FIRST WEEK

Family & Friends,

HAPPY BIRTHDAY MOMMA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I remembered it was your birthday on the bus ride to Birmingham and was so sad that I forgot to wish you a happy birthday!!!! So there is it, Happy Birthday!  

Well I guess you want to know everything that has happened in the last week so here it goes! I woke up at around 4:30 on Wednesday morning and put my luggage on a bus. Then I emailed real quick and had breakfast. We left the MTC at 6:30 and drove 2 hours to the mission home! It was a pretty long ride though I sat next to Elder Poll who was a good friend at the MTC. We both felt pretty sick and not super excited but as time went on we got better! When we arrived at the mission home we were greeted by President and Sister Rasmussen who are super great! President Rasmussen is a hugger so I liked him right off the bat!

President and Sister Rasmussen

 I think he gave me four hugs by the time I left the mission home that day, ha ha!! It was pretty great though, it did make me want to give Mom and Dad a big hug! After we met with the President, we met the AP's and guess what we got to do! That's right Role Play! My absolute favorite pass time! For lunch we had pizza from Papa John's which was a little different but still good! After lunch I got my companion, Elder Worlton! Who you probably have already seen a picture of but I'll send more just in case! Me and him get along great! He loves cars so that's pretty much all we talk about, ha ha! He is from Herriman, Utah and we are pretty sure he knows John Blodgett cause well John was the head counselor at his school! I actually did see Sister Wood at transfers and we got a picture. She was super happy to see "Elder Kmetzsch" and was really nice! Thanks for letting her know that I was coming Brigs!

Me and Sister Wood

After we were put together we sat around for hours waiting for a bus to take us to Coventry! Like you know, I am serving in Coventry, ha ha. The area specifically is Coventry E there are five area's in Coventry district and yes only one ward! So that equals Ten missionaries for one ward. There are four sets of elders and one set of sisters. The sisters are a little, well a lot crazy, but they are really fun to be around Sister Gardener, and Sister Bertha. Sister Gardener knows Drew Linton so she freaked out to hear that I was literally his next door neighbor! She knew him from college so that was cool. You'll have to let the Linton's know so that they can tell Drew! Well after we got to our area we went strait to ward coordination and met our ward mission leader Sam. Sam is 23 and super motivational! The work is going so much more smoothly because of his efforts! I love everybody in the district as well! Elders Anderson and Smith are super funny especially Elder Smith. Elder Anderson is a chinese speaking missionary! It's such a blessing to have him cause we teach a lot of Chinese people in Coventry! Elders Rutter and Passey are also pretty great! Elder Passey is from my MTC group so I knew him already. We have the Zone Leaders in our district as well! Elders Winters and Sommer. Yes we know that we have Winter and Sommer, ha ha. We are just looking for fall and spring to come in next transfer! They are great! Then you have Elder Worlton and myself. Elder Worlton is the district leader so that's pretty cool cause we get to talk to everybody everyday!

I about died when we got to the flat because it was such a mess! I almost threw up when I saw the bathroom and kitchen and it was just bad! So we spent more than a few hours cleaning! I literally turned into my father and started scrubbing and organizing, ha ha! Thankfully it is clean and much more organized now! It was Thursday that we cleaned and later that day we taught Susanne and Wayne who are less active members, but not a couple just two friends who happen to be less active, ha ha. I personally think that they are a couple and need to get married and come back to church! They are funny and sometimes get things confused for example the Word of Wisdom and Law of Chastity. They knew the doctrine they just messed up the names! They are starting to come back to church and teaching them is fun! On Friday we had our flat inspection which went well, we passed. Brother and Sister Fells are the inspectors and they are great! They gave us some cakes that were really good! Another thing the chocolate here is so, so much better! I will for sure send some home for Emma! But not for Nate and brigham, ha ha! Later Friday night we met with Phillip! Phillip is already one of my favorite people. He is 22 and from Kenya! He loves everything about the gospel and is so great! The one catch is the Word of Wisdom! Tea and Coffee have just been in his culture for his whole life so he is really struggling with keeping it! So pray for Phillip! He was going to be baptized this week but he wasn't quite ready and the worst part is that he is going back to Kenya this Tuesday. But the missionaries down there will get him there and he will be a strong member!

 On Saturdays we get to play soccer! Every Saturday the missionaries and the ward hold a soccer match and we bring investigators and less actives! This week however not one person showed up!! I was pretty bummed because we had two committed to come but both fell through! But it was still fun for the 6 of us to play a little soccer! The rest of the day kinda tanked on Saturday, but I did get a bike! It was a bike that had a flat tire and the brakes were too tight. So the 3 mile ride back to our flat was probably the worst experience I have ever had! Although now any other bike ride is going to seem easy! Yes it is a biking mission and we bike around 15 miles every day! So getting used to that is going to be tough considering the most exercise I did in the last two months was walking upstairs from my bed!! But everyday it get's easier!

Sunday was great I got to meet a lot of the ward members and they are amazing! It is tiny compared to any ward in Utah but apparently it is huge for a ward in England, so I am feeling really blessed! We didn't do much else besides church on Sunday because Elder Worlton is the district leader. I forgot to mention that on Thursday we ate at a chinese place in town which was actually pretty good called Nicely Noodle Bowl! It's been a pretty good week though! 

Love you all,

Elder Kmetzsch (Jakey)

Me and my trainer Elder Worlton

Outside my first flat