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Hi, 

Hope everyone has had a good week. Up here in Magnolia we had a lot of fun this week, did a lot of driving!

Monday we went down to Bossier City and did some shopping at The Bins, and then went to Lululemon to look at pants and shorts. We also shopped at Hobby Lobby and Bass Pro, and Elder Davis almost bought fishing gear in many instances and I almost bought sunglasses in many instances. Luckily neither of us gave in :)

We spent the afternoon mostly at the Brownlee apartment talking to family, and then drove back to Magnolia after pday. In the evening we had a lesson with a lady named Lois (pronounced "Low-is") and taught her through her mesh porch. We walked around and taught a bunch of people too. David put an entire hardboiled egg in his mouth at once (this was a prior event that I am now recalling). 

Tuesday we did service, and then taught Enoch. He told us:

- His family wants him to be more into religion 

- They want him to be a pastor and own his own church and he wants to as well

- He wants to be more involved in religion

BUT

- He doesn't want to be pressured

- He refuses to start reading and praying even though he knows he should

- He doesn't want to look to his family like he's studying and praying cause then they will tell him to do more then he wants

- He doesn't want to pray because he thinks it's silly to pray if you don't really mean it and he never means anything haha

Because of all this we have had a super tough time getting him to do ANYTHING! He's nice but full of excuses. We finally hot him to commit to saying gratitude prayers. We taught Bill in the evening, and them David and Charlien. Immediately after the pray I layer out very clearly everything the Word of Wisdom says you CANT do without even missing a beat. This is not usually a wise tactic but I'm tired of beating around the bush and they need a little boldness sometimes. Charlien took it very well and suggested to herself that she could drink Sprite instead of Tea! We didn't even have to suggest it. And apparently she likes Sprite better than tea anyway haha she only drinks it cause that's what they have. David didnt commit to following it really but he seemed to understand it a bit better by the end. Tyre also had his Baptismal interview and passed it. 

We drove down to Bosssier City to spend the night there and then in the morning drove to Zone Conference! It was surprisingly good, lots of good messages. This mission president is really heavy on the importance of memorization which is interesting, so he's having us memorize a lot more. After Zone Conference we had interviews with him, and it was fine. He's a cool guy, just seemed to be somewhere else in the interview haha

In the evening we exchanged with the Brownlee Elders, and had dinner with the Deatons. Upon arrival at their abode we were immediately attacked and restrained by their rogue children!! Tags were stolen, arms grabbed, backclimbing attempted, and yelling began. They have the most wild kids I have ever seen, I was just about to get out my wacking stick but I refrained. Dinner was pretty good though, had some good lentil soup!

I exchanged with Elder Haymond (a greenie) and he's super cool! Got to talk with him about his future career as a helicopter pilot. :) He also complimented my excellent driving! (Not to brag but I have learned the precise things that will trigger Tiwi on the truck, and so I can have a lot of fun driving and still not get flagged by Tiwi)

Elder Haymond already seems to have a handle on missionary work which is cool!

Thursday we drove back to Taylor, AR and helped demolish the paneling in one of the rooms of the mayor's house. It was fun (as you would expect) to tear it all off! We ate with the Masses at Sam's Southern Eatery for lunch which was absolutely amazing as usual! We are recognized as regulars by the girls that work there now and they always say hi. In the evening we returned to Magnolia and taught David and Charlien. We pulled up and Charlien had a bottle of Sprite next to her!! We taught them the Law of Chastity, which went pretty smoothly. 

On Friday we did service at the Thrift store and I got fed up with how many cords there were so I started cutting and discarding every cord that wasn't remotely useful. I went through 2 boxes of them when I usually have enough time to go through only 1/5 of a box each time :))

We ate dinner with the Marchans (Spaghetti), and then went with Brother Bahr and taught Tyre all about the Priesthood and temples! Brother Bahr did a really good job of getting through to Tyre. After Tyre we drove out to Bradley, AR and visited some people out there! We drove 50 minutes on country roads to get there which was lots of fun cause driving dirt roads is like a roller coaster. Everyone we talked to turned us down, which is good because it's too many miles to go out there very often haha

Saturday morning we had Tyre's baptism, which went smoothly. I baptized him, and Elder Davis gave a talk. After he was baptized he wouldn't open his eyes so I had to lead him to his stall in the bathroom and give him all his stuff haha--don't know why he kept them closed so long. Because of the baptism we didn't walk the dogs, but I can just imagine them barking angrily at our absence. Glad we were too busy for them 😤

In the afternoon we noticed our tire pressure was slowly dropping so we called Elder Jacobs and he told us to take it in. They found a series of small holes halfway around the front left tire, so we got two new front tires put on. And we payed in cash haha After that we taught Bill again who's dealing with a lot of relationship trouble in his family so we just listened while he shared it all with us. 

Sunday Tyre got confirmed, and the 5th Sunday lesson was on the new PMG which was great! I also had 4 interviews after church. Tyre will be getting the Priesthood next week, and then Logan will be getting his Patriarchal blessing! 

-Abe