Bonjour, ma belle famille!

Another week has passed! Seriously, of all the weeks so far, this one has gone by the fastest. I think that's a good thing. It was kind of a crazy week, but in a good way. I'm not going to talk about things in chronological order, sorry. We had our 3rd TRC experience this week. The assignment was two parts: the first part was in French. We had to pick up our investigator (two investigators in our case) and take them to church, on a bus, and talk to them about whether or not they kept their commitments to read le Livre de Mormon and prier (pray) about it. Since I had done most of the French part the last couple of times, my companions and I had decided that I wouldn't talk much at all this week and they would practice. It turns out, however, that since there were two investigators, they talked to one of them and I talked to one all on my own! It was kind of rough, but it was fun. I asked my prepared questions, like "Did you pray" and "How did you feel as you read 3 Nephi 11?" and he said his answers, and I definitely just nodded my head and said "oui" alot. I kind of understood him, and I kind of responded. French is dificil! The second part was teaching the second lesson in English. It's the Plan of Salvation, and it's seriously an incredible lesson. I had been studying it all week, and can I just say that I know for SURE that Jesus Christ is our Savior. Heavenly Father loves us SO much and all He wants is for us to return to Him and be able to be like Him. He's given us His Son to give us the opportunity to do that, and all we have to do is follow Christ and have faith, repent, be baptized, receive the Holy Ghost, and make good decisions that will help us endure to the end. It's SO SIMPLE! Anyways, the lesson was a little rocky because we are still having a hard time balancing out how to teach with three people. It's seriously one of the hardest things I've ever had to do. I was feeling a little discouraged about it, but afterwards, our teacher, Soeur Gabriel, came up to us and told us that the other teacher that was in there said that one of our investigators IS ACTUALLY AN INVESTIGATOR. The teacher said that we actually did a really good job with him. Aah! How exciting is that? What if I, a measely little missionary in the MTC, have a hand in this guy's conversion?! It was pretty cool. I've seen him at the TRC before, and I just think that is the neatest thing. So that made me feel a little better about the experience, but Soeurs Vasileva and Kenny and I still need to plan plan plan our lessons better and practice practice practice.

We got a new district of elders in our zone this week. There are only six of them, but we will have a bigger wave of newbies in 3 more weeks. Last night the zone leaders and I taught them for an hour about setting goals, planning, MDT (Missionary Directed Time), and companionship inventory. One of them is Elder Searle, who told me that he knows Grace from band and that he saw you guys at Chili's the other day! That was pretty exciting for me, I don't know why haha. Any connection is nice. But that makes 4 elders in my zone that went to school with Grace. Neato!

We had some pretty cool firesides/devotionals this week. On Tuesday, Elder Gonzales of the Presidency of the Seventy spoke to us about becoming Christlike teachers. It was a great lesson. On Sunday we had a cool one too. Stephen Jones, Thomas Durham, and Newell Dayley came and talked to us a little bit. They are all composers of hymns, and so they told us how their hymns came about and then we got to sing them with them. It was awesome. As I've said before, I LOVE singing in the MTC. Music is incredible, and missionaries are incredible, so the two of them together kind of blows my mind! We sang When Faith Endures, With Humble Heart, and Lord I Would Follow Thee. Love them.

I got to go to the outside world again this week. Kind of. Sister Kenny had to get a prescription so we got to walk down to the BYU Student Health Center. I was hoping I would see someone I knew on the way, but I had no such luck. It reminded me of the time I spent in there before I put my mission papers in...hmm.

So I will probably talk more about this next week, but I'm going to be a celebrity! Someone from the Salt Lake Magazine is coming to our class on Monday to write an article about the MTC and the language training efforts. I don't know how our class was chosen to represent the entire MTC, but we were. AND my district leader, Elder Poole, and I were chosen by our teacher to be personally interviewed for the article. Whaaat?! So, I need to think of some good things to say (and I need to look amazing) on Monday because I'm going to be famous. It won't come out until the November/December issue of the magazine, but I expect you to look for me there :)

So it sounds like y'all are getting pretty ready for the Red Rock, yeah?! What are the dates, again? And are you getting different shirts, or sticking with the neon yellow ones? I am excited for you!

Also, I'm not convinced that Todd works here. I have been looking for him, but have not seen him in the three and a half weeks that I've been here! I've seen Ashley a couple of times, but not Todd. I'll keep my out for him, though.

Sister Kenny's sister or somebody sent her a package with a bunch of candy in it (yes, English candy!) and she shared with me. She gave me Haribo Star Mix and a Crunchie candy bar....aah it was like I was in London again! My mouth was so happy. I'm trying not to get fat though. They have a lot of unhealthy food at the cafeteria, and even though it's mediocre, I seem to be eating a hearty meal every meal (except breakfast). I'm still running some, but my district has been playing volleyball in the evenings a lot. I contribute nothing to my team, and I'm pretty sure they are barely tolerating me being on there, but it's way fun. It's nice to be outside, especially in the evenings.

This email is all over the place and kind of random...I'm sorry! Thank you for all your letters and packages, they are so wonderful. It's the best thing to get mail here, seriously. We get regular letters after lunch and dear elder letters after dinner. Keep writing me! I will write you back, I promise! I'm also trying to send pictures, but the picture printer in the bookstore is broken too often, and even when it's working, it takes like 4 days to get your pictures done. But I have some good ones on the way, don't you worry!

Ok, I love you all so so much. Boys, have a great time in school! I'll be praying for you! And Grace, have fun at camp! I'll be listening for you!

LOVE YOU!

Love, Allie