OUR 1ST EMAIL FROM JARED !

Hurray ! Today is the day that I have been waiting for since he got in the MTC! He's written me another letter, but I got my first official email from Jared this morning. It's pretty amazing. I see how much he's grown in only 10 days. The MTC is doing marvelous things for him. Read on....

Dear Family,
This is my first official e-mail from the MTC!! Yay!! Well, what can I say? Things here at the MTC are always pretty routine. We are either in class or we are eating in the cafeteria. It seems like we eat alot here! I think I've actually gained some weight. Oh well. I'll work it off during gym anyway. So in class, we are still learning French, (we've already passed what I've learned in my high school years.) It's crazy, the class is going so fast!! I am picking up on most of it but not all. Yesterday, our teacher Frére Lyman was teaching us about the house of etre. Basically it's just this way of learning how to use words in the past tense with the verb etre. So we had to draw this big house looking thingy, and Elder Mason (The district clown basically) said "Hey let's make it into "the Dojo of etre" So we did. We had these ninja ropes and a zen garden and a dojo master. And we had to use these verbs that describe a physical change in action like To descend, To be born, or To Return. It was pretty cool, I'll have to admit.
Elder Spicer and I got to go to the TRC (teaching resource center) and we had to make 3 contacts in French, and then we had to teach the first lesson in English. I think we did pretty well, but we will definately do better next week.We also got to go to the RC (refferal center) where we got to make a bunch of phone calls to people. It was cool. I want to go back, but I have to wait until Monday. The MTC is freaking crazy. We always have meetings and class and meals and we are always somewhere all the time. The days are so scheduled out for you here. It's crazy. We've been going over how to contact people and we've been trying (With not much success) to learn how to do the passe composé. It's all really confusing. My first official week and a half here at the MTC was pretty fun.
Oh have to tell you about our district. We have two sisters in it, one from Ireland, and the other one from Germany. They've been teaching us a little bit of their language too. It's cool cause they have all these different sayings for things, like for schetchy, or mysterious, they say "dodgy" so that has pretty much become our whole district saying now! Elder Zarate (Say KA-RA-TE like an Asian person would say it.) is crazy good at French. He can speak for like minutes at a time!!Elder Mason is always happy or smiling, and he's way funny too.
What else???? I've been getting every one of your letters Mom. I don't really have a whole lot of time during the day to write anything back, so sorry if I haven't sent very many yet. I just sent one today, and another one just a couple of days ago. Life here at the MTC goes on.I miss you all. I love you. Thanks for all the support.
Love,
Elder Walch

Ta-daa! Do I have an awesome son or what??? We were so excited to get this first email. How crazy that some words on a page can make your heart hurt and burst with pride at the same time? He's having the time of his life. I, on the other hand, have been writing every day and have been trying to cope with him being gone. Tears still come quite easily, and not just for me. Gary has been welling up himself when I get emotional or when he reads one of his letters. What can I say? We just miss our baby boy! Anyway, thru the tears and all, today has been such a good day as we got this terrific email from him. He'd love to hear from any of you that would like to write to him. So please do...

My friend Lindsay at work asked me if she should buy stock in Kleenex...I told her absolutely...! We've been using alot at our house !
Until next post... Love to all
Colleen