Loving Life in the MTC and Basketball is played in Heaven

Dear Family and Friends,

I WANT TO WRITE IN ALL CAPS BECAUSE I AM SO EXCITED TO WRITE TO YOU!!!!!!!!!! AHHH!! HAHAHA I AM SO HAPPY!!  You have no idea :)

My first week at the MTC has been very successful. I am a district leader!!!! I am having a lot of fun and really enjoying the spirit here and the feelings here are great. The food is good but nothing like home. Thanks for all the birthday emails and messages I LOVE YOU ALL SOO MUCH!! :) I am at the west campus, not at the main one, there’s so many missionaries they had to pay for a lease at the west campus of BYU! I got to hear the BYU game vs. Utah. The crowd was so loud we could hear it from our apartments’ it was so cool!! Hearing the roar of the crowd like, “aaahhhhh” made me miss football so much! I have heard that the west campus is the best campus. We are so spoiled ha ha ha ha, oh well. Life’s great! :) We got a new apartment dorm and its super nice and fun. I got to meet some amazing people and my district is awesome. I really like serving others and just having a good time and really loving the people here. I have learned a lot here. It’s kind of like Institute just more mission focused which is great. We do a lot of practicing which can get kind of old but ya… I didn't realize how much I prepared. it’s crazy! I learned all of the stuff they are teaching now and just trying to help out the teachers with helping the district understand these things they are teaching. So glad I went to mission prep and institute sooo much. It has really made the MTC experience a great learning environment to really apply what I have learned in mission prep and at Institute.

We have an army elder in my district so we have been using a lot of army terms. We like clear the room whenever we go into our dorm room. ha ha It’s awesome! Thinking of you there, Alex. Good luck in the military stuff. My companion is kind of shy and not much of a talker. He is fully Native American. He just got out of high school. Elder Bancroft. It’s hard to help him with speaking from his heart and not from his mind. He’s really trying to learn. I am glad I am his companion. I learned you got to love anyone and you got serve with all your heart, might, mind, and strength. Work really hard. This isn't about my mission or me. It's His, we are just His instruments. It’s awesome. Got to be very obedient too, because if you aren't it’s going to be hard on you for the mission. Going to bed on time. Waking up on time. Staying with your companion at all times even if he is in sight. Just stay with them. So I am doing good and loving what we’re doing. I want to hear how you are all doing. I learned also how important family is and friends are because you are all gone and I miss you all a lot but I get to have my own mission family, full of brothers and sisters. My birthday was not like a birthday at all, and I don’t even feel 19. I kept forgetting it was my birthday on the day of it. They sang to me in the cafeteria and we went and got ice cream and the other Elder in the district got me some chocolate... I really miss my family more than anything. I miss you Mom, and Dad. Austin, Travis, Ethan, more than anything. I loved that Austin spelled happy birthday to me but he spelled it like happy birbbadi. I love him, and miss you Ethan and Travis so much. I don't want to come home though at all. I learned that it is okay to miss people because people are amazing! I mean that. You are all amazing. I am happy to be where I am and with these wonderful people all day, the same thing. I've really grown. I am happy, so glad to be here serving the Lord and others. I LOVE IT. The days here are so long but they go by so fast. I can't remember like up to two days ago. It’s really awesome. It’s weird being 19 because it’s kind of sad because I am that much closer to the mission ending and so far, I don't want to go. I just want to keep learning and keep serving and keep meeting and KEEP HELPING! The gym here on west campus is a blacktop with those basketball hoops you buy at sport chalet. Lol, push it around. Ha ha ha. They have no gym here, they are building one. Basketball is awesome, as always. I learned from Elder Dan R. Clarke from the Quorum of the 70 that basketball is a sport that they do play in heaven...soo...ya. Best sport. I couldn't be more happy here.

This is what life is about. Meeting people and helping them if they want it. Let me know if you want to hear about cool experiences. I don't want to preach to you so ask me individually and just tell me. I would like to write the spiritual experiences to you instead of email it to you, maybe you could send me a journal and you can write something in it and I'll write something back about one of the spiritual experiences I had and mail it back to you and it can be between us! I'll send you an address of where I am going to be staying. I am out of the MTC September 30. :( I wish I had three weeks here. It’s so nice and relaxing and I am the kind of person that likes to stay at a place for a while before I go ha ha. But I DO want to get out of here!! I'll send emails for you now though. You can write to me or send me a journal because I don't have anyone’s home address. Can't wait for Denver! 5 more days! DENVER OR BUST! till then... God be with you. I’m praying for you guys. Love you all. Thanks for being my friends.

Love,

Elder Garrett Steven Harrington

I'll send pictures next week. I have no idea how to attach the photos here right now because the computers here are high tech.

Scriptures of the Week

DC130:20-21

Mosiah 3:19

Moroni 7:45-47

John 15:13