Crazy Ohio Weather!!

Family!

TORNADO!!!!!

Yep, that's right, I, Elder Foote, saw a tornado with my very own eyes!  We were contacting a referral in a town out west, and as we left their porch, this crazy siren went off!  It was super loud!  Everybody came out of their houses, and they were all looking around trying to figure out what was going on.  Then we saw it.  It wasn't a full-blown tornado, but it was a funnel cloud that started to come down from the clouds!  It was amazing!  I hope the pictures I took do it justice...  And yes, instead of heading indoors, we stood outside and took pictures. =)  It didn't really amount to anything though; after about 10 minutes it went back up into the cloud and disappeared.  But still!

While I'm on the topic of the weather, I finally got a taste of the humidity everyone said I would feel.  We had a few days where it was so humid I sometimes thought I could see the water!  Also, I got to experience one of the crazy Ohio rainstorms.  I thought I had seen rainstorms in Utah, but the one we were in was insane!  We had to pull off the road it was raining so hard, and afterwards there were inches of water left on the road.  It was awesome!

Thanks for the package!  I got it last Monday after we got back from emailing.  It was perfect!  I did think of something else I need.  I don't need it right away because Elder Graf has one, but in the future sometime, could you maybe send me a card-reader thing.  I think Dad has one; it's that thing with the USB on one end and a place for a memory card on the other.  It would help to have one.

No strange food this week.  The members either feed us at their homes, or they give us gift cards to nearby restaurants.  So I've had a lot of Subway and Chipotle this week. =)

As for the work, it is hard.  Finding Spanish speakers in Ohio is an ongoing challenge.  There are only a few central areas where they live, and over the past few years those areas have been tracted by missionaries many times.  So finding people who haven't been talked to before is hard.  We tried a new technique a few days ago.  We got the phonebook, looked up every Hispanic sounding name, plugged the addresses into our GPS, and went contacting!  Needless to say, we are trying to get the members more excited so we can get some referrals from them.

While we are out, we run into all sorts of people with all sorts of beliefs and stories.  A few days ago we talked to some guys from Sudan who had come to Ohio only a few months ago to get away from the wars over there.  There are lots of amazing people and stories out there.

But yeah, we just keep plugging away for now.  We just have to keep in mind that the Lord sent us here for a reason.  In a training meeting last week President Porter said something to the effect of: "The Lord doesn't make mistakes."  I know that's true.  I am where I am for a reason, and if we keep working, we'll find the people the Lord wants us to teach.

Well, that's about it.  I hope you all have a great week and good luck with your last week of summer Katie and Trevor! 

Love,

Elder Foote

P.S.

Oh, I almost forgot.  I might need a bike.  It's not anything urgent, but I've been passively looking for a bike shop around here.  Just thought I'd let you know.

The apartment

My amazing baking job...

A giant statue of Jesus as seen from the freeway.  A few years ago it had it's arms raised upwards, but it got struck by lightning, so they rebuilt it with the arms down.  If you look closely, there's a lightning rod on the head now...

Crazy rainstorm.  Picture doesn't do it justice.

TORNADO

TORNADO

TORNADO

Southern Patriotism in Dayton Ohio...