Cadence and Michael Harris

April 9th, 2011 was Cadence (Cady to me and Grandad) and Mike's wedding in the Redwoods! They are now husband and wife and a beautiful wedding it was, several miles east of Mendocino, California, at Mendocino Woodlands Camp. http://www.mendocinowoodlands.org/home.html

Most everyone arrived on Friday evening and located their cabins, their firewood and hugged each other! Everyone was able to attend from our side of the family, including our brothers Howard and Steve, and I think also the Harris side except for some who live back east. What a beautiful forest with pines and redwoods and nice little cabins with fireplaces and plenty of wood and a great big kitchen, dining room and dance hall.

Saturday was the wedding ceremony performed by Erin, Cady's long time friend from Chico and the one who introduced them around five years ago. Erin was amazing, Cadence was beautiful and it is a wonderful memory! It was held in a meadow north-east of the camp surrounded by tall trees, family and friends as you can see by the pictures. We all rang our bells at the designated time and the knot was tied!

It was a great three days of family and friend fun culminating in a most entertaining talent show on Sunday night. There were several goodbyes on Sunday afternoon and night. Then the next morning was the clean-up done by those who stayed. We were out of there with about 20 minutes to spare, at 11am, Monday morning. Dennie and I, Connie and Sherman, Howard, James and Virginia and Cady and Mikey all stayed in Fort Bragg for another couple of days to take in the sites of the beautiful area. James and Virginia were more familiar with the area so they took us here and there and then treated Dennie and me to a Clam Chowder dinner (made by James and Virginia from clams and abalone that James caught) at our trailer at the "seedy" RV park we'd booked sight unseen. The chowder was sure gooooood!! And the trailer park turned out to be okay, although a little scary and we enjoyed two nights there and a nice rain storm the second night. (Also a leak in the trailer which is being fixed.)

We are very grateful that everyone arrived there and returned home safely. We were especially grateful that we ALL could be there, including Dennie's cousins, Connie and Sherman, Paul Jacobsen, his wife Sue, Ruth and her husband, Steve, and Mark Jacobsen. We have recently had the pleasure of getting to know the Jacobsen cousins better and we hope to see them much more in the future! After all these years we've discovered that we have much in common and have a really good time together!

October. Osijek, Croatia

the candles from all saints day

a building inside the grave yard... but we never figured out what it was.

ghost version of me and elder brown. but elder brown moved so i told him that i was going to crop him out. he was just too excited to be a ghost.

from the park next to the church

artsy picture that i thought looked cool

congrats to dad. i am very proud to have old retired parents now. sounds like the visit with adam was fun. wish i was there to join in on the fun. let me know how the elections go. you know. the props that pass and dont and the seats in the senate and all that jazz. i need to know so i dont waste my time wondering. even though i will all this week. i might just ask president hill tomorrow at zone meeting what the turn out is. halloween is NOT the same here. i think i saw about 6 trick or treaters. lame. and they're all scary things. which is okay. of course. but they arent anything fun. like a racecar driver like me :] the bigger holiday was all saints day and its not really a holiday for anything. they just put candles in the grave yard and it looks cool. its going well. i like elder marchant a lot. of course we're getting to know each other every day. i think this week we're going to start talking in croatian 24/7. he's pretty good with the language too. he has been here in croatia for 9 months i think it is and i have for 8 or something. so he's been here longer but did have that break where he went home for 3 months for the operation. he knows some words that i dont know, but sure isnt used to speaking in croatian this much. even as much as we do right now. but when we start to do it 24/7 i think itll help him and stuff to be a little more comfortable with speaking in croatian. its good exercise. his knee is pretty good. he cant play sports or anything like that, but its healing well i think. sometimes when we walk too much, it swells and hurts the next day. but it sure doesnt affect the work. we can do everything we were doing before. we taught a guy this week named mario but i dont think he's really interested. he's just really interested in finding out the differences between us and the catholics and then he really likes the fact that we're from america. i mean half the people here are interested in that. haha stella is great. we did service this past week but nothing too exciting happened. elder jones still has back problems so he cant do service. so we have to help them out. we're still passing out english fliers for the sign up day which is next monday. so we'll see how many people come and for which classes. im hoping a lot of people show up. im super excited for this transfer and english classes. the fliers look great and we're doing great handing them out. a lot of people sound interested. we have a piano at church. elder jones kinda knows how to play so he plays the most often, but thats probably the hardest part about sundays is the music haha. no one leads music cause its not really needed. but maybe someday in another ward. i used to in rijeka sometimes. but here we dont really need it. when more people come, maybe. there's not a whole lot to tell about this week. we had a couple lessons with people and we went over to lidija's house with alen and little lydia there. that was fun. she's going to make us sarma for elder browns birthday on friday. so im SUPER excited about that :]]] we also had a lesson with alen that went well. we had a lesson with ivana. a lesson with mario. and i think thats it. he became a "new investigator" so im glad for that. i just hope he really is interested and keeps wanting to learn more. i cant wait to come home and celebrate real halloween :] i dont really know what you guys want to hear from me. i always feel like these emails are super duper boring and have nothing to do with missionary work or anything. sorry everyone! i should be better about that. here's a small story. it was all in croatian, but ill type in english of course.

so we were walking to an appointment (that ended up falling through) and we saw a couple older guys standing by some pumpkins. one was carved too.
so we stopped and elder marchant says, "hey thats cool".
they stare at him and say "... what?"
marchant just says "well that pumpkin right there. thats what we do in america and we havent seen one like that here yet"
they give him a weird look and say " we didnt do it. some other boys did it."
elder marchant kinda just says "oh.... well... then thats not cool"
after that we ended up talking to them for quite a while and found out that one of their wives is from england and the kids knew English and had little accents and everything. so it was cool we talked about what we do and everything. its just good for people to understand that we're not jehovah's witnesses or catholics. we need to just get our name out there.

announcement for everyone. i need recipes. i want recipes. but here's a little twist. they cant contain measurement like "1 can of..., 1 packet of..., 1 stick of..." cause they dont exist here. i could figure it out maybe, but still i dont know. some recipes that ive thought of:

• any cookies!
• breads that are good and easier
• cakes or brownies or something
• pizza ideas (already have amys famous from cammy, thanks!)
• any meals that are fairly easy
• anything that is cheap, fast, simple, good, and healthy. if it fits into that category, send :]
• ivy, those cookies you made me before i went into the mtc. they're the chocolate ones that are always moist. i LOVE those.
  

you can send them to me via email or snail mail, up to you. just a note. croatia doesnt have jello. so i cant even make my favorite cake :( and doesnt have dry ice and a couple other things, but its okay. you can still send me recipes :]

ill write more if i can think of more, but usually i dont so i guess this is good for this week. i love you all and thanks for everything!

love
elder jacobsen

Elder Brown and Me

Translation: "STOP SECTS! we are catholic! we dont want your conversations! thanks"

English class

Zone Conference in Zagreb

Stella and me

me and stella. we're basically best friends now

i just want to let everyone know that i love this work. even though sometimes i think about home and look forward to being back in good old ramona, i still know that this is the most important thing i can be doing right now at this time of my life. im having a great time. ill just let you guys know in case you were wondering... its hard here. its a tough work. thats why they call it missionary WORK. just to give you an idea... we had 1 lesson this last week. that was the spiritual thought in english class. and 2 lessons taught to members. one was just a spiritual thought, but the other was a good lesson with ____. that was really good. but basically that was it. otherwise we were just trying to find people. we talk to around 20-50 people everyday and its very rare to even get a number from someone. but still we keep truckin away. there's not much time. we cant waste our time. i have found out how important this work really is. i am one of the 4 missionaries called here in osijek to preach and teach and baptize people into Christ's church. thats very particular and very special. i have felt the companionship of the holy ghost with us. its a great feeling and only comes when we're obedient and truly ask for it. but the Spirit is so important in this work. without it, its just a couple of 20 year olds trying to convince people to what they believe. we talked a little in zone conference about this but we are put in twos to work. we have companionships. what we need to realize though is that every companionship is basically like a three-some. there's elder brown. me. and the Holy Ghost. thats 3. and we need to be that close in order to work. im so grateful for this work and all these missionaries here in croatia. i love the scriptures. they have all the answers. all the answers we need are found in the scriptures. then if we have questions. there's prayer. its so simple. hard work is how we are able to reap blessings. if we work hard we'll be able to find the people, teach others, and truly feel the Spirit. it might be hard or tedious, but its all worth it in the end.

My son, peace be unto thy soul; thine adversity and thine afflictions shall be but a small moment;

And then, if thou endure it well, God shall exalt thee on high; thou shalt triumph over all thy foes.
D&C 121:7-8

when we think about it like that, its not so bad. really, this time is short when you compare it with eternity. i know that this message is so important for everyone in this world. i know that we have a prophet who leads and guides this church. Elder L. Tom Perry in the MTC said "no man leads this church! Christ does". its through him that we receive revelation for his own church and i know how important that is now. we are not lost. a general authority in the MTC also said that the Great Apostacy ended with Joseph Smith yes... but the apostacy is still alive and well in the hearts of people. these people are living in an apostacy. they are searching for truth but know not where to find it. we're the ones who need to pull the people out of their personal apostacy. im so happy that im here and that im called by God to be a servant of Christ for the crpatian people. im super excited for this opportunity and i hope that you all can feel this same excitment and urgency. remember, every member a missionary. i love you family. i think about you a lot. the work is hard. people arent listening. their hearts are hardened... but that never stopped paul in the new testament. and it wont stop me either. i love you. have a great week.

love

elder jacobsen

New Baby, Rylee Rebecca Smith

Rylee Rebecca Smith was born Sunday, August 8th, 2010. She weighed 8 pounds and 5 ounces and she is chubby and healthy. Cam said this was the worst labor she'd had the pleasure of experiencing but all is well and she is feeling fine. Rylee had her hearing test today and she passed it.

Isaac, Jaycee, Ammon, Callie and Sheldon are all excited to have a new sister.

August 8th Letter from Ethan

good morning!

first order of business: got the package on friday! and i loved it. thank you SO much for all that and yeah that was expensive! everyone say that and apparently they were very amazed at how much it was. butthank you and i hope that ill be able to use my trumpet soon for some kind of music thing.

second order of business. recipe for friendship bread! croats would love it! so that would be cool. also could you find out a little about nikola tesla. where he was born and went to school and stuff. whats funny is croatia claims him as his own, but so does serbia, and slovenia. so.... who knows. so if you can find out CITIES. thats the big thing. cause technically he was born in yugoslavia haha. but oh well. its a funny thing. every city here has a nikola tesla street. another thing. camaro pictures. at least on the email. i need just a few to show some people cause its so cool. oh yeah, by the way dad, when i get home we are fixing up the pick up. wou can just sit there and tell me what to do if you want, but i want to fix it up cause it would be really fun to learn about all that stuff and actually do something like that.

a really cool thing that you guys can listen to is a song by a croatian guy. and its really pretty. its by oliver dragojević and the song is called vjerujem u anđele. so if you look that up on youtube it should be there. if not on google you should be able to find something. he's really good.

another thing. every year for zone conference near christmas we have christmas skits. so.... i was thinking. can you send me things like phonetic punctuation, the other victor borge thing i have (with the inflamitory language or something. "threelips". and if anyone has any funny church related skits, they are very welcome. any ideas whatsoever. its nice to have a variety haha.

oh yeah, and for chirstmas i dont really need a whole lot. especially cause i got the package! :] but what i was thinking was a family calendar. the ones that leah always makes. she can just make one more and you guys can send it to me so then ill remember birthdays, ill have a calendar, and ill have great family pictures. that would be really cool.

this week was really weird cause elder brown left for ljubljana and it was just elder anderson and me in osijek. we have some good times though. we had an audit. and it consisted of a lot more than i ever thought. it was a good training experience though and it was a good learning tool. ill definitely respect my bishop and stake more now that im learning more about how it all works. im having a good time. its pretty different here cause we dont have a ward or a stake or anything. its basically the mission president and us the missionaries. thats about it. i mean there are a few members and stuff, but they are very few and not many stay active for a long time. thats a big problem here. the inactive rate. we have about 50 members in osijek. and 2 came to church yesterday. and that was a good sunday... its pretty different...

a lot has happened this week and i dont have a lot of time to email. only about 30 minutes left. okay so heres a story for you.

elder brown went to ljubljana (slovenia) this last week and he got back late friday night. so elder anderson and i had to pick him up fro the train station. especially since he had a huge suitcase and my package which was stinking heavy! so anyway. right before he had to go we started hearing thunder and we looked outside and there was lightning in the clouds going every 2 seconds literally. it was lighting up the entire sky. it was about 9 at night. then wind started blowing like crazy and the rain came soon after. it all came very fast and it was insane. but the best part was that we had to go pick up elder brown from the train station at 9:30. so we were pretty excited cause it was going to be pretty wet outside. ive been stuck in some pretty crazy storms before, but never as bad as this one. i have never seen this much rain or wind in all of my life. let me tell you that right now. so we get in regular p-day clothes cause its not too likely that we're going to stop people on the street and talk to them. and i get my camera so i can get some of the action on film. the sad thing is that i watched the films that i took and they are nothing compared to what it was actually like. they are weak sause (thats what we say here). so we're about a 8 to 10 minutes walk from the train station. not too bad. so me and elder anderson just start running! we ran so stinking fast. we were running full speed all the way to the train station and it took us like 2 or 3 minutes at most. we only stopped once. that was under a little tent thing at a cafe and all the people were inside the tent thing just drinking their little drinks and just laughed and said we were crazy. we just waved and started running again. so we got to the train station and water was just pouring everywhere. we were soaked. literally. everything on my body was wet. my shoes through and through and my garments were soaked in every place. so we waited for him for a while and finally say him getting off the trian> we ran out to grab his stuff for him and he was wearing his entire suit, so he was getting wet. and there was no way to save him from getting wet. at the beginning elder brown was running around to try and avoid getting wet and after about 1 minutes, he was already completely soaked so he just started walking. we had his rolly luggage thing and my package which was crazy heavy too. so we just walked home and got in and we all had to just strip down in the bathroom and throw our clothes in the shower cuase they were so stinking wet. the paper on the package was all wet too but goo thing everything was wrapped in bubble wrap cuase nothing got wet excpet a little bit on the ensigns. but thats okay. they dry. so yeah. it was an exciting night and we all have pictures and films and such so you will all see very soon. ill try to attach some today so you can see how wet we really were.

anyway. i gotta go now. if i think of anything else, ill email again later today. i love you guys and ill email you again more. dont worry.

love

elder jacobsen

The Mission in August, Osijek, Croatia

Mac and Cheese!! Courtesy of Elder Anderson's mom.

It was raining..... a little

After our adventure of picking up Elder Brown

Elder Brown after our 8 or so minute walk.