Jan. 22nd, 2013

Hey family!

Sorry about writing late, I got the flu and have been in bed for seriously the past 40 hours. I'm doing better now, but still pretty drained. 

Rachel, man your life must be better than you ever thought it would be! haha! Going to all these awesome places, amazing family, good health! I can't even imagine that here in Russia... haha! It almost seems wrong that someone's life could be that great. The only people here that live like that got their money dishonestly. Hey! What's your address, I've been wanting to send a letter to you for a while now, but I haven't been able to... get that to me please!

Mary, your stitches looked awesome!! Battle scar! Your boots are destroyed! ha ha! It's probably from all the hikes/waterfalls/mountains/caves//floating islands of titicaca/ancient ruins of machu pichu you've been exploring. If you were to just calm it down a bit and do normal missionary work like me, maybe your clothes would last a bit longer. haha! Don't worry, I'm just jealous. My culture activity was probably way more exciting anyway... we went to an opera! nosebleed section, way off to the left so you couldn't see half the stage, and there was no hope in understanding it... not even the natives fully understood what was going on... pretty awesome... haha! we left half way through. haha!

Tiffany wrote me this week! She says hi to you Mary specifically and then hi to the rest of the fam! She says she got an extension till the 21st of Feb. Seems like she's doing well. This past week has been fun, and pretty crazy. We've just been working hard this week, but it seems like nothing is really moving too fast. Lorenzo Snow's mission in Italy was pretty similar, but it also says that later, there were tons of people that were baptized because of his influence there, who knows if he even knew about the amount of good he did there. I'm sure I'm having my effect, but it doesn't make it any easier! ha! 

Dad! I'm glad everything is difficult for you! haha! That's how it should be! In fact, it's a blessing to have to work so hard in such a new way right now! It will help you stretch and expand your abilities! Mom, sounds like your life is going well too! sounds like you're having a fun time in life right now. Life must be different without kids around all the time. It seems like you've all started hanging out with other friends now. I wonder how it will be when we get back. Speaking of which, I don't want any trunky comments coming from you as my return date gets closer. I've noticed that the main cause of trunkiness in a missionary are typically his parents. 

Well... that's about it for this week! I love you all!

Love, Elder Swartz!

PS: Congratulations Brittany Fishback!!!  You're married!!!! I hope this doesn't mean that we can't hang out when I get back!! haha! A girl in my mission said that she knows Cameron, she says that they were in the same math class at USU. Small world.