May and Lincoln, RS Dinner, Lunch with Amy, Frozen yogurt and hike, Japan Festival, Special Olympics fund raiser...

May and Lincoln came over on Monday and we had fun playing with them.

 Lincoln looked sharp in his Totoro outfit!

 May had fun fixing her hair and playing dress up with her jewelry.

Luke is almost finished with bowling.  He made a STRIKE on Wednesday and won the game with a score of 129!

We had a marvelous Relief Society dinner.  Yummy enchilada's and soft tacos were served with cupcakes for dessert.  There was a game of family feud and a special musical number and lots of visiting.

LaNae picked up Amy from school and they went on a lunch date

For St. Patrick's Day, we made green rice crispie squares

We went out for Irish mint frozen yogurt and then went on a hike to Potato Hill.  We hiked to the bridge and back and saw lots of beautiful views of the Draper Temple.  It was about 70 degrees when we left and down to around 60 at night.  Perfect hiking weather!

We watched the sun set

It was stunning!  Tim has an app that when you point to a star, it tells the name of the star and the system it is from.  We had fun using it as the stars popped out in the night sky.

We could see the Draper Temple on most of the hike and it was particularly beautiful at night.

Luke had a swim lesson with Kaylee

We met her new husband, Joseph

On Saturday LaNae and Luke went to Harmon's to help out with the Special Olympics fund raiser

On Saturday Night, LaNae and Tim went on a date to the UVU Japan Festival.  We saw a couple of Tim's students.  The program was amazing with taiko drums, Okinawa dances, aikido demonstrations, etc. and then we went to visit Uncle David.  We played Phase 10 and watched videos of Todd and John.

The choir sang this hymn on Sunday.  I love the words!

Take Time to Be Holy (Dickman)

Take time to be Holy, speak oft with thy Lord.

Abide with Him always and feed on His word.

Make friends of God’s children, help those who are weak,

Forgetting in nothing His blessing to seek.

Take time to be holy, the world rushes on.

Spend much time in secret with Jesus alone;

By looking to Jesus like Him thou shalt be;

Thy friends in thy conduct His likeness shall see.

Take time to be holy, let Him be thy guide

And run not before Him whatever betide.

In joy or in sorrow still follow they Lord,

And looking to Jesus trust in,

Trust in the Lord.

Take time to be holy, be calm in thy soul.

Each thought and each motive beneath His control;

Thus led by His Spirit to fountains of love,

Thou soon shall be fitted for service above.

Thou soon shall be fitted for service above.

Text:  William D. Longstaff

Music:  Traditional Irish Melody

Arranged By:  Annette W. Dickman

This week's letter from Elder Stout:

Hello, Family!!

He looks SO MUCH LIKE ME!! I love those pictures. You can all be sure they are saved on my iPad, and I look at them frequently. I am so excited to meet the little guy.

John is doing a ton better!! I feel really dragged of energy this week, but am still genki and Dendouing hard!!! This week has been awesome, but I will talk about it at the end of the letter!

I know it was sold out, but how was Beauty and the Beast?? Me and Elder Stout have seen a ton of posters for it in Sanjo, I bet it was way good. Let's be real though, Froby Yogurt is more our speed. Luke looks way happy in those pictures, it was obviously the best option!! I KNOW the hike, but I haven't hiked it! You all know that I am not the biggest on hiking, but that sounds way gorgeous!! 

JAPANESE FESTIVAL!! That's so much fun!! Was it like the real thing?? Festivals are really fun for missionaries nowadays, because we have permission to dendou a little and mostly walk around and improve the image of the church by showing appreciation for the culture. We still don't go much though, because me and Elder Stout just kinda feel awkward not doing traditional dendou. Still getting used to modern ideas about how to be a missionary.

I will continue to pray for our family members, I am so sad to hear about sickness in the family.. Please keep me updated.. Tell Grandpa thank you so much for the personal letter!! It made me worry a ton less, relieved a lot of stress for sure!! He seems pretty genki from his prospective! But I guess Grandpa has always been really good at always being positive too!

This week, in really short terms.. we had Zone Conference, and so President Nagano came! I am still in my Japanese only challenge thing, so I participated only in Japanese, which was tiring.. But very rewarding!! I am happy to be able to actively participate in any situation in Japanese. After that, we slept in the Niigata Elders apartment with 14 OTHER ELDERS. It was intense. After that we had interviews, then District Conference (Stake Conference for areas that only have Branchs) So we were in Niigata again! Also, the Conference was in only Japanese, and I totally understood it all! My brain hurt for sure, but I feel way happy with my comprehension ability. My speaking still isn't where I want it to be, but I think after another couple months, I won't be worrying about hearing Japanese at all.

WE LOVE YOU GUYS SO MUCH!! President Nagano says there's a 50 percent chance he'll just keep us both in Sanjo another transfer, so please keep us in your prayers!! We will be praying for y'all too!! I had a dream last night that Dad was tutoring me in Japanese about Japanese, and it made me way happy. That was way random, but anyways!! I know this church is true! The work is awesome, and it's tons of fun! Most importantly, it's essential. We are truly members of the Church of JESUS CHRIST of LATTER-DAY SAINTS. It's the last days!! I am way happy and proud to be helping everyone prepare! Love you all buckets!

スタウト長老〜♡