Pictures at the MTC

Lance and his district, he is the only one going to Ohio, the rest are leaving for Minnesota.
Lance with Amanda's Friend Thomas Ballard, he has been in the MTC since February. He has already left for his mission in Cambodia.
Lance and His companion Elder Massey

Second E-Mail

So week two was very enjoyable I'm gonna have to say. Oh and before i forget here is my flight information. I have to wake up around 3 am the 27th. To report to the MTC travel office at 4 am with my luggage and everything else. The funny thing is I leave a day before my district and the people in my room have to come with me to the travel office at that time so I won't be alone on the way up and so my comp. won't be alone on the way back. So that's kinda funny. Um...My flight leaves at 7 am to Detroit, Michigan. I don't know how long that flight is but i'm assuming about 3-4 hours. Then I have an hour lay-over. After that i get on a 45 min. flight to CLEVELAND!!!! I'll be there around noon or afternoon depending on the time difference. So the point of that is if you send me a letter probably any later than Friday it may take quite a while to get to me. UM...It's kinda hard to summarize a week here when you do so much in a single day that you and your comp. start thinking the stuff you did this morning you think you did yesterday. Um....A spiritual thing would be Tuesday I had a mock-teaching appointment with this guy named Keith Smith. Well we were talking about the Plan of Salvation. At the first of the appointment I was having trouble getting words out of my mouth that even made sense to me much less the investigator, until I got an impression about the Joy the lord wants you to feel on earth. My impression was that Heavenly Father wants us to always feel the Joy you get when you hold your newborn child. I said I've never done this or else some of you reading this would be grandparents/uncles & aunts/etc. but I've heard the Joy is inexpressible. After that I felt a change in the lesson. Me and my companion just started teaching by the spirit continually. So yeah. The gospel is true. A funny story would be yesterday while I was helping host the new missionaries. I was told to lead around these new Japanese missionaries to their new rooms. I had to go and get their luggage with them from their temporary room and then go drop off their temp. keys at the main desk. What I didn't know was that I already had their new keys so I couldn't had them drop off their luggage in the building to the left. Instead I made them bring their luggage all around the MTC. Also every place they needed to be was on the top floor. Well I'm done for now.
(*)<~Elder Sump.

First email from Lancie :]

Well I'm kinda on a time limit and since I was a bit of a slacker before I came out here I had to set up this e-mail before I started writing. Anyway. My first week was awesome. I've been learning a ton. Oh and just so everyone knows I'll generally be putting what's been going on the mission in my e-mails and not the letters cause despite what i thought I don't have very much time for anything. Well my first day was pretty good. I went to my room after I was dropped off and they didn't even give me time to un-pack. I went straight to meet my teachers. Bro. Adams who went to Kentucky and Bro. Phipps who went to Boston. They are both really really awesome. Adams is amazing at talking in very calm and spirit bringing tones. Phipps is uber knowledgeable about gospel history and stuff. My companion Elder Massey is a really nice guy I'm pretty lucky to have him because some of the guys in my district bother me. Although I have been nothing but nice and usually ignore the snide comments. Um to throw a mission story in there I was walking down the hallway and I saw this Elder walking down the hall with a can of Red Cream Soda tapping it with his key. I Said hi elder. He said hi and then his key like ripped through the aluminum of the can somehow and exploded. This scared him so he dropped it and ran for cover. Also I'm pretty sure my comp. Broke the Iron which i thought was pretty funny.

Anyway I'm having a good time. I know the church is true. Love you all and gotta go.
(*)<~Elder Sumsion

Day 4 the first letter!

We received our first letter from Lance today, his P-days are on Thursday but the first Thursday they did not have a p-day although he and his companion Elder Massey went to lunch early by mistake so they had 30 minutes to do some light correspondance.

He said his first day went really well and he learned quite a bit from his teachers Bro. Phipps and Bro. Adams. His companion is a wrestler and refers to him as a good guy with a good testimony. He end with saying he is having a great time!

Last shots at the MTC April 7th, 2010

Try to get everything packed, Lance wouldn't have been able to shove everything in his suitcases without Cameron's help!

Grandpa Sumsion
Grandma Sumsion
Unloading van
Loading Dads Carat the church and getting a hug from sister Alissa