Trust in the Atonement

Email received 3/17/14

HEY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 

Things are going pretty good here!!!!!!!!!!!! Elder Rasmusson is doing good!!!!!!!!!!! He´s been telling me a lot about farming and stuff (Oh also, he´s a farmer) I don´t know if Max is still into farming but for reals if he is that kid could make a ton of money!!!!!!!!!!!! There´s a big business side to farming that I never knew!!!!!!! It´s pretty cool!!!!!!!!!!! But yeah he´s doing good. We had stake conference this weekend so we weren´t able to have the baptism...But hopefully this week!!!!!!!!!! But like i said things here are going GREAT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 

This week I´ve never been so happy to be from the good old ¨Bubble.¨ Everyone ALWAYS says that living in Provo is dumb and boring and the majority of the people that I went to high school with ALWAYS said that as soon as they graduated they were going to move away from Utah because they hate it. This week has made me a strong advocate of bubble living. So the area I'm in is a pretty rough. Every night we hear gun shots and see people dealing drugs and there´s at least 1 person per week that gets murdered here. And this week was pretty bad. We saw a lot of crazy stuff!!!!!!!!!!!!! I have never thought so much about Utah in my whole life!!!!!!!!!! In Provo I never once saw someone get shot, someone dealing drugs, someone get stabbed, etc...Here, these are everyday occurances and it gets me thinking of all the little kids that live here and have lived here their whole lives and to them it´s natural to hear gun shots all night long. It´s pretty sad that that´s the norm here. I feel SUPER blessed that I was able to grow up in Utah or the bubble!!!!!!!!!!!!!! It´s something that I think I took for granted. 

It´s also SUPER COOL to see because yeah, even though it's rough here, there are still TONS of SUPER GOOD people here!!!!!!!!!!!!!! It´s AWESOME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I meet tons of people everyday that have lived here their whole lives and they are AMAZING people!!!!!!!!!! Always willing to help and have a good time. It´s pretty amazing!!!!!!!!!! I´ve always had the belief that happiness is a choice and if you really want to be happy and have a good time you can do it in whatever circumstance you find yourself in. Yes sometimes it´s harder than other times but you can do it. All you need to do is trust in the Atonement and we can be happy whenever we want. It was a good testimony builder for me.

But yeah, I´m SUPER GLAD that you all are doing good!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! That´s SUPER COOL that the house is going to be different and we´re going to get central air and everything!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I´m excited to see it but not for 3 more months :) Anyway, thanks for everything!!!!!!!!!!!! I LOVE AND MISS YOU ALL SO MUCH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 

P.S. It turned out that Phil had a mom who was WAY bigger than Phil. So we chased them both out and they haven´t come back so we are officially opossum free!!!!!!!!!!!