Hello Mom :)

I got your Thanksgiving card! Thank you so much for that! It was kinda weird getting that... because usually I sign that along with the family and we give it to someone, and now I am the recipient of it. I love it though :) I love the pictures, as well. Can you please send me some nice printed pictures that I can put in my photobook? I look at those all the time. Just like the ones you sent of our family pictures before we left. That would be awesome! It's good to hear that Caelan is doing well in choir. I am so bummed that I never did choir in high school. FORCE the kids to take it. Also I want to see some pictures of you being pregnant! I don't know why... I just do.

We had a lesson in Priesthood and it was about eternal marriage and then it somehow turned into a discussion about Heavenly Mother... It was very awkward... just the way they were talking about her and throwing out her title. Some of our members don't even believe in her and were debating... yikes! Elder Lamb had to basically bear testimony that yes, we do have Heavenly PARENTS and that there, in reality, is a Heavenly Mother. Elder Lamb is a stud.

We had three more baptisms this week! I am so blessed that the Lord is allowing me to experience all of this! We baptized an older lady named Paulette, and her two daughters, Laure and Isabelle. The two daughters are like 29 and 33. I was able to baptize Paulette and Isabelle. When I baptized Isabelle, before she was fully immersed she flew back out of the water... I don't know why. I always have the people who don't want to go down all the way. So we had to do it again and I shoved her down pretty far just in case she wanted to jump up again. After the baptism all of the missionaries in Yaoundé (10 including the Thompsons) went over to their house and we had a FEAST! There was sooo much food and it was so good! Well, some of it was. I ate chicken and cake bread :) I let the other missionaries eat the gumbo and fufu. That stuff is definitely not for me.

I finished writing in my first journal on December 2nd! It took me 157 days to complete it... and I wrote in it every single day. I am pretty proud of myself. It is so cool to look back and read about my life basically in the MTC and the first few months in Africa. You will have fun listening to some of my entries when I get back!

So, we got into a taxi one day to go over to an investigators house and we called "cent-cent" which is basically 40 cents. You can usually get a ride for that amount. Well because we are white the taxi men think they can get more money out of us. So we called our call and the taxi man hesitated for a little bit and then let us in and then he asked us "comment est-ce que vous connaissez 'cent-cent'?" (How is it that you know 'hundred-hundred'?) and I said "Par le pouvoir du Saint-Esprit vous pouvez connaitre la vérité de toutes choses!" ("By the power of the Holy Spirit you can know the truth of all things ! Moroni 10:5) It was pretty awesome. I felt pretty proud.

So we met this anglophone (able to speak english) lady the other day and her name is Désy (Daisy) and she is crazy! But she is so awesome! She was telling us that she used to visit with other missionaries, like a year ago, and she loved them so much. She said that they were best friends and that they would come over to her house and pray and talk about the gospel all the time. At one time, she said that the missionaries and her laid their hands on her sons head and she prayed and the next day he was speaking english! I couldn't believe that one... so we called the missionary who was with her that night and asked because we thought it was so funny and he was shocked that she said that... he said "WHAT?!?! No way! That didn't happen!" and then he said "yeah, we were spreading apostasy over there in Ekounou 1." haha it made for a good life. Well, anywho, Elder Lamb and I invited her to baptism at the end of the lesson and she thought about it and then she asked us if we were married and we said no, and then she asked us if we will ever get married, so then, I pulled out my picture book and showed her a picture of Alex and I and I told her that someday I hope that I will marry her. Well, she looked at Elder Lamb and I, and told us how happy she is that we will get married when we get back from our missions and she told me that she loves Alex so much because she is so pretty... then she accepted our invitation to baptism!! haha so, I need to thank Alex for helping one of our amis accept the commitment to be baptized :) She will probably be so embarassed when she reads this. I love you babe :)

So, that was my week. It was pretty good and I am very happy! I love this misson so much and I am so blessed that I am here right now. Everything is going so well. I hope all is well back at home. Enjoy the cold... it is so hot over here. I love you!

Avec amour,

Elder Schmid