Holy Member Missionary Work!

These week members have been helping us so much and I love it so much! We have been giving them the challenge to write their tesitmony in the Book of Mormon we give them and then give it to someone that they know whether they be active or not active or they can give it back to us so that when we give out Book of Mormons, they have a testimony of how the Book of mormon has changed their lives. The members have been taking it well and they been doing it. This Sunday we had 3 people come up to us and ask for Book of Mormons to do just that because people announced in church that they did that and it got people excited.

We met with Frank and Annie this week for a lesson. We taught about enduring to the end. But we also learned something during our visit. It is Annie's divorce that we are waiting for. After it is done, Frank can marry Annie and then Frank can get baptized. We also asked Frank if he had any concerns about what has been taught to him, but he has none and he is totally gong hough on getting baptized as soon as he gets married. So we are still waiting for that. Big waiting game!

We also asked Cade about his permission with his father. He just got permission to recieve the lessons! Yay, we can start teaching him! Problem is that the person that wants to teach him at his house is on vacation in India and won't be back in 3 weeks. So, we are probably going to teach him somewhere else like at young mens or at another persons house. Cade is really mature about it so we believe he is understanding all of this gospel talk. He is still good for the baptismal date for March 14 and hopefully we will be to if we teach him everything. But if everything falls into place, we should have no problem with it.

This ward I believe is what I thought every ward was going to be like when I got in the mission. The ideal golden ward. However, the same thing can not be said for the other wards in the stake we are in. We had a meeting as a zone with a person from the high council I believe. He kinda oversees the missionary work here in the stake. But here is the thing. It was just mainly him complaining for members that missionary work is too hard and that the missionaries don't know who their missionaries are. He was saying that ALL members go to bed at 12 and wake up at 5 so they have it hard. I kinda have a hard time believing that all members go by that schedule. And if they don't want to meet with us, that is fine. There is nothing else we can do than just to invite them to here us. But when they complain to this high council guy, that is kinda taking it too far. When member missionary work works, it is amazing! When it doesn't, then the work is brutal for the missionaries. If members don't help the missionaries in the ward, then the transfer is going to be a long while. And it is almost like it is torture for the missionaries.

The members have been giving us a lot of names to see and I am so grateful for them doing that. That way we don't waste our time just tracting 24/7 which I don't believe in at all. It is all about meeting with members and helping them understand what is being asked of them. As a missionary, it is not all about obedience. It is all about love. If you love the Lord and the people you are serving with, then the rest of the attributes that a missionary should have will fall into place. 

Jeez it has only been the first week of this transfer. That was a long week! I hope it doesn't be like this the rest of the week this transfer. Well, that is all I have to report on. But guess what?! 24 more weeks left! ;) Love you all!

Transfers come with surprises and the Sunday even came with more surprises

 This was an exausting week! Getting ready for transfers was a tiredsome event. Olsen wanted to say goodbye to a couple of people. Plus he had to pack and he was nervous of who he was going to get as well. Like I said last time, transfers is a nerve racking kind of time. We didn't know what was going to happen. The ward was pretty sad that Elder Olsen had to go. They were grateful for his service to this ward and helping them in the missionary work. He will be missed I guess.

So now the moment you have been waiting for. Transfers and the results for them. Now Elder Olsen got to go to the North Calgary Stake with a no so popular missionary. Actually, he is quite hated for some reasons. I hope he will do well with him. We heard that the area was good so that is alright. Elder Carlton got Elder Behm who I like very much even though he hasn't been out for quite sometime. He is cool. Then there is me. I didn't get a companion who was still north. I got one who was coming from the South which was good because I wasn't a fan of the missionaries I saw from the north. So I went to transfers a bit later with the Zone Leaders to get my companion. And my companion is Elder Wiser who is a cool kid.  He has been our for 13 months now and he is from Logan, Utah. Surprise was through was when he was called to be my companion, they also said he was a district leader. Now we had no idea this was coming. We just knew the Spanish Elders who were district leaders left our zone and so we thought they were going to divide out the sisters into the remaining districts. But nope, Elder Wiser is so the district leader over the 17th wards sisters and the Arbor Lake Sisters. You know what that makes me? The DLB again!!! YAY!!!!! But we can't really go on exchanges with the sisters, but we can go with the zone leaders.

Elder Wiser is sweet! He likes soccer and likes music just like I do. He doesn't play music, but he loves to listen to it. He looks super young and many people think he has only been out for a couple of months. Haha! I will probably send you a picture sometime.

This week has been mostly finishing up the Lost Sheep work. We either get no one is home oe people just send us away. We weren't really expecting anything else. The ward was hoping that we get imformation about them.

However, our members are so much in the missionary mind. They have been giving us refferalls and also bringing their friends to church. It is pretty dang awesome. The Jones family brought that chinese woman again named Grace. She really wants to study our beliefs to think of a decision. We have been trying to set up an appointment with her. Hopefully that follows through.

Plus I have news on Cade our "investigator". The reason I put it as quotes because we haven't taught him quite yet, but he wants to learn more. He just needs to get his dads permission still. But good progress is being made because his dad bought him a full quad set of scriptures. Plus Cade has chosen his baptismal date already. March 14! We were freaking out when we heard this news! It is awesome! We just have to start teaching him however!

Question time:

1. How is the eczema?

Still getting better. Still have quite a bit on the legs, but everywhere else is fine.

 2. how old were the boys?

Around 15ish. The boy was nativeish that stole the stuff. The others wre just watching. They didn't steal anything else.

Question #3, could you tell as missionaries that the person was getting confused or just overwhelmed?

Usually I can tell when that happens. I think most missionaries can tell, but we don't want to get in the way too much when the members wanna teach.

Well, got to resume our P-day. Love you guys! Take care!

Eczema is getting better, and a very interesting week!

Well, things are getting better here this week. My eczema is getting a lot better since I got the medication. Most of it on my arms has gone away and on my face and back. There is still quite a bit on it on the back of my leg. But I think if I just apply it as I have been instructed then it will not get as bad. So that is great that that is getting better. :)

The work here is progressing better and better now. Our ward is getting more missionary minded. One family brought a family to church which is great. Only one thing I wasn't really happy about when that happened, the family in gospel principles attacked the person with our beliefs. The just stuffed doctrine down the families throat so we missionaries had to take over and start from the beginning with an organized lesson and taught them the first discussion in gospel principles. They seemed to understand it. But we learned later from the Mandarin Elders that she couldn't think that the first vision was possible and no one could know that. Maybe she missed a point in our lesson or she just couldn't accept it to be true. I thought it was a pretty good lesson, but there is just so much you can do I guess.

Funny story though: So we were at the Zone Leaders Pad which is Brother Pitchers home discussing what we are going to do for our P-day. While we were talking about it, Elder Carlton saw some boys going through the Zone Leaders car. We took after them telling them to get lost. Elder Carlton tackled one of them and got back what they stolen from the car which was coins and sunglasses. It was a pretty hyped up day for us! We learned then to lock our cars wherever we go. :/

As you know, Transfers are this week and yes we got a notice that Elder Olsen is going to get transferred. He is staying north however so he won't be going far. I don't know if my companion is coming from the south or from the north. Either or I am nervous who my new companion is going to be. :/ I do believe you guys know my feelings on transfers. It is so nerve racking! You just don't know if you are going to get a companion who will ruin your life for the next transfer or they will make your next transfer the best.

There are 2 other elder companionships that are getting affected this transfer. Elder Shumway and Elder Heuer are getting transferred. That means the American Fork group is now going to only two people in our district. It won't be the 1-801 district anymore. Haha! Oh well man.

Now time for questions:

 #1 - Did you have anything besides hot chocolate to draw peoples' attention to a group of missionaries?

We do a couple of surveys here and there. But usually hot chocolate is the thing to go. They give us a lot of ideas that we can do, but we haven't quite tried them yet.

#2 - How did you keep the hot chocolate warm and "advertise" to people that you had hot chocolate to share?

We had a cooler to hold the hot chocolate, but it wasn't that big so we ran out pretty fast. We just went to the people and offered hot chocolate and a Mormon.org.

#3 - Did you have to get permission from the city or somebody else to do what you did?

Not that we know of. We just do it and no one says anything. I think it is only when we are selling something that we have get permission or something.

 #4 - What are your district meetings and zone conferences like? How often do you do them?

We do district meetings every Tuesday at 10:30 unless transfer week where we do them on Monday. For Zone Conference that is every other transfer. So about 3 months. District meetings are usually the same pattern. Opening stuff, reporting, training, closing stuff. Zone conference is pretty much the same, but expanded out more where there are a lot trainings from different people.

Well that is all that happened this week. Here are a couple of pictures of our district. Love you all! I will tell you who my new companion is next week. Bye!

Eczema is getting worse....and worse

First thing is first. That picture I sent last week was not a recent one. That was when I was 10 months out so around June. It was just some glasses from a gas station that I decided I wanted to try on. I didn't have eczema then. Speaking of that, as you can see from the subject title of this email, my eczema is getting horrible. I have to itch a lot and it is spreading like crazy. The nurse for our mission told me to go to a doctor, but they are not open until today. So hopefully I can get an appointment and get something to help it. My face has gotten worst, my right arm is terrible and it is spreading to my side. It is not a good picture. I am doing all I can do to try to sustain it or get it better. It just sucks. New years has happened and you know what that means? New time for Church. Our church time has rescheduled to 9:00 in the morning, the earliest one I have been to so far on my mission and probably will stay that way. So far, none of our investigators have come to the new church time. Maybe they don't know or their fellow shippers didn't tell them or something. You guys remember Richard? Ya, he contacted us and said he was having a hard time believing in God. Our WML proposed we give him the movie, God's Not Dead. So we went and bought it at Wal-Mart and gave it to Richard to watch. He really likes movies and hopefully this solves his concern or something. We'll see. As you all know, this week was new years. We had to be in a members home or at our own apartment. We went to the Pitchers and played risk with other missionaries while the new years night was going on. The Pitchers showed us the ball drop at the New York plays which brought back good memories. We had fun. This week was pretty slow for missionary work as people were still busy or gone. We did as much member work, but that didn't do too much. So we focused on the last bunch on the lost sheep and so we are done with that list. Now we are mainly just waiting for good referrals from the ward. Also on Friday, our District went downtown to do a hot chocolate stand. It went...alright. It was cold as fetch. I think we took more Hot Chocolate than giving out to people. It was that cold. I wasn't in the best dress anyway so I kinda have to blame myself for that one. Alright Question Time! 1. What kind of goals do you set each week?  Or month?  Or day? Realistic goals for our area. As personal ones, mine so far is just having a good attitude and have an effective study. 2.Dallin sent in his mission papers and is now waiting for his call.  Wouldn't it be awesome if he got called to Canada?!!!   Fetch yes that would be awesome! This mission is pretty sweet and I think he would like that here! Sorry for only the brief explanation this week. Like I said, nothing too exciting happened this week. This week is board week and so maybe one of us will get a training call. I haven't trained before so I don't know what is going to happen. We still think Olsen is leaving. I don't like transfers because it is so nerve racking. One companion can turn your area and life terrible. That is what I am afraid of. Love you all!

First 4 days were a blast, the last 3 days were the worst!

This week started great! All the Christmas dinners and caroling with members and just the Spirit of Christmas was everywhere. Even as missionaries we celebrated together by playing boardgames, eating together at the Pitchers. It was just great! P-day was fun as well. We went ice skating! It has been a while since I have done that, but I didn't forget how to do it. I was pretty good. We had a lot of fun as a zone and also as a district! I just love the Christmas season wherever I go. It just that happiness and that excitment when it comes to Christmas! Plus thank you for the Christmas package and the cards I got from you guys. It lets me know how much you guys care about  me and what I am doing out here. Thank you for thinking about me.

The Skype call was nice, or Hangout. Whatever we used...It was great! It was pretty dang exciting to talk to you guys and tell you most of what is going on in the mission face to face. I wonder what we will talk about the next time we Hangout/Skype call. Probably plans on coming home or stuff like that. For Christmas morning we got up and opened our Christmas packages to see what we got. Elder Olsen got a lot of neat stuff and a lot of money. Lucky him! His family also got me a sweater and I must say it is a snazzy sweater. I like it! I love the book that you guys got me. I read it most of the Sunday meetings. It helps clear up somethings that I had troubles thinking about. Also thank you so much for that piano guys cd as well. I really like those guys and most missionaries don't for some reason. Meh, oh well. After opening presents we had this big brunch at the members we were skyping. We were so full after drinking so many egg nog, and lots and lots of waffles. Sooooooooooooo good!

After Skyping, we went to the Philippino's home and ate with them. Because of the Brunch we didn't eat much so ya. Still it was a great dinner that we had. But after dinner we had to be in by 6 so we went back home and enjoyed playing Risk for the rest of the night.

The next three days were just...terrible. Not only because there was no one who would set up appointments with us, but because everything wasn't going our way. Olsen lost his wallet and had to get ANOTHER money card so that didn't help the situation. Plus we went shopping for our hygiene stuff, but for some reason, the store we went to was closed so we couldn't smell nice for like 2 days. It was a hard 3 days. There were many times where we just wanted to go home and not do anything. Plus, Olsen got sick on Saturday so that didn't help either. It was meh.

But now we are doing better. Things are going back to what they should be going back to so that is a good thing. But we will see what this new year will bring us. I hope it will be better than the last one. The last one started great with two great companions, but started spiraling down the two companions after that. Eugh! That sucked so bad. But now I know how to deal with certain companions so I am good now. Another thing that is pretty cool is that our district wants to make shirts and one of our things that we are going to put on our shirt is 1-801 because the one is for the British Elder in our district and the 801 is for us Utah Elders. I will try to get a picture of it for you guys when they are all done. Well, thank you so much for your support this year and love you all for doing so. I wish you all a happy new year and hope that this will be great one!

Caroling Galore

NON-STOP CAROLING! We have been singing a ton this week for the Christmas season and I am not sick of the Christmas Carols yet. It was pretty dang cool how many people were so receptive to us singing to them. Not only did we carol as a district again, but some members yesterday took us caroling as well to a whole bunch of less actives. We had a lot to eat as well. They usually feed us like some mexican alad which is a big deal here because mexican food up hear is very expensive. We usually love members who serve us mexican food.

We couldn't really see our investigators this week because of two things: 1. They were gone for the Christmas season. and 2. Some of them had the flu and couldn't meet up. Frank and Annie were gone for this week it seemed so we couldn't meet up with them. Cade got super sick this week and we couldn't communicate with him. However, one of the members of the Stake Presidency told us that he basically told his dad that he and his entire family is going to be baptized. They even prepared for it by buying new suits and scriptures. The situation there is pretty complicated. Cade lives with his mom and stepdad, but wants to get permission from his real dad for the lessons. That is what we are waiting for. Come to think of it, both of our investigators are waiting games. All we can do it wait till they get permission or till someone finalizes his divorce. :/

Question time:

1. How does this time of year affect your teaching of your investigators and work with less active members?
Meh, it kinda makes a difference, but not by much. Christmas is usually time where investigators are gone and less-actives are always home. I don't think I told you this, but our mission is mainly less-active work and it probably always will be.

2. How did you know how many times the word atone or atonement are in the scriptures?

I have this book called "The Continous Atonement" by Brad Wilcox. I am a big fan of Brad Wilcox and his talks because not only are they interesting, but they are so simple, but complex at the same time. Missionaries out here like to talk about deep stuff which I am fine with. I have no objection to it, but sometimes you have to use hard words or wierd thoughts to do that. Brad doesn't do that. He keeps it simple and I love that.

3. Do you correspond much with other full time missionaries that were friends or fellow ward members before your mission?

A bit yeah. Sometimes it comes up about memories coming home, sometimes it doesn't.

Sorry for the short letter, but we are going to talk on Thursday so you can tell me whatever you want there. I believe the rule still stands as long as we are not a inconvenience or bothering the member, we can talk however long we want. But I guess its your call. We can use Google Hangout or Skype. I will set up both accounts just in case one doesn't work. By the way, a member invited us over at 10:30 and said we can use her laptops. We can begin at 11:30 or sooner or later. Just let me know as soon as possible. Love you all and see you on Thursday!

Surprise after Surprise after Surprise!

Well hello everyone! This week was just...great! Lot's of good tidings of great joy that happened here! First off, we had ZTMs this time instead of DDMs. Our entire zone got together and had a little training. This training was on how do we as missionaries fit in the restoration. It was a pretty good training. It was just on how we as missionaries can tie everything back to the Restoration of the Gospel! It is nothing I already heard before, but it is a good reminder to learn about these things.

Now Wednesday was great because it was our Mission party. All the missionaries from the north went to this gathering and it was just like last year at Christmas. President bought us pizza and you can probably guess that I went crazy on it! You know I like pizza! Anywho, after eating, President Nicholas shared his family tradition of Christmas. It was mainly telling the story of the birth of Jesus Christ of what happened in the America's. We sang a lot of songs together as a mission and you could definately feel the Spirit of Christmas there. Now, I told you that this party was like last years party with President, but there was one quirk. Previously, President told us that they were playing "Meet the Mormons" in a movie theater in South Calgary. He told us we couldn't go to it or proselyte near it. However, he said he got permission from Salt Lake to show us the movie, and he pulled out the dvd! We were screaming and cheering because we were so happy to see this movie that has come out! I have to say I really liked it. *SPOILERS* The beginning was hilarious with all the rumors that were said about us. And...I have to admit, BUT I WASN'T ALONE, the ending was really emotional with the missionary mom. Most of the missionaries in the party were sniffing and crying a bit when that was playing.There are only two church videos I get emotional on now. "Meet the Mormons" and the Tyler Haws Mormon Message. But other than that I am good!

I also had interviews with President on Thursday and it was actually very good. We looked back on how I had progressed as a missionary. He could see it as well and could tell I was changing for the good. I also asked him about Google Hangout. He said I was allowed to use it. I have never used it before so I guess this is new to me. However, you can have more than one tablets or people on Skype as well.

We also went caroling as a district thie Saturday! It was pretty fun. We took a portable piano with us so that we could plug it into peoples houses when they came to hear us sing to them. I was the Piano player and Elder Shumway was the guitar player. The singers were Elder Olsen, Elder Olson, Elder Heuer, and Elder Carlton. It went pretty well! We sometimes changed the beat up for songs so they could be a bit catchy. We may go to a C-Train station and perform there. We sing and then we hand out the He is the Gift Christmas Cards that we got from the mission. That is another thing that the mission is focusing on is the He Is the Gift video.

There was a carol festival as well this Sunday that we went to. It was held at our Stake Center, but there were choirs of all sorts all around Calgary that were there. It was beautiful and I loved it! I would love to see it again.

Now it is question time!

 Question #1, do you guys ever shovel snow for service?

Yes we can do that, but like I said last week, it was mostly sunny so all our zone was gone.

Question #2, is there any more information on when your mission might begin using tablets?

We don't know too much. We just keep hearing they will come soon...:/

Well, we still need to establish a time for Skype so let me know as soon as possible when is the best time.

Also, without looking it up or searching it, how many times is the word Atone or atonement in the new testament? the book of mormon? Love you all!