Dear Family,

Wow, that sounds like is has been eventful and is really exciting. It is hard to hear about the baby. I am glad that Lovetta is still doing ok though. She is a strong woman. I have been telling Elder Gurney about her this past week and sharing with him all of the things that I have learned from her about what really is important. One thing that I still remember about her is when she got upset one time-she didn't hurt me or anything, she just got upset and went to her room- but she came back in a few minutes in the depths of humility and appologized. It was amazing to me to see how fast she changed her attitude, and really how much love she had for me. It made me want to be a much more caring brother/father/ faithful priesthood man.

We are going to get some flowers today for our appartment. We have been cleaning near every day a little bit, and we just really felt the spirit tell us that we needed to take some time yesterday and clean. This appartment belonged to some people before the missionaries. There are lots of stories about it. Elder Stahle cleaned it before I got here, but he didn't get it all, and the Spirit needed us to clean it if we wanted it to continue to dwell with us.

These pictures were from Elder Gurney's camera card. The computer recognizes his. So you get some this week!

We are really seeing a whole lot of blessings. Teresa is coming along, we pushed her date back to the 19th of June, because she has to go out of town, and teaching with 5 kids and all the stress that goes along with it is not too quick and easy. But she is really loving and learning by the spirit. It is amazing. The Bitner family is also doing great. They have a daughter Nyia who has gone to the hospital twice now because she stopped breathing in the middle of the night. As we were thinking about what to teach them, Lovetta's story came to mind as a good example of faith in the Lord no matter what happens. I think that it would really hit home and touch them. I'd like permission to use it though, and it would be more powerful in her own words too. To Lovetta: Could you write up something for me to share? Just your feelings/testimony even in the midst of your trials? I love you all and hope that you will have a wonderful week!

Love,

~Elder Owens

P.S. I didn't get sound for the movie, but it looked like a lot of fun. Telisa's testimony would be awesome to have recorded, I wish I had written mine down as an activity right when I was baptized and confirmed.

One thing that I felt I needed to tell mom was that I am indeed grateful for the lessons that she has taught me about loving animals. I remember when I was little I was capturing ants and using a magnifying glass to try to burn them with the sun, and mom scolded me. It really made an impression and since then my love for all animials all life has really grown. Carissa has also helped. The pictures were fun, I am glad that you sent them. Telisa's party looked like a sucess. The successes that I have found from the Lord have really been higlighted in the phrase: "Find Joy in the Journey. I am definetely sure that this life is not ment to be full of sadness and misery every single day. But when those days do come, I am glad for the humility and closeness to the Savior that they bring. I am glad that she likes interviews. I agree with her, those men are so kind and they are really there for our blessing. The Bitners asked the other night about the priesthood, and if it were only the men who were able to hold it. I answered: "The priesthood is the power of God given to men to serve as He would, Elder Gurney and I have had a whole lot of fun experiences this past week. It has been great to serve with him so far. We helped Teresa paint her new house, we gave her another blessing. He spoke in Sacrament meeting, and Brother Lopez had us over for dinner. He is fixing up a house(a big old one) for someone else, and they are letting him stay there while he does. He had a bonfire and invited the owner of his house and a friend over for ice cream. The friend had just gotten cancer, was in the hospital about to die, and his mom asked many congregations from different churches to pray for him. Miraculously his cancer disappeared, the doctors couldn't explain it, he just got up and started walking around. He kept asking us: "is that possible?" Do you believe it? Was that an answer to those prayers? He kept saying "but I don't understand, is it because I lived a good life before, and tried to help the poor and give of what I had?" I have tried to live a good life, and when the mormons came and visted me in the hospital they prayed with me and had me say a prayer, they told me that it wouldn't be selfish just to ask for that blessing. Then just so quickly I was up and walking around and the doctors were looking at me as if I were a god." We weren't able to teach him much. He isn't the type to listen to us, even when he asked us questions, he didn't really want to know the answers. "Be comforted" "have faith" "repent" "come follow me" The way to understand sprititual things must be done BY us, not done TO us.

Love, Elder Owens

Bye!

Dear Family,

I offered to play hymn number 142 Be Still my soul- but I can only play the right hand, and I am not that great at it. It will be such a blessing for Skyler to be able to play the piano. (We ended up singing A-cappella in Gospel Principles.) Writing things down is definitely something I have learned to do as a missionary. I carry a notebook with me everywhere so that I can write down Spiritual promptings when they come- otherwise I forget way too easily and quickly. Anyway we are going to Oneonta to play some sports with my district today, so I've gotta run, :D but I am glad I got to hear from you. Thank you so much for all you've done. I love you so much. I love You mom. I love you Dad, I love all of you Melody especially has been in my thoughts and love. Lovetta and Tom are such great examples of love and fun. I love them, I love Skyler and his obedient Spirit, I think he is blessed with the gift of knowledge and wisdom from what I remember. I love Telisa and she is such a joy to our family, I love playing with her and she is so much fun and is always so happy at the important-but seemingly small things in life. Have a great week!

Love, Elder Trezor Sheen Owens