Dear Mom, Dad, and Cole Family,

Well my kid came out at 6'5 and 340lbs.. and he's only 18. Not bad for having my genes ha ha.  If haven't already guessed he's Samoan but he was born in California and moved to Salt Lake.  His name is Elder Key and I love this guy, he's the cousin of Elder Kelsall who's also in our mission which made things super cool.  It was cool when they got to see each other at General Conference on Saturday for the first time in five years.  Elder Key was telling me that he played football for East High and that he had 20 sacks his senior year along with a few scholarship offers from Utah, Oregon...and other schools. Yeah I could be seeing this guy in the NFL in a couple of years.  But that makes me respect him a lot more for making the decision to come on a mission before playing football.  Maybe he would have ended up like Jabare Parker if he would have put football before his mission.

This week before Elder Green and I got our new companions we decided to deep clean our apartment.  And when I say deep clean I mean "DEEP CLEAN".  There was so much stuff that past missionaries had left that we just thought that maybe if future missionaries would see a clean apartment that they would keep it clean too instead of piling up all of the junk.  Now I'm happy to say that the spirit is more fully able to abide in our apartment :). 

Work has been fun as people have naturally been attracted to my awesome companion who is soaking in all of the attention.  But I told him sooner or later he's going to get sick of it like I did when I first arrived.  Anyways, with the help of Elder Key's new missionary energy we have had a lot of success with OYM'ing people, it's just getting an appointment that's the hard part.  One of these day's we'll get a return appointment with someone and it will actually happen!  Being with Elder Key reminds me a lot of when I was a new missionary, full of excitement for the work and a love for God, but  still new in the language.  It's a humbling opportunity for me to be able to help him learn this wonderful language so that he can better fulfill his purpose as a missionary.  He told me that he just want's to learn this language so he can talk to people.  He doesn't want to be quiet!  It's a hard experience coming from having pure Filipino companions who can say anything they want to having to pretty much lead the entire lesson but I feel a great power when he speaks that he truly loves these people and our Heavenly Father.  I couldn't have asked for a better companion. 

General Conference was awesome and I am so grateful that I had the opportunity to listen to the words of our living prophet and all of the other apostles.  I thought it was funny that there were so many talks about marriage.  Sorry Mom and Dad, I really need to heed the apostles advice about marriage so maybe you'll be grandparents earlier than you wanted to ha ha.  Of course I'm just joking.  But really one of the talks that hit me was from Larry M. Gibson about "Fatherhood".  When he told the story of when he did a 50 mile hike in under 20 hours with his two sons.  Upon their return from the hike all of them retired to their respective rooms to rest; but with all the strength that Elder Gibson had he went and checked on his sons and asked them about their experience.  The first one replied "That was the hardest thing that I have ever done, and I don't want to do it again". Then Elder Gibson promised his son that he would never have to walk 50 miles in one day.  So his son replied "Good, then I'm going"   Then he went down to the room of his oldest son and asked him the same question, he got an answer that showed the spiritual maturity of his son.  His oldest son said "That was the hardest thing that I have ever done, and I don't want to do it again; unless my sons want to".  Elder Gibson's son showed a lot of spiritual maturity by already realizing that a true father puts the needs of his family before his own.  Of course fathers deserve the opportunity to do stuff that they want to do but a fathers primary responsibility is to raise their kids in righteousness and to be a good example.  I am so grateful for my father and for the example that he has set for me.  I never realized of how much my father sacrificed for me throughout my life but my heart is full of love and gratitude for both of my grandpa's who have raised my parents in such a way that I was able to be born a member of this church.  (I am just as grateful for my mother and grandmother's as I am the the males, I was just focusing on Fatherhood here). 

Mahal na mahal ko po kayo!  May God be with you till we meet again. 

PS:  Happy Anniversary Mom and Dad :)

                                          -Elder Cole