Hey
surprise it's me! And I'm definitely being transferred. After 5
straight transfers in the same zone, I'm being moved.. Back to the
city! I'm going to South Ogden to serve as a Zone Leader with Elder
Kuczak. Which I am absolutely thrilled about. I've been in areas that
are 80% farms for like 18 months out of my mission. And I'm being
transferred back into the heart of Ogden - actually, we're going to be
covering the stake where the mission office is. So I'll probably be
spending a lot more time there! My companion is going to be awesome
too.. My first one from outside of the country! I'm pretty sure he's
from Ontario. Elder Sillito has been a super awesome companion and
we've seen a lot of success. I've also had an absolute blast in Brigham
City; the leadership, members, and missionary work here are all just
incredible. It's going to take a lot to exceed or even match my
experience here. I'm leaving behind 4 people with baptismal dates
(again!) who I'm going to continue to pray for, but from what I have
heard the South Ogden stake is booming right now. Fingers crossed! :)
Thank you all for your birthday wishes! I must admit, it
doesn't feel a whole lot different to be 21 as compared to being 20. It
also didn't feel too much like a birthday because I was in church all
day. The one piece of birthday-glimpse that I saw was actually really
funny. We've been teaching a family with 4 kids for a bit now and 3 of
them are getting baptized on the 7th of September. They're all insanely
ADHD and have struggles focusing in lessons. On Sunday we went over to
their house for dinner and a lesson, and after dinner I whipped out the
Despicable Me pinata! But.. Me being crafty, I wanted to keep all the
candy to myself.. So I dumped out all the candy secretly beforehand and
filled the pinata with breath mints and uncooked pasta. Much to the
children's dismay as they destroyed the pinata, the minion was no
longer filled with skittles and suckers, but NOODLES dropped to the
ground. I was laughing my head off as they all called me a liar and
said it was "the worst pinata ever!" ... But hey. I got it on video, so
it was all worth it. I'm gonna miss their family a ton - we went with
them over to Clarkston, Utah (a small town that was back in my area in
Richmond) to go see the Martin Harris pageant. I'm seriously going to
try my hardest to go back to Brigham to see the baptism in 3 weeks.
It's always really hard to leave an area especially when you find and
teach so many people that you come to love so much. But change always
leads to growth. :)The facebook-ing is going really well. We're trying to get the members in the area involved more and more. If you've been reading my posts, I've been trying to share short, powerful testimonies with quotes and scriptures. We went to a sacrament meeting on Sunday and it was high council Sunday.. And when the high councilman got up he told everyone how much good Elder Sillito and I were doing teaching online. He then read 3 of our posts that we've put up. Member trust through the roof? You bet! :) Another funny thing that happened all day Sunday was that people were wishing me a happy birthday. And I couldn't figure out how they knew.. Until I realized that I was facebook friends with like, everyone in the ward. I thought it was pretty funny. It's been a bit of a slower week for teaching other than that - we've been trying to set up the area for transfers and have spent more time solidifying appointments and building relationships with members than trying to find new people. We've been getting a lot more referrals lately though so my replacement will have plenty of things to do. A member in our area took us to the top of Willard Peak on a Jeep ride last week - definitely going to have to take dad there in my Jeep some day! On the way up the super sketchy rocky trail we passed a guy driving a Mustang convertible.. And we asked him why he was driving such a nice car. His response? "Two word.. Rental car." Hahaha! This is why I would never want to own a rental car business. People take 'creative liberties' and act stupid because it's not their car. Actually, that's probably how the church feels about missionaries driving church vehicles, come to think of it.. Oops. :)
Mom - Thanks for updating the blog! I guess people actually still read it and follow it. And thanks for the birthday package. I've already eaten all of the fruit snacks, needless to say. We ate at HuHot last week with 4 missionaries and someone walked up to us and dropped a $50 bill on the table. So I got to use the money you sent me to buy some new shorts, which I desperately needed. I discovered that I have a full thing of concerta left.. So that might last me until the end. You'd better hope so.. Otherwise my investigators might struggle! I can't believe Ryan kicked you out for his patriarchal blessing.. What a scrub! I'm so glad that he's finally choosing to progress though. Lots of prayers! So my laptop finally died? I'm going to have to make sure I get all of the music and stuff off of it. Can't afford to lose all of that! It's so weird to think that I'm almost 2 years behind in music releases.. Especially since I dumped my iPod over a year ago. Blessings for sacrifice!
Dad - What a long e-mail this week! Tell Evan that I'm glad he remembered my birthday. :) Don't even get me thinking about President Faldmo being released! I'm about to freak out! It's also super strange to think that Zack Kelly is getting married soon.. And that Matt & Kim are going to the temple! I'll try to be there in Spirit. So you weren't too keen with your experience with the .50 cal? I'll have you know that they're not that scary. I know that because of my Call of Duty days. I actually pulled off a lot of kills shooting that gun from the hip while doing 720's off of the roof of a building. And you try and tell me it's not realistic... Hahaha :) Am I going to get the Jeep back? I guess if Ryan's going to be taking off then I'll take it back again. I hope I don't get any of the fun back problems you and Ryan got. I was at the trampoline park last week and did 3 backflips in a row before I botched my landing and hit the springs on my back.. And that was my first thought. I don't want arthritis! We led the zone in lessons online and in person this week again. Hopefully the South Ogden zone is a wee bit more motivated.. Maybe in a perfect world! :)
I love you all so much! This is the most excited I have ever been to be transferred to another area. This is basically my dream area with an awesome companion... The perfect way to finish my last 3 months as strong as I can. When I talked to Elder Kuczak at the leadership training yesterday he told me that the area is on the verge of exploding. More on that next Tuesday. Thanks for all of your prayers and love. You're the best. :)
Love,
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