31 October 2017

Well, I'm going to start off with an apology: Yes, I did forget that our PDay got switched to Tuesday and so no one got warned I wouldn't email yesterday. With that, it made yesterday really weird. We woke up still half expecting it to be P Day and my companion was super sad about it the whole day. It ended up being even stranger after we had a door conversation with someone who still believes in the Egyptian gods and was trying to put down the Book of Mormon and the Bible as just "bedtime stories already in the Book of the Dead." We didn't really know what to say, so we invited him to have the English elders come over and teach him more of the Book of Mormon. He declined, saying that it was a man-made religion. That night we also had both of our appointments not be there, so that was fun.

On Saturday, our ward combined with one of the English wards to have a trunk or treat. It was a lot of fun, and we were able to go because one of our investigators showed up. They had the missionaries judge the costumes, and we declared the winners to be an older couple who dressed up as Carl and Ellie from Up. They were great, they had the grape soda buttons and everything. While talking to our investigator, we also got him to commit to go to church, and he did! After the trunk or treat, there were still hundreds of hot dogs left, and they filled up a pot with them and gave it to us and another companionship. So. Many. Hot dogs. We were splitting them up when we realized how ridiculous it looked and so we got a picture right as I was dropping one. 
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Sunday was pretty fun too. That was when our ward again combined with the English ward, but this time to have a primary program. So our poor bishop got to conduct the meeting in both Spanish and English, we sang all the hymns in both languages, and and the primary kids did some songs in Spanish as well. Our investigator really enjoyed it, and we got to teach him about prayer that night. It was super cool, and you could really feel the Spirit. Aside from that, not a whole lot happened this week. Randomly, I have a picture of my district and some super sketchy van that we found on the side of the road.

 

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23 October 2017

Well, we started off the week by going to the state fair. It was pretty awesome. Some of the rides were absolutely fantastic, and all of them spun. Like, all of them. I was going to try some fair food, but one of the rides just absolutely killed my stomach. It was one of those that spins you around super fast until you're stuck on the wall. I don't know why, but I couldn't do that one well. Which was really disappointing because right after that we saw deep-fried bacon wrapped Reeces. I'm pretty sure I found heaven. My favorite ride was one that would spin you around while slowly swinging you higher and higher until you were going all the way around it like everyone wants to do on swing sets. It was super crazy because it feels like you're upside down forever before the earth is coming back at you super fast and you're going to die. My companion didn't want to go on that one for whatever reason. And sorry, I forgot to get pictures of just about anything. I know, I know, I'm a terrible missionary. Speaking of which, we only found two Spanish people this week. We found around 7-8 referrals for the English missionaries, but we couldn't find any of our own this week. It was a little bit frustrating, but we're hoping this week is going to be better. Member work is super hard because no one gives any referrals. We don't know why, but we're going to try to kick them into high gear. Maybe we'll get a referral or two. This first transfer has gone by so fast! I don't want it to go this quick! I know Mom is reading this and sitting there thinking that it's not going nearly quick enough, but it's too much for me. Oh yeah, we also moved apartments. The one we'd been using the mission had for 7 years and it wasn't doing to well. So we just got to move into a far nicer and newly renovated apartment that is absolutely fantastic. It's maybe 400 feet down the road and in the same complex, but everything is so much newer and it actually all works! It's a miracle! Anyways, I think that's all of my news for the week! Have a good one everyone! This is weird person that I really like weird Elder (those are the exact words he told me to put under this.)



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Also, we just had a whipped cream challenge and I did it. So here's the video. ​

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16 October 2017

Ah, nothing quite like making a week sound so much more fun than it really ended up being in the title. That isn't to say that we didn't have our own share of adventures though. First off, we actually have people consistently keeping return appointments and reading out of the Book of Mormon! It took 5 weeks, but we finally have people to teach. One of them, Benjamin, even accepted a baptismal invitation! The other two we have are more hesitant about baptism, but are still progressing and interested in learning more. I don't know what made the difference exactly, but we've been working more effectively this week. It's been pretty great.

In less spiritual matters, it's been really crazy.  On Wednesday we were on transfers so I was actually driving, which is unusual for me. Even more unusual was the insane rain. It was so bad, we couldn't see much of the road, let alone the lines. It was really bad, and I'll try to send some videos of it that my exchange companion took. The roads were flooding, and it was the worst weather I've ever had to drive in. It was pretty crazy but still fun. I don't think I went more than half the speed limit that whole time it was raining super hard. We got to some intersection at the bottom of the hill that we thought might just kill the car to go through it until another car pulled it off instead of just bailing out over the median. Also, the next night, Thursday night our fire alarm decided that it didn't want to let us sleep and so it went off at 10:30. It then turned off a few minutes later, so we called the housing coordinator and asked him what to do. He said if it went off again, we should go outside and call the fire department. It did, and so we did. Nothing like two trucks coming in with lights and sirens late at night. To be fair, they turned off their sirens when they got into our apartment complex. A couple of firefighters hopped out and asked us what the problem was, and so we explained it. We led them back to our apartment to show them the detector, and that was when Elder Rolph got this picture of one of the trucks.

 

They came out a few minutes later saying it was just a faulty detector and we would be fine. They left, and we called our housing coordinator to explain. After that, it was about 11:30 and so we finally got to go to bed. So yeah, that's all of my exciting stuff for the week. Have a good one everybody! 

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​Sorry that these are a bit crazy, it was a tense night.

9 October 2017

Holy cow this week has been tiring, but good. Just yesterday we stopped by a potential without setting an appointment, and he was actually there instead of hiding from us! Not only that, but he was super receptive and we got our first baptismal date and he said he'll read the Book of Mormon. It's still a little hard to understand everything that they say because they always talk so fast, but I'm getting much better. Talking is harder, but I'm still working on it. I've gone from not being able to talk at all to being able to hold conversations, understand jokes, and keep up with almost everything in only ten weeks. It's super crazy how much the Lord can help us if we let him. We also met a young guy who is super open to learning more and wants a Book of Mormon, but his dad doesn't believe in what we teach at all and so it might get a little hard to keep him going. We'll keep trying though! Maybe his dad will open up more as we teach his son. Other than that it's still mostly been a lot of tracting. I got to go on exchanges with my MTC companion Wednesday, which was pretty cool. Even more so because our trainers were also MTC companions. Go figure. And yesterday a member showed up to priesthood meeting with a huge bag of ties and said that if they weren't all taken, they'd get thrown away. And so now I have a lot of ties. 
​This is maybe half of them. The weirdest part was that almost of them were purple, so now I have tons of purple ties. We also have a random spider who has a web right next to our apartment who we've been feeding random bugs to. It helps keep them out of our apartment. Also, I caught a frog in a jar. It sounds a lot harder than it really was, I just put the jar in front of him and then he hopped in. It was pretty cool, but I let him go like two minutes later and forgot to take a picture. Going back to how exhausting this week has been, it's been super hard to just get up in the mornings. We've managed it, but this is the result half the time: 
​Yeah. It's not pretty. This was during companion study when they make us watch tons of training videos because I'm a greenie. Elder Rolph also is insisting on training me to be a district leader because he's saying I'll be training and a district leader right after he's gone. I hope not, I don't feel ready for either of those at all. Especially training. I'm still trying to figure out what on earth I'm doing. Also, he's saying that he fell asleep because he was sick, but I don't think so. He's now saying that I'm lying, but whatever. anyways, that's all of the news for this week, have a good one and write me back!

Who asked how my Spanish is going? I can do a lot of the talking, but I don't like talking to new people very much so that's a bit of a struggle. I'm definitely getting a lot better with it though. With the band, yeah it gets pretty loud. Especially if you're by the drumline. Also, I find it rather surprising that Matt even knows what a soprano sax is. Do you know how he heard about it?

I tried to run a 5K today, but only made it to two miles. It's just so boring only running on a treadmill, and my companion doesn't like to run nearly as much as I do. Still, I got my mile time down to a 5:45, so that's good. It's really hard to do, but I'd say I'm getting much more in shape. It's been helping me just make it through the days without feeling like I'm dying by the end. We have a zone activity next week that I forgot to mention, we're going to the state fair. It looks like fun, but I'm having some trouble convincing Elder Rolph to go on the really big and scary stuff. He's opening up to the idea. 

Have fun in Louisiana! Hopefully the house will stay standing with only Tom in charge! And I've now sent two emails, so I hope together they're long enough!

2 October 2017

Well this is being weird and won't let me put a subject in, so sorry. It's been a pretty slow week in the work, but Conference was awesome! There were so many great talks, but I really loved Elder Holland's on how we don't have to be perfect, just doing our very best, and Elder Callister's because of his awesome defence of the Book of Mormon. Workwise, this week has just been a lot of tracting. So far, we've had one person keep their appointments, and no one has showed up to church or conference. We're going to keep trying though! A few days ago we got lost on a greenway and couldn't figure out how to get to where we were supposed to, but we at least ended up by an awesome lake. This state is super picturesque, but is really hot and humid. This week was in the 90's for most of it. And humid. I thought I was dying, but then it cooled down into the 60's. I don't understand this weather. And we saw some deer out our apartment's window! I went out and got a picture, but they didn't let me get within 20 feet. I did my best though. Elder Rolph and I are planning on trying some new spots to tract at soon, so we're hoping for more success there. We also found this apartment complex that has tons of Hispanics, so we're going back to there too. Well, here's hoping we can do better!

This is one of the Elders in our district riding a bike on a car

Here's the lost lake

And some deer pictures


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