Best service I've ever done

Hey,

Silas seems to be having a pretty rough week, definitely. Sorry to hear it. Tell him he should write me a letter back and talk to me about it! I haven't gotten one from him in awhile. Yeah, probably shouldn't keep missing school though. I shouldn't say too much though, I wasn't always the best example on that.. Glad his talk went well, I bet that it was pretty nerve-wracking for him! It's a shame his friends are all fighting, but I think it'll work out. It always rubbed me the wrong way when people would put others down just because of how "spiritual" someone else is. I saw it a lot in high school, and I never understood why that was such a big problem for people.

Well, I'm glad you're paying it forward by feeding the missionaries. Oh, our mission knows the wonderful little, black box that is the Tiwi. It tracks where you're going, when you're going there, how fast you're going there, if you're going there too aggressively... The thing is annoying, everyone hates them. Well, except the office elder who's in charge of transportation.

Well, this week we didn't have a ton of things going on. We've taught a less-active guy who has decided to come back to church after like, fifteen years. We've been just trying to stay busy, though sometimes it can be really challenging. We did some service the other day for a man in Stafford- we helped him cut down a huge tree in his backyard. Best service I've ever done, it was early in the morning until about noon so we got to spend the morning outside. We helped guide the tree down with some rope as this 60-something German guy cut down the tree with a chainsaw (so the tree wouldn't fall and crush anything). It was really fun, and it smelled really good because of all the freshly-cut wood! The German guy was his father-in-law and he was really funny. Had open-heart surgery like a month or two prior, so he was also quite insane. He just pushed through like it was nothing though. You grow to appreciate being outside, especially when the forest/woodland area we're in is so green and pretty. Most of the Stafford ward boundary is just rural countryside which is really awesome.

The Stafford ward got a new bishop just yesterday, which was interesting to see. We ate dinner with the bishop the night before he was released, and he's pretty well off. He was president for a part of Nike for awhile, and he's been a CEO for one or two other bigger companies. He showed us a shoe made specifically for Shaq (which was a size 23) and it was freaking huge! You could fit like three of my feet in this shoe, it was enormous. His family was really awesome, they were a lot of fun to have dinner with. I really enjoy both of the wards out here, they're all really friendly and so nice. This one younger kid we had dinner with the other night gave Elder Baxter and I these hand-drawn pictures of how cool missionaries are.

My mamma is gonna' to be teaching kindergarten! That will be quite a mix-up! I think she'll do really well, she's always been good with those sort of things. She dealt with Silas, Ben, and I growing up so I think she's pretty well adapted to deal with anything those kids can throw at her! 

Not really a whole lot went on this week here in Wilsonville. Just kind of the same old routine. 

I love you all, hope things are going well. 

-Elder Samuel Burge 

P.S.- Yeah, the mission president knows about as much as you do (The church announced two new missions in Vancouver, WA and Salem, OR that will impact the Sam’s mission). I think they might take missionaries from our mission and be sending them to Vancouver as well, we actually have a small amount of missionaries that go into Vancouver (mostly the ASL sisters, and a few of the elders that are working with two of the all-Tongan wards, which I want to work with!) 

Oh, I also burned my finger while cooking lunch. It hurt like crazy, but it's all good now! Just blistered and it looks gross.