June 18th & 21st

June 18th:
Today is Wednesday and we have a lot going on this week! Today we have our land nav test. So we have six people in a group and they just drop us off with 5 points we have to plot and then walk to find five oints. We have like seven hours to get it done. We have to get them all right in order to graduate and to move on from red phase. Then tomorrow we are going to the gas chamber and we have to be there like five minutes. And then on Friday we have a test on all our red phase stuff. We won't move on from red phase. So we are busy busy. They even let us sleep from 9-6 last night! I think we might be doing our 8k march this week too. Can you believe we are more than halfway through June?!

Did I tell you in reception we got our photos taken in our uniform. I ordered some so when I graduate you should be able to take them home. So we did an obstacle course yesterday and I know there was some pictures taken of me so you should look on the Facebook page and see if I'm on there! I found out about the limited hand holding and PDA on graduation the day I got your letter talking about it. HAHAHAI haven't been told all the rules yet but I'm sure they will tell us closer to graduation.That whole last week is all practicing and going over graduation so we will pretty much be done with most of our training. So we got our weapons last Friday. It doesn't feel real still hahah. We have a red metal thing on our barrel that blocks anything from coming out. We have been practicing taking them apart and putting them back together. Mine is very difficult to take apart. One of the pins is really hard to get out and that takes the barrel and the .... apart.

June 21st:
How are you? I am doing pretty good. I haven't written for a while because I had to prepare a talk for today and we had a phase test on Friday. We don't know how we did yet but it's based on the platoon's score averaged out so that makes me nervous but we'll be positive. We are not moving out of red phase anyway. Our drill sergeant kept a group in red phase for six weeks!

I just got back from church! It was busy. I helped pass the sacrament and then gave my talk and then I helped teach the plan of Salvation to two people who are getting baptized in a few weeks!

We are almost ready for bed. It has been a good day. We have had a lot of time to clean and organize. Not personal time but cleaning time. That is pretty much all we do all day Sunday. It's nice because we all talk.The conversations were a little interesting today hahaha. I got so sunburned today. We pulled weeds for three hours today. I didn't even think about putting my sunscreen on today until I was already a lobster hahaha. We are getting prison haircuts or were supposed to today but will get them next week I guess. My hair is getting so long. This next week we are going to start shooting our weapons! This week should be fun. Tomorrow we start using a simulator so we can learn how to do it right before we waste a ton of rounds. Our one drill sergeant was gone all week and I was so glad she came back because she is the toughest drill sergeant in our whole battery but she helps us stay in line and it makes things better. Our platoon is slowly getting better at being quiet.

Did I tell you about the gas chamber? Oh my goodness it was terrible! We went in and had our masks on and started doing push ups and stuff like that and the mask is already tight and makes you feel a little claustrophobic. But then you move into the hot side where there is a higher concentration of gs and take off your mask for 3 seconds with your eyes closed and holding your breath and then put your mask back on and seal the make and start breathing again for 15 seconds and scream the soldiers creed and none of us made it past the second line before coughing and dying. It feels like you are drowning and you can't open your eyes for like 5 minutes for more than a few seconds. It hurts so bad. But I am glad I did it, It was a good experience. Oh and it makes your skin burn like the worst sunburn you have ever had.