Happy Hump Day!

Bon tardi querido famianan y amigunan

Yes, I did hit hump day this week. We didn't do anything special. We had district meeting that day on Skype and Elder Holt typed in "Happy Year!". That was about it. (Elder Holt was Jeff's MTC companion who is serving on the island of Curacao now.) No, I still haven't had the birthday dinner yet, haha, but it's all good, it will come sometime when we don't have so much food.

I just saw the picture Dad attached to his email of Todd and Mom. Wow, Todd is tall! Or Mom is getting shorter, haha!

I didn't get any packages yet, but I did get a letter from Grandma Weech this week, thanks! I'm not sure what's up with the package you sent, but I'm sure everything will work out. Actually the mission office finally figured out that the church HQ in Santo Domingo sends stuff to our branch president's house every week, so it sounds like they might start to send our stuff from the mission home to us down here through DHL. I'm not sure if that will be an ongoing thing, but I think that it will at least get what is already in the mission office now down here to me. One other thing is that you have to put "The Dutch Caribbean" at the bottom of the address when you send it. Apparently there is an Aruba in Africa somewhere, and the things can get sent there to that country if you don't put "The Dutch Caribbean". (We did put The Dutch Caribbean on our package, so . . . apparently even when you include that in the address packages go somewhere other than Aruba for a LONG time!) Sorry the mail system is such a mess, haha. But, don't worry about it for now, I'll be fine until I can find the other packages. Sounds like our new President will be coming down to the islands in August so that will be sweet!

Karen's family decided on this weekend for her baptism, so hopefully she will be baptized on Saturday. Also, we are just waiting on an interview for Marisol, and then she should be ready to go, so we hope that she can be baptized this weekend as well, but if not, then soon.

We had a great day in church yesterday, members brought friends! That is always awesome! We are also teaching a part member family who came to church. The wife is inactive and the husband is actually like Hindu. I don't even think that he believed in God before, but he is doing so awesome! He is progressing so much, and they came with their baby to church yesterday, and it would just be so great to see him get baptized and see them go to the temple. Wow, that would be truly amazing and a miracle!!!

We actually don't have a baptismal font while they are doing construction on the Church building in Oranjestad, because we're not supposed to be in the building while they do renovations, so we will have to use the world's biggest font!! The ocean! That is soooo cool!!

Morice told us that he can't do anything this month, so he is for the most part done, but that's alright, the Lord has blessed us with a lot of people who are progressing greatly so we will use our time there for now!!!

I can never get this camera to work, it will come up when I use the camera, but only after messing with it for a few minutes, so I will buy a card here, like Dad told me, and then I will try to send this one home when President comes down in August. Sorry, I have some sweet pictures, and I wish I could send them home!!

Hey, did you get to talk to Sister Halbert yet about the Lee's? We actually gave a blessing to a husband of a member from Bonaire that is here in the hospital with Dengue fever. That's nasty stuff, it looks really bad. So, the Lee's actually called us this week, just thought that was kind of cool. (The Lees are the senior couple serving on the island of Bonaire right now. They know Scott Halbert who is a good friend of Jeff's. He is currently serving a mission in Palmyra New York. I called Scott's mom Lila Halbert and found out that the Lees on Bonaire are not the Lees we knew from Gilbert 12th Ward years ago. They are Terry and Linda Lee - Scott's aunt's mother-in-law and father-in-law! Fun! Mystery solved!)

I love you all so much and I thank you very much Mom for what you said. I got my hands on a Doctrine and Covenants study guide this week, and I learned something from it, I think it must have been a quote from a past apostle or prophet, but it said basically that fear is the absence of faith. I had never thought of it that way, but it is that simple, fear does not come from Heavenly Father, it comes from when we take our eyes off of Jesus Christ. So let us "look and live". Because as I was taught earlier in my mission, "whenever we are looking to the future with Jesus Christ in it, in our sight, then there is always light." How grateful I am for that counsel that a very wise man gave me in my mission.

I love you all!

Elder DeSpain