Good morning there! Happy 1st day of school!!!! I am sure there are definitely some mixed feelings in the house about this day haha! It is really strange that Adam is in the big 7th grade now, seems like he should still be in elementary! Let me know how the 1st week was, it should be good! Good old school...glad I am not starting right now haha! For your info, transfer news will come on Saturday and transfer day is on Wednesday. The mini transfer did happen here though because the missionaries going home went two weeks early in order to fix some inconsistency with our transfers in relation to the other missions in the region, IDK.  But yeah, this transfer is gonna be GIANT I heard. Like 90% are going to move, so it will be really interesting to see what happens!

So you asked if I eat a lot of fruit and to be honest, I bet you eat more than I do haha. It’s hard to buy fruit here since I am in a village, everyone just has their farms so nobody sells any...But I do eat a LOT of coconuts! Fresh coconuts are awesome, I will miss drinking coconut juice when I leave! It’s always fun to watch somebody send their 7 year old kid to scurry up a 70 foot coconut tree and throw us down some coconuts then fireman slide down. Maybe when I move I will be able to eat fruit more, but for now not really.... Thanks for emailing me about your nice Sunday dinner; I hope everyone enjoyed a nice big cold glass of milk as well. I had some fufu with palmnut soup and fish and beefskin. Yeah! We went to the hospital on Tuesday because Elder Assibey got tested for a hernia, well kind of, and they had a poster up for avoiding ebola. Basically what you said, along with avoiding eating bats and monkeys. Guess I won’t get to try those guys anytime soon haha. Yeah Elder Assibey has lower abdominal pain and so Sis. Stevenson told him to go get a physical. He has never had one so I enjoyed explaining the procedure to him haha. But I was very disappointed because we went into the doctor’s office where the dr. was playing on his iPad with a couple of nurses sitting around. Elder Assibey sat across from him and the dr asked, "What’s wrong with you." He told him and he just pushed on his stomach a few times, said there was nothing wrong, and prescribed him some ulcer medicine and antacid. We were in there for about 5 minutes haha, The guy said more to me about being from America than he did to E. Assibey about his issue. Nice doctor haha. So I think we probably need to call Sis Stevenson and tell her about that...

My washer is being a champ. I figured the leak problem is part of the function, it’s just getting rid of dirty water, so I learned how to work around it. I have a whole routine for this machine haha.  And on the bright side we get more money to spend!!!! When I got here we were receiving 180 cedis for the month and it has steadily increased every few months. It was at 230 until today, we get 280!!! The cedi is just dying. Did I tell you I went and exchanged money a few weeks ago? I had $40 in my wallet that I just had sitting from home for the past year and I decided to change it. I got 136 cedis in exchange, so I was happy! But yeah, today we will get to do a little shopping, not gonna buy much since I might go this week, but we will see!  I have not seen too many crazy animals/bugs to be honest; the coolest are probably just the fireflies that are everywhere.  Luckily no scorpions or anything, that would be pretty crazy. There are lots of colorful grasshopppers, but they are not too cool haha.  Yeah I have heard about Billy Johnson, they have a short video about him, you could probably find it on YouTube! It’s really a miraculous story! Oh and there is a book all about the church starting in Ghana, I think it’s called "Walking in the Sands" or something like that. Maybe you could find it on Amazon, IDK. Over in Hemang there is a big grave for him and Steve Young built a school right by it! Never been there though, just heard about it. The woman who we blessed still has not had her baby, she is really stressed about it. I think that’s normal though right? But yeah I feel bad that she is so worried about it, she always has a big frown on her face, hopefully the baby will come soon so she can stop worrying! 

Well, August is coming to an end soon. We do trimester goals for each area for baptisms so the tri is ending. We had a goal of 5 and we have achieved 8 so I am very happy about that! The area has really come a long way, I remember setting that goal and really not being sure if we would be able to accomplish it, but we have done so and exceeded it! The people are solid and doing well also, so I am happy! The Lord blesses us so much each day! It is His work and He allows us to help. I marvel all the time at how the Lord really does this work and kind of just places us to do things. Each day we receive so many blessings. Yesterday we were out of food in the evening and expecting to go to bed hungry, (does not happen often I promise haha!) but we got a call from some members and they fed us fufu! The Lord is mindful of us, that is sure! Things like that happen all the time, I am so thankful for the Lords hand in our lives!

Well, I have a weird story from the week haha. Remember Bro. N? The guy with the giant hernia who is also the high priest group leader and is also an alcoholic? Well, we went and visited him and checked to see how he was doing on Wednesday. His reason for drinking has always been that it is in his hernia medicine so he has no choice. Well, he was telling us how he made his own and it worked better than the alcohol medicine so Elder Assibey told him to give us the alcoholic ones so we could get rid of them. He brought 4 bottles out of his house and was not wanting to give them to us. He handed three over and I pointed at the other and asked for it. He tried to change the subject but I just held my hand out smiling. He got mad about us wanting them all and told us we were treating him like a child. Elder Assibey calmed him down pretty well. Oh keep in mind he was drunk during this. Well, we took all the bottles and began to leave and he escorted us down the trail. Elder Assibey began to smell all the liquids, and none of them had alcohol. We asked him what was going on? If your medicine has no alcohol, where is the alcohol smell coming from? He got mad and left us there and went home without saying a word. So we dumped the bottles in some bushes haha. Friday we went back to talk to him and apologize for making him mad and he was saying there was no problem. He was drunk again. I kind of gave him a little heat, because he refuses to meet with the bishop because he is older than the bishop and just wants to continue drinking and going to the temple. It was interesting haha. Thursday we went to the bishop’s farm though, we trekked miles into the jungle and went to his corn farm this time! Still had to cross the port-a-potty river sadly... We planted corn like old-time farmers ALL day. Somebody pokes a hole in the ground, somebody else puts corn kernels in and covers it. There was no order or anything in planting, no lines to follow. They just randomly poke holes in the ground and put corn in. And it’s not like a field, it’s like a jungle haha. We met with all our recent converts and Bro. Kofi, they are all doing good! The group in Bereku is strong and the ward is still doing the same old same old. No complaints from Akonfudi, we are just working! 

No sign of the package yet, hopefully soon though!!! At some point in the future I am going to need a new scripture bag, this trooper is getting a bit worn! Also a belt, a pair of black pants, and some black socks. Not urgent, but at some future time those would be an A+!!! I am glad you guys are doing great though!!! Have you guys taken the boat out at all? That poor boat must be lonely haha!!! Thanks for all you do for me though; you guys really are the best!!! I am so blessed to have such a wonderful family!!! Hope everyone is doing good!!! LOVE YOU!!!!