March 8, 2022

 Everyone!

We had a fun chat with Ethan yesterday so here is the update on how he is doing.

Ethan was excited to tell us that Donna (a woman they have been teaching who survived a polygamy discussion in Relief Society on her first day attending Church and still went the next week) is on-date for baptism on April 9th.  They are excited.  They have some other people they are teaching who, they hope, will progress towards baptism.  

Last week, Ethan and Elder Howard decided to ask if President Palmer would like to do companionship study with them one day.  He told them he would check his schedule and get back to them.  Last Monday, President Palmer texted them to see if they wanted to study.  They hurriedly drove to the mission office (close to their area) to have companionship study with "a future general authority" as Ethan put it.  He said they spend about 1 1/2 hours studying and discussing the Gospel with their mission president.  I am so grateful for a mission president who takes time to spend with his missionaries.  I am grateful for the experience Ethan is having.

Ethan went on a mini-exchange on Monday with an elder in another area.  It seems that each time Ethan is on exchanges in that area, they go to the same member house for dinner or a spiritual thought.  He has now been there 4 times...to the same house!  The first couple of times they just called him "Elder Blank" because they didn't think they would need to learn his name.  But after 2 dinner appointments and 2 spiritual lessons, they may need to learn it.  Ethan thought it was funny.

As he always is, Ethan is a pack rat and he was excited to say that they picked up 3 rolling chairs for free off the side of the road last week.  I don't know what they are doing with them but he was so excited to collect free stuff.

For p-day on Tuesday they were going to play frisbee golf and then help someone move.  It was going to be a pretty low-key day for them where they could just relax and get some things done. He went and got a haircut.  He looks sharp!

About the egg video from last week.  I asked what the story was and Ethan told me they play a game called "What are the odds?"  It's complicated to explain but the loser has to do something and Ethan asked Elder Howard what the odds were that he would drink raw eggs.  Ethan lost the game and had to drink the raw eggs, although he said he threw up so nothing ever got down to his stomach.

They then took it a step further and made a motivating video for their Zone in which they showed their love by drinking a raw egg (which actually was, again, spit out because that's just gross!).  As Courtney says, "Elders are weird." 😉  Ethan said he didn't actually get much of this egg because he was going to crack it in his mouth but it didn't quite work.  So you can see him at the end trying to scoop it from the sink into his mouth.  Gross!

I love it when Ethan posts on Facebook.  He doesn't do it very often but I like to take a picture of them to keep.  Here is his latest post.

If you couldn't tell, Ethan is doing really well and enjoying his companion and his area.  He has grown so much and we can certainly tell.  No, he hasn't gotten his pants fixed yet but it is on his to-do list that he will, hopefully, get to soon.  Thank you to everyone who has written and prayed for him.  

-Michelle