April 3, 2012

i was able to go to general conference again, and it was my last one as a missionary.  I was able to attend 3 of the 5 session. Becuase i am going home in the next 6 months the mission provided us with one of the tickets and they got us amazing seats. We were about 10 rows back from the front. For once in my life in the conference center i didn't have to look at the huge screen! the messages were all good. The one that i enjoyed the most was Elder Bednar's talk during priesthood about the priesthood. But as far as the work goes, i think this week is going to be a slow one. the reason why i say that is becuase it is spring break out here and pretty much everyone is gone out of here for warmer weather. So we are just going to have to hang in there this week and hopefully be able to catch some lesson in there. Anyways hope that you have a good week!

 

March 27, 2012

Things have been going really good out here in the Thayne Wyoming Stake. this past week it has been on the 50's. which i guess still kind of seems a little cold but that is really warm out here for us! we are loving it. we found out some good news the other day. the little girls that we baptized, Madison and Kayla. Her mom and her boyfriend are getting married pretty soon, so that is awesome. they have been living together for a couple of years now and since they started coming back to church they have decided to get married and their marriage date is on June 19th! so that is a good thing. we were able to meet with someone who was a non-member who wanted to ask some questions about baptisms for the dead and stuff. but it turned out that this guy was a Christian that went to some other church in town and he was trying to put together a lesson plan about paul in the book of acts. and he was going to talk about what other christian religions have to say about certain passages.we taught him a little about the chruch and he was a really nice guy and not argumentative which was really nice becuase honestly when put into a situation like that people get defensive and missionaires try to convert people like that... but we just taught him what he wanted to know and we went on our way.but anyways our one baptismal candidate, Mickel, is doing really good, she is set for baptism on april 17th.so we are excited for that.  

 

Mar. 13, 2012

this week has been ok other than my health. we were able to get 3 baptisms so that was really awesome. but these sisters got baptized and they were the ones that were the really funny ones that we have been teaching. but their names are madison and kayla and madison is 10 and kayla is 9. but during the baptism madison read a poem that she wrote about baptism and it was really really good. sometimes on my mission i think that when i teach people they really don't understand what we are talking about but when she read that it was really awesome to see that she really does understand baptism! but the other baptism here was girl named tania who is 16. but anyways she was the one that was supposed to get baptized yesterday. but her mom isn't a member and her step-dad and brother recently converted to the church about 4-5 months ago. but it was really awesome to be at her baptism and we were really excited for that. our teaching pool is dropping becuase we are just baptizing our investigators... which is probably the best problem that i would have. but elder ortiz and i are doing well. 

Mar. 6, 2012

this week has been pretty good. we almost had a baptism on saturday but it didn't work out becuase the Tania, who is a 17 year old girl was supposed to get baptized had some woman issues to deal with so the baptism was delayed until this next week. but that is ok becuase we are going to have some 3 baptisms this saturday so we are really excited for that. but the other baptism is of these 2 little grls named madison and kayla. madison is 11 and kayla is 9, and honestly they are the funniest little girls that i have taught on my mission and everytime we teach them we just end up laughing the whole time.

 

but we also picked up another girl to teach named Mickel. anyways the story with her is that she is 10 and she isn't baptized. but anyways the ward mission leader here in the Etna ward is amazing. we always keep in close contact with him and he always gives us people to go visit. but anyways we thought that Mickel was on the do not visit list and then we found out that she wasn't on the do not visit list at all. But we went ahead and visited her and her parents were super nice and we found out her step dad was a convert. but they haven't been to church in a while and Mickel really wants to be baptized so we set a baptismal date for the 7th of april. so we are exited for that. we are also teaching a kid in her class named connor.

Feb. 28, 2012

elder ortiz and i have been working really hard and honestly he is my favorite companion on my mission and has become one of my best friends. we get along really well. things have been going really good for us out here. and transfer calls are today and we are staying together so we are pretty happy about that.. we had a baptism this week and it went really well. our investigator austin got baptized so that was really awesome. but funny thing happened. in our building, the baptismal font room is pretty small, so we usually start the baptismal service in the relief society room and then we move to the baptismal font room for the actual baptismal ordianance. anyways when we got to the building there was just this dead guy in a casket in the relief society room. which was a little wierd and it kind of freaked out elder ortiz. even though he is from one of the most dangerous places in the united states...camden, new jersey. Anyways, the work is going really good out here. we are going to have another baptism out here this saturyday and then 2 the next saturday. so we are really excited for the baptisms!!
 

Feb. 21, 2012

things have been going really good the past couple of days. i am really enjoying serving out here in star valley wyoming. honestly i thought that i would hate it becuase i have mostly been in city areas my whole mission but honestly i really like it out here becuase everybody is just way chill out here and i have a good compaion. but honestly if i didn't have elder ortiz i think i would be killing myself right now. becuase companions make a big difference in the area. but anyways. this week we had a baptism so it was really good. it was this girl named Adriana. We honestly really didn't teach her at all. i think i mentioned her to you before about how the only reason why she wasn't baptized was becuase her parents wouldn't let her get baptized until she was 18. but we also have another baptism happening this next weekend which is also awesome! and then we have 1 for the 3rd of march and then we have 2 baptisms on the 10th of march and then another one for the 17th. so if everything goes as planned will have baptized 5 weeks in row which will be awesome!

Feb. 14, 2012

but this week has been really good for us in the sense of missionary work here in star valley. This week we weren't really able to pick up 6 new investigators like we had hoped for but we did pick up 3 and we are going to be able to pick up 1 more this week. but we are also going to have a baptism on this weekened which is going to be pretty exciting. it was pretty much just a free baptism for us. we haven't even taught this girl, but she had been taught by missionaries before us for several years and the only reason why she wasn't baptized was becuase her parents wouldn't let her be baptized btu she has finally turned 18 and has just decided to to it anyways and i guess her parents are still pretty cool with it, which is really good.

but this week i almost got sent out of star valley. but anyways it is called emergency transfer, and it wasn't my fault!! haha but what happens in the mission is that you usually have a possibility of being transferred every 6 weeks. but sometimes missionaries (like me at one point) need to go home or either they can't get along with their compaion and they can't stand each other anymore, but anyway there were 2 companionships in the mission that weren't getting along and rather than just switching them around they decided to involve us, so the AP's called me up and said that i was going to be transferred. and so i said ok. and then i thought about it a little bit and i thought this is not right becuase i have only been here for 4 weeks and have been having really good success with Elder Ortiz and the member out here really like us and all sorts of good stuff. so i called President Olson and told him everthing that was on my mind and about how i shouldn't be transferred and he said, well those sound like pretty good reasons to me not to be transferred. let me get back with you. and so an hour later i found out that i wasn't going to be transferred. but anyways. i am really liking here even though it is cold. but everyone is super nice to us and we are having good success. 

Feb. 7, 2012

it is kind of ridiculous how expensive things are down here.the people out here are really kind and they just give us food out here. so i am really liking it out here. but recently it has been really cold out here. i think this is the coldest weather that i have been in in my life. when we go to work out in the mornings the coldest temperature that we have seen has been -6 degrees.... but the work hasn't been as cold as the weather has been though which is really good. we have been teaching this kid named austin since we have been here and so far the lessons are going really well and we have a baptismal date for him set on the 25th and as far as things are going he might be able to have his baptism pushed up to the 18th. but we will see how things are going.anyways we got some maps of this place and we are not so lost out here and we were finally able to go to visit some people that needed to be visited so if things go the way like they are planned we will be picking up 6 new investigators this week. so we are really excited about that. but anyways that was pretty much for this week. we have been keeping pretty busy out here and it is really good. i am really enjoying serving with my Puerto Rican companion and i will try to stay warm.

Jan. 31, 2012

this week has been pretty good. we are starting not to get lost out here too much, becuase they really don't have N, E, S, W addresses out here and it is just random roads and stuff like that and most of the hosues out here don't even have addresses, which makes it even tougher sometimes. but when people give us directions to go to their home, they just tell us to turn on certain roads. but things have been getting better. we were able to get some maps of the area to find out where we were going, so that those have been helping out a little bit. but as far as the work goes, it is going pretty good. we started teaching this kid named austin who is 13. but his dad is not a member and his mom is a member who is recently coming back to church and so we taught him the first lesson and we committed him for baptism on the 25th of february. so we are excited for that. but anyways other than that the people are super nice out here and honestly i really like serving out here.

 

Jan. 25, 2012

i am in Star valley Wyoming. there are techincally 2 parts to Star Valley, there is a north and a south valley and we are in the north valley. i am serving with one my old companoins agian, elder Ortiz. we served together in layton and i asked the mission president if we could serve together again, becuase we were really successful together and we are really good friends and so president olson put us together again and we are super excited. but star valley is really really cold, it has snowed the past 5 days that we have been here. and i have driven in it the past 5 days which has been pretty fun. the area is really beautiful out here. honestly it is a really cool place. but we didn't leave until friday and so elder ortiz and i pretty much had 2 down days. we had to go with one of our senior missionaries who works in the office and we picked up our furniture and then we got it all packed up in a trailer and left on friday. but the drive took us 5 hours to get up there... and then yesterday we had zone conference in logan and that took 2 1/2 hours to get down there. so this place that we live at is pretty far away. but we live in a 1 beedroom trailer and it is actually really nice. it has recently been remodeled and so it is awesome! it is probably one of my favorite aparments on my misison. but we live in a town called Etna, Wyoming.

the people out here are really excited that we are out here. the stake president is super nice and all the bishops that we have met are super nice. in the past there have been only 1 set of missionaries to cover the 2 stakes out here in star valley and the missionaires would never make it up to where we are at because it was too far away, but now that we cover their own stake, so they are super excited and they have a lot of missionary work to be done. so we are excited to be here and hopefully i am here for a while becuase the people love to feed us dinner which i am totally ok with. the poeple alwalys just sign up to feed us which is awesome. but anwyays i love it out here and hopefully i don't freeze, but our trailer is super warm so anyways that was our week this week.

Jan. 17, 2012

transfer day is tomorrow, and guess what...i am getting transferred again... i am actually going to star valley, wyoming.  i am going with my old companion Elder Ortiz, and i really got along with him so that it is going to be really fun. things have been going pretty good this week. we had 2 baptisms on saturday, so that was pretty awesome. a 9 year old boy named Mike got baptized and he was super excited about his baptism and was really happy, but it was a good experience. and also this other girl named Heather who is 14 got baptized. and she is the one who is a foster child and her foster parents live here in south ogden and she was super golden and pretty much wanted to be baptzied when we had our first lesson with her. it is going to be sad leaving this area and to be so far away from the people when they get baptized but i am always looking forward. 

Jan. 10, 2012

things have been pretty good this week. we had the confirmation of one of our investigators named lisa, and it was really good, we also had another good thing happen. we had one of our recent converts named toby, who was baptized last month, was able to batpize his 8 year old daughter so that was really awesome. but thigns are going really good for him and his family. so that is exciting. but also we have 2 more baptisms coming up this weekend, which we are excited for. but they are for these 2 people. one of them is a 9 year old boy named mike who is really excited to be baptized and then the other one of is for this 14 year old girl named heather, who is actually a foster kid and she is living with this active family. so it is really awesome.

 

but i don't know if you have heard about the ogden shooting that happned recently, but anyways it happened on 33rd street and we live on 36th street. we really didn't hear anything, but we saw about a million cop cars fly by our apartment which was pretty crazy, and we actually followed them to the place and there were about 40 cops there which was pretty crazy. but anyways there was this other misisonary companionship that actually serves in that area and they were in a lesson really close to where it happened, but anyways they heard everything. 

Jan. 3, 2012

i am proud to report that we had another baptism this week. it was this lady named lisa lowrey. i have actually only taught her twice but my companion had been teaching her for about the past month or so. but anyways she came to the conclusion that the church was true when she prayed for about 5 hours one day. so that was pretty awesome. we met with her this past wednesday and she wanted to be baptized on the next monday. so we made it happen last night and it was amazing.

 

we are teaching some people whose names are melody and angel and angel has been in prison for the past 4 years and just barely got out a couple of months ago and while she was in prison her kids joined the church and her son is actually on a mission on arkansas. but anyways we took them to the baptism last night that we had and melody told us that she felt a lot better about bapism becuase she thought that a mormon baptism was when she stood in front of the whole congregation during sacrament meeting and then poured a bucket of water on her and called her baptized! haha when she told us that i was like. wow, good thing that we took her to a baptism and it was pretty funny too becuase we had a dinner/lesson at their house afterwards and she has like seizures and stuff, and she is like on a lot of meds and she looked/acted as if she was high. but also angel didn't get a call from her son on christmas which kind of sucked also and so what we did was we called the arkansas misison president and asked if he could talk to his mom and he said that it would be ok, and so we called her son and talked to him and so then we set up a surpise phone call at the lesson and angel got to talk to her son for about 30 minutes so that was pretty awesome!

 

also one of our investigators, the one who is 88 years old, was supposed to be baptized on the 17th. but the old person home that he lives needs 30 days notice and also when he get's baptized they need to have atleast 2 employees in the font with him while he gets baptized. so we are going to have to wait a month for him to be baptized. so that is going to be kind of annyoing.