I love learning so much about the gospel! It is amazing!! So much left to learn!

"Probably the coolest FHE that I have been to! Just think of the tree in The Lion King, and a bunch of Latter Day Saints sitting under it in moonlight and you pretty much have the picture right there! It was so awesome!" 

Well, here I am again! Sitting in cyber writing my beautiful family. Thank you so much for your letter! I always love hearing about how my OLD parents are doing! Sheesh! Empty nesters already eh!? Where has the time gone... That is until I am living with you in December at least... Then I am going to crash your party hard core! That'll be okay though. I mean, at least I hope so at least! You might kick me out and tell me to find my way on my own. I'm just hoping that that wouldn't happen :) That is cool that Shelby is going to live with Kenz! I bet that will be a fun learning experience for them. They will see that doing their own laundry and cooking for themselves maybe isn't all what it is crazed up to be! Well I mean I guess I can't say much.. Thanks Beatrice :) Haha. 

This beautiful woman Beatrice does Elder Layton's laundry.  (He does pay her for it and said it's well worth it for both.) She also feeds him and won't accept any money for food and says that she does it for service. Such a kind woman! She takes such great care of Elder Layton. I love her! 
This picture was taken at her baptism :)

How crazy is that that Ty, Tay, and Nick are all home!? That is so awesome! It seems like just yesterday that I was at their farewells. They all look so happy to be with their families! Soon enough, that'll be me! But obviously my time has not come yet, so I don't have to worry about that just about now! I am really trying to focus on finishing off strong. Like dad always says, I am the best missionary I have ever been right now. Knowing the language and people and culture. I just need to keep going strong! And that is what I plan on doing. But, I am still pretty jealous of those guys ;) 

"How crazy is that that Ty, Tay, and Nick are all home!? That is so awesome! It seems like just yesterday that I was at their farewells. They all look so happy to be with their families!" 

     So this week on this side of the world, went pretty well. I was able to go on two companion exchanges with Elder Woodland from Idaho. He almost has just about a year out on the mission. It was fun to get to know him. He is a really good missionary and a lifelong friend for sure! That was Thursday. (My mission hump days). Then on Saturday, I went on another one with Elder Ne-Kindinga. He is the district leader in our apartment and wanted to do a split with us. That went really well too! I really like going on splits because you really learn a lot! Even if you are the "older" missionary. I learn things every time. If it's a teaching method, or something new about french, or a gospel principle. I love it! And you get to know a lot more people as well. Getting to work in other areas and such. 

     While I was on my split with Elder Woodland, we has a rendez-vous with Fofo and his wife who was SUPER pregnant, but when we got there all we found were the little kids who don't really speak french. So, in my super horrible and broken up Mina, we found out that Fofo was still at work, and his mom was at the "marché". But literally like 30 seconds after we got there, Fofo came running into his house and was all like, "my wife had her baby!" And we were like, "whoooo!!" But then he was like, there is a little problem though. They had to transfer the baby to a bigger hospital because it had a problem with its intestine sticking out of its stomach or something like that. I didn't really get what he was saying... But I guess it wasn't that big of a deal in the end. We called him the next day and he said that everything was fine! The wife is healthy and so is the baby! We have yet to see the baby, but at church yesterday, he asked us if we could pick a name for it! I guess after having 9 already he has run out of names... Haha just kidding. So my companion and I have been coming up with other names. We have yet to decide on one though.. I will let you know next week. If all goes well and there health is good, they should be able to progress with their baptism this Saturday! And the same goes for Veronique and Lornet and their kids. We should be having 6 baptisms this Saturday! How awesome is that!? Workin' hard or hardly workin' am I right? 

     This past week and about a half, I have been battling a cold... A pretty rad one! It started out with a sore throat... Then it transferred to my nose, then I couldn't breathe through my nose for like two days until I pulled out my nasal spray that I distinctly remember putting in my suitcase thinking, "I will never need this in Africa . But it has been saving my life for the past couple of days! It is doing a lot better now though, so no worries! Beatrice has been sure to be bringing me these weird African remedies that are working pretty well! They taste kinda funky, but they are good! She is too funny. Whenever she hears that one of the missionaries is sick, she goes into like freak mode and bugs the heck out of us in asking us if there is anything that she can do! She is too nice! 

     Upcoming in this week, we have our monthly zone leadership training with president Weed, and then tomorrow we have our Zone counsel. We just got another district added to our zone making our zone a number of 20 missionaries. Elder Kunz is now in my ward! And same with my old comp Ouonnebo! 

They were together from October-December 2012 in Togo

There come to the same branch as us as well, so that will be fun to see them all! There will be a transfer this weekend though, so you never know what will happen. I am going to give a lesson in our meeting about being "born again". It is something that I have been studying this week and I have learned a lot about it! I always thought that when we are baptized, or "born" or water and "born" of spirit, we are automatically "born again". But that is not the case! Because in John 3: 1-5, Jesus talks with Nicodemus and says that no one can SEE the kingdom of God without being born again. And then in verse 5 he says that no one can ENTER into the kingdom of God without being born of water and of spirit. So I am going to talk about how we can search for this new birth and how we can become fully converted to the gospel of Christ! Maybe I will send you a copy of my lesson plan next week... I love learning so much about the gospel! It is amazing!! So much left to learn! But after playing with the Eastmond's iPad and their scriptural apps that they have of the church, I was absolutely amazed! You can look up a scripture, and then pull up any quote or reference from a talk or prophet that mentioned that scriptures somewhere. Who amazing is that!? Christmas list... ;) Technology will for sure make studying easier when I get back! But I think it will be cool to have my french scriptures all marked up as well.

     Well that's about it for this week family. Again, thank you for all your support and love that you send me! I really do feel your prayers pushing me to be a better missionary and protecting me along the way! Have a great week, and remember to always feast upon the words of Christ!

                   Love,

                        Elder Landon Dean Layton

I sure was excited when I received a second email today with pictures in a word document! I was able to save them in Paint so I could share them.

From last weeks letter: "We had our baptism for Ma Fille, Rita, Parfaite and Akpedjé. We have been teaching them for about 2 months now and they were finally ready to get baptized! I took pictures of all of it, so you will be sure to see them when I get home! Which is really in no time at all. So don't fret."
Looks like I got a picture sooner. Such a fun surprise! 

 

 

"I am going to go see Agathe at her house! I am super excited! I will be sure to take some pictures.. That you will see when I get home. Haha. I bet that is killing you! It'll all be worth it."
2 weeks later: "I got to see Agathe! And that was fun! We took a picture!"

"Hi Mamacita!"

Hi Buddy! How are you?

"I just ate a hamburger and feel like a champ! Who knew there was a good burger place right across the street from our cyber."

I asked him to please tell Beatrice that I love her! Thank her for taking care of my boy for me and told him to get pictures of her!

His reply: “Haha I do have some already! You will see them with due time!”

Me: Due time... Blah, blah, blah.

Elder Layton: “Haha I love you mom!”

I sent him this picture of some remodeling that was done at the high school.

“Whoa!!! That is sick!!! haha that looks so much better than it did before!!”

Me: I'm sorry you've had a cold. That's no fun but happy you had the nose spray!!!

“For sure! It really saved me!!! I thought that I was going to rip my head off! I slept for 15 hours on Saturday because I felt so crappy!”

Poor little buddy! I'm so happy you were able to rest. You feeling okay now?

“Yeah I am fine! That burger got me really going!”

You probably really needed that!

“I did for sure...”