We have a baptism coming up for John and Cece this Saturday. We just had their wedding last Saturday at Brother Weaver's barn/furniture store. They have been making a lot of progress and I can tell they are ready for baptism because of their willingness to keep the commitments we extend to them.

We went to the temple on Tuesday. I regret not going more before my mission, but I am glad I got to go so soon after coming out to Ohio. It was a good experience and will probably be Elder Hill's last time going to the temple on his mission unless we get an investigator to do baptisms for the dead.

I think I forgot to tell you about the welcome I received when I first got to Danville. The Mount Vernon Elders (Snyder and Janson) hid a bunch of dominoes in our house and left a sign that said "have an EXTRA nice transfer." The word EXTRA was replaced with a pack of extra gum. We have been looking for these dominoes for a while and just found the final one last Wednesday. Since we found them, Elder Hill wanted to repay the favor and hide them in their residence so he did thaton Thursday while we were on exchanges.

We did exchanges again on Thursday. This time I stayed in Danville and Elder Hill went to Mount Vernon. Elder Anderson came with me and since this is my area I get to drive. I haven't driven a car in nearly 6 weeks and it was kind of a weird experience. I also had to take the lead more in planning and teaching, so it was a good learning experience.

We have a taser in the residence that Elder Hill bought from a member having a garage sale. Elder Anderson is silly and asked me to taze him when we were on exchanges. He didn't like how the video we took turned out, so he asked me to taze him again in the morning. I think there may be something wrong with him. Elder Snyder also tased Elder Janson during the first week I was here. I would have thought missionaries would have more sense than to want to inflict pain on themselves.

I got to do some family history work for a few hours this week. I didn't like it at first since I wasn't really sure what I was doing. All of the branches of the tree were complete on FamilySearch except Grandpa Ron's parents. It kind of shocked me since he is so into family history work and compiled that 1000 page book on our ancestors. I found a 1940s census record that had his parents and siblings on it. The reason things weren't linked up is Grandpa Ron's record was showing up as "Ronald B Livingston" instead of "Ronald Burnell Livingston." I enjoyed trying to fix the holes in the family tree. I am surprised it wasn't all done with all of the members we have in the family. I saw that Kevin and Kathy have done a lot of the work for that side of the family. I also found a set of great-great-...-great grandparents from the 1700s on the Livingston side that were first cousins. That was kind of funny to find. Their names are James Livingston and Christina Livingston if you wanted to look them up in FamilySearch.

Now for the Q&A :)

Are you on your bike where ever you go?

I actually haven't had a chance to ride my bike. Elder Hill is missing a part that keeps his front tire on, so we have been driving everywhere. It has been kind of convenient not having to bike through all the rain we have been getting. Tropical Storm Bill affected us last Saturday and we got several inches of rain in a few hours. Some lawns looked like swimming pools. We have received either two or three flash flood warnings on our cell phone.

Will you send Elder Hill home from Danville? Will you leave the area when you send him home or will you have someone there before you transfer out?

We will likely stay in Danville for the full 12 weeks of my training then Elder Hill will go back home to Idaho. After he leaves I am guessing that I will stay for at least one transfer before I get moved somewhere else. I hope they don't double out this area, there are a lot of investigators that are making slow gradual progress and I wouldn't want that to be lost.

How are you enjoying the members? How many members do you have there on Sunday?

The members are great. Apparently Danville is one of the better areas for getting fed by members. Nearly every weekday we have a meal scheduled with a member. All of the food is home cooked too. We had a "Linger Longer" at church this week, which is the equivalent of the "Munch and Mingle" at the YSA ward in Lehi. There was quite a bit of food and nearly all of it was cooked by the families that used to be Amish. We usually have 60-70 people at the group (the one that meets at the wood shop) and around 40ish meet at the Mount Vernon Ward building. It is kind of interesting having a ward that is split like this.

Do they have you busy at church as missionaries?

We don't do that much extra in church. We switch off teaching the Gospel Principles class every week for Sunday School. Other than that it is just a normal church service.

Love you all.

-- 

Elder King

Ohio Columbus Mission

We made strawberry jello with bananas and whipped cream (which we made ourselves from mixing heaving whipping cream, sugar, and vanilla) for John and Cece's wedding. Elder Hill had never made jello before.

Outside the Columbus Temple

A bird pooped on me after we tried knocking delivering cookies to a less active family.

Picture of the Bridge of Dreams in Brinkhaven about 2 miles east of Danville.

Elder Hill and I baked some cookies to take to investigators and less active families.

Elder Anderson getting ready to leave after exchanges. He packed his bag with a bunch of EmergenCs  that were sent in a care package to Elder Evans forever ago.