November for Elder Jarom

Finally he sends pictures with him in them! Doesn't he look great♥ We are really looking forward his phone call on Christmas!!! Time isn't going very fast for us here at home.....I know it will get better but it seems like he has been gone forever. He is just coming up on his first transfer week since he arrived in France, we don't know if he will move or one of the other ones or if they will just stay in the threesome.  He spend the day with their District leader Elder Jellin from Orem in another city called Montpellier and had such a great time with him. He didn't care much for the size of the city, but I think it was nice for him to be with a fun Elder and leave the stress of his companions...They have been struggling, and I think they were struggling before Jarom even arrived, but I will share with you how they let the newest Elder solve their problems.. yep I'm proud of my Jarom.   

Thanksgiving was meat and potatoes and bread. He let me know they live above a bakery that has almost American tasting chocolate cake....could be dangerous! haha..

.... i went to toulouse for the blue's conference (here we're called blues instead of greenies) and wow that was so cool!! i love our president.i LOVED that day! it was so nice. very uplifting and motivating. but yeah so eventually i had to part ways with them and when i got back, things hadn't been going well. things had been happening for a long time now and i've been praying and trying so so so hard to find a way to solve our little companionship issues. impossible! took all week and finally we all just blew up on sunday morning. bad bad morning. and i was supposed to teach sunday school (terrifying) and anyways i ended up thinking all church how to fix this problem. eventually heavenly father answered my prayers and i figured it out. i had us do a little meeting when we got back from church. i sat us all down in the middle of the room i started it with a prayer, then i had us all share our favorite scriptures and how its helped us in our lives and then started the evaluation of the problem. first, i started out by saying the things that i was having a problem with. eventually it ended up with us discussing what was wront and how it all comes down to our different perspectives of what missionary work is and stuff. all in all after about almost three hours of non contentious discussion, we all figured out what was wrong. it ends up all i found out was what type of person my trainer was and all the things he's trying to do. i really just found out how i'm supposed to deal with him and how to make things easy and good for him and at the same time have unity and be able to work good together. it was a pretty good little meeting i think. if we didn't have the spirit there, it would've been a very scary meeting. we were all pretty heated and angry in the morning and we said... fine we're calling the president... i really didn't want president to have to figure things out that we could do ourselves so i just tried this out instead. great results. we still don't really like each other but there's no tention and we can work better a lot better together.
 

 I asked to see his apartment and he finally said after they cleaned for hours that he took this picture to send to me.  I think I felt better before I knew what it looked like where he was living.....Jay didn't seem to mind he said it looked like an Elder's apartment. Jarom actually said theirs was one of the bigger and nicer apartments. Really?......our main room in my apt. we have a massive apt compared to all the others. it has a study room, main room with kitchen and couch, then a batheroom and tub and a bedroom with 4 beds. pretty sweet huh. we just spent like 4 hours deep cleaning (me and elder nicholes, while samuelson slept)........

After getting such a short haircut before leaving the MTC I was surprised to he needed another one so soon. I remember cutting his hair and he was a little picky...wonder how his companion did? Again...notice the apartment.......I might not ask for pictures of his other places! Here is some of his last letter:


so yeah everyone in the ward is french, everybody speaks french except for an indian guy who came to church yesterday as a new investagator and he is looking like a next baptism!! its so cool! we just contacted him on the bus and invited him to come to church and he came! we taught him a bit and he's super interested and doesnt speak french. just english. so its pretty cool i think. i'm excited........... my president is so awesome. i think he's getting sick of my companion and how every single time he's told to do something by an assistant or zone leader he has to complain to president...........
   So we decided to stop by a referral that we got from a member and his name is Ihcean (ishean is how you say it?) he lost his job because he told his muslim boss that he was christian and that the boss should stop pushing his religion on him during work. understand? basically because he's not muslim, he was fired and can't find a job. but anyways we taught him the first lession and i taught quite a bit of it too, it was awesome and after the first lesson, he placed a baptismal date!!!!!!! holy crap huh?! so he came to church too and he was all excited and loved all the lessone (except i don't know what it is about french people but they're obsessed with deep docterine?! its so annoying all the sacrament talks were all about deep docterine stuff that wasn't even true and stuff, ) anyways i sat with him and helped him look things up in the gospel principles book and scriptures and stuff. it was awesome. i couldn't say much but i could try. it was pretty cool. i've never felt the spirit so strong in church than when i'm sittin next to an investigator helping them along!! its the coolest thing ever!! i love it..........anyways so this week went pretty good and i'm starving. i need to eat something. by the way i'm always thinking about bizarre foods with andrew zimmerman haha every time i eat something weird.... like salads.... and wow how come i really don't like tomatoes? why?! french LOVE tomatoes... its so weird. i never thought about it. well anyways i gotta send you some pictures so gotta go. i love you mom and its impossible not to think back at all the fun time we had just chillin and eating nasty hot dogs at maverick and stuff haha. i miss you a ton!! hope you have a great week!! love you.

Jarom

Goodbye to the MTC

 Well, as the 2 months come to an end I finally get pictures. Jarom has really enjoyed his time at the MTC. There were some really Spiritual experiences there and he is so very appreciative for the Gift of Tounges.

Let me share pieces of his letters with you.  They aren't in any order, just random.

"So ten of us french missionaries had to make a trip to San Fransisco yesterday to meet with the french consolate for our visas. totally pointless trip i thought. 2 hours over, 20 minutes to meet with the guy and give out papers to him and scan our fingerprints, then stopped at peir 39 then 2 hours back. totally pointless but i was so tempted to run over and call you from the phones but i wasn't sure if it was allowed one week in. crazy its only been a week. feels like forever. but yeah it was a heck of a trip. i'll probably never do something like that again. well in class we have been working on contacting and working with the first lesson. crazy cuz on the plane ride home (all us missionaries were sitting next so someone we don't know, i think they plan that) but i sat next to a lady from texas and she was way religious and we talked the whole way home, which i wasn't too happy about cuz i love to just watch out the window of the plane, but we talked about the church and her beliefs and all sorts of stuff and right before we got off the plane i kinda bore her my testimony and gave her a pass-along card and she took it and was way excited, it was a crazy experience. pretty cool. can't wait til i actually know what i'm doing and be able to know what to do in a situation like that."

goodness!"

Roomies.  All going to Toulouse
and a great bunch of guys!

He was lovin these P-Day clothes!

A distant shot but a powerful one!
They love the Temple♥

"About the french. its coming along, i can't believe how much i've learned since i got here but i kinda wish it would come faster. i'm workin hard and i talked to my instructors yesterday askin for tips on how to learn faster. my teachers are so cool. so i'm praying, testimony, and getting to know people in french. there is a program where every wednesday we go and teach something in french then teach a lesson to a investigator. its pretty cool. i'm always nervous, but when we finish i feel so pumped and awesome! its pretty cool haha in 2 weeks we start teaching 40 minute lessons in french. i''m terrified about it. anyways its goin pretty good :)"

"K its pretty hard not to turn into a spiritual giant here. so the people who don't change... they really really tried not to change. me and elder park have been dominating the first and second lesson. we teach great but we just gotta work on teaching equal time. i feel the spirit like a million times every day here haha love it. we're constantly studying churchy stuff or teaching. its pretty awesome. i gotta leave my comfort zone a TON here so i just deal with it. i gotta do it eventually so why not start now. no use complaining too. well out of time. love you guys! tell dad sorry i didn't write him back. i ran out of time while writing you. just saw his message. tell him i'm being as obedient as i can and haven't broke a rule yet... that i know of :) haha alright i'll talk to ya later! love ya"

First MTC Picture!

At church today the mother of the missionary on the right showed me this picture! Her son is also in our ward and he had Jarom's good friend (first elder) from Gunnison in his district. I was so excited!! I miss my Jarom so much, so its great to get a picture of him. Sorry the quality isn't good, for some reason it wouldn't let me upload the scanned image so its a picture of a picture. I haven't gotten any pictures from Jarom yet because he has been having trouble with his camera card but has now found a machine that will read his card so pictures will come soon!!! How cute is he? I don't care how hard things might be in France, how could anyone turn away such a handsome boy?! haha...yep, that would be a 'mother' talking.
So he will be flying out about the 8 or 9 of November and I am so looking forward to his phone call. He has a 4 hour lay-over in Dallas so his call should be a long one:) Just an update on his time at the MTC. His companion is a little taller and skinnier than Jarom, is quiet like Jarom and they really enjoy each other. Thank goodness. His district is the BEST! All of this has helped him adjust even tho there were some really homesick days the first week there. He is doing great, teaching and speaking in French all the time, loving the continuous Spiritual moments that happen every day and looks forward to attending the temple every Friday.  A new group of  forty French speaking missionaries have come in and now he is one of the 'old' missionaries. He was hilarious when he said the newbies all looked so innocent..haha.. Imagine feeling old at 19...He has been able to see his friends come and leave the MTC and he is still there, but hey, thats the price for getting to serve in France:)  His last letter home he said many times that he is so ready to go and serve the people in France. When I hear that, it makes the missing him a little easier.