My Dear Family,

I´m so proud of my great family! 

Mom, those new organ pieces sound so fun! I´ve been printing off a couple of good classic songs to practice on the piano in the house and it´s been a very fun trip down memory lane playing some of the songs that I played in high school. 

Emily! I can´t believe you´re graduating! That´s so fantastic! I know it´s not for three more months, but it sure sounds like you´re killing your last semester!

Isaac, Mom told me that the jazz band sure sounded good and I believe it! You really have a great talent in the arts, (both music and drawing; I´m still very impressed with all of your paintings. =) )

Jacob, I talked to you a little in the email you sent me, but really I´m proud of all the ways you keep trying to prepare for your mission. That shows some real spiritual maturity. 

Joseph, I´m so proud of you for successfully taking care of the first ever Hales family pet! That´s really quite the accomplishment, and I know you´re doing a lot better than I would have done when I was ten! I can´t believe it´s almost your birthday. You´re so big!

And Dad, it sounds like you´ve been killing it with the cross fit exercising! You are always so focused in the things you try and do. 

We´ve been having some really great adventures here in Guayaquil this week too. (Fortunatly not weather adventures. The rains calmed down this week which was a great blessing. We still however carry umbrellas with as every time we leave the house/office haha =) )

On Tuesday we got a really special treat. Our mission president invited us out to lunch with him and the assistants as a good bye meal for Elder Fernandez. He was by far one of the most serving assistants that we had, and he even taught a bit of Portuguese while we were living together in the mission home. We were all sad to see him go back to Brazil, but he served a fantastic mission.

The big news in the mission is that Elder Rydalch is the newest assistant and now lives with us in the mission home. We´re going to play some basketball for morning exercise in the big center park right behind the house now. Watch out Jacob! ;)

Then on Wednesday we had the treat of hosting 6 of the 11 zones in the mission to a zone conference in our stake center. As the office missionaries we´re always in charge of getting lunch together and setting the tables and plates and serving the food. With a little over 100 missionaries in the chapel it was a little tight, but we talked about a lot of great points, and I don´t think anyone was too uncomfortable.

For P-day today my companion, Elder Gemmel, has both started and finished his BYU application. I´m actually quite impressed that he managed to do it all in one day, but that´s all we´ve been able to do today. I really hope he gets in, but he´s worried his ACT will hold him back. I guess we´ll have to wait and see. This Monday is the last day for applications, and I think that they hear back from BYU sometime during the next month.

I love you all and hope that you have a fantastic week! 

Lots of love,

Elder Hales =)