Hey Mum and Pops,

I'm glad to have one fish again in the house, but I still need a lot more than the one. I taught a guy this week that had 100 gallon fresh water tank and he had a reef in his tank and a huge angel fish. It was a really cool aquarium. It just made me think, "Hum, maybe when I get home I will get one that size it would be real cool." Then I can put Sydney the fish in it and an angel fish and some reefs and maybe even a beta fish. All I need is a lot of mean fish and they will take care of their own.

I’m so proud of Cody and his swimming feat, that's great to hear he is doing well. I would get stuck to sometimes and it always felt so great to get a good race like that one and get a PR. It was like the time I was swimming the butterfly and you put in everything and you come out good it feels so nice. Man I miss swimming!!

This week has been crazy nuts too. We are teaching loads. We are doing very well this week and taught 19 lessons. The week before we taught 20. We come home and are so knackered (tired) that we plan, play a quick game, call people, and go to sleep. Before we know it the alarm is going off, it’s so hard to roll out of the bed we need more sleep! I sometimes take naps during our breaks for a few minutes, but it’s still not enough. Then we are off to teach more lessons. We had a few people who dropped us this week but we replaced them real quick with some more. Our teaching pool is around 10-12 people. I love it! I have never had that many people to teach ever before. And the people we are teaching are good. They all are progressing even the new people and the old ones are working towards baptism. I’m so happy with this area.

So I will talk about some of the people I’m working with. Our main person is Janice Dixon she is a sweet heart love her to death. She is about 45 and has a good number of children. I talked about her a bit last week. Well she right now is going through some hard times. Her partner is a less active member of the church. We found her through him. Well they have been living together for about 10 years or something like that. They act like a married couple and we thought they were for ages. But Bob, her partner, walked out on her the other day because he is an idiot and gets in these moods. So when he does this, he leaves her for a few weeks and won’t talk to her at all. To make it worse, they just got engaged this December and had a vacation booked out for them so Janice had to leave the family take her friend and go on vacation this past Friday, because Bob would not talk to her. Well of all the people Janice wanted to talk to was us when Bob left. So we prayed and asked God for help what we could do to best help her out. A member's name came to our mind, Sister Cathy Grayson, we called her up for help. She came immediately and when she arrived she actually knew Janice. Their kids used to play together. So we sat and talked and listened to Janice for awhile. Then we left to find Bob and try to talk with him while Cathy stayed with Janice. Cathy helped her out so much and we were able to help Janice out and give her a blessing. We talked to Bob but he was still a butt and did nothing, and now Janice is on vacation. This Saturday when she comes home we will be able to teach her again. This experience was amazing and it was a real answer to a prayer. It really helps me have more trust in the members.

The members her in Londonderry are just something else. They love missionaries so much and feed us all the time. This past week I have had 4-5 dinner appointments here. And then if they can’t feed you they bring food for you at church. This Sunday we received 3 bags of food for our flat. Because of it we don’t even need to shop this week. In fact, we have not had a normal shopping week yet. We just buy milk and cereal because that’s basically the only food we use. We either don’t have time for a meal or we have so many dinner appointments we eat at the member’s home. It’s been great.

Tell Tyler Robinson hi from me. I know who he is, he is a really nice guy. We never hung out but we always said hi to each other in the halls. Tyler was one of those kids all the girls loved because he was such a good looking guy.

Well mom, I love you so much and family too. Miss you tons. The time is short and I will be home very soon.

Hugs and kisses from me,
Brady

I’m a pretty lucky mom, because I was asked by Bro. Sorenson to brag about my son Elder Brady Hafen, who is serving a mission in Ireland. Mothers love to talk about their children, but I’ll try to stay under control. Many of you do not know Brady because he left for his mission just a few weeks after the stake division took place almost two years ago; so yes he is on the downhill side of his mission. His release date is April 16th so he will be standing at this podium in just three months. Many of you might actually see him occasionally or at least see his picture since I do have the most well known missionary in Utah County! Somehow the Daily Herald has my son’s picture and uses it to advertise; the advertisement is to place an ad to announce or share with Utah County everything worth celebrating; so we see him in the news paper frequently.

His mission is called the Ireland Dublin Mission, and includes all of Ireland; Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland. He went to the Preston England MTC, and loved it. The Preston England MTC is smaller and very personable which he really enjoyed. He loved being able to attend the Preston England temple and misses the temple since there is no temple in Ireland. He has served in 5 areas of Ireland; Bangor – which is in Northern Ireland, Bellyfermont (Jeremiah Sorenson makes fun of the way I say this-good he’s not here; Jeremiah served his mission in Ireland as well) – he actually re-opened this area; it had been closed since 1992, it is very close to Dublin; Tralee which is along the South West shore of Ireland; Firhouse, which is by Dublin; and his new area as of the first of January Londonderry; which is in Northern Ireland, the most Northern part of Ireland you can get.

Ireland is not a big baptizing mission; but they contact people on the street, work in charity shops, and a big part of his mission has been reactivating and fellowshipping members. Every area he has served in he has helped to reactivate someone and he loves doing that. I know that we shared this experience with the youth in our ward, so I apologize in repeating, but this really touched us as a family as well as Brady. After Brady had left his first area in Northern Ireland, our family received a letter from a member of the Bangor ward named Sister Jacqui Richards. Jacqui joined the church in 1978 and was active for only a short time, becoming inactive for many more years. She always believed that the Church was true, but was in a rebellious stage for a long time. In June of 2007 she was diagnosed with cancer and had to have radical surgery followed by chemotherapy and radiation treatment. I would like to quote her letter now: “It was a horrible time for me and my family and it forced me to think about life and what was important; family and a relationship with Heavenly Father and his son Jesus Christ. So one day in April I decided that I was going to go back to Church. When I walked through the doors (which in itself took a lot of strength because I had been away for so long) were the missionaries. One of the missionaries was an Elder Headington from Wales who appeared the more senior of the two. The other was a brand new missionary, just out on his mission, looking very nervous and shy. His name was Elder Hafen, from Orem, Utah.

These two young boys, neither of whom I had ever met before, were to turn out to be real friends to me. They came to my house, taught my children, fellowshipped with my husband, (who isn’t a member of the church) did some carpentry work for me, painted the outside of my house and generally made my transition of going back to church so much easier.

Thank you so much for your son, he is a fine young man and whom you can be very proud. He is no longer with our ward, but while he was here I watched him grow from a shy nervous boy into a confident spiritual young man.

Please take heart in knowing that even if he doesn’t baptize anyone on his mission he was instrumental in bringing at least one soul (mine) back to the Lord and I will always be grateful to him and you for that.” Brady didn’t realize how much the service rendered meant to Jacqui until I mailed a copy of the letter to him.

Brady has been blessed with one baptism that took place while serving in Firhouse. Johnathan Manning became a member of the church on October 24, 2009. One thing that Brady has learned while serving is that sometimes missionaries do not get the opportunity to reap the seeds that they plant, others may reap those seeds. Johnathan Manning was just that, he had been taught by previous missionaries, but because of his strong Catholic bonds with family decided that he shouldn’t be baptized. Three years later Johnathan found a pass along card and knew that he needed to be baptized. He called the number on the card and the missionaries were there; he was baptized after receiving the discussions again. Brady had just broken his wrist playing soccer with the missionaries so he was unable to do the baptism, but felt privileged to perform the confirmation. I would love to read to you a part of his letter. I need to preface this since many of you do not know Brady, but Brady loves to swim. During his High School years he swam for Orem High School, winning State. I quote: “On Sunday I confirmed Jonathan, I was so nervous. It was like being on the blocks for the 400 free relay at state and you are swimming up against the fastest swimmer on the East High Swim team. I could actually feel the adrenaline pumping into my blood, my whole body felt really hot and tingly but once I put my hand and cast on his head I calmed down. I said all the necessary parts but once I came to the blessing I couldn’t say what I wanted to well; but it all came out and went well. Bishop commented on the blessing afterwards. Jonathan afterwards looked a bit goofy cuz there was no way to wipe the smile off his face. He was just so excited. He says he can feel the spirit so strong now.”

Brady’s mission president is from Provo, the Edgemont Stake; their names are Gordon and Janice Creer. Brady loves them. President Creer knows that Brady loves to swim so every time he visits with him he asks if he is gotten in the water. Brady always responds no President that is against the rules, but it is really hard for him to not jump into the ocean. President Creer is released in July and tells him that the two of them are going swimming when he gets home-Brady thinks that might be a scary thing to see President Creer in a swimming suit.

Brady is in a really cold place right now Londonderry, it is actually snowing. Ireland usually doesn’t get snow, they get slush, but he has snow. This area is also an area where many rebels live; they call themselves the Para Military. In 1968 civil violence broke out and continued for thirty years. Peace has returned but there are some who believe the war is still on. They deal with this more in Northern Ireland, so he lives through bomb scares, and basically terrorist activity a little more now where he is serving.

Brady loves his mission, and knows that the gospel is true. He knows that he is acting in behalf of the Lord, and feels it a great honor to wear Jesus Christ’s name everyday on his name tag. He knows that he is planting seeds, and that someday the people of Ireland will be ready to accept the gospel of Jesus Christ.

Well this week has been crazy. We have been running from one appointment to the next. We have been stressed out. Me and Grone are best friends and get along super well everyone tells us that they can tell. They say they can tell by Groneman. Grone did not get along with his last companion so now he is smiling and laughing loads we both are hoping and praying for another moves together. And I think some of the people we are teaching are too. The weather here has been so cold the warmest day was 19.5 F; luckily we have a car, or unlucky trying to drive in it! It’s been snowing all week long and they don't plow the roads. Cuz it does not snow in Ireland so what's the point of making snow plows, that's their mentality. All the estate roads are ice 3-5 inches thick you could go ice-skating on them. It’s really bad, cars are stuck everywhere nobody has 4 wheel drive and it’s so hilly here they can’t go up them. Roads have been closed and taxis charge 2 pounds extra cuz of it. People here won’t leave their house cuz of it, not even to go to church. And all the humidity is frozen so the dryness has dried my skin out. My face flakes a bit almost as if I was on Acutane, and my lips have been splitting too.

Well for something to tell the ward about the new area. Its part of Northern Ireland and it’s in the high north. It’s the 4th largest city in the entire island. It’s very beautiful even in the winter. I’m close to the Atlantic Ocean and it’s very cold. The city has a very old feel to it like you would see in the movies. I really like it a lot. This city was hit really hard during the troubles and there are a few factions of Para Military who won’t give up. Small inconvenience for us some times. There was a bomb threat on a road a while ago but it ended up being nothing. It made us 10 minutes late to a dinner appointment which the member was not too happy about. I get fed loads here, every day we seem to have some sort of a dinner appointment, and sometimes it's twice a day. I’m sure I will gain some weight here driving and eating so much. Me and Grone cover the whole city all by ourselves and wish we had the sisters back here every day.

Karl Hamilton is a great member he feeds us every week and is way nice to us. He had just got a new blackberry phone I think for Christmas and took those pictures. He then asked who to email it to so I said my mom. I knew you would like those but what I was afraid of was that you might think it was a scam and delete it; good thing you did not. And yes mom that's my new companion Ryan Groneman. Glad you liked those.

Well like I have said we have been very busy. Our new top investigator is Janice Taylor. She is married to a less active member named Bob. Janice is a really good investigator one of those golden ones who ask all the right questions that lead into the next thing we are going to talk about. She listens very well and understands well. Her and Bob together have 9 kids but it’s a Brady bunch situation. Both of them where previously married and now they all live together. But if we can get them in the church, wow, this ward would grow. The only problem is the kids are older and can make their own choices. We have not taught the kids yet, but pray all will go well there. The ward could use another solid family. As all wards could.

Sorry this is not as personal of a letter and a bit more like a news letter. I’m just in a rush and the first one was deleted off so I’m sorry about that. I hope this was also detailed enough for you.

I love you all so much and miss you.

Hugs and kisses

Brady BOO