Tuesday, December 31, 2013

Dec 27th
I got this wonderful text tonight from a sweet stranger. 
Hi there, I'm a Mormon mom and I work at the Las Vegas airport. I get to see many missionaries who come to Nevada to get their Mexican visas. I just thought you might like a picture of your missionary. Enjoy!!



Dec 26th
This is our conversation from his P-Day
K:We had a good day,  everyone came in the afternoon,  ate,  got tub,  played games.  Annie and Daniel have been really sick,  went to the Dr this morning for medicine.   We all missed having you there but are glad you are having a great experience.  We had a good day,  everyone came in the afternoon, ate, hot tub, played games.  Annie and Daniel have been really sick,  went to the Dr this morning for medicine.   We all missed having you there but are glad you are having a great experience.  
J: It was sooooo great mom. wow it was just so fun. we had David a. Bednar come and he did something that has never been done in church history! he talked for a bit about inspired questions and how to ask good ones, and then he passed out 200 cell phones to the audience and said for us to pass the phones along and to text in questions that were then sent to his ipad and he went through and answered them, and not only our mtc but ALL of the ones around the world!!! he is such a stud! he just had an answer for everything. he knows his doctrine so well it was killer! gosh you should have been there! it was such an awesome experience!!
K:What a great experience!  I think that would be amazing.  What choir did you get to sing in?  Did you have a good dinner? I was going to send you some white chicken chili but the BYU mail service was closed, I was bummed,  maybe next week.
J:just the mtc choir, but it was way cool because it was broadcast to all of the mtc's for the Christmas eve devotional that we sang in, and for the Christmas day one and they totally zoomed in right were i was so im kind of a big deal mom. haha chiste chiste (thats like the equivalent to jkjk in spanish)......ehhhhh food yesterday really wasn't that great to me, but everyone else seemed to love it, so that's good :) dang!! that would have been so good! that's really thoughtful of you thanks mom :)
Eric:Hey dad here, So cool about elder bednar. Glad you had that chance. I had something similar with apostle in the mission home in slc. We got to meet with one in the assembly Hall in the temple in slc.
K:So you will be leaving soon!  Be sure and get a calling card at the mtc before you leave,  let me know if they don't have any and I will send you one. That way you can call us from the airport on your layovers.
Have you got to see Jordan at all?
Your 6 weeks is going fast!
J:yeah i have seen him several times! he is a stud! yeah maybe you could send me a calling card? it is going by so quickly!
K:Let me know when you find out your flight schedule so that we can have as many here to talk to you when you go to the airport. It's like 10 Days!
J:i know! i will for sure!! i leave to get my visa in Vegas tomorrow!
K:That's kind of cool,  a break from the walls!  How big of a group is leaving with you to Mexico when you go? Are the guys in your zone mostly going to your mission?
J:no, just me and my companion, which I'm okay with cause he is a stud! i wont know until i get my flight plans, but i have to go so i will talk to you later! love you all!!!!!
Dec. 25
So we did not get to talk to Jacob on Christmas, because he was in the MTC, he told us that we would be able to email back and forth but didn't know when. So this is the sum of the emails that we got.

7:28 am-Mom!!! merry Christmas! I only get like 15 minutes of this right now so I hope you're on right now!
7:32 am-Well just be sure and tell everyone how much I love them and how grateful I am for all of you. my best memories of our family are from Christmas. I love you all so much and I hope that everyone can remember Christ today and think about Him. I have such a great appreciation for everything He did not only for me but for all of you and everyone who has or ever will live. he has saved us, we just need to accept Him. feliz navidad!
Of course I didn't see it till Me- 7:44am-Hi so sorry you there?
J: No worries :) I love you. I have to get off soon.
Me: Did you get your package
J: Yes best Christmas ever
Me I didn't know you would be on this early. Everyone is just getting here. They all say Hi, I love you and Merry Christmas
J:Yeah....well they kinda botched everything haha its all good though. im have p day tomorrow so I can talk to you then!
Me: I hope you have a great day! What is the plan?
J:lots of fun stuff! haha devotionals and we are singing in the choir. cool stuff :) That was at 7:49 and that was it!! 
It was bitter sweet. Glad we got to hear something from him :)


Friday, December 20, 2013

Dec 19th 
So our new districts are awesome! We have some really strong missionaries that are going to do a ton a great things! It's really hard seeing some missionaries go every week. It's crazy how close you can get to people in such a short amount of time, but i think that the spirit really plays a big role in that it helps you see people for who they really are. I think before my mission I sometimes would judge people too quickly, and some of these people here I wouldn't have given a chance, but now that I have the spirit so strong with me, I get to see people for who they really are, and they are awesome!!! Um some interesting stuff, I guess would be....really idk. A lot of stuff happens but I have no idea where to start. our district has a ton of inside jokes, we laugh a lot, and I laugh really loud! ha ha but we have one elder, who is just the best, he is immature, but is just so so incredibly self confident and in no way humble ha ha but we love him because of who is is, I wouldn't change a thing about this guy, love him. Anyway, when he goes to the bathroom EVERYONE in our class and adjacent classes come near the bathroom and listen to him because he SLAMS the toilet seat down when he is done. its pretty freaking hilarious. we score his slams and have a running tally of how hard he slams and everything, its great :) 
Something funny about a couple Spanish words, just depending on where you put the accent on a word can change what it means. so like Papá means Santa Claus, and el papa means the pope of the catholic church, la papa means potato, and papá also means dad. I thought it was pretty interesting. Don't send me gum ha ha we aren't allowed to chew gum as missionaries, its hilarious whenever any of us get packages we always get gum and just laugh so hard! get me some of those Listerine tape mints or something instead ha ha. On thanksgiving we did this really cool service project where we made over like 350,000 meals! We had these assembly lines going and our group just tried going as fast as possible and we made it a really good time actually, I was laughing so hard, and I had everyone laughing with me because we were all just being crazy. I'm pretty sure all of the sister missionaries in our zone think I'm just the weirdest guy ever. I swear they hate me sometimes, but its all good. ha ha I just think people take me too seriously sometimes, and I harass people and mess around and I'm really sarcastic...and sometimes they just don't pick up the jokes. Anyway. I'm loving it. I'm getting a lot better with my Spanish and I really am so stoked to go out in the field and get to work!!
I love this picture, because if you look really hard at the glass ornament you can see Jacob!!
Dec 12th
MOM! 
thats so cool! so happy to hear everything is going well! i keep her in prayers as well as all of you! haha so some sad news. i cant call on Christmas :( but ill be able to email so just be sure and be by the computer of have your phone so we can message and stuff. got 16 new missionaries last night and i actually did a great job with our meet and greet thing we do! i had them all laughing haha, but really its great. oh i also saw Mariah Lopez last night!!! she just got here, she is that one little girl with the super duper curly red hair and the cute laugh haha. it was good seeing her!
I miss Sam, lil punk better write me back. i want to talk to him gosh. he is my best friend and if he doesn't reply then he is just being selfish and that isn't cool. i miss him too and i want to hear from him. anyway. i love you :) tell everyone i love them!
Love Elder Glenn

Friday, December 6, 2013

Dec. 6, 2013
Okay so some pretty cool news! Me and Elder Hansen just got called to be Zone leaders!!!! We are both really excited about it and I couldn't be happier! I love hearing from you all and I hope everyone is doing well. I pray for everyone every night and I'm so grateful to have such a great family! Well we got your package and Elder Hansen was touched that you made an ornament for him :) I tell everyone lots of stories about you guys and they all love hearing it. I say a lot of funny things and so I get put into Elder Farley's(an elder in my district) "quote book" a lot. A good one from the other day was after we had just got out of a REALLY good devotional and I was just really feeling the spirit and was super pumped I said "Wow, I could just punch something right now!...but in a good way!" Ha ha they all really got a kick out of it. I laugh a lot. more than I ever have really. Our district is so awesome! We work hard and we laugh hard. all of us are learning Spanish really quickly and we love it. We use hardcore Spanglish just because it sounds so funny. I love it. Our residence hall has me and my companion, Elder's Farley and Baldwin and then the other two elders in our district are just the room below us. They are Elder's Roser and Marion. All great young men, they all inspire me and make me laugh so hard. Our zone leaders we had before us said that we are the hardest working, most diligent, and best district they have seen, so we are very happy to know that we are doing well!

So weird thing. I get out my scriptures on the first day and I look for something in the bible....but ALL of the bible tabs are our of order! haha so it makes it confusing. So if there is anyway to like get some new tabs for it that would be pretty cool. and not the kind that stick out, like just some stickers to go on top of the incorrect ones, if that makes any sense. Also if you could send me my one zip up turquoise and white bedazzled tie that would be great! apparently paisley ties are like "the thing" here. oddly enough I had one bright paisley tie and an elder saw me and asked what it would take to have me part with it....so me and Elder Hansen went to his room and he had like 30+ ties!!! crazy right??? and I traded it for 3 ties haha! I had heard of "underground" tie trading in the MTC but this was comical! turns out they do these like big gatherings to have tie trading conventions, but we, as elders, really aren't supposed to be having big gatherings and focusing on things like that, so no one goes, because...well..its dumb haha. I am giving two years to do the Lord's work and I will not waste any of it being distracted by foolish things. I love you all and will try and send some pictures but the computers are weird so I might now be able to! ill try! love you!

Elder Glenn


So notes from "the mom", Jacob's P-day is on Thursday just FYI.
We got his scriptures figured out, we sent him a new set and he is going to send the defective set back.
"The parental units" (as he has called us) are very happy and proud of how well he is doing :)

Friday, November 29, 2013

A little from his email on Wed. Nov. 27,2013

Mom, 
 My Spanish is coming along well and i just had a lesson with and investigator this morning and me and my companion Elder H. did such an amazing job. I bore my testimony and really felt the spirit so strongly. even in Spanish. I cried during our investigators prayer. She committed to baptism and she was praying and the spirit just overcame me. I feel like i am just making huge strides in my progress. I have a long way to go but I am certainly loving this experience.
Love Elder Glenn

SERVICE

Thanksgiving Nov. 28, 2013

MTC

Nov. 25th
Mom, dad and family
i am having an awesome time at the MTC! My companion is Elder H and he is from Logan, hi is also going to Chihuahua which is exciting because he is an awesome Elder. I am learning a ton and trying to retain as much as possible. I love you all and I miss you all, but honestly I haven't had two seconds to miss you all. BUSY, BUSY, BUSY! I will say that you all inspire me to do better and that the closeness of our family is such a blessing. I love you all and hope that you are all doing wkll and I pray for you all. I feel so much different already. I was just made a senior companion last night. Anyway write to me! Go to Dearelder.com, it takes your message and they print it out the same day and give it to me that day. email is great too but I have to wait til P-day and only have 1 hour to respond to everyone.
i love you all and hope all is well
Love Jacob...Elder Glenn