Spanish is Taking Over!

Hola querido familia,

I can't believe it's already been over a month since I've been gone. See, I'll be home before you know it. This past week has been extremely crazy. I've been forced to learn and experience a lot. I'll tell you more of the details in my letter that I write later today.

Since it's been a month there has been lots of changes in leadership in our branch. Elder Burr and I were both released as zone leaders. Elder White and Jasperson replaced us on Sunday. They're a solid set of missionaries and will do an execellent job. All of the district leaders and the coordinating sister were also changed. Elder Murray, George, and Faasee were all released. Elder Sudol took over as District Leader in our district. He's one of our roomates and you have a picture of him I think. I'm definitely going to send you the pictures I've taken today. We made some pretty cool ones last night.

The Spanish is coming along excellent. I even occasionally forget what words are in English and can only think of the spanish word. It doesn't happen very often but it is still cool. I've been understanding our teachers really well lately. We've also made a major transition to speaking pretty much only spanish during class. We're working on diminishing the english we speak outside of class too but that is not going as well. We just have to keep working at it.

We gave our last lesson at the TRC in english on last thursday. That means this upcoming thursday we have to give the entire first lesson in spanish. We are going to be so ready for it. It is amazing how quickly the Lord is allowing us to learn our new language.

I'm jealous of you Matthew and Jonathan. Even though it was muddy I would've loved to go mountainbiking with you. I've met a couple of Elders here who share my same passion. Elder Dahl and Elder Sudol both like mountainbiking a lot.

Thanks for the healthy snacks. It's nice to have something that isn't one hundred percent sugar. Which reminds me that I've been slowing down a little bit on gaining weight. I'm only up to 153 pounds now. I think it had something to do with being sick. I'm just about over it now though. My goal is 160 by the time I leave the MTC.

The food here was really good to begin with. Now it usually just okay. Occasionally we get a good meal. It all kind of starts to taste the same after a while. My favorite thing though is the chocolate milk. I usually have one glass with two of my meals each day. I hope that it's not too bad for me because it tastes really good.

I'm glad to hear you made there okay grandma. I'm excited to try some of your cookies (healthy or not). How long are you going to be staying?

We got to go to the temple again today. It is always a cool experience. Lately we've been doing names for President Watkins. I think we've done over fifty names as a zone for him.

Keep working hard in school. I pray for you to do well and have the desire to work hard every night. I feel like I'm in school right now. Except we study only spanish, preach my gospel, and the scriptures for several hours every day. Including on Saturday. Our classroom is not very large and we cram twelve of us plus a teacher in there for most of the day. It is crazy how well it works.

I need to go now. I need to leave a little bit of time so I can go and print all of my emails.

I love you all very very much. And I pray for you often.

Elder Ben Arnold