family out as well too so that we can all have a loving and warm environment in the house and super good relationships together. So, you're the patriarch of the family and God will give you revelation that you need to lead us all to do what we need to to have a better family life. I'm ready to leave my posessions and follow you into the wilderness =P But really though I know that we just need to work on a few things. We really have such a GREAT family. After being here for so long with so many problems with families it's been nice to know that I have a wonderful family waiting for me back home. That's cool that you talked to Rachel and Kylie. I didn't know Kylie was going to be living at The Colony too? That will be cool. Anyone else I'll know that will be living at The Colony? It would be cool to have a little KS colony haha. Hey, so did you figure anything else out about the Hebrew classes? I still think I'd like to take the current Hebrew class. It would probably not be too hard to take them both actually...just thinking out loud. I always have been thinking a lot and want you to check on a writing class maybe. Times up Love you!!

Ok love you all tons!

Elder Norton



Saturday, April 21, 2012

Kub'iha'!! Baptisms



Hey Guys!! 

First off, sorry that I didn't write yesterday! We got back kind of late from our p-day activity and by the time we got back there was only a couple of internet places open and none of them had internet service because of a small storm that passed through. We got on the computers and waited, hoping that the internet would come back, and so while we did I typed a little on Word to use my time well. So for lack of time to go and change everything I'm just copying and pasting what I wrote yesterday. So just know that when it says today it really means yesterday. :) 

I write you all from Teleman, area of our ZL’s after a long relaxing p-day of not doing very much. Today we decided to go to a place called San Vicente which is part of Canlun’s area (where Elder Ware is at.) So we all met up (all=me and my comp, Elder Ware and his comp, and our two fearless leaders, Elders Dilworth and Snow.)  This morning at the Canlun house where we made a some french toast and had a nice little breakfast. After that we hopped on a truck up to San Vicente. After the 2 hour ride up the mountain we finally got there. So we all climbed out and it was market day there so of course all of the people just sat there and looked at us. We didn’t really do anything at all to be honest. Just got out, went to a cool little lookout spot, sat down, ate some sunflower seeds, and talked for a long time. We took some cool pictures, went to another cool spot to take some more pictures, and then went back to the little market to wait for a truck to head back down. Might sound kind of boring but it was a lot of fun just relaxing and talking about life dreams and plans with some of my best friends from the mission in the middle of a little village in the middle of nowhere for a few hours. So I had a good time. The down side was that I unwisely chose to wear shorts instead of pants and got pretty sunburned on my legs. But other than that it was a great p-day.

Goofing around with Elder Snow.

Elders Snow, Norton, and Dilworth.


This week has been a a busy, slightly stressful, and miraculous week.  Last Monday we were looking for a way for our couple to get married without having to get their blood taken out and weren’t having very much success. So, Tuesday we decided to go to a place called Panzós where there is another municipality. We got there and they told us that they didn’t ask for blood tests for marriage there, and even better told us that they could perform the marriage that same Thursday. We were pretty excited and went back to tell our investigators the good news. We called the wife to tell her first and she said that it was good for her. Then we went to go and visit her parents, since they also had to be at the marriage to sign for the wife, Alicia (she’s 16…don’t go getting any ideas Kinzie!!!) So we got there and they told us that they had to be in La Tinta Thursday to present a case to the police about something that had happened to them. It took a little bit of time and a lot of convincing, but we got them to try and worry about that for Friday after the wedding. The parents agreed. We called Alicia again to get the final details. She told us that they didn’t know how to get there because they didn’t have any money to pay for the trip. (it’s about Q12 for every person.) We called a member who happens to own a pick-up truck to see if he could take us there and bring us back for a little bit cheaper. So, we worked things out with him and got the trip set up and paid for. You can guess who were the ones that ended up paying for that trip…After that we thought everything was all set and ready for the wedding. It turned out though that Oscar (Alicia's husband) called us and told us he couldn't go because he had to work that day. Determined and trusting that the Lord would provide the way, we got his boss's number from him. We knelt down right there and said a prayer asking the Lord to soften his boss's heart so that he could have the day off to be at his wedding. We then called and got a very friendly and warm response that it was completely fine and that he understood completely. He not only gave him the day off Thursday, but Saturday too to be there for the baptism. We were VERY thankful. So we went Thursday to Panzós in our little pickup truck, got there on time, and had a great little wedding with three other couples that were also getting married there at the same time. Friday was a semi-normal day and we got some work done. Then Saturday we spent the whole day getting the baptism ready. We made a nifty little program for the service pretty much the same as the last one that I made but in Q'eqchi' and better than before. We even put a little picture of the couple that got married on the inside. They really liked that haha. We also bought drinks and paid a lady in the branch to make 150 empanadas (tortillas folded over and fried with vegetables on the inside. really good!) so that everyone could eat a little something after the baptism. So all in all, it was a great great service. I was priveleged to baptize the 2 boys and the youngest girl and my comp baptized the oldest girls. Unfortunately, I also ended up baptizing our cell phone haha. After the second baptism I remembered that it was still in my pocket. oops haha. The good news was that since I'm so tall it didn't hardly get wet at all and was fine. The bad news was that the phone apparently fell out of the truck on the way up to our p-day activity....so it looks like we'll be getting a new one anyways. 

Oscar and Alicia's Wedding






And that's the week! Last night, after trying to use internet and everything we couldn't find any rides to get back to our area. So I went with Elder Dilworth and taught a couple that they are trying to get married and baptized. The mom was kind of down on the marriage idea and kept trying to say things that discouraged them from getting married. So I had to kind of "tell her off" I guess you could say (in Spanish we say "dar cincho" which means to give someone the belt/ aka whip or beat them for something bad haha) and basically said "Well, you're his mother and you have a right to try and give him advice, but God's his Father and He knows a lot more than you do! And even if you don't like the fact that they should get married, God does." Of course I didn't say it in a mean way and she didn't get offended. But after that she didn't really have too much else to say haha. I'm getting good at being direct with people about marriage and how important it is! It's actually pretty fun! 

Ok well here are some more personal (aka baggy) comments:

Mom and Dad- hey guys, just wanted to tell you both that you are both VERY BAGGY! haha. It's ok it's fun to be baggy on Mondays sometimes, especially with E. Dilworth and E. Snow (you'll notice that symbol we are making with our hands in the picture that I sent you guys...3 and a half baby!)


Ok, but anyways I'm actually not disappointed at all that you won't be able to come pick me up. I'm actually kind of excited now because it means I'll get to have the whole airport experience and all and I'll get to fly home with all of my good buddies from the mish which will be awesome. I feel good about it and I think it's all part of the plan. It will be better to come back maybe next year. Places we could go on vacation? hmm...wherever! Just a getaway somewhere where we can chill and catch up on everything. Colorado, Montana, Michigan, S. Carolina, N. carolina, Chicago. I'd like to see a musical or something fun like that? I don't know, I'll be good with anything. Let me know what y'all think :) (By the way I have a question for you: I remember reading in Grandpa Jack's journal that he grew up in Montana. What town in Montana?? Since E. Dilworth is from Montana and E. Ware has family there I thought it would be interesting to know.)

Jack- hey buddy! Sorry I didn't get the chance to write you a little something last week. Sometimes it takes me a week to have the time to write after you've written me. So sorry, but that's GREAT! about your track stuff man! Who knew you had molten lava leg muscles to be able to jump so far! I'm really proud of you for exploring your talents and for being more atheletic than I ever was. And that's funny that you look just like me in your pics. It's going to be weird when I get home because you will have the same age as I did when we moved back to KS. Weird! The difference will be that you are the more muscular version of me haha. Keep up the good work bud. Love you tons. Can't wait to see you!

Kinzie- Hey you little freak! How come that you never write me anymore?? haha how's the new school/ chamber choir going for you? I hope you're doing well.Any good music coming out lately? You have to keep an updated music playlist for me for when I get home!!! Write me! And get cute single girls from ages 19-21 to write me too! =P love you!

Mom- wow that's really awesome about the temple and everything! I'm so excited to be able to go when I get back. That will have to be one of the first things that we do when I get back is go to the temple together!! I imagine they will probably have headphones to listen to the session in Q'eqchi' right? I hope so! I can't believe that I'm coming home so soon either. Time is a mystery to me. I'm having to think a lot about life and what to do and everything and it's kind of scary sometimes. But everything will turn out great with the Gospel. I'm glad that you didn't get hit by tornadoes but yeah I like a good thunderstorm here too. Makes me think of the Kansan plains.That's cool that Jeriann and Will both got Monson scholarships. Pilas! We'll have to hang out there. Love you mom!!!

Dad- that's cool about Matt coming home this week. I'm really excited to hang out with him and be able to room with him and get to know him again there. He definitely will have to help me out a lot and I'll try to help him out too. I've been thinking about things I want to do and study and stuff. I'll probably just talk to you more when I call in May. I'm just thinking about things that I've "always wanted to do" and about my talents and what I like now and trying to decide from that when I want to study and what I want to do for a living. Thanks for all your support day and for having already taught me how families can be successful. Love you tons dad! Don't get too baggy!! Talk to you soon! Love you!

Alright well guys, time's up. Love you all tons!! 

Elder Norton

Monday, April 9, 2012

Sahil Ch'oolejil choq' eere sa' li rahil kutan a'in! Or in other words, Happy Easter!




I hope you are all doing well and that you are in high spirits and good health. Things here are going well for the most part. This past week was pretty good but just a little bit lame because of some possible parasites that snuck into my stomach. I'm not really sure what it was that I ate that had parasites...I ate one blackberry, one strawberry, and one mango all in the same day. It could have been any of the three. It wasn't really too bad- just lots of ha'-sa' (water stomach = diarrhea) for a couple of days. It was weird because when I would sleep at night or when I was laying down I felt fine and I would say to my comp "ok I'm feeling better, let's go". Then as soon as I started to get ready my stomach started hurting again and more water stomach. So we missed a couple days of work which was a bit frustrating to be honest. We went to La Tinta on Friday to buy some pills that kill parasites and it seems to have worked pretty well. Anyways, apart from that the week was good. Monday I started divisions with Elder Ware which was GREAT. We had a lot of fun together. We hiked a huge mountain, almost suffered a heat stroke, made chow-mein, and got caught in a huge rain/hail storm that lasted for an hour and a half. (we were really close to the house when the storm came so fortunately for us we were able to get inside before it started raining.) It was a fun division to say the least.

We are still working with our investigators to get them baptized this Saturday but things are still complicated a little bit. The thing is that the municipality here asks for a simple medical certificate saying (more or less paraphrased) "I don't have AIDS and therefore can get married to my spouse". So when we told them that it was a requirement, the dad of Alicia, our investigator, told us that he didn't want her to go to the hospital. He's apparently afraid that they are going to take out anywhere from half of a liter to a liter of blood, and so he's saying that if she has to do that to get married it's better if she just doesn't do it. So right now we're trying to figure out what to do with that. We might go to a different little county/ town to see if they will let us do the marriage there without the medical testing. But we'll see. Pray for us please! We really want to have this baptism this Saturday!!!

Alright on to some personal comments:

First of all, here are my thoughts on the picking me up thing. If there is even a possibility that Dad wouldn't be able to come then I say we just wait and all come back maybe next year or something. I would rather just come home and see all of you at once. Besides that will give me an excuse to come back later on. And it looks to me like maybe it's not in God's will for it to happen yet, because it seems pretty unusual that the appeal would be denied by the other party and the judge. So that's what I say. We'll just wait. We can go on a low key trip to Colorado or Michigan or Chicago or some other fun place. I'd rather do that and see you all at once :)

OK. that said.

Dad- hmm. I actually think it would be better to take the current Hebrew class instead of the biblical class. It's true that I want to be able to read/ understand the bible in Hebrew but I would rather learn how to read it instead of just learn a few passages or something like that. Besides I am interested to see the similarities and differences between Q'eqchi' and Hebrew. Also I have been considering trying to go to Jerusalem maybe one semester at BYU Jerusalem. That would be cool! Also I did tell Matt that I think learning Japanese would be awesome but I think for now I'm going to wait. I am more interested in learning Arabic and Hebrew. Apparently Arabic is a language that will be handy to know for business and trade etc within the next few years. (I talked to a senior couple here where the Sister is pretty much a linguist. She speaks 4 languages fluently and is learning Q'eqchi'.) So I'm not sure to be honest. Also thanks for the update on applying for the MTC. I think it would be a good job because from what I can tell it is fairly flexible in terms of time- like, you get to make the schedule of when you come and when you teach and everything. So we'll talk more aobut that on Mother's Day. I'm sure it would be really hard to stop teaching seminary after having taught for so long if they release you. But the Lord will always find other ways for you to serve in the ward :) You do an outstanding job though and all the kids really love you a lot. You're the best dad! I love you. Thanks for being such a Christlike man.

Mom- wow! the temple is BEAUTIFUL! I can't wait to go with the whole fam!! (and yes I very well could get sealed there! YIKES!)  It will be awesome to live so close to the temple. I am going to stay in KS and look for a house between you guys and the temple. Having my family close by with a beautiful temple and close to the New Jesrusalem! What more could I ask for! :) Thanks for the talk and for the update on politics. Mitt Romney 2013! I also heard through the grapevine that KU lost to UK. Bummer. But at least we always represent KS in NCAA bball. Thanks for your testimony mom :) It always has been a support for me. As for my package I don't think there's really anything that I need you guys to send me really. I think that I'm all set with what I've got. The thing I would most appreciate is a bunch of "Polochik ties". Just look at the ties of all of the Polochik elders. Elder Ware's mom sent him a bunch of Polochik ties haha it was really funny and awesome. Just that I guess :) thanks for all you do for me mom. you're the best!!! Love your guts! =P

Alright guys well times up once again. I'm excited to talk to you all on the phone for the LAST TIME in a few weeks! Love you all!!!!!

Elder Norton

Monday, April 2, 2012

Eventful Conference Weekend


Hey guys!

Hope you all enjoyed conference weekend as much as I did!  Actually I hope you all enjoyed conference weekend a heck of a lot more than I did. Not that I didn't enjoy it but the circumstances of watching the conference were probably better than the circumstances we were in in the Polochik. We were here in Saqsuha' where we were supposed to get satelite service to watch the conference. Unfortunately there was no service. So, instead of watching the first session on Saturday I spent about 2 hours talking on the phone with a couple guys from the capital, and Elder Snow spent a good time talking to some guy in SLC about how to fix it, but we still got nothing. So we ended up going to Senahu (there were 8 of us that were supposed to watch it in Saqsuha') where we were able to see the 2nd Saturday Session and the Priesthood Session. That night we all slept in the chapel in Senahu (kind of like my first conference haha) and I just slept on the floor with a blanket. Fortunately, the senior couple in Senahu were able to provide us with a few blankets and pillows which made our stay a little bit more comfortable. It actually wasn't too bad to be honest and I slept ok. Sunday morning things went well, just in the afternoon a big rainstorm came and the power went out. We were afraid of missing the session but we were able to get a power generator running just in time for Elder Perry's talk. So we didn't miss much. Then yesterday night we tried to get back down to our areas but we couldn't find a ride in time and ended up all sleeping in the ZL's house in Teleman on cots and on mattresses on the floor. (it seemed like heaven compared to the chapel haha). It was a lot of fun actually and we got to talk a lot and get to know each other more. We got to know Elder Paulson from Draper since it was his first weekend in the Chik. He is super fun and we had a really good time. Then today we got back to our area where we showered (admittedly for the first time in a couple days...) and came here to La Tinta for our pday. Today I am starting divisions with Elder Ware that will be until Wednesday morning which will be super fun. To answer your question mom, Elder Ware's mom reads my blog and everything and she made a blog for him. elderryanware.blogspot.com is the site for his blog. He says she hasn't been initiated in your "secret motherly combinations" but I'm sure that you can lead her astray. =P

This past week we found another part member couple that wanted to get married and baptized. The nonmember's name is Zacarías and he is a pretty cool guy. He's already been coming to church for a while now, we just didn't know that he wasn't a member. Now that we know we are starting to work hard with him to get him prepared so that they can possibly be married in the last part of April or the first part of May. Everything's going well with all of our investigators but we don't know who ended up going to conference because we weren't there unfortunately! I hope most of them went.

Alright time is short.

Mom- hahaha ok I didn't see E. Archuleta but another elder swore that he saw him. I didn't really believe him but I said, "well if it's true, my mom will for sure tell me Monday." I can always count on you for little bits of info like that haha. Yah it was a great conference. Lots of revelation for our fam huh? I just felt like every single talk was just saying "Elder Norton you need to get home, get studying and working, and start looking for your wife right away." I had been thinking a little bit lately about how I have no idea how to start a family or much less provide for one financially (or even for myself for that matter..) So I had been thinking that it would maybe be a good idea to first just spend time preparing and then maybe in a few years get married. But after this conference I just felt a lot of impressions that said "You don't need to wait at all. Just find your wife and marry her. Do what's right-go to the temple, read the scriptures, pray every day together, listen to the prophets, pay your tithing, and do what's right- and it will all work out just fine." So I'm definitely going to work and make sure that I can provide for my family, that I'm responsible and everything, and that I will be a good father, but "bachelorhood isn't good", as I learned in the conference. Yikes! Love you mom!!

Dad- sounds good about the classes I think. If I want to change anything I think it should be fairly easy in the first week or so when everyone is switching classes and stuff. But I feel good about it. I actually know who the Woodward's family friend is that teaches Spanish. I slept at his house when I went with Twoody's family to Colorado haha. Actually it's his wife that has mom's pillow hahaha. Maybe I can finally get it back. Would you do me a favor though dad and do a little bit of research on the differences/ similarities between arabic and hebrew? What is the official language of Israel? Is hebrew spoken by only the Jews in Israel? Just out of curiosity. But yeah everything looks good. I guess I'll have to wait for pilates for another year haha. What other classes is Twoody taking? I was thinking a lot about how great it will be next priesthood session when you Matt, Jack, and I will all be together at the conference center watching! It will be awesome. Thanks for doing everything for my schedule though dad I really appreciate it. Love you!!

Alright guys, well sorry I couldn't write more but my time's up. I'll talk to you all soon!! Love you!!

Love,
Elder Norton

Add caption

Can you pick out Elder Norton in the picture?