Letter dated 30Jul2012

[Dear family and friends, I hope this letter finds you doing well! We have had a couple of busy weeks. Julie, Andrew, Christopher and Nicholas just finished a wonderful but grueling 5 weeks preparing for two musicals - Beauty and the Beast and Chicago. The twins were dishes and wolves in Beauty; Andrew did an amazing and wonderful job as Cogsworth in Beauty - and as Aaron the attorney in Chicago. Julie was the musical director for both musicals. Right now Andrew and I are at Band Camp for the week. I hope you are enjoying your summer! If you want to send a note to Weston, just respond to this email - and I'll forward your note to him! Much love, Weston's editor - BWS] Dear Family, I´m sorry, but photos will have to wait until next week. I forgot to bring my camera to the computer today so you´ll just have to wait. I´m excited to hear how well the plays went this past week! I can just tell that Mom is way more relaxed now that they´re done! You deserve a good rest for everything you did to help out Chicago and Beauty and the Beast. I wish I could have seen them, hearing everything that Andrew´s been doing in the plays he´s been in! You´re going to be so good by the time I get home that I´ll have a lot of competition for being the dramatic one in the house (HAHA)! I hope that you´re having a really fun time at Band Camp as well. It´s good to know that you are all doing so great and having a great summer right now. Rest assured, I am also doing great and so far I have not been attacked by any smoke monsters.. yet! [This is a reference to the smoke monster in the TV show - LOST.] There was a really weird thing that happened one of the nights this past week (but I need to establish a little bit of the story first). We were wondering if it would be possible to go up onto the roof of our apartment and so we talked with our building president to see if she had a key. She did and nobody uses the roof, so she just gave it to us but told us to keep it safe. So for the past week we´ve gone up to the roof to chill and just look at the stars. We also brought our couch up to the roof as well, and since it hasn´t rained much here, we´re good!) but earlier this week we were talking on the roof and some weird clouds came by and we started seeing lightning in the clouds. They weren´t striking the ground, but it was still super weird because there was no sound at all. It could have been the smoke monster but I´m not exactly sure... Oh, and the other week I had an interview with President Pace since he was getting to know all the missionaries in the area and I asked him if he knew Grandpa Wilson. We had already finished the interview and were walking back when I asked him and he paused, looked at me, then said ´´Come back into my office´´. He asked me how I knew the name Merrill Wilson and I told him that he´s my grandfather. He then gave me his account of how Grandpa saved his life in surgery when his appendix ruptured. President Pace is very fond of Grandpa Wilson. So we´ve had quite the week. One of the families that we´ve been working with are from Equador. They are a family of four and this past week we had a few lessons with them, teaching them about the Book of Mormon and then the last visit we had with them we watched the Testaments with them. We´ve been working with them a lot for the past couple of weeks and they have shown so much interest in learning more, letting us come over and teach, and they are reading out of the Book of Mormon. Then finally, yesterday, we walked over to their house right before church and wanted to check to see if they were coming. The father of the family looked out the window and told us that the girls were getting ready and that they were coming in just a minute. Elder Greep noticed in his hands that he was holding a Book of Mormon and asked if he had been reading it just then and said he was. We had a moment and told him that we love them and then he said that they all love us as well and then we went to church, shortly followed by them. It was a special time and we´re going to see them tonight to see them again but they are such a great family. We´ve been meeting lots of new people as well, including families that are less active but they all have great hearts and it´s been a blessing to meet and get to know them all. There was another family that we helped move some of their furniture because they are moving back to the mainland but we got to talking with them and they were just so great. Sometimes it doesn´t seem fair why some things are going on in our lives but I know that the Church of Jesus Christ is the biggest blessing that we have in our lives, right next to our families. I can´t wait to continue meeting and helping new people but I hope that you all continue doing what you´re all doing and always remember how important it is to give our devotion to the Lord. While this area in Inca may be one of the harder areas in the mission, I´m keeping my head up and haven´t felt as discouraged as some might let themselves get. I´ll continue praying for every one of you and keep you close to my heart, always (literally, I have a photo in my agenda and so it´s always right next to my heart XD) Can´t wait to hear from you all next week! I wuv you daddy, mommy, Joey, Danny, Andy, Chrisy, and Nicky! Élder Xander Weston Chandler P.S. Here is my actual adress and I know that it should work. But make sure you share this one with everyone and get rid of the other one. Elder Schindler C/ Ramon Desbrul #50, Escl. 2B Inca 07300 Mallorca, España