2017!!

Hey Mom!

Bummer you guys all got sick on the holidays! I guess it's better now than in school, but then again, it sounds like Noah's got no winter break with basketball and if you really think about it, school shmool. Hope everybody's feeling better now!

So crazy that Austin is already heading out on her mission! Haha I bet she's freaking out a bit, but that's pretty much the norm. It gets better after a couple days in the MTC.

Wasn't able to go to the New Year's baptism:( but the good news is that it went through! I can't complain about missing it, a lot of work went into making all this happen finally, so I'm really happy about it. It was the end of an 9 month journey!

New Years for us was pretty fun. We had a sweet game of soccer in the morning that involved me making the keeper save of the year with my face as well as a belly slide header for a goal, and then a finding activity in the square. While we were there, a man ran around making airplane noises with his arms all the way out. Nothing unusual. There was a branch party that we got to catch a piece of. It kinda felt like a church dance, except at one point an older lady took the microphone and started to sing an opera, and another missionary pretty much cut loose to Gangam Style. I was not that missionary. Then we had a sleepover party at the other elder's apartment and stayed up til the new year. To celebrate the end of our full calendar year of missionary service, we threw a ham that we had previously failed to cook off the balcony into the dumpster a few stories below. I was mostly impressed I nailed the shot, the ham was 5 lbs!

The work is still going really well! We're doing a lot in the square, as per usual, but we also go around a few different parks in the city that: 1. look really cool in the snow, and 2. are full of fully sober people. As far as the investigators go, we had 2 in church yesterday, and another random guy showed up that apparently got contacted a few weeks ago by a mystery elder. That was a little New Year's miracle. One of the 2 from church finished the Book of Mormon last week, and he wants to get baptized before the end of January! 

The new city near Kraków is called Mielin. It's a city where a family that used to have to drive 2 hours a week to go to Kraków lives. We visited them a couple times, and the city is really cool. Pretty exciting stuff.

Elder Barlow is doing really well! He's getting a solid start on the language, and we've been working well together.

Hope you guys have a good rest of winter break! Try to get to Disneyland! 

Love you Mom!

Elder Haskett

Xmas!!!

Hey Mom!

It was awesome seeing you guys yesterday, so good to talk again! I can't believe that we've only got one more skype call! Time has really flown by. 

The rest of our Christmas was pretty awesome. It was about 8 oclock at night, but we still had time to go to another family's house for Ben and Jerry's! Merry Christmas to us!

Sounds like you guys had a really awesome Christmas, and it also sounds like you're gonna be pretty busy for the next little while! Tell Noah good luck at the tournament!

That's pretty fun that Sabrina might be coming to stay! Hopefully things with the movie go well, and that it's all fun and stuff!

I don't think that I've got a lot to say about our week after skyping yesterday! I think I already covered all the details! The packages were great, and I think I'm pretty much set on hand warmers now haha. Thanks again!

Love you Mom!

Elder Haskett

Xmas

Hey Mom!

Haha I'm jealous of your trip to SLO! Sounds like the tournament has been fun so far, and I saw some pictures of the hike and the beach! Looks beautiful! Once again, I miss the beach. Other than the castle and the rest of the games are you guys planning on doing anything else in SLO? Taking out the quads again or hitting up that apple farm restaurant for those awesome fries?

One more week til Christmas! Haha I can't believe that it's almost time already to Skype again. Should be really fun! As far as that goes, we'll be at a member's house. Pretty much any time works for us between 2-7. So for you guys that's 5-10. Let me know what time works the best and I can confirm on Wednesday!

Our week was pretty quiet. Not as much time in city center, in fact, not as much time in Warsaw at all! We were on an exchange this week in Lublin! It was pretty cool. There was like some weird mojo going on there, and I basically couldn't miss haha. Everybody stopped and wanted to talk, so that was really fun. Only downfall is that it was way cold the whole time. I think we're officially to that time of year again. We had an interesting lesson while we were there though. We were at an investigator's apartment, and about halfway through, she tried to start a pillow fight with us? We were like, uhhh, and pretty much just sat there until it was clear that we wanted to leave haha.

The investigator with the date met the missionaries in April, took a Book, and that was it. First day of this transfer, he showed up in church, and said right away that he thought God led him there that day. As far as the baptism goes, we're all really excited! He passed his interview yesterday, and is pretty much just ready to go. It'll happen the day of Christmas Eve. In the words of Brother Bremner, "the missionaries call that a Wet Christmas". The next week, our investigator in Kato is planning on taking the same step. Fun stuff!

We had the funniest tracting/caroling contact of our lives yesterday. In front of the door, I was talking about how terrible it would be to get a tongue piercing, and I did a little demonstration with my tongue out, and this dude opens the door while I'm standing there all awkward, sticking out my tongue, saying "owowowow". Sister Demordaunt started laughing really hard and couldn't stop so she was all curled up in a ball. Anyways, as professional as we all probably looked at this point, it couldn't be compared to the sight we saw on the other side of the door frame. The dude that opens the door is like a college bro, riding on a tricycle, using his feet to steer on the handles, smoking a bong. His homie is chilling behind him on the couch, also smoking, and they're both looking at us like, "wut". They just looked at us, and I think the guy took like 30 seconds to register before he shut the door. Once that door closed, I don't think I've ever laughed so hard on my mission.  

I'm really excited for our next week though. We're of course looking forward to the baptism, but the district is also planning a bunch of other fun stuff to do as well. We've got culture night, Christmas, and Christmas Eve to look forward to, along with a pretty good amount of member-provided meals! Should be good! 

Can't wait to see you guys! Love you Mom!

Elder Haskett

Xmas pics

Christmas ties!