Week 12 (from Mom)

Dearest, darling Jordan,

What fun to be able to use your Francais! Est-ce-que vous comprendez plus que [understand]? What a treat. So your companion speaks French, Mandarin, and Korean? Yowee. Any chance he can help get you into Yale? :) Do you still get to interact with your MTC companion? Have you gotten the BoM yet? It was ~$70 to ship it, so next time I'm going to just go to Amazon... :)

Just yesterday we got the package with your boots, Dr. S., and bag. Missionary Mall called to see if these (more expensive) boots worked for you, or if we should just go in and switch them for the (cheaper) ones we bought. Did you try them on? I'll plan to keep them unless you let me know. FYI, the MM box was 15 lbs. Your BoM box was 3. Crazy! Did your "trustworthy" Elder have to pay the shipping? It looked like it came straight from the MTC, but if we owe the kid $$$ just let me know.

Your cousin Jason just got accepted to the Y, but is planning to defer during his mission.

Madi has been in Ecuador for almost 2 weeks. Neither her plaque nor yours are up on the wall yet. Have you had someone take a "head and shoulders" shot of you? Smiling would be great.

On the back of the front door, I have about 10 completely different pictures of you so I get to stop and grin every time I go out. It's been a fun way to keep you in my thoughts.

Holly's got Stage 2 slow-growing breast cancer in the lymph nodes. They will do surgery in a couple of weeks in hopes of getting it all out, but then they will do chemo to (try to) kill all of the pre-cancerous cells. It totally creeps me out. I've been taking her to the different appointments (mamo, ultrasound, MRI, genetics advising, surgical and oncologist) and have tried to stay upbeat. We try to watch funny movies, eat lots of popcorn, and laugh as much as possible. We're working on the Dr. S. strategy, but I'm worried that she hasn't bought into the system fully...so...we're working on the laughing at least! Her hubby had his heart attack 2 years ago, and his heart transplant 1 year ago. Serious struggles at their house. She did get a job she enjoys. She's a grant writer for UTA.

I'm going to try [no, not try--just do] to get into LegalShield and ID Protection sales again. In the last couple of months, Target, Nieman Marcus, IHC, and the U have all had their systems hacked...all kinds of personal information having been stolen. People need the coverage we have; I just need to get over my anxiety about calling, making appointments, and then following through. Please pray for me to have courage as I work to overcome my paralyzing anxiety!

Finally, keeping your letters on the blog has been very successful. You've had 1500+ views so far. :)

Thanks for being such a great kid. Try to give yourself a break and have some fun every now and again. Don't let your fabulous sense of humor get rusty, K?

I love your gutz,
Mom