12/10/12

Dear friends and family,

Please take a minute to send us an email and/or picture of your family that we can forward on to Jake.  It is hard to be away from home for the holidays and we would love his inbox to be bursting with messages from all of you next week.   langloisfamily@hotmail.com
Thank you for all of your support for the past 18 months.
Love, Sheri and Doug


Hi!

The training is going well. He doesn't seem to want to learn, but I am trying to force everything onto him for me to leave earlier. He will be a little lost when I leave here.

My replacement is Elder Gubler, from Louisiana but lives in Utah now. The financial secretary is still Elder Douglas, but this next transfer will change him too I think.
 The christmas party will happen next week 18th of December. This week will have the last meeting to plan everything that we have to do last minute. e
Everything is basically planned, just some details that we need to fix. 

That is awesome that you adopted a family for christmas again.

 I will be in the office still I think, and christmas will be on pday, so probably will be on the 25th.

It will never feel like christmas here, especially since it is super hot. I am used to being cold, making a fire, and using a blanket during the christmas season. Here it's barbecue and going to the beach.

It would be cool to live with some of the guys on the volleyball team,  I don't think would respond to you though if you sent him an email though. See what Dan and Nate will do too. If I can't find anything maybe I will send an email to the volleyball coach, I think he would be able to help me. 

I still need to get those names for you, don't let me forget. And, when you buy the airline tickets let me know, also if you need help booking the hotel while I am here in the office let me know. I have tons of time to research things now that I am just helping the new secretary.

Everything here is good. Like always. This week we have a zone leader council, then next week is Christmas. Should be a little hectic, but it is fun. We played volleyball again today, and it was interesting... It gets worse and worse every time we play now. I think we are going to have to switch sports for a little, I am losing my patience playing with these people. haha. It's more of a social gathering than a volleyball game. 

We also rehearsed a hymn to sing during the christmas talent show. I wanted to do some sort of dance or something funny, but no one wanted to do it with me. 

Anyway love you guys and hope everything is going well!

LOVE ELDER JAKE LANGLOIS

12/3/12

Hi!

Sounds fun making the move with grandma and grandpa. How was the drive? way longer than with a car right? It was a huge truck.

This week was good, the best part was what happened today. There was a meeting with Elder Costa with all of Maceió. He is super funny, and loves to tell some cool stories. Also, we had a meeting with him as secretaries and APs, which was cool. He talked a little about China and some of the complications that are happening there. I don't think he wanted to say much about it. He said that its a sad situation, but the government likes the church.

The new elder for me to train will get here on Thursday, the transfer day. I am glad to be leaving, not because it is terrible here, but because it is so much better outside! I have never been the person to stay indoors forever, I was always playing a sport. President still hasn't told me what I will be after, nor to where I will go. I don't know much yet, because he has 6 more weeks to think about it haha.

The christmas party still isn't completely planned, but there will be a talent show, with a game with 10 questions where you have to get the signature of a missionary that answers that question. Ex. The tallest missionary. Then I would have to sign it.

There will be a huge lunch, and a fireside in the morning. Then all of us will take pictures, like last year with the entire mission together. It wont be very long, 9 in the morning till 4. All of the missionaries have to return to their areas, including those from Sergipe. Also, while we eat, there will be slideshows of pictures of everyone when they were little as a family and on the mission. Also a slideshow of all of the incoming missionaries this year, and all of those that went home. (my job)
I got Saras box! still haven't opened it yet, but its here!

I will be able to Skype whatever time I think. When is the best time for you guys?
Everything here is going well, learning more and more every day. An apostle will visit our mission in January too! so many visits in so little time! I am super excited!

Anyway, hope everything is going well with you guys.

LOVE ELDER JAKE LANGLOIS

11/26/12

Hello!

This week was CRAZY. We had conference on Tuesday and Wednesday, traveled on Thursday to Sergipe, and had conference on Friday. Then we came back to Maceió Friday night at midnight. Basically we have had no time to do anything in the office, and we have been teaching. In other words, we aren't able to keep up with everything in the office AND teach as much as we taught this week. This next week Claudio Costa ( seventy) is coming to visit the mission, and we had to change the transfer because of his visit. So instead of the transfer on the 4th, it will be on the 6th. I don't even know how I am going to be alive after these next two weeks. It is SO good to feel tired though.

My training went well with monsters inc. Everyone was laughing the entire time.

Dan's homecoming was good then? I love to listen to him speak, he is hilarious.

hahaha Ron talked with Bill? that is awesome!
 Rachel is going to Salvador?!!?!?!?! that is sooo coool! its the mission below us. She will love it there.

Thanks for the updates, I am happy to hear all of the things that are happening there.

Everything here is normal too. Just running a little bit trying to do everything in time. I have to do 2 visas this week, because they will go home next week. We were waiting for São Paulo to send a paper for us to go, but never came, so we have to do some other tricks to get them out of the country legally. haha Should be fun.

We made a choir for Elder Costa, and it actually is really good. I thought that it would be terrible, but it actually sounds pretty good.

We talked with Adriane, the receptionist here, and she is excited to be baptized this Friday. Everything is ready, and she is doing really well. Also this Sunday was packed with referrals from a member, but we won't contact them till Saturday.

We played volleyball today, again haha. It was better today.

So, funny story. the other day I was at the cash register and the cashier looked at me funny. She was a tiny, little lady about 22, and she just started cracking up. I didn't know what happened then I realized that I am 7 ft tall. I joked with her, and she could NOT even hand me the dumb groceries. I just stood there waiting for 5 minutes for her to stop laughing. That's my life.

The mission is great, I am tired so I think I am doing my job here ha.

Love you guys! hope you had a good thanksgiving!

LOVE ELDER JAKE LANGLOIS

11/19/12

Hi

Christmas plans are going well. We have almost forgotten about christmas because of the area 70 that is coming to our mission at the beginning of December. Everything is crazy here, and the next transfer will be changed too because of the 70.
We heard that there will open 7 more missions here in Brazil, but it doesn't seem like it will affect us. Tell me more about china, I told some people and they are asking me tons of questions about it and I have no idea.

That is awesome that china opened up! Its cool to see how God works little by little.

It's raining there? I miss the cold, it has been so long since I have gone outside and its cold.

Tell Thomas to score for me at his game. I will right him a letter on pday, but tell him happy birthday for me too.

The secretary is in Bahia again, so we have to wait until Monday to talk to her again. It should happen this week, she can't put it off anymore. She had to fight against her mom, and now it seems like she handled it. The friend of Wellington that we baptized two weeks ago will be baptized on December 1st. He accepted everything that we taught, and will go to church tomorrow too.
The assistants have 4 kids they will baptize so we will have to help them with the set up.

BYU football isn't doing very well. They are losing almost every game.

So many fans are dressing up as missionaries, its not very original anymore. I have already seen that 5 or 6 times.

Nothing here will happen on Thanksgiving. Everything is christmas already. Not very much, but there are some lights here on the big buildings.

Presents are still wrapped!  You know that I won't open them until Christmas day.

I will have tons of new clothes when I get home. That was a pretty sweet deal to get the 2 year guarantee, but it isn't very good quality.

Things are going well here. President got back from his trip and we had to get ready for the zone conference. I think everything is in order now, just some small things that I still have to take care of. I am excited to give my training this week, it has a clip of Monsters Inc where that old lady is really grumpy about the papers that aren't being turned in. (baptismal forms) It should be really funny, and hopefully everyone remembers what I say.

Don't have much to say this week, but hope you guys have a good week!

LOVE ELDER JAKE LANGLOIS

11/12/12

Hi!

Sounds like fun at Nate's homecoming. Wish I could have been there to see, but I watched is farewell.

Glad that Dan went back to In n Out. He must not have changed much hahaha
Kyles job sounds important. Creative director, that's cool.
Everything is still wrapped don't worry! I did look the other day to see if I had forgotten something that I could have opened before christmas and noticed that you sent something for Elder Douglas. He will love it, because he probably won't get anything from his family for christmas. His mom isn't a member and he only lives with her. Glad that you thought of him too.
Will Sara be able to move back to CA? Did she get her job there or internship, I forgot what it was.

I heard that Mitt Romney lost because of the large Hispanic population. Obama was for immigrants and Romney against. Something like that, but we don't here very accurate information from so far away.
We decorated our apartment! Actually, Sister Gonzaga just gave us a tree and we decorated it! that was SO fun. We took pictures too.
Things will be more hectic this week unfortunately, as we are starting to prepare our trainings for the zone conference. Also, I have to plan the christmas talent show and the party that we will have, and I am making a video of all of the missionaries with a picture of them as a baby in the mission and with the family. That is a lot of people to make a video. We will see if my head explodes before then.
Things are going well here. We were to have a baptism this week, but she went to another state in Brazil to visit her mom. Seems like she will go again next week, but she will be baptized after she gets back. She is way cool.

We played volleyball this morning, and there was an elder from Chile playing and he plays really well. He was a setter on the traveling team for Chile. It was AWESOME to play with a setter. I forgot how easy it is when the set is perfect every single time.

President is at a mission president conference and doesn't get back till Tuesday, but he said that we will have a lot of changes coming our way. Not sure what that means, but I think he just said it to scare us.

That's about it. I don't have the most exciting weeks when I am in the office, there is lack of stories while I am here. BUT I am having other experiences that will help me with life as a businessman or someone that works in an office every day.

Love you guys and hope you have a good week!

Tell Dan and Nate to write me! they have no excuse now!!!!

LOVE ELDER JAKE LANGLOIS