December 15

Greetings from New York City!  I am typing this at a desk in our hotel room which has a beautiful view of the Chrysler Building lit up with lights out the window in front of me!

Questions:
1) What do you know about Skyping on Christmas Day?  I'm so excited!!!  We can make it work at any time, but our schedule at this time is as follows:  We will be home all day until we go to Grandma's house at 4pm.  The Neilson/Carling Family will come to our home for a Christmas Brunch around 11:00 or 11:30am.  We can adjust those times if necessary.
2) Do you have any specific plans for Christmas Eve or Christmas Day yet?  We will be at Grandma's home on Christmas Eve this year.
3) How are Duane and the husband of the part-member family doing?
4) You've mentioned grocery shopping in Blanding.  Is there more than one grocery store?  Does Blanding have a Wal-mart or anything of the sort?
5) You mentioned picking up a new truck in Farmington.  What kind is it?
6) Is that truck just for you and Elder Salmon or do yo share it with the other two Elders in your home?
7) What are the names of the other two Elders?  Where are they from?

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Mom,

Sounds like a good time in NYC! That's awesome that you have such a good view of the Chrysler Building.

1) I don't know anything, we're still trying to get to know the people around here and no one has specifically offered to let us use their computer yet so hopefully someone will offer soon and we can get it set up. I should be able to do before 4 o'clock, hopefully. It's mostly up to the member's schedule. 

2) We don't really have any specific plans yet. Grandma's house should be a good time for Christmas Eve!

3) Duane actually moved, but we are hopefully going to start teaching his significant other who is still in town because her sister is a very active member and so we are hoping to have the lessons in their home! Kevin is doing pretty well, he didn't make it to church yesterday but we are going to see him again tonight with his fellowshipping family. Having a family to fellowship someone as they learn about the church makes a world of difference! It's pretty cool to see it here.

4) No, there's just one store, Clark's which is part of Associated Foods. There is also Alco which is a pretty general store (a smaller version of Target/Walmart), they have some food (mostly junk food) and then other items, but Alco across the country is closing down so they'll be gone sometime in January. The closest Walmart is in Cortez, CO.

5) Nissan Frontier, it's pretty nice but the Toyota Tacoma is still my favorite, it is such good truck. Handles really well, drives smooth, very comfortable, and looks nice.

6) Yeah, it's our own truck and the other elders have a Frontier too, ours is silver and theirs is charcoal grey, but we mostly walk here in Blanding to save miles.

7) Elder Ball is from Rexburg, ID and Elder Thomas who is from Lubbock, TX. They are both really good guys and fun to live with.

I can't believe that Stevi is married and it's especially weird to think that Jackie and Trevor bought a house in SLC! They aren't too far from Emigration Market which has Eggs in the City which is a pretty awesome breakfast place on the northwest corner of 13th South and 17th East and then also 15th and 15th which I think has Mazza and Caputos. The Lord has blessed me, I have lost most of my knowledge on non-mission related things but I can still remember all the best eats in SLC. I hope they have that extra bed/couch in their home for me to stay at occasionally. Grandma mentioned all the house shake-ups last week in an email, it sounds pretty crazy!

All of the packages arrived today, thank you so much for all the gifts! There are a ton of them, many more than are necessary but thank you! I'll be excited to find out what they are on Christmas. Enjoy the rest of your time there in NYC!

Things are going pretty awesome here in Blanding. This past weekend was Stake Conference and President and Sister Batt came and spoke in the Saturday evening session and everything was really good. It was so good to be able to see President and Sister Batt again and we actually just got to see them this past Friday in Cortez for a mission Christmas party with the Utah zone and Durango zone, it was a lot of fun. Me and Elder Salmon were in charge of organizing an hour and a half worth of games and we had a couple of big group games at first and then the end portion we opened up for people to play different board games with whomever they would like. We got to play Mormon Bridge with President and Sister Batt and Sister Batt got a little competitive, haha.

We also got to set a baptismal date with another investigator from a part member family, his name is Chuck and his wife is a member and they seem pretty awesome. We have also been working with one of the two seminary teachers because he is in 3rd ward and we are planning on starting to work with the youth a lot. The youth seem to be the place where missionary work is at for Mormon communities because they have so much more interaction with non-members and less active members and they can really embrace and fellowship the kids at school and show them their love. And youth are probably a lot more open to learning about things because they have less prejudices at the younger ages. There are a ton of awesome families here in Blanding and a lot of missionary work to be done.

Merry Christmas! I hope I already mentioned it, but if you haven't seen the He Is the Gift video onchristmas.mormon.org YOU NEED TO WATCH IT AND SHARE IT WITH EVERYONE! Christmas season is such a special time of year because it is one of the few times where everyone's minds and hearts are turned towards Jesus Christ. I was reading through the Christmas story in the Book of Mormon the other day in 3 Nephi 1 and it discussed the signs of Jesus Christ's birth. One was that when the sun went down there would still be light and the other was the new star in the sky. I felt those symbols were significant because they showed that because of Jesus Christ light will even shine in the darkness and that regardless of where we are or who is lost, He will always be guiding us by the beacon of His light even as the North star gives the traveler direction. This Christmas season think of those who are lost, who need His light in their life, and invite them to discover the Gift and embrace the Gift of Jesus Christ. I love you all and am so grateful our Savior who all the prophets have testified and taught of. 

Love,
Elder Schaelling