22 June 2015

Sorry I couldn´t respond to each one of your emails this week! Don´t have too much time this week! I can´t wait to see you all! I get home Tuesday June 30th at noon!  I´ll talk to you all then! Thanks for the letters! 

Elder Battraw

1 June 2015

So the job across town would be difficult to go to, I would have to use the car to get there.  Which McDonalds? The one off of 116th or the one closer to the house. Will Mcdonalds let me work there for just a few weeks? What are the hours like there? When would I start? Thats cool that school is now out and everybody now is on spring break.  How is everything going, everybody just relaxing right now? We get fed regularly here no problem.  Does the ward still have sisters, or is it a pair of sisters and a pair of elders? Thats cool that the temple is so close to getting done, everybody seems really excited.

  This week was interesting.  Monday we had the normal p day.  We had a family home evening planned for that night that ended up not working out, but it was okay.  Tuesday morning my companion wakes up sick, throws up and has a fever and is very sore.  Not good signs,  but he starts to get better enough, to go to District Meeting, which was normal.  Afterwards, starts to not feel well again, so we call a member to come give us a ride to the hospital.  Arrive at the hospital, my companion goes through and ends taking a whole bunch of meds through IV, but he leaves the hospital feeling a lot better.  We stop by the chapel really quick and then head on home.  Wednesday, my comp is back to normal so we set out to work and we managed to find some new peoples to teach.  We found a 13 year old girl who is a cousin of a member who has been wanting to be a member of the church for a while now, but has never been able to b/c she needs her moms permission.  Really cool lesson though.  Wednesday was pretty good. We got to teach Andre and his wife as well and that was super cool.  Andre loved church and is super excited to come back.  He and his wife both came to church this last Sunday and they both loved it! Thursday, my companion wakes up with the same symptoms as Tuesday, except for vomiting.  We come to the obvious conclusion that the hospital treatment did not work.  After lunch, its back to the hospital.  All these symptoms are common symptoms of a disease that is common here called Dengue, which is a pretty nasty virus. The doctor runs tests for dengue and parasites/bacteria, and while this is happening, my companion gets another IV.  After 2 1/2 hours waiting the tests come back.  Its not dengue, but its an intestinal infection and tapeworm.  The doctor was impressed that he had both at the same time, but this time he passed a bunch of medications that seem to be working just find.  The crisis has passed.  Friday was normal, just working out.  Saturday night I got to play piano for a devotional of the Relief Society.  Sunday night we got to have an activity called the Member Missionary Training Center in which we had 3 rooms in which Returned Missionaries and us the Missionaries taught the members how to be better member missionaries.  It turned out really well and the members loved it! The activity will continue for 3 more weeks and everybody is pumped for it. We´re super excited as well!

  I hope that you all have a great week!  I miss you all! 

Love

Elder Battraw

 

Image 1 and 2 are of the flooding that is happening in Manacapuru.  Its a yearly thing. 3 is of my district right now, 4 is of Elder Brock and I when he was leaving for home, 5 Elder Mazzagardi of the seventy and I after the stake conference, 6 the Manaus Temple!

 

25 May 2015

Thanks for writing! I don´t have anymore information about my travel plans, so that I will leave Manaus to Miami at 12:01am Tuesday June 30th and that I get home on American Airlines coming from Miami to Indy at 12:08 pm.  I get home the 30th at midday, that is confirmed.  That sounds like fun, painting the deck, what color are you all painting it, or are you staining it? Congrats on finishing up with the class! There is a new sprinkler park in Holland Park now? Thats cool.  When did they do that? That is a cool challenge that the Bishop put out, how to keep the Sabbath Day holy.  That´ll be a cool one to do.  Thats is an interesting one to teach investigators because for a lot of people it is very different than how they are used to living on the sabbath day.

  This week was normal.  Monday got Elder Fernandes from Manaus and got back here. We got invited to Family Home Evening that night and got to teach one of our investigators.  Tuesday was District Meeting so I got to give a training.  Went pretty well. Got to teach Joelle and Fabio again, they are doing pretty well, just having some problems getting to church.  The rest of the week was pretty normal missionary work.  Nothing too different.  Saturday we helped set up a primary activity in the chapel, ended up not being able to stay b/c we had an appointment and the activity was starting late. It was fun to see everything get set up though.  Sunday was church and we had an unexpected investigator show up.  I don´t know if you all remember me talking about andre, but he is an investigator we taught awhile ago when I was with Elder Sanderson and Saturday he stopped us in the road pretty quickly and Sunday he showed up to church.  That was really cool, and now he wants to come back with his wife next week.  We´re super excited for him.  Right now we are working with a lot of married couples who are needing to get married.  One is Rhain and Ellen, Rhain is already a member and the rest of his family as well, but he is living with Ellen who is not a member.  We are working to get everything together so that they can have a wedding in the chapel so that Ellen can be baptized.  They are both really cool and fun to be around. This week we got a reference from a family who is living in Manaus and they gave us a reference for their niece, Jessica, who lives in our area in Manacapuru,  We got to visit her and her sister.  They are both are pretty quiet and don´t talk much.  On our first visit we taught the Restoration to them and challenged them to read and pray to know if the Book of Mormon is true or not.  The next time we came back, Jessica´s sister Geovanna had already recieved her answer and committed to get baptized.  It was a really cool lesson. We are super excited for both of them! Right now we are organizing an activity to help the member more excited about missionary work called the Member Missionary Training Center (MMTC).  We will start the activity this coming week and it will be really cool!

 Thanks for the email. I miss you all!

Love 

Elder Battraw

18 May, 2015

What would be my preference? It would probably be to live upstairs.  I just wouldn´t want to share bed with him, thats it.  Sounds like you all had a pretty busy week! How was the PA Fest? What was the theme this year?  Swimming lessons, where? would I get to use the car?  That would be something to do during the summer.  I got the final word on my itinerary.  So I will leave Manaus to Miami at 12:01 am and I get to Indianapolis at 12:08pm (midday) on June 30.  They will officially send my itinerary next week, according to the secretaries.  It will be fun.  Its a lot better then trying to go to Brasil.  It´ll be cool.  

  This week was a bit crazy. Monday was normal, just the normal p day routine! Tuesday was the last district meeting of the transfer with Elder Jesus and Pablo.  That was fun to have with both of them.  Wednesday Elder Jesus and Pablo both left for Manaus in the afternoon so I stayed with Elder D. Silva in Manacapuru for the rest of that day.  It was cool to be able to work with him for a day.  Thursday we got to work a little bit and then we as well left for Manaus to be able to get there for the mission tour by Elder Schmeil of the Seventy.  The trip was pretty good, normal.  We stayed with the assistants that night.  The next morning we got up and headed over to the chapel for the mission tour.  It was really cool to listen to Elder Schmeil talk.  He talked a lot about exact obedience as missionaries.  The tour only lasted until mid day, so afterwards we had lunch at the chapel and then we headed to the temple to do a session there.  That night we got to go to a restaurant called Mr. Pizzo that is all you can eat and it was really good.  Saturday morning we headed back to Manacapuru to be able to help out with a baptism that was scheduled for that night.  That day was mostly running around filling up the font and getting everything set up.  Sunday morning was Stake Conference in Manaus so the 2 wards in Manacapuru had rented 4 buses to be able to get there so we tagged along.  The buses left  the chapel at 7:30 in the morning and got to Manaus about 9:30.  The Conference was really good. One of the speakers was Elder Mazzagardi of the Seventy and his talk was really good.  He said one of the best ways to strengthen the church and its members is to teach them how to hold the Sabbath day holy.  That was really cool.  Another quote was The Restoration, the plan of salvation, chapels , meetings everything in the church would be useless without temples.  That was one of my favorite quotes from the conference for sure.  After that we went and visited a few people in Manaus with Elder Pablo.  Today was the transfer and I got my new companion, Elder Fernandes from João Pessoa. Hes seems really cool so I´m excited for this next transfer! We got back to Manacapuru today.  

 I hope that you all have a great week! I miss you all!

Love

Elder Battraw

Statistics: 5 days of traveling

8 buses (4 in Manaus 4 to and from Manacapuru) 

400+ km

30 hours of sleep:)

Money spent : More than I wanted to

11 May 2015

It was a lot of fun to talk to you guys as well! Its weird to think that in 7 weeks I´ll be coming home! He got his tooth pulled but they left a bone fragment there? Thats not too good. I hopefully dono´t have to do anything like that! When do the plants start giving strawberrys and raspberrys? It in the summer or fall, will they even have fruits this year?  Thats cool though! Here they don´t have either one of those two fruits.  I think that you might be able to find strawberrys in Manaus, but they would be extremely expensive.  Pipes have a tendency to clog up here as well :) I have to a story to tell you all when I get home about unclogging a pipe in Itacoatiara.

  This week was pretty good here though  Monday was the normal pday.  Nothing super extravagent. tuesday was working in the are for a little bit, but 5:00pm we returned home grabbed our bags and headed off to catch the bus to Manaus.  Really cool moment of that trip was crossing the Rio Negro bridge into Manaus and looking off over to the side and seeing the Angel Moroni on top of the temple as we crossed over.  We got to stay the night with the Elders of Tapajos, and then the next day we headed to our Interview with Pres. Castro.  He left us with a brief message on the importance of obedience and then started the interviews. While he was interviewing, Sister Castro talked with us about the importance of inviting people and how we can do that even better in our daily work as missionaries. It was pretty cool. My interview with Pres. Castro was quick but it was good.  After the interview, we ate a quick lunch with the elder of Compensa 2 and then caught the bus back to Manacapuru.  The rest of the week was pretty normal.  Friday night we got our reward dinner for answering 3 riddles that the Elders quorum president gave us and we managed to answer. I´ll give one of them to you right now.  After going and getting honey from a few beehives, you and your friend are walking down a path and come to a fork in the path, you need to go one way and he the other, so you decide to divide up the honey.  You have  5 liters of honey in total, but only pitchers  5 liters, 3.5 liters and 1.5 liters.  How do you divide up the honey? If you can get figure it out, send me back the answer :) (No using the internet). Saturday night the ward had an activity for the mothers in the ward that was pretty cool. A bunch of people sang and it was nice.  Sunday we got to call home and that was awsome! Most of this week will be spent in Manaus since Elder Jesus is going home now after completing his mission while he does his interviews and everything. It´ll be cool though! 

  I hope that you all have a great week this week!  I miss you all! Have a great week! 

Love

Elder Battraw

 

4 May 2015

I did get the other emails thanks so much for filing my FAFSA!  My ecelestial endorsement cleared so its all good now, I just have to wait for registration now! Hopefully the government gives us lots of money:)  I saw on the emails that there was marching band auditions but the dates have already passed for the auditions and I´m in a three world country without a clarinet, problems needless to say.  I´ll just have to try again next year when the auditions come around.  The spaghetti dinner sounds like a lot of fun, wow, its been awhile since I´ve eaten spaghetti.   In regards to calling home I will probably call home about 4 pm local time here.  When do you all have church? Is it in the morning or the afternoon? I can try to call later but I will have to see.  Send me an email when you I can call home.

  This week was interesting.  Monday we spend part of the day here in Manacapuru in the church just relaxing with the other elders, and then we ran home and packed our bags and we caught the bus to Manaus.  I did get an official call about when I will be coming home. I will be coming home, Manaus to Miami and then I don´t know the rest but I will get to Indianapolis somehow. In 2 weeks I will receive my itinerary to get home.  Its quite strange to say the least! Monday was spent in Manaus.  We had our normal tradition of getting pizza as a district which was cool.  Tuesday was a Zone Training in the chapel of Compensa.  It was really cool and enforced the importance of marking baptismal dates.  We always raised our Standard of Missão Manaus! It was quite cool.  Then it was grabbing a bus back to Manacapuru.  Never is quite fun getting the bus back. Wednesday was normal.  Thursday normal.  Friday we got to participate in a Family Home Evening that was really cool.  Had lots of nonmembers there. We shared a message about the Saviors love and how we need to have a similiar type of that love.  It was cool.  Played a game called Little Spot if you translate the name that was a lot of fun. That night was also a marriage in the chapel.  I played the prelude music to marriage and then Elder D. Silva played during the actual marriage.  Elder D. Silva knows how to play the piano really well! Saturday was the baptism of Kennedy.  It was super special.  He was the only member of his family who was not baptized and during his baptism when they called his name to enter into the font, his mom broke down crying.  There  was a super special spirit at that baptism.  Elismara and Kenndy were both confirmed Sunday.  Its been a good week this week! 

  Hope that everything is going great back home! I miss you all! Until Sunday! 

Love

Elder Battraw

27 April 2015

Thats cool! I really hope that you don´t need the information for the FAFSA so if you could see about that would be great!  Registration for incoming freshmen is in June, so I don´t really need to worry about it until June.  Thanks so much! When will be girls camp? It will be after I get home?  I was thinking parties Brasilian style, music, pizza and dancing until 4:30 in the morning.  But we could just go until midnight if you want :) It will be a lot of fun though.  I got the phone call today asking me to which airport I would be going home and that was cool to have.  I might be getting home the 30th, I don´t know. It completely depends on the route.  If I go through Miami, then I might get home the 30th, If go through São Paulo then Atlanta, then its the 1st.  We´ll see.  In three weeks they will send my itinerary tell me how I get home.  What are 4 12´s?

  This week was pretty normal.  Tuesday we didn´t have District Meeting b/c the Zone Leaders were off to Manaus.  So we mostly just studied a little bit more and got ready for the day. Nothing too extreme happened Tuesday.  Wednesday we participated in a Family Home Evening with Joelle and Fabio with the Elders Quorum President.  He showed the 3rd film in the Work and the Glory Series and it didn´t seem to go over too well.  Everybody was super tired and nobody was really understanding the film, but oh well.  It was interesting. Saturday night was the ward activity.  There is no word that translates into English for this type of activity  It was really cool.  There would be a question or scrambled word or a task apresented to everyone to complete.  There was a few like, count the number of doors or windows in the chapel, unscramble the word tangerina.  There was so really cool questions in there , it was a lot of fun! I really enjoyed it.  We had invited some of our investigators to come, but it didn´t work out for them.  We had a less active family that we´ve been visiting showed up as well! Sunday morning was a lot of running around trying to get everyone to church.  Lãone came to church for the first time, that was really cool.  We´ve been teaching here for about 2 weeks but this was the first time that she went to church.  That was really awesome.  Kennedy went to church this week and is excited to be baptized this next Saturday! He is the brother of a family of recent converts and it super cool! Sunday afternoon was the baptism of Elymara.  That was cool, her mom and family were all there to watch! Her sister Sabrinha, who is the only member of her family bore testimony at the  baptism! That was super cool! Its been a pretty awesome week! 

  I hope that everything is going great back at home! Have a great week! I miss you all! 

Love

Elder Battraw

20 April 2015

You could braid Matts hair? Thats different for sure.  I´m not too suprised that he wanted to go to school like that though:)  Wow, Prom has already happened?  Its seems to be getting earlier and earlier every year! It looks like sam had a good time though.  Its weird to think about Prom, so long ago.  Its be a little while. I haven´t gotten any official word about when I go home.  I thought that I would have gotten some official notice or phone call by now, but it looks like it might be a little while more.  We´ll see. I am pretty positive that it will be the 1st of July when my flight touches down in Indianapolis, just no travel itinerary or flight information has been arranged yet.  I´ve heard that they don´t send it towards the end of your mission, like 2-3 weeks beforehand.  I don´t know.  It´ll get here when it gets here.

  This week was fun.  Monday we traveled to Manaus to get Elder Jesus (yes his name is Elder Jesus) and come on back to Manacapuru.  That took up most of the day, lots of time on the bus just traveling.  But it was good. Got back here, emailed home and then let him unpack his bags. Tuesday was district meeting which was good.   It was normal, nothing extraordinary.  Tuesday was a lot of showing the area to Elder Jesus and introducing him to members and investigators.  Wednesday we got to go to the Temple which was super cool.  We had to wake up at 4:15 am to catch the 5:30 bus to Manaus.  The bus ride was super nice.  It was cool to go riding through the Amazon rainforest watching the sun come up.  Kodac moments. Got to Manaus and got on another bus to get to the temple about an hour early.  The trip took a lot less time than we thought. But it was still cool to be at the temple early and just walk around the grounds.  The session was nice, and afterward we got lunch and got on other buses to get back at about 5:30.  Total traveling time: 5.5 hours on buses.  Fun times.  Got back home and were able to do a few visits.  Thursday was normal, nothing super special happened. Friday, Saturday, and Sunday were normal.  English and piano class were cool.  I´m teaching both of them now that Elder Sanderson left the area and Elder Jesus doesn´t know how to speak English.  Its fun though.  I´ve been teaching about treble and bass clef.  Its weird to teach something that is so natural for me, like asking which note is this? For me its super simple, but for them its a lot more complicated.  All of our investigators are doing good. Elismara is progressing well and she is excited for her baptism! When found a few new families to teach this week and we are super excited to teach them! They are receiving the lessons well! Joelle and Fabio got confirmed last week and are still super excited about church! Our area is getting interesting.  During this time of the year, the Solomon river floods its banks and floods part of the city, which includes part of our area (but not our house!) The picture that I attached is us on a bridge that when the river is normal, it about 9-10 feet off the ground just to give an idea. 

 I hope that you all have a great week this week! I miss you all! Have an awesome week!

 Love

Elder Battraw

13 April 2015

That sounds like it was an awesome trip out to Maryland! I am kind of jealous that you all got to go out to Gettysburg this weekend.  That would be super cool to do.  Just another thing that I will need to do when I get back.  I remember that Fort McHenry was super cool as well.  I do remember seeing them raising and flying the flags while we were there.  So why didn´t you buy the new van? Sounds like it is pretty awesome.  Casper is a pretty cool name.  What was the cherry festival like in D.C.? Was it cool, what did you do there? Lots of sandwhiches huh?  Its been a long time since I ate a sandwhich.  

   This week was pretty crazy for us.  Monday was the last p day for Elder Brown on the mission.  Tuesday was District Meeting which was normal.  Nothing super crazy happened during District Meeting.  Pretty normal.  Wednesday was also normal.  Nothing super strange.  Thursday I got to go on exchanges with Elder Pablo. We went around and did some visits in both areas while Elder Brown and Sanderson went to Manaus for a meeting for Elder Brown.  So I got to stay in Manacapuru with Elder Pablo.  It was pretty cool.  We walked quite a bit going from area to area.  Did some basic visits. Friday rolled around and it was the same thing.  Elder Pablo and I were able to submit the intial papers into the offices here to help some of his investigators get married.  It took awhile because some of their papers were not exactly right and so they had to make some phone calls around, but it all worked out in the end.  We had a cool visit later that night with a less active.  He hasn´t gone to church for a little while but we were able to teach him about the sacrifice of Jesus Christ and the importance of taking the sacrament.  It was a cool lesson. Saturday Elder Brown and Sanderson got back from Manaus about 9:40 in the morning. Saturday was Piano class as well, which I am starting to enjoy being able to teach about music.  Taught about how to figure out which notes are which in treble clef for all you music people.  Pretty simple stuff, but it was still fun nonetheless.  The rest of the day was normal.  Sunday was the baptism of Daniel.  He is the nephew of one of the members and we were able to teach for the last few weeks and Sunday night was his baptism.  It was super cool.  I was able to baptize him which was awesome! We got to visit Joelle and Fabio this week and they are doing great.  We sang Families can be together Forever with them and they started  to cry.  They are super awesome and its awesome that I´ve been able to teach and help them. Transfers have come and gone and my new companion is Elder Jesus from São Paulo Campinas.  He is pretty cool, but I´ve been with him for about 3 hours now.  It will be a fun transfer.  I´ll still be in Manacapuru for now. I´m excited for this next transfer!

 Hope that you all have a great week this week! I miss you all! Have an awesome week!

Love

Elder Battraw

6 April 2015

David plays the saxophone? What kind, Alto, Tenor Bari?  Tenor I think is a little bit easier to learn than the others and its in Bb so not really hard to transpose music to C.I got a cake with the candles and everything, just haven´t had time to make it so far. Sounds like it was a fun Easter!  You are going to Maryland? When and why?  That would be super cool.  I´m still trying to register for classes for BYU, its taking a long time b/c my Eclestial Endorsement is not done yet, so  I can´t register for classes, super frustrating and has a long story with it that still is not over. I called my mission President and asked for him to do it today, so hopefully it´ll get done soon, after I register I´ll get my book list and everything, and then all I think that I will need can be resolved when I get home, I don´t think there is anything else yet. The first payment for Tuition is the 1st of July and the first housing payment might be then as well.  If there is anyway to take out a student loan without me being there, I could use that to make the first payments, but I don´t know if you can do that.  I will keep you updated on any other costs that can come up.

  So this week was pretty good here in Brasil.  Monday was of course the normal pday.  Nothing super spectacular monday.  Mostly just hanging out and relaxing after the long week.  Tuesday was District Meeting and was normal.  The training was on how we need to remember the importance of Christ during the Easter week.   Nothing too special.  Wednesday was a lot of fun.  My 20th birthday and was super cool.  The morning wasn´t too great b/c Elder Sanderson had ear problems so we ended going to the hospital and staying there for a while while the doctor looked over his ear. After that came home and got ready for the day.  The day was pretty normal.  I did open my present, The piano guys Wonders.  That was awesome thanks so much!  I did notice that you had already opened and listened to it:) Thanks so much though.  That night we had a Family Home Evening with one of the families in the ward.  It was pretty normal.  We shared a message about tithing and the importance of it.  Pretty cool.  Afterwards they invited us back in to their kitchen we they had pizza and rice and chicken with soda and when I entered they all started to sing Happy Birthday.  It was really cool . they are a super awesome family.  The next day I even got cake from another family in the ward.  The members here are pretty awesome.  The rest of the week was normal.  Saturday was the baptism of Joelle and Fabio.  That was super cool.  After teaching them for so long they were finally baptized! It was super spiritual baptism.  Next week will be their confirmation.  We are super excited for them both! General Conference was this weekend!  It was awesome.  We all watched in Portuguese. It was super cool.  The Saturday sessions all seemed to have a common theme, Marriage, but Sunday not as much.  Pres. Monson didn´t talk to much, but it was awesome that he annouced three new temples! Hati, Thailand and Costa do Marfim.  Those will be super cool.  The conference talks were all awesome.  The talk by Elder Holland was awesome.  I really liked that talk.  Elders Packer, Perry and Christoffersons talks were all really good as well.  I throughly enjoyed the general conference. It will be weird to watch the next conference in English and not portuguese. In the sunday morning session they were having a bit of difficulties getting the Portugese going, it started out in only english! But everything got working! Really awesome week, birthday baptism and conference.  Can´t ask for much more.  

  Hope that you all have a great week this week!  I miss you all! Have an awesome week!

Love

Elder Battraw

30 March 2015

Things are going pretty great here! Foods that I miss, lets see, everything.  For foods, just anything that is super american.  Burgers, fries, etc.  Just not chicken, rice or beans.  Our family doesn´t have too much luck with the Pinewood Derby.  Nobody seems to be able to do too well.  Almost never, either we rig the car to lose to get last place or the car rigs itself to lose, usually one of those two. But it is still fun.  Most fuel efficient car, that is a cool award.  Wow, is it time to sign for AP exams now? That  is super weird.  I remember doing AP Exams.  Those were never fun, but I did get a little bit of college credit out of it.  Found out that BYU almost doesn´t accept  any AP stuff.  They don´t like it at all.   I did get Chemistry credit though! Sister  Smith is the new YW President, that will be a cool calling for her! Fun stuff!

  It was a pretty good week here.Monday, was the normal p day.  Went to a lesson later that night and got to walk underneath a tarp to get back b/c it was raining so hard. Tuesday morning we all showed up at the chapel did have District Meeting and found out that the chapel had gone Titanic and was underwater.  3 or 4 classrooms were under water so we got to spend an hour pushing water down the hall into the baptismal font.  It was really quite interesting.   The chapel had been having problems like this for awhile, but excessive rains and bad construction lead to this.  We found out the reason for this later, that the chapel steeple had been put on the church wrong, and was not letting water drain correctly and the water would accumulate and would make its way down into the chapel. They will have to get a crane, take off the steeple and put it back on.  Wow, quite a job.  The rest of Tuesday was normal though.  We got to have a family home evening with Joelle and Fabio that night with the Elder and Relief Society Presidents that was really cool. They really liked it.  Talked a lot about Faith , Repentance and Baptism.  Super cool. They are progressing really well. Friday we invited them to be baptized and they will be baptized this coming Saturday so we are supe excited for them! The rest of the week wasn´t too different.  We did companion exchanges and I stayed in the area with Elder Pablo and we got to teach some cool new investigators. One of them is Daniel who is a nephew of one of the members and is super cool.  We got to teach him for the first time and it was super cool.  He told us a lot about his life story and how he was adopted twice and hes been through a lot.  But he is really awesome!  Saturday was normal.  Sunday we got to do a devotional about member missionary work that went well.  We split everyone up into 4 groups and gave them all trainings on how they could all be better member missionaries and it was really cool. I taught everyone how to invited somebody to church, by showing them how NOT to invite someone.  Everyone seemed to enjoy it a lot and it was really cool.  This week will be a lot of fun in the area.  Saturday and Sunday will be General Conference! Elder Sanderson and I are super pumped about that! Hopefully we´ll be able to watch it in English,but who knows!

  Hope that you all have a great week! I miss you all! Have an awesome week!
Love

Elder Battraw

P.S.  BYU Registration is this week I think! These will the classes for which I register. 

Mon: 6am-ROTC workout 9-Calculus, 11-Portuguese, 12 Book of Mormon

Tues: 9:30am-Political Science, 12:30 Calculus

Wed: 6am-ROTC workout 9:Calculus, 10-ROTC, 11-Portuguese, 12 Book of Mormon

Thrs: 9:30am- Political Science, 12-Calculus, 1 ROTC Leadership Lab

Fri: 6am- ROTC workout 9:30 Calculus  11-Portuguese

It´ll be a fun semester!

23 March 2015

That sounds like a cool week!  Congrats to Zach with their performance at ISSMA! Gold is awesome! That sounds like it was a fun trip out to the farm though.  I remember going out there once and that it was freezing cold. We were all walking around outside without coats or anything and it was windy.  It is kinda of near the airport right? That doesn´t surprise me that they wanted to get into the water though! It was probably freezing! Ice cream sounds really good though.  Here the ice cream is water based and not milk based b/c milk is super expensive here. I would probably be 5-6 dollars a gallon at the minium.  Really expensive! The chest freezer died? Thats sad, but that is cool that we have a new one though! And now we have a grill! Thats cool.  I need to learn how to do Brasilian barbeque b/c it is super good!  I remember the Brother Lopez made it at my open house and its really good here as well! We don´t eat it that much b/c it is expensive. But its really good.  How is Stirling doing?  I hope that everything is awesome with him! That would be super cool if he could be there when I got home!  An Open House would be cool, but would it be the same day that I get home?  I´m going to be so tired after 24 hours of flying.  Whatever you want to do is cool!  That is a cool little blessing with the jobs!

  This week here in Manacapuru wasn´t too crazy.  Monday was the normal pday.  We traveled to Manaus that day after lunch and got there and emailed from there.  That was cool to be able to use fast internet!  Tuesday was a Zone Training that was pretty cool.  We learned how the Gospel of Jesus Christ, you know, Faith (fé), Repentance (Arrpendimento), Baptism (Batismo), Receiving the gift of the Holy Ghost ( Receber o dom do Espirito Santo), and Enduring to the End ( Perseverar até o fim) applied to us as missioaries.  It was a super cool training! I liked it.  Talked a lot about the importance of obedience and how we need to be exactly obedient to the mission rules.  Pretty cool training! We left back for Manacapuru directly after the training and got back about 2:30pm, kinda of tired but still functioning.  Did some visits for the rest of the day that were fairly normal.  Talked with Diane a little bit.  She is progressing well.  She was traveling this weekend so wasn´t able to go to church.  Wednesday was normal.  Taught a bunch of people.  We had a good lesson with Paulo Henique and Luana.  We got to learn part of the Brazilian National Anthem as well which was cool.  I can kind of sing it now!  Thursday we handed out invites for the open house quite a bit.  Friday as well.  Just getting everything ready! Saturday morning we taught English class and I taught piano class for two people. It went pretty well.  Nothing too amazing.  We also got the chapel cleaned up for that night.  That day we didn´t have any time to really do visits, lots of running around and getting things ready.  The open house started at 5:00pm and nobody showed up!  I think over 800 invites had been handed out and nobody showed up! So at 5:30, we got all the members together and we formed an action plan.  We all paired up and left for the streets to invite the people passing by to come on in and see the chapel! I got paired up with Alex, one of the youth and we hit the streets just inviting everybody and it worked! We got quite a few people to come in and do a tour of the chapel which was really cool! It went until 7:00pm and we got some references from the open house now to work with! It was really cool to see the youth all team up and hit the streets to invite people to come on in and see the chapel! Testimony Building moment!  Sunday was busy as well.  After church we made a few  visits and then had a meeting and made some more visits. This week was busy but was really good! 

  I hope that you all have a great week this week! Miss you all! Have an awesome week!

love

Elder Battraw

23 March 2015

That sounds like a cool week!  Congrats to Zach with their performance at ISSMA! Gold is awesome! That sounds like it was a fun trip out to the farm though.  I remember going out there once and that it was freezing cold. We were all walking around outside without coats or anything and it was windy.  It is kinda of near the airport right? That doesn´t surprise me that they wanted to get into the water though! It was probably freezing! Ice cream sounds really good though.  Here the ice cream is water based and not milk based b/c milk is super expensive here. I would probably be 5-6 dollars a gallon at the minium.  Really expensive! The chest freezer died? Thats sad, but that is cool that we have a new one though! And now we have a grill! Thats cool.  I need to learn how to do Brasilian barbeque b/c it is super good!  I remember the Brother Lopez made it at my open house and its really good here as well! We don´t eat it that much b/c it is expensive. But its really good.  How is Stirling doing?  I hope that everything is awesome with him! That would be super cool if he could be there when I got home!  An Open House would be cool, but would it be the same day that I get home?  I´m going to be so tired after 24 hours of flying.  Whatever you want to do is cool!  That is a cool little blessing with the jobs!

  This week here in Manacapuru wasn´t too crazy.  Monday was the normal pday.  We traveled to Manaus that day after lunch and got there and emailed from there.  That was cool to be able to use fast internet!  Tuesday was a Zone Training that was pretty cool.  We learned how the Gospel of Jesus Christ, you know, Faith (fé), Repentance (Arrpendimento), Baptism (Batismo), Receiving the gift of the Holy Ghost ( Receber o dom do Espirito Santo), and Enduring to the End ( Perseverar até o fim) applied to us as missioaries.  It was a super cool training! I liked it.  Talked a lot about the importance of obedience and how we need to be exactly obedient to the mission rules.  Pretty cool training! We left back for Manacapuru directly after the training and got back about 2:30pm, kinda of tired but still functioning.  Did some visits for the rest of the day that were fairly normal.  Talked with Diane a little bit.  She is progressing well.  She was traveling this weekend so wasn´t able to go to church.  Wednesday was normal.  Taught a bunch of people.  We had a good lesson with Paulo Henique and Luana.  We got to learn part of the Brazilian National Anthem as well which was cool.  I can kind of sing it now!  Thursday we handed out invites for the open house quite a bit.  Friday as well.  Just getting everything ready! Saturday morning we taught English class and I taught piano class for two people. It went pretty well.  Nothing too amazing.  We also got the chapel cleaned up for that night.  That day we didn´t have any time to really do visits, lots of running around and getting things ready.  The open house started at 5:00pm and nobody showed up!  I think over 800 invites had been handed out and nobody showed up! So at 5:30, we got all the members together and we formed an action plan.  We all paired up and left for the streets to invite the people passing by to come on in and see the chapel! I got paired up with Alex, one of the youth and we hit the streets just inviting everybody and it worked! We got quite a few people to come in and do a tour of the chapel which was really cool! It went until 7:00pm and we got some references from the open house now to work with! It was really cool to see the youth all team up and hit the streets to invite people to come on in and see the chapel! Testimony Building moment!  Sunday was busy as well.  After church we made a few  visits and then had a meeting and made some more visits. This week was busy but was really good!

  I hope that you all have a great week this week! Miss you all! Have an awesome week!

love

Elder Battraw

16 March 2015

That sounds like a lot of fun! A trivai competition!  Where is it held? Thats super cool though.  I want to go there now!  Thats no fun for Matt to have lost his teeth!  Is he losing a lot now on a regular basis?  Wow it was Pi day and I didn´t even remember it!  Thats cool that its starting to warmup now though!  Its sounds like its been super cold there for a long time.  I can´t even imagine what it will be like when I get home! I did get the birthday box that you sent.  We actually used some of the stuff to hold a small party for one of the Elders in my district 2 weeks ago.  Thanks so much! I still haven´t opened the present though!  My date to return I think is July 1st, but it hasn´t been officially confirmed yet by the mission.  It sounds like I leave from Manaus, head to São Paulo, then to Atlanta and then go to Indianapolis if I follow the same pattern as other elders, I would leave the 30th and get to Indy the 1st about noonish.  something like that.  Thanks for the email from BYU! 

  This week was pretty cool here in Manacapuru.Monday was pday of course and we got up early and played basketball and ate roasted chicken for lunch.  Pretty laid back pday.  Went to a Family home evening that night with a family  in the Ward with one of our investigators and that was really cool.  Our investigators name is Ezekiel in english and he is super cool.  He is pretty intrested in learning about the gospel and is super cool.  he is always at the chapel playing soccer.   Pretty cool kid.  Tuesday was normal.  We got to start teaching Diane that day and it was super cool.  Her brother was baptized a few months ago and now she is living with a member family and is interested in the church.  Fun to teach, she is reading the Book of Mormon and is liking it! We are super pumped for her! We´ve been trying to teach Paulo Henique this week as well.  He came up to us in the street outside of his house this past week and told us that he wanted to be baptized, and so we are getting him ready for that date.  He just needs to get permission from his parents for him to be baptized!  Wednesday was pretty normal.  Nothing super exciting happened.  Thursday we got to wake up at 4:15 and catch the bus to Manaus for the Tri-Zone Conference in Alvorada.  It was super cool.  We got there at about 7:30ish and the conference went until 3:00.  Pres.Castro talked a lot about the importance of exact obedience and how we need to always keep ourselves worthy of the Holy Ghost. It was a really good conference.  It was weird to see all the people who would be leaving!  After that we headed on back to Manacapuru.  We had to take 2 boxes of Book of Mormons with us to the Bus statioin and that was hard.  They each weigh about 30 pounds!  Got back to Manacapuru and got to see a missionary farewell of one of the Young men in the Ward.  He is going to Campinas!  We  are all super excited for him! Friday was normal! Saturday was the baptism of Lara.  it was super cool to see her baptism and there was a really special spirit there during the whole baptism.  Really awesome.  Sunday I get to play the piano alot as I helped out playing for the choir, make some recording of hymns for the choir  and then playing for the devotional.  Tiring.  My fingers are still a little tired from that.  This week will be the church open house! Excited!

  I hope that everything is going great back home! I miss you all!

Love

Elder Battraw

9 March 2015

The pinewood derby is coming up again already: Thats seems like it was just here! Its was always fun to do the Pine Wood Derby, but it always seemed like one of the Fordhams would win, so kinda took some of the fun out of it:)  That sounds like it was a fun birthday part.  I don´t know if they ate more than us.  I remember my 16 year old party, we ate a bunch of food for that.   Did they say who the guest conductor would be for Zachs concert.  That would be cool to see who it is. 

  This week was pretty normal.  P day we made taco salad for lunch as a district.  It turned out pretty good.  The meat here is a little weird so it didn´t turn out exactly like it does in the US, but it was still really good.  Monday night we got to go to a Family Home Evening with Irmão José who is super cool.  He owns a restaurant that sells some of the biggest and best burgers that I have ever seen. Anyway we had a family home evening there with one investigator that he introduced us to whose name is Ezekiel.  He is 19 years old and is super interested in the gospel.  Its really cool to see him so interested and have such a thirst for the gospel.  Tuesday was District Meeting which went well.  We are teaching a lady whose name is Luani and she is the daughter in law of a member who we had lunch with which is who we met her.  She is also very interested in the church and we are excited to be able to be able to teach her.  Its cool to see how much she wants to learn about the gospel. The rest of the week was pretty normal.  Taught a bunch of lessons this week.  Geneleza is not really progressing anymore.   She didn´t go to church this Sunday and this makes it a few weeks.  Samuel and his family didn´t go as well.  We´ll talk to all of them this week and so whats going on.  Hopefully they´ll all be able to go to church this next week.  So cool lesson trick I learned this week from Elder Sanderson.  So you take a cup and you explain to everyone this that it is the world.  Then you take a handful of pepper and tell everyone that they are sins, and that the world is full of them, pouring the handful of pepper inside of the cup without mixing the water and pepper, just letting the pepper float on top.  Then you get a volunteer and ask them to dip their finger in the water and take it out without getting pepper, or sin on it (the key to this is that the top of the water is completely covered in pepper).  They will try it and will fail, getting pepper all over their finger.  Then doing putting a drop of liquid soap on your finger, secretly or publicly, your choice, tell them that it is through the power of the holy ghost that they can live in the world, but not get covered in sin, and proceed to dip your finger in the water and watch what happens.  Its pretty cool.  We used it on an investigator this week and it  blew his mind, really funny to watch!Sunday night I got to play piano for a devotional.  It was a lot of fun!  This week hopefully will be an awesome week!

 I hope that everything is going great at home! I miss you all! Have a great week!

Love

Elder Battraw

2 March 2015

That sounds like it was a cool baptism! The Teschs have a kid! Thats so cool!  I´ll get to meet him then when I get home!  Its March and its still snowing out there!  Thats crazy.  Thanks for getting my dorm room! I´ll take whatever I can get.  I didn´t want to sign a housing agreement without talking to you b/c the first payment will be due the day that I get back from the mission so I wanted to talk to you first so that you would know that before I committed to 300.00 dollar payment!  Thanks so much! I think that dining plan is great.  It´ll get me food to eat.  I´ll email him for the tax returns.

  This week was pretty good. Monday we traveled to Manaus and waited there that day for the conference with Elder Cook for the next day. We stayed with the Elders of Compensa and Tefe.  It was pretty cool to stay with them.  Nothing extremly excited happened.  Tuesday we got on the bus and headed down to the mission office to get ready for the conference. I got to see several of my previous companions which was super cool!  I got to see Elders Acchura, Brock, Rodriguez, and Sousa Silva. It was super cool to see them all! The conference with Elder Cook was super awesome.  He talked to us for about 2 hours along with Elder Adikuatis from the Seventy.  They talked a lot about how we personally can be better as missionaries. How we can make ourselves better missionaries.  It was really cool to see and to hear from them. My testimony that we have 12 Apostles here on the earth now was strengthened quite a bit.  They are definitely called of God. After that, we got lunch and then we started back for Manacapuru.The rest of the day was just checking up on investigators.  The rest of the week was pretty normal.  Joelle and Fabio are going great right now! We talked to Fabio Wednesday night and he committed to baptism.  Its so cool to see how he has progressed over all this time! When we first started teaching, he didn´t really want to talk to us, but over all this time he has been getting better and better.  Its really cool to see! Samuel, we´ve been teaching him all this week.  Saturday was supposed to be his baptism, but it didn´t work out so we hope that he will be baptized this next Saturday.  Elder Sanderson and I are super excited for this next week! We have a lot planned out and we are excited for all of our investigators.  Its going to be a great week. Today is Elder Browns birthday (our new Zone Leader) and we got to hold a quick birthday party for him!  Its going to be a good week!
  Thanks for everything! I hope that you all have a great week!  I miss you all!

Love
Elder Battraw

16 February 2015

That sounds like a fun Valentines Day. Here Valentines Day is in the middle of June so here was pretty normal! Yes, the temple will be dedicated in August then! I will be there!  So you haven´t really started working at your new job yet, huh? When will you be starting then? I remember you doing Second Saturday b/c you would leave us all alone and I got to babysit all of them.  I got grandmas email about them coming down here to Brasil.  That will be super cool for them. Goais is in the middle of Brasil, not too much happen them.  They´re going a weird portuguese there.  Weird accents.  Goias is the sticks there.  Manaus is a long ways from anything b/c its in the middle of the Amazon rainforest, but Goias is just in the middle of nothing. How long is the mission there? Matt is already praying that I come home safely! It will still take a little while...

  This week was pretty good here.  It was quite interesting.  Monday was normal still, tuesday was normal as well.   Really it was just Friday that was pretty crazy.  Friday afternoon was just a great day.  That afternoon was super cool b/c I got to see a family from my first area here in Brasil.  We were just walking down the main street here in the city and we suddenly here from a car that was driving by, BATTRAW, BATTRAW and it was Irma Patricia from Ala Canaranas.  They are a super cool family. Later that night after all of our appointments she bought pizza for all the missionaries here and we got to hang out.  That was really cool. Her two kids right now are out on missions right now as well.  Sunday was a good day as well.  Got to have Genelza to church with Raimundo!  I don´t think I´ve talked about them just yet.  They are a married couple in the late 40´s that we found through a street contact and have been teaching them.   They are super humble and this week was the first time that they got to go to church with us.  They borught 2 of their kids and they absolutely loved it there!  She got really excited and told us at the end that she wanted to come back every single week! Super cool family.  We are still teaching Genelson.  For some reason, he didn´t go to church yesterday so this week we are going to talk with him.  Andre as well, this entire week he wasn´t able to talk with us, so hopefully we´ll be able to talk with him this week!  Joelle and Fabio are going great! Last week they both went to church though this week they didn´t.  We went over Thursday night and show Pres. Uchtdorfs talk from the last General Conference about light and it was a good lesson. You can always depend on the Apostles to share a good message.  Joelle is getting excited about the gospel!  We´ve be getting back to talking with Diego!  Talked to him briefly Saturday night and he seems great! This week we´ll be able to teach him again!  Carnival has started up here in Manacapuru which means huge street parties every night until 3 am!  Its getting pretty crazy at times!  We just try to avoid those areas when its getting dark outside! Most people here don´t go to Carnival as well, its just really all the younger people above 18.  The parties will be going until Wednesday night which will be the last huge party!  Carnival is pretty serious here!  It´ll be interesting trying to teach people during it, but everything will go great!  

  Hope that you all have a great week!   I miss you all!  Have an awesome week!

Love

Elder Battraw

9 February 2015

Thats cool that Stake conference was this week!  Here Stake Conference was just a broadcast from Salt Lake, it had Elder Cook talk in it!  Speaking of the temple, when is it scheduled to be comleted? Have there been any releases about the temple or anything yet? Hopefully I´ll be able to be home in time for the open house and dedication! Never say where you don´t want to go!   I remember before my mission saying that I didn´t want to go to Provo Boise or South America and here we are.  But I love my mission!  Its awesome here!  Thanks for the blog, its quite true for missionaries! I liked it! Everybody here tells us of how cold it is there back in the states.  They mainly talk about New York and how its covered in snow, but we have heard how cold its back there.  Here its just about the opposite.  Super hot and raining!

  This week was fun! Monday we traveled to Manaus after lunch and got there about 2:00pm!  Got to spend the rest of pday there in Manaus!  We mostly just walked the streets and used the lanhouse there.  For dinner it got interesting.  We were all hungry so we walked into a pizza parlor and there they told us that a pizza gigante (giant pizza) was only 15 reais.   We all looked at each other and said, I think that I could eat that.  So us 4 we all ordered our own gigantic pizza and that was dinner.  It was funny because the waiter came up and asked yes what we wanted and one of the ZLs said he wanted a gigantic and the waiter started to leave but he called him back and said, Wait, they´re going to want some too!  it was super good and all 4 of us managed to finish it!  That night we slept in the coldest a/c that I´ve been in the mission.  Elder Sanderson and I were in hammocks b/c they didn´t have enough mattress so we froze to death that night!  The next day was the zone training! It talked a lot about the importance of marking baptismal dates with your investigators to help them progress and other missionaries techniques! It was super good!  Got back here later that day super tired, but we managed to teach a little bit.  We´ve been teaching a 19 year old whose name is Genelson and he is super cool.  We´ve been teach him a lot this past week and he is progressing a lot! He has a desire to serve a mission as well.  We  found out this week that his cousin is a member of the church and that she left for a mission as well this week! Super cool discovery. He is always offering to help us out with dinner or anything like that. Just cool.  This week was just packed with appointments so we spent a lot of time running from place to place trying to teach everybody.  Its going great!  Saturday was Elder Sandersons 21st birthday so some of the members made him lasagna and cake.  It would have been even better if they had told us about it!  They had mentioned it last Sunday but hadn´t said anything to us about it so we didn´t know if it was going to happen!  Well, 8:00pm they called us and asked us Elders Where are you!  We went over there and had made lasagna and cake for Elder Sanderson! It was all super good! Sunday was the baptism of Lucas!  His Uncle from another ward was the person who baptized him! It was super spiritual! Really cool! Its been a pretty good week! Elder Cook from the Quorum of the 12 Apostles will be out here in Manaus to give a training for the mission on the 24th. Everyone is super excited for it!

  Thanks for the letters! Have a great week! I miss you all!

Elder Battraw

2 February 2015

That sounds like you all had an interesting week! I hope that everything is going great for Tom out there in Califórnia! Thats super cool that you are back at that same hospital now1  How is it going there? How much long will you be in training?  Thats cool though.  Matt is throwing up now? Thats no fun at all.  This season right now here in Manacapuru is the season of sickness.  The river is filling up now as it does every year, but as the river fills up its means more sicknesses and just not being well.  its fun to say the least. 

  This week here was pretty cool.  Monday was p day.  Normal p day except for the fact that I went up to dunk the ball during our weekly game of basketball and ended not landing too well on my foot.  Hurt quite a bit but didn´t really put too much thought to it.   Tuesday the LZs were in Manaus so we ended up not having District Meeting.   Tuesday was a pretty normal day, except that it was pretty painful to walk on my left food b/c it had swollen up like a balloon. The wife of our Ward mission leader looked at my foot and said it looked I sprained/ twisted the nerve in my foot.  I went to on the Ward members there whose dad Works with stuff like this and he helped it out a bunch.   Wednesday, the foot was still pretty swollen so we headed up to the hospital and got it all x rayed.  After 3 hours in the hospital we found out that it was not broken after all, just sprained.   So the doctor just told me to go easy on my foot.  It still is a little bit sore, but its doing way better now.  The rest of the week was pretty normal.  Thursday I got to go on exchanges with Elder Thomas from Texas and that was super cool.  Sunday was interesting b/c there wasn´t any power in the chapel b/c there had been a problem with the church payment system and the energy had ended up not being paid, so they cut the power in the chapel.  That is getting resolved this week though!   Right not we have a bunch of investigators that are going great.  We have one 18 yr old whose name is Diego, and he is going to church right now.l  He has a desire to be baptized so we are helping get ready for that!  Super excited for him!   We are teaching a 20yr old right now whose name is André and turns out he isa 2 time Jiu Jitsu Olympic Champion.  He has been several times to the US and was planning to train there, but ended up getting married and staying in Manacapuru to help out with his wife.  He has a lot of intrest in the gospel and super cool to teach!   We are also teaching a 15 nephew of a recent convert.  His name is Lucas and hes been to church a couple of times now and is really cool as well.  We are super excited for all of them!

  Its been a pretty good week this week!  Hope that you all have a great week as well!  I miss all of you!

Love

Elder Battraw

19 January 2015

That does sound like an interesting week for sure!  I read Toms
account about the trip out to salt lake and it sounds like it was
interesting! Was he flying delta?  You don´t have to leave the
terminal to be able to get your baggage though.   Oh well, he got
there.   I remember my trip out there was really calm.  We flew
directly to Salt Lake so we didn´t have any layovers at all. I was
also with austin gorge and not alone so that was cool.  Brenna
Donnelly is back from her mission now! Thats weird b/c I remember
talking with her in the MTC.  I saw her a few times there in the MTC
Bookstore!  Pretty cool.  Matts got his first tooth! Is he already
asking about the tooth fairy as well?  Is it already warming back up?
  This week didn´t have too much happen.  Tuesday was pretty normal.
We had District Meeting and the normal.  My companion Elder Sanderson
was sick that day so we work a little bit and then we went back home
to let him rest up and get well.  Hes fine now so everythings okay!
Tuesday night was also supposed to a Ward Family Home Evening but
didn´t happen on the account of it raining super hard.  So that didn´t
happen. Wednesday was all normal.  Thursday was the 2 ward soccer semi
final that we got to watch.  Super fun to be there. Brasilians really
get into soccer to say the least.  Out of the 2 wards participating
there had been 10 -12 teams and now it was down to the final 4, which
out of those 4 are now 2. Fun game to watch.  Friday normal. Saturday
was did exchanges and I got to spend the day with Elder Pablo who
suprisingly is from Brasil.  Super good missionary.  We got to teach a
whole bunch of people and that was cool to see how he teaches the
people. Sunday was church.  Pretty normal.  We are teaching Gospel
Principles right now! We have a few investigators who are going pretty
well. We are still teaching Anderson.  He got interviewed for his
baptism that if all goes well he will be baptized this Saturday.  We
are super excited for him!    We got to teach a lady with the name of
Franciamara this week.  She is not too old and has a lot of interest
about the church.  She was very interested about the Book of Mormon so
we got to explain that to her!  Lots of fun! We are teaching a kid now
as well who is always playing soccer at the chapel!  His name is Hugo
and he is super cool! Also has a lot of interest in the church! Not
too much besides from that happened this week! Its been a good week.
Elder Sanderson and I will stay together one more transfer now! Its
going to be awesome!
  I hope that you all have a great week! Miss all of you! Have a great week!
Love
Elder Battraw