Hello Everyone!

Of course I have to wish everyone a Merry Christmas, even if I am a day late. I hope that you all had a wonderful time and that you were able to really spend time together and be in this spirit of Christmas. This was a great week and we were able to see some great Christmas miracles in finding some new awesome investigators!

On Monday evening, I must include this because it was pretty awesome, we went to a little hole in the wall Mexican food restaurant where I ate a burrito and, hold your breath, a root beer!!! The Root Beer was 3 euros, ouch, but it was totally worth it, since I hadn't had one in about a year, when I was in Marseille. It was so good and the burrito wasn't quite like Mexican food in Arizona, but it was probably the best to be found here in France!

Tuesday was supposed to start out with a rende-vous but it ended up getting cancelled so we did some contacting and such until the afternoon when we went with the other missionaries and drove to a little village about 40 minutes away where a member from Marseille moved in. That ended up taking a good amount of time and then we went to see Frère Philibeaux and we had a good lesson with him. We then went and did some Street Meeting and then saw Irma and her daughters and had a quick little lesson with them.

Wednesday we had a lesson with Jinane in the morning and tried to help her understand the importance of Christ. We even had a member that was Muslam before but converted. She shared her testimony but the idea of seeing Jesus as the Christ and Redeemer is a huge block for her and she has a very hard time understanding or seeing why his role is important. After we quickly ate lunch, we went and did a "Brochure Flood", in trying to win a competition for the zone. We ended up giving out 75 brochures in one hour and getting several numbers and such. It was really cool and very fun to do, to kind of spice things up a bit. We then hurried to see Becca one last time before she left to go back to the US because she finished her semester here in France. We had a nice message about Noel and then we stayed for English Class. Unfortunately, all of the students have left so no one showed up. We did some contacting and then headed back home.

Thursday was our big Christmas Zone Conference and it was great. We were able to share the Christmas spirit and really enjoy the company of each other and get to be spiritually edified, it was really great. After, we headed to see Eva, a new investigator. We had a great lesson with her. She had so many awesome questions and was really interested by the message. Unfortunately she was leaving the next day for a week and a half on vacation but she has the Book of Mormon to read and she said that she would take the time during vacation to read and pray about it. We then hurried to our meeting with the Ward Mission Leader and then went and saw Irma. We weren't able to share much because there were some members in her apartment from the Ward fixing a broken window. It was great to see the real charity that is in the church.

Friday morning we had a whole bunch of rendez-vous at the institute building so we spent the morning and the beginning of the afternoon there. It started with a lesson with Jinane. She is doing well but seeming to get a little discouraged that she hasn't received any answer yet from God. We tried to explain how that works and that it comes little by little and that he has already shown little things but that maybe she isn't seeing that. We engaged her to read and pray every single day while she is on vacation for the next week and a half so I hope that she will see the impact in her life. Afterwards we had a lesson with a girl named Anna that actually thought we were the Jehovah's Witnesses. We cleared that confusion up and then presented our message. She was very open and willing to do her efforts to find out for herself see everything is true. We then ate a bit, we fixed lunch for the member that helped us with all of these lessons, and then we had a lesson with Wan Qing. It had been awhile since we had been able to see her but we had a good lesson with her about Christmas and the real meaning and importance. We then hurried to make some truffles really fast for the next day before meeting with the other missionary to go to The Kool family's house for dinner and to practice the songs that we were going to sing on Sunday for Sacrament Meeting.

Saturday we did our weekly planning and then passed by Irma to give her some Truffles and then went to meet some other members to sing christmas songs in the center of town. We did that for a few hours and then headed to a lesson that didn't work out but then met the other missionaries to go to the Gerard's house for dinner. We were with a bunch of the young adults that don't have their family here and so it was really nice. The food was delicious and there was SO much. We had snails and foie gras and mussels and lamb and salad and fruit and dessert. It was very much a traditional French meal and it was delicious!

Sunday we woke up and of course opened up our presents. We then went to church and Irma and her daughters were able to come as well. Church was great and the songs that we had to sing ended up turning out well. We then went to the Myulderman's house to eat lunch and afterwards I was stuffed. We then went to the Kool's house to skype our families and then we had dinner after that. Needless to say, I was ridiculously full after all of that!! It was a great day and it was great to be able to talk and "see" some of my family.

I hope that all of you have had a great Christmas and are looking forward 2012 and all the wonderful blessings that that will bring. I love you all and appreciate all of the love and support that I receive from you. Have a great week!

Elder Kirkpatrick