Elder Nathanael Stuver: Email Update: 11/10/2014

Dear Everyone,

Wow. Sounds like the Harpers are having a rough go of it. Good luck Michaela!

As for me, things have been pretty interesting---well, a couple interesting things happened, anyways. We had another week of solid service, so much that we didn't even have a lot of PDay to spend doing PDay stuff. It was super fun, because on Saturday, i got to play with fire! We spent the day burning weeds---with a flamethrower attached to a propane tank that had to be pulled by a trailer. Actually, Elder Riley did most of the burning, because he's had a bit more experience with burners of that size. I did get to torch a 20 foot square section, though. I had fun. The weeds are gone now.

Later in the week, we got to deliver a bunch more wood, and then we spent some time talking to the family there. They are named the sweats, and they just recently started going back to church on a regular basis. They also took in a lady that was in a pretty bad situation, but now they are all doing really well---and they really appreciated the wood we brought over. It turns out that they are from Fruitland, Utah originally; and they now live in Fruitland, Idaho---on Utah street. (They say that Fruitland, Utah is somewhere by Vernal and Strawberry area. Just for some geographical reference). After we finished with a lesson, he lets us go into a room nearby their kitchen (after we had washed our hands), where a particular creature lives. We got to meet and hold a 19 foot albino Burmese Python, named Sissy. For Uncle Brannon's benefit, she is a natural albino, rather than a synthetic breed. It was awesome. I think that holding that snake for the ten minutes that i got to while we talked a bit more, swept out any anxiety i had earlier in the entire week. I wanna go back...

Anyways, this week was Stake Conference, and there were a few cool things in the announcements. First, a few of the young men that i had worked with back in the New Plymouth days have been ordained as Elders, and have received their mission calls! One is actually going to the same mission as one of the sisters in my district is from (her name is Sister Tomas). Her mother is a non member, and Sister Tomas is serving in New Plymouth, so a few of the people in New Plymouth are saying that he will go and baptize her mom. I hope so, because it would be awesome for Sister Tomas to get to see that in her family. The other cool announcement has to do with Stake conference itself. Starting next year, there will be a general authority at every stake conference, and every other year there will be a broadcast from Salt Lake, that will not be a part of the other sessions of stake conference. In other words, every two years we will have 4 hours of church for stake conference. It will be like another general conference all over again!! I actually pretty excited, mostly because of the general authority news. I think that the official statement was, "a Area Seventy, Seventy, or Apostle," so it should be awesome.

Well, that's the major news coming out of Fruitland these days. Thank you for everything that you do!

Love, Elder Stuver