1 Feb 2016

Big week. I got a new companion and we lost our car.... sooo that's been fun. My comp is a cool guy and a good kid but he hates walking so that's a challenge we need to work on overcoming, and just figuring out how to be productive on foot.

Monday- I wrote a lot on my studies of Ammon and Lamoni and it wasn't my best writing. I feel like it probably didn't do the actual story justice but in the chapters where Ammon is taken prisoner to when the Anti-Nephi-Lehis come about, there's a lot of parallels to modern day missionary work. At E-mails I met my new comp for a few seconds, and he is a super goofy kid. The opposite of Elder Gillespie in how he acts around people. Oh and when we met him he was under the impression we would have a car. Then as soon as we left e-mails the APs give us a call saying we are not going to have a car anymore... It was awesome to finally get my debit card just because, you know, its nice to actually have money. We went bowling again for p-day but I was cool with it because this time
*drumroll* I could actually pay!!! We spent the entire proselyting time pretty much just talking with Patricia and Mike, They are slowly making progress, but they need a lot of help.

Tuesday- We spent like 2-3 ours at the Chevy dealership because of a recall on the car and they told us it would be like 30 min tops.... so that was kind of annoying. Most of the afternoon was spent packing and prepping for transfers. We got a call and just like I thought, the Spanish Elders are moving in with us again. This time we have four beds so no one is living on the couch. Most of the night was Elder Gillespie just saying his farewells to investigators and recent converts.

Wednesday- Transfers!!!!!! So we spent most of the morning at the transfer site and it was cool to see all the missionaries that I haven't seen for like 3 months, Obviously the highly anticipated part was meeting Elder Browning. Super crazy kid and has been out for 6 months in a small farm town. For those back home just imagine Gresham. Not a lot of people but most of them are members, so he has to get used to serving in a city and I have to figure out how to make this transfer work without a car. Making back up plans is a lot harder now. After all the transfers where finished and we got Elder B settled in a bit, we walked across our area to meet up with Patricia and Mike.  One thing that's been helping them overcome their problems is taking walks so they walked us to dinner and we had a good conversation. They both took to Elder Browning really well. Patricia is about to move into a new apt. out of our area and Mike never technically lived in our area so it will be a little rough for her to move into  a new stake/ward but we are still planning on seeing her once a week at the V.C with the new Elders she will be with. We ended the night at the Visitors Center (V.C). Elder B just became a District leader so he had some interviews to do. Once those finished we watched the God's Plan video with the family he interviewed. That movie is sooo cheesy but it does a good job of inviting the Spirit and teaching on eternal families.

Thursday- Starting last night Elder B noticed I had apple juice and he's like, "did you know that gives you crazy dreams?"  I told him that's exactly why I have it (I've had a dream almost every night of my mission). Not all of my dreams make sense but now every night he asks what I dreamed about and he's going to start drinking apple juice every night also. So today we had a correlation with the Z.Ls because Elder B is new to being a District leader.  The Z.Ls pick where to meet and we decided to do a lunch/meeting at Buffalo Wild Wings. We walked in and we all had the same thought, "this is probably the most worldly place we could have chosen." So we all talked and what not and even in BWW members pay for us. I'm very appreciative but also very tired of it. They always say, "Oh I have a son on a mission and I know he's always saying they don't have money,.."  I think to myself, "Just give this money to your son then!" I just feel wrong when I get money for being a missionary. We got back home and we are still having trouble with the whole figuring out how to make this work on foot, We wasted a ton of time walking to a stake center to make copies, then our dinner appointment tried to pick us up at our apt. and we were trying to call and tell them we weren't there but they wouldn't answer. They got to the apt and the Spanish Elders had just moved in and when they pulled up the Spanish Elders answered in their p-day clothes, The guy was super confused and thought we were slackers for a while until we got the chance to explain everything. We finished the night meeting with a guy named David, I might have mention him before, but he's like super prepared. He turned his life around a few years back and got a huge testimony of Christ and His atonement, but he has never really attended a church. We have a lesson set up for the visitor center and it should be awesome.

Friday- I'm just going to start summarizing. The biggest thing that happened today was going to Chick-fil-A with the Spanish Elders. Then later  we just set a baptismal date with our investigator Jason. So I hope you could pick up the sarcasm in that but we are super excited for Jason. He's ready to go. He keeps his commitments, the ward has taken him in and he was hesitant to make a date just because he wanted to know EVERYTHING, I guess he's finally had enough witnesses and he's on track to be baptized on the 20th. Then later we went to the V.C to have a lesson with the Criders. The mom is less active and coming back and the four kids are all getting on track to be baptized. They have no relatives in Idaho so the mom has felt alone for a while and was hesitant to let the ward in. But now she's doing a lot better that she was and the ward is treating her awesome, and its looking really good for this family. Elder B never had the chance to teach at the V.C before and he's kind of fallen in love with it. Partly because its easy to teach lessons there and I think partly because you always run into other missionaries there.

This week has been awesome but also really different and kind of challenging.  All in all we cover one of the most compact stakes in the mission so walking isn't that terrible. I just want the snow and ice to go away so we can bike.

Hope you guys are all doing great, have an awesome week