Re: Momma

Dear Momma,
Happy Halloween!
Thanks for sending me some good news. I really appreciate it. Pass on my congratulations to Chynna and Zachary. We really do have such a talented family. I'm glad my mission had done something good for you and the rest of the family. It's just been hard to see that sometimes. I think stress is a trigger for depression for me. I'm trying not to be so down. Nate said all he wanted for his birthday was for me to be happy. (His birthday is on Saturday.) It's really been a tough couple of months here as far as missionary work goes. I've been getting cranky and you know I'm ready to come home. I've been a missionary long enough. Now I just want to hug some babies and listen to music. Doesn't help that I'm just plain sick too. I've been fighting with a cold for over a week, and I'm pretty much aching all over. All the ward members are trying to bully me into staying home in bed, but we've just got too much to do for that. (I did did sleep in a few hours this morning,though and that seems to have helped for now.) These last two weeks, we've gone hiking and seen some benches. We've also been painting apartments, cleaning houses, washing windows, stacking wood, decorating for parties... It feels really nice to be doing active work. Stacking wood's a lot more fun than beating investigators over the head with scriptures. ...Hmm, maybe I should just beat them with wood instead. ;-) All the service projects have been helping me feel better.
We're going to Stockholm for a training meeting tomorrow, and we'll be there until Wednesday. We'll be going to the Copenhagen Temple with the ward on the 12th as well, so we'll be at the temple together. And yes, as far as I know, I am still flying home on January 12th. I'm going to talk to the secretaries about my travel plans, though. I want to ask them to change my flight plans so that I'll come into Charlottesville instead of DC. That's just way more time in the car than I need, and it would be much nicer to be released right away.
My companion wants to go shopping, and I've got a little Christmas list together, and some of the things on it are on sale, so I'm thinking we'll head out and do that today. My checking account's pretty much empty, so I'm thinking I'll put it on credit card, and then just pay if off with the Christmas money you'll be sending later. (Or you could just pay it off and never mind sending me Christmas money.) I have a payment due on the credit card soon. (There's about $100 sitting on it at the moment.)
One last thing - could you pass on my love to Jeremiah? Let him know that I'm very proud of him. I think I know better than anyone else in the family how hard missionary work is, and he's done a fantastic job with it. He's done so much good for the people in his mission, and he's done the right thing between himself and the Lord too. I think he's very brave, and I'm proud of him. I hope he plans and prepares to go back and finish the work he started, but even if he doesn't, he can proudly say that he's served a fantastic mission. I thinks he's done wonderfully and I know the Lord does too. (You can share those thoughts with anyone else in the family who might need to hear them too.)
I love you, Momma. I hope you have a great week, and I'm going to try my best to do the same.

Love,
Syster Hillary Kiser