May 4, 2010-Mother's Day

Dear Family and Friends,

They swapped Day of Preparation again. It is back on Tuesday again, so I hope that doesn't throw anything off.

To be honest, this week was pretty rough. Our numbers took a giant nose dive. To be entirely honest, there were days where we only taught 1-2 lessons. So we are essentially at rock bottom. But we only have one direction to go now and that is up. Yesterday was already a lot better.

We went out to a part of our area called Nova Colina. It's about 30 minutes away from Sobradinho and is the face of what people would think of rural Brasil, with dirt roads and almost no lights. But the people out there are actually fairly wealthy so it's strange to see cars like a Lexus or Camry going 4x4.

I have a favor to ask. If you could send the sheet music for "This is the Christ" over email. I don't have time to get it by snail mail. I have to practice to play in a fireside our district will do at the end of this month. It can be in English, because they have the words in Portuguese, but not the music. Because I am the only one who plays, I play a lot now. Yesterday we were helping a member with a project and the sister let me sit down afterward and play their piano a bit. She had some classical music, so it was really fun. I think my playing has gotten better as I have played more for the wards and mission.

Really quick. They don't have my shoe size, so do I just need to send a picture of my shoes to you and they will send them? Just tell me what to do and I'll do my part.

The other thing is I will be withdrawing some money either this week or next week. I'll probably send it home in a few months. Speaking of money, could I get a basic report about my financial status too?

So about the Mother's Day call. You actually have to call me. I guess we have no way of calling the US. So if you want to talk (it's cool if you don't and you know I'm not very fond of the telefone), could you call around 3:55 afternoon your time? And now Mom is probably not very happy with me about the previous comment (I'm not mad, I just think he's a complete and total nut job if he thinks I don't want to talk to him on Mother's Day!). I don't know the code for Brasil, but 061 is our area code for the DF.

I hope Nate is doing well. I'm glad you got to talk to him, because I was wondering how he is doing the other day.

How is Real Salt Lake doing? Have they started yet?

To be honest, right now I am waiting for the email from the mission office to give us the code for Brasil and other info about the call and since nothing really happened this week, I am doing filling stuff right now.

Right now I am deeply prone to attacks of random singing in the house. It is really amazing the ability of the human body to remember so many songs, especially the ones that drove you crazy when you heard them. Whatever type of music from Backstreet Boys, Lion King and Journey. I have been told my Living Scriptures repertoire ( I have no idea how to spell that with a Portuguese spell check) is impressive. I would like to thank my parents for getting those for me when I was little.

So the mission office didn't have the number, so if you could just look on the internet, you can probably find it. Love you all, thanks so much for all of your support.

Love, Elder Barton