Steven's letter Jan 3

Dear Family 
How was the new year?  Did everyone make it to midnight?  It was just a regular day here.  We went to bed at 10:30 and were up at 6:30, just like every other day.  The holdays were a lot of fun.  It was hard to get ahold of people though.   I think I told you,  but I got a lava lava for Christmas.  Those Hawaiian skirts.  Ya one of the sisters in my district is Hawaiian.  We had a white elephant gift exchange and that’s what I got from her.  Its pretty neat.  I bet there aren’t many missionaries that go to Arkansas that can say they got a lava lava on their missions.  Elder morris had to get a picture of me wearing it because he thought it was funny. 
 Elder Kelly and I are doing great together.  He is a  great missionary, and being with him is defiantly breaking me out of my comfort zone.  I’ve had a lot of fun with him.  Hes from Salt Lake City, and he is about 2 inches taller than me.  I’m starting to feel a little short, there are two missionaries here in Collierville that are taller than me now.  Elder Cox is in the first ward.  He is about the same height as Elder Kelly. We have a tall district.   This week we have been doing a lot of finding.  Elder Kelly and I are both getting good practice at tracting.  Yesterday, we tracted into a family that let us come in and seemed really interested when we started talking to them.  They asked for a book of Mormon and said they would read and pray about it.  We are going to try to go back a little later in the week.  We have also started teaching a Baptist minister.  Most of them don’t really like talking to us,  But this one does.  His name is mikey.  He and his wife are really nice.  They told us we should come over for dinner some time.  Both are very nice.  They went out to Utah a couple weeks ago and ordered a free video when they went on a tour of the tabernacle.  We have a lot of fun talking to him.  I’m not sure if he is really interested in making changes, or if we have just sparked some curiosity.   That’s something that still amazes me is how nice and friendly most people are here.  Every once in a while we meet someone that doesn’t like us, but most of the time everyone is very friendly.  Almost everyone has a church they go to.  Sometimes it makes it hard because a lot of people are set in their ways.  Their parents were Baptists, so they are Baptists.  Very good people though. 
Chruch is starting at 11 now.  That’s going to be really nice.  This will be the first time on my mission I will be able to study before church starts.  I have always been at 9 or 9:30.  It will be easier to try to get investigators to church now too.  They don’t have to wake up as early.  We had a couple of less active families that we have been working with come to church this week.  It was great to see them all there.  They’ve made the goal to start coming back to church again.  Both families have been inactive for 10 or 15 years.  They both live down in Mississippi. 
Well I hope you have a great week this week.  I hope everyone has fun going back to school.  I love you all.
Love Elder Marshall
Lol  and nope I haven’t eaten it all yet.  There is still a lot left.  Elder Kelly are working on it though.
Quote of the week:
“As we go about our daily lives, we discover countless opportunities to follow the example of the Savior. When our hearts are in tune with His teachings, we discover the unmistakable nearness of His divine help. It is almost as though we are on the Lord’s errand; and we then discover that, when we are on the Lord’s errand, we are entitled to the Lord’s help.”                       - Thomas S. Monson