July 7

Dear Family and Friends,

This past week has been pretty normal as far as missionary work goes. But since it was the 4th of July, it was kind of deserted. It was weird. And since it's July in Arizona and it's freaking hot, everyone goes out of town for the whole month anyways, so it's even more of a ghost town than it was a week ago.

But it was a good week. We had our 1 year mission anniversary party last Tuesday which was amazing. We all went to the Gilbert Temple in the morning. That was super neat. And then we ha d a great devotional with President and Sister Nattress and the temple president and his wife. We also all got a small rock from the temple. It's from the rock that wasn't quite good enough quality for the actual temple, but it's still pretty cool to have. I'll send a picture of it next week if I remember.

We started to read the Book of Mormon as a mission that day too, which was pretty cool. I'm through 1 Nephi now, and it's been really cool to read it so quickly. I feel like it all flows a little bit better. I really love the Book of Mormon. It's crazy to think that the stories of people who lived thousands of years ago could help me, but it really does. It gives the guidance and direction I need and I'm grateful that Heavenly Father has give it to us.

I was on exchanges on Wednesday with Sister Bryant, that was fun. Nothing too exciting happened, but we did got to sonic and get balloons. We were super excited about that, so we took a fun picture. Haha.

And then Friday was the 4th of course. We had weekly planning the morning and then we had a normal afternoon. We came in at 7 to avoid any drunk drivers and studied for a few hours. It was actually really great. And we watched a few fireworks from our apartment. But they were pretty far away, so it wasn't too great. It didn't feel much like a holiday, but it was still a good day.

And then yesterday was weird because church was super empty. Everyone's out of town. We went to young womens for one of our wards, and there were only like 3 girls, it felt like I was back in Morristown. Haha.

And that was basically my week. Pretty average, but still great. I hope all is well back home. I love and miss you all.

love always,

Baylee

P.S. I'll send pictures next week, the computer won't read my card reader for some reason.