Happy Easter!

Hola Everyone!!!!!

Everything is going fantastic here in Montgomery :D I absolutely love it here. I think the bigger city kind of feel gives me a little bit more energy. It's weird though because it's a bigger city, but it's not like we have a bunch of skyscrapers or anything, it's just TONS of people and TONS of houses. Which is great because I'm actually meeting people who have never talked to missionaries before which was completely different in Florence where everyone had met a missionary before :)  I feel more comfortable when we are in the rougher part of town than when we are in the rich part of town. Rich people won't listen to us.. And they all pretty much go to church. We try to stay away from the really sketchy parts though. Apparently there's a street called Smiley court and as our District leader, Elder Bentley says, "When the local homeboys are afraid of an area, you probably shouldn't go there." So we steer clear of that area ;)

We have been tracting like nobodies business. I love it. Sister Child is having to get used to it :) haha. But we have found a lot of great people that we have started to teach. We have finally gotten our feet on the ground I think. We are starting to learn the area more and finding out where all of the members and less actives are. Hopefully within this week we can start seeing more of them. We have a few investigators that seem promising. One of them is Gene. He is an older man who has many health issues. He loves God and wants to know more of his purpose in his life, but he is not churched which is excellent.

A couple of other investigators we have are Salvador and Maria. We have blessed their home (although he wasn't there) and we have been able to come back and teach the first lesson to both of them. Salvador has met with missionaries before and went to english class for a long time until they stopped it apparently. He remembers a lot of the story of Joseph Smith. He says he feels like him because there are so many churches and they all say different things. We committed him to baptism and he said he would if he came to know that these things were true but he wants to know first before he sets a date. Fingers are crossed for him :) We have talked with the elders and hopefully we can work together to help him and his family to baptism.

They are our only spanish investigators right now. (We need to get to the trailer park!)  If we go a day without teaching in Spanish, I feel a little bit bummed. I miss my Spanish family in Florence :) It's crazy to have to teach most of the lesson in Spanish! I've found though that I can communicate fairly well with the natives. It's strange to have to be the one in charge and translate things. I don't like being the leader, but I am definitely starting to learn how to be a better one. I hope Sister Child doesn't mind if I mess up a bit with her ;) I'm sure by the time I'm on my way out I will have trained TONS of sisters and then I can get the last one right ;) All of the missionaries here have been so helpful. Elder Bentley is an excellent District leader and Sister Kim (Temple square korean sister) and Sister Houston have really helped us figure out the ward. I still have a lot to learn, but I hope that I'm helping these missionaries and people here as much as they are helping me!

We started to ride our bikes this week. I LOVE the bike. But I think I love it too much because I tend to kill my companions on our bike rides ;) haha. I guess I haven't realized how much muscle I have built in my legs. I'm just gonna say that is the major factor in my 20 lb weight gain to make myself feel better about myself. President says to take it slow at first on the bike, or our companions will hate us. So I've tried to enjoy the restful bike rides ;)

President Holzapfel called me the other day and asked to talk to me privately. I thought something horrible had happened and almost had a heart attack. But he just said that my old companion Sister Stock and her companion are having struggles. Apparently they don't get a long at all. He wanted my input on Sister Stock, so I was very frank with him :) I hope I helped... but I'm glad i'm not the only one who had struggles with Sister Stock ;) She definitely taught me a lot though.

I had to give a talk yesterday in the English Sacrament meeting. Sister Child gave it on the Atonement and they just told me to talk on something eastery... Whatever that means ;) I studied a lot on the life of Jesus and his resurrection and ended up giving it on Being witnesses of Jesus Christ. It went pretty well actually :) I didn't really write out the talk at all, I just wrote down some points of the Resurrection and such and used a talk in the March 2008 Ensign by Elder Christofferson and it ended up flowing pretty well. I've never felt so calm giving a talk in my life! That was 100% the Holy Ghost right there. I love being a missionary :)

I hope all is well!!!!!!!!! I love you all so so so so so SO much and miss you all MUCHO! Hugs and kisses :) 

Love, Masey

Brayden! Enjoy the MTC! Just think. You will never have the opportunity again to just be edified by the good work of God and have all that time to study and learn spanish! Enjoy the Journey! Every minute of it. You'll be a lot happier if you do ;)