Thank you for your letters! I loved seeing the pictures from Brooke and Brian's wedding. Sister Young and I are so excited for both of them! She knew about Brian practicing with RSL...I can't even begin to tell you how excited I was when I heard about it. I knew Rimando was probably going to play for the national team, but didn't know anything about the other two! So cool! Ahhh I miss soccer so much. The elders at the MTC don't know how lucky they are...

Congratulations to Greg and Katie! I haven't seen Travis yet, but hopefully will soon. I don't know how we can get our paths to cross...maybe at choir? If you find out when he has P-day or meals, let me know!

I'm so glad Michael decided to major in English! It's too perfect. I want to hear about all of the classes he decides to take.

In less than a week the group of new Italian missionaries will be here! There are seventeen of them, so our branch will have two new districts. The zone leaders and I have been preparing for the orientation next Wednesday, which is exciting. Our time here has gone by so quickly; it seems like just yesterday that we were the new ones.

At mission conference on Sunday President Brown announced the release of the first counselor, Brother Nalley, and his wife. The Nalley's will take the Brown's place in January. They all shared their testimonies, and it was such a powerful meeting. Then for the devotional that night we watched President Monson's 85th Birthday Celebration. The only time we're allowed to listen to music here is on Sundays during "Music and the Spoken Word", so to be able to hear songs from Brigadoon, Phantom of the Opera, Les Miserables...I was loving life.

As far as the language goes, we're all making steady improvement. Remember our new teacher, Brother Brewster, with the accent from Bari? Sister Durfee and I started teaching him (as an Atheist named Francesco) this week. We gave him a copy of the Book of Mormon after our first lesson and decided to focus the next few on God and our relationship to him. You can't exactly ask someone to pray for a witness of the Book of Mormon until they have a concept of God. Anyway, our second lesson with him went pretty well, and then just as we were leaving he told us that he had read the introduction and a few chapters in 1 Nephi. We were surprised, and gave him a few more chapters to read.

During our third meeting with "Francesco" we taught him how to pray. We only had ten minutes for a lesson, so once we finished our kneeling prayer with him we were ready to go. Before we got off our knees he asked, "do you want me to try?" He did, we asked him to read Alma 34 and experiment upon the word, exercise a particle of faith, etc. and set another appointment. It's kind of funny. When we're struggling to say something or ask a question, Brother Brewster will say, "oh, you mean ___?" and help us, which is exactly the opposite of what our two previous teachers did as investigators. Maybe he's going easy on us because he's new...or just to help us get farther in lessons? Either way, I can't complain.

Elder Kopischke spoke at the Devotional on Tuesday night. His son and nephew are here at the MTC right now preparing to serve in Greece, and their district is in the room next to ours, so we were all pretty excited. He gave one of the most powerful talks about repentance that I've ever heard or read. One of the elders in our zone went home this week, so it was especially significant to all of us. It is amazing to see how our lives can change when we apply the atonement. One of the reasons the testimonies of the prophets in the Book of Mormon are so powerful is because they are teaching about things they've experienced personally. Alma's testimony to Helaman is just one example of this. As missionaries we can only teach things that we know, that have touched and changed us, that we've internalized. I know I have so much to learn, and am so grateful for this opportunity I have to serve a mission. There is nothing I'd rather be doing right now.

Thanks for all of your support. I love you!

Jenni