Grandpa's Little Pumpkin Boy!

So an explanation about the title of this post...  When Ben was little his Grandpa used to sing him a song called "Grandpa's little pumpkin boy."  When Ben got older he kind of would tease Grandpa about that song.  Grandpa is known for finishing everything on his own plate and then some from others so he would not waste.  Ben has always been a pretty picky eater so after reading this letter Ben has come a long way with eating AND growing up!  Here is this weeks letter:

Ciao family!

Hopefully all is going well this week! This week went by quick. I have to say I have never eaten so much food in my life. Since Anziano Ibba is getting transfered this week we saw alot of members and ate a TON! But this week we got a call from president and Anziano Ibba will be transfered to Torino and I will be getting a new companion from Milano. His name is Anziano Webb and he's from Utah. I haven't seen him in the mission but I know he has one month before he goes home. But not much has changed here in Genova with transfers. We will be getting new missionaries and there will be a total of 12 missionaries in Genova so that will be interesting. We will still remain in 4 in our apartment but there will be sister missionaries opening a companionship in our ward. I will miss Anziano Ibba though I really enjoyed being with him and felt like we worked hard together. We are working alot with new converts and less actives still. This week we saw Ricchi and taught him "the big three" prayer, scriptures, and obedience. It went great he's such a great kid. This week we had to stay inside a day as well because in Genova there was a Flood alert and last year 6 people died from the flood. So we stayed inside and it rained soooo hard!! I felt like I was in Arizona during monsoons season! It just rained hard the whole day and wouldn't stop! But it stopped over night and we were able to go out and do work the next day. But I'm excited for this next week because we should have a zone conference in Alessandria!

The other day I had a scambio with another missionary and we ate at a south american's home. They made us this soup with platene and it looked a little stange but I didn't want to offend the family so I tried it and it wasn't that bad. They gave us a ton though. But as I was finishing I noticed that my comp hadn't eaten anything. He doesn't eat vegetables ever and there were vegetables in the soup. And you could tell the family was getting upset a little because the mom had spent all day cooking. I was full and didn't know what to do so I grabbed his bowl and ate everything. I was sooo hard. I wanted to throw up. But I did it! After I got on my comp a little and told him no matter what you eat everything. He was like what am I in prison? If I don't like it I'm not eating it.. But yeah it was frustrating hopefully he'll figure it out. But it's funny before the mission I was super picky with food but now I can eat anything haha. Things are going well we are still looking for investigators so with this Christmas season coming the miracles will come! Thanks for everything love you all and have a great week!

Anziano Thomas