Hello from Citrus Ridge!

This has been a pretty crazy week. Ha actually just about every week in the mission is packed, so it's something you come to expect, I guess. Well a couple of cool stories first:

On Thursday Elder Kitchen and I went to visit a potential investigator in our area named Rocky. He's good friends with a member of our ward, and the missionaries before I got here had done some service for him. He runs a cleaning business, so he's normally up all night getting places ready for the next day. Well we had a great conversation with him and he told us that he'll really try to be at church on Sunday because there's a chance that E. Kitchen or I will be getting transferred next week (we'll get transfer calls on Saturday, so I'll keep ya posted). Before we left though, he fed us an awesome lunch and then his wife handed us a 100 dollar bill! I was blown away. We told them that we don't accept payment for service, but they told us that is was for our groceries and we couldn't give it back. It's amazing to see how generous people are, especially towards missionaries. Well they didn't end up going to church, but we'll be visiting them again in the near future.

On Friday evening we were with Brother Staber, our ward mission leader. He's a really great guy, and would do anything to help us out. Well he was going to visit some less active members in the area and he needed some help going out. Well after we had finished we stopped at Publix (a popular grocery chain here) so that he could grab some stuff. While Bro. Staber was grabbing some stuff I noticed a big Indian guy was staring at us. I'm used to that by now, but I nodded and smiled at him. He didn't acknowledge me at all, and I just kind of brushed it off. Well a few minutes later E. Kitchen and I were grabbing some milk and when we turned around that guy was right by us. He asked us what church we were from, and when we started telling him he just started to break down. Tears rolled down his face as he told us how his mother had just recently been killed in a car accident and that he was at the end of his rope. Something had prompted him to talk to us, and he didn't know what else to do. "I'm financially stable, but spiritually robbed" he said, with the smell of alcohol on his breath. We talked to him and bore testimony that there is more to life then just getting by, and that he will be able to see his mother again. He wants to meet with us tonight, and I'm praying that all goes well there.

One other awesome story: We've been trying to finish up a neighborhood that we started tracting a while ago, and earlier in the week we ran into a family from the U.K. They were really nice and funny, and then we went on our way. Well a couple of days later we were back in the neighborhood and the dad saw us out on the street and he waved us over. He invited us in for a drink, and so we got to talk with the whole family. They had a lot of questions about the church (are all Mormons like the Osmond's? Because Marie must be a factory with all those kids! haha), and we were able to have a an awesome talk with them. The dad is really cynical (he calls himself a christian atheist...I didn't understand it either), but I made him promise that when he comes across missionaries like us in Britain that he has to try to be nice ha ha. He said he'll try his best. Then he made me promise to have some fun while I'm out here. Ha he suggested drinking, but I'll have to ask President if that makes the approved list.

Thanks for all the support and letters! I love hearing about how things are going with you all. Mom, that was the Wentzel family that you talked to. They fed us dinner yesterday, and they're really cool. The ward here is so great. Definitely people that you'll have to meet some day. I can't believe that they didn't have school until today! Ha that's great to have a couple of days off. Oh and Grandma, they have had a bunch of leadership meeting here. They go for three days from about 9-3 or 4 and just role play and learn more. I'm excited to get the new program rolling here. We haven't learned much about it yet.

Well I hope you all have a good week! Love ya!

Elder Kade Bartschi