Richard's Mission Address

Elder Richard Aufdermauer
Michigan Detroit Mission
33505 State St. Ste. 101
Farmington, MI 48335

Monday, November 21, 2011

#64- Back in Order

This week has been great. 

We've done a lot of referral work this week, we had 24 referrals that were not updated correctly or at all. We set out to to contact all of them this week and try to sort the wheat from the tares. We have reduced our referrals down to 12 with about 6 that we have yet to contact, and a few of them that we were already teaching. Most of these referrals date back to June and July with one all the back to February, it feels really good to have everything back in order. 


Part of Monday November 14, Friday November 18 & Saturday November 19 went to trying to contact Referrals.


Monday November 14, 2011: We switched our Preparation Day to Thursday so that we could go to the Temple with the Pickett's. Just what the above states, we used a big chunk of time to look for and try to get in contact with some referrals. We were able to contact a few of them.


Thursday November 17, 2011: We went to the Temple with the Pickett's. It was great! I love going there. Later in the evening we went to see Mary Cook (LA) the Pinto's came with us to fellowship. We had a great lesson with her on the Gospel. She opened up and we addressed some of the concerns that she has. She's not quite ready to come to church, she says, so we are giving her some time to warm up to it. 


Saturday November 19, 2011: It was a good day. We did our normal Saturday day morning routine. At 8 AM we were at the Church to play Basketball with some less actives and a few members. There were 8 total including Elder Lewis and I. That's the most we've had in a couple a weeks. It was really fun. We then went to go do service at the Church across from Danita's car wash in Detroit. That was great too, and then out to find a few more referrals. We found one, Max, he was really interesting. He records music at his house and apparently he has a song playing on the Radio. He seams to be really religious but has a lot of mixed beliefs. He is really open to having us over more, he knows that we are doing the service of God. 


Sunday November 20, 2011: We had a really cool experience last night. After we stopped by an investigator family, the appointment we had after that canceled on us. We parked the car in a nearby parking lot and took a look at our GPS. "Who should we stop by?" as we looked for a few minutes I got a feeling to go stop by Cassie, a less active that we haven't been able to get in contact for awhile. We got there and she let us come in to see her, she expressed that just moments ago she was praying, and asking for guidance, when just a few minutes later we pulled up in front of her house. It is definitely a testimony builder that God really does guide us to where we need to be.


I love you all. Hope things are going well. Hope everybody has a great Thanksgiving!


Tune in next week for more of "Richard's Mission Adventures!!!"


~Elder Richard Aufdermauer :)

Monday, November 14, 2011

#63- Good - Bad - Good

This last week has gone by pretty fast.

Like I said last week on Monday, November 7, 2011: Elder Lewis and I went to The Henry Ford museum and did the Rouge Factory Tour, it was a lot of fun.

Tuesday November 8, 2011: We saw Matt today, he is the media referral that we got a few weeks ago. He ordered a Book of Mormon. He told us that he loved Jacob 5 and that he was at Mosiah 3. Don't know how far he is now, but we'll find out this week. After seeing Matt we got our hair cut. Michelle, who works at the barber shop we went to cuts missionaries hair for free, it's really nice of her. Not much more happened the rest of the day. We stopped by a few more people.

Wednesday November 9, 2011: All day was taken up by Specialized Training. We left at 7:30 in the morning to go pick up some other missionaries and got home around 6pm, then we went out and tried to find a few people.

Thursday November 10, 2011: Cool thing today was that we had a lesson with Mary (LA) and we watched the Finding Faith in Christ DVD and after our discussion about it, she gave us a lesson about Bumble Bees. She even brought some from work to show us. It was really cool.

Friday November 11, 2011: Probably the best yet worst day of the week. We had 5 set appointments 3 cancelled on us. It's tough when an awesome day planned gets pulled apart. The other 2 were good lessons. We saw Danita, we helped her paint some more. I think we finished all the painting now. We shared some scriptures to help out with something she's struggling with. Later in the day we saw Rosy and addressed some of her concerns and things she needs help with, we also put Rosy on date for December 24. And to end the day we were blessed when Sean (Member) called us up and invited us over and as an extra bonus, he fed us. Good day turned bad turned back to good.

Nothing else from the week really stood out. Except that we got transfer calls this week and Elder Lewis and I are staying together for another 6 more weeks!

Monday, November 7, 2011

#62- Lots of Fun!

This week has been pretty slow, but for some reason it went by kinda fast.

Monday October 31, 2011: HALLOWEEN! It was pretty fun. We went bowling with the Schaefer (Mortensen & Green) and Greenfield (Whicker & Bingham) Elders. After bowling we went out to eat at Applebee's for Elder Mortensen's birthday on the 30th. Following dinner, because the Detroit areas have a curfew of 6:30 tonight they stayed with us while we went trick or treating to a few members and investigators houses, we only got 4, but it was fun.

Wednesday November 2, 2011: After our District Meeting I went on an exchange to Schaefer with Elder Green. It was pretty good, I got to be on my bike for the rest of the day and part of Thursday.

Thursday November 3, 2011: Elder Green and I went to play basketball with the Greenfield elders in the morning. While we were playing Elder Bingham came down to get the ball and elbowed Elder Green right above his eye, it split open and he started bleeding a lot. We fixed him up when we got to the apartment, it's going to leave a mark.

Saturday November 5, 2011: We went to Danita's car wash to help her out and to wash detail our van. We had apartment inspection and they check the car too, so we had a very clean apartment and a very clean car.

Sunday November 6, 2011: HAPPY BIRTHDAY CHRISTIAN!!!! The church was all fixed up from last week so things were good. This guy came into church near the end of sacrament meeting and a member called us out to talk to him because he had a question. He was a Southern Baptist (white guy) and he asked about the curse of dark skin given to Cain and how it relates to black people. We explained that it was a curse of dark skin and not of black skin, we also gave him the account of Laman and Lemuel receiving the curse of dark skin. Definitely a common question we get.

Monday November 7, 2011: To celebrate Christian's birthday Elder Lewis and I went to The Henry Ford. Thanks to the Montierth Family who got us in for free. We went around the Museum and saw a bunch of the stuff there, unfortunately part of the car area was closed for some construction. The really cool part was going on the Rouge tour in the Factory. We got to walk around and see the assembly line and the workers working on the Ford F-150s it was really cool. Sorry you had to miss it Christian.

This week we were also able to see Malissa, and talk to the Velasquez family. Both wanted to and hoped to come to church but come Sunday none of them were able to make it. :( Hope they come next Sunday!

Also sorry I can't get the pictures of the service in Detroit or the pictures from Halloween party stuff, I guess you'll all have to wait until I find a computer in the library that will do it or just have to wait until I send a card home (I will, I still have one that I was suppose to send awhile ago, I'll get it to Christian and Molly soon).

Monday, October 31, 2011

#61- Crazy Week! Service, Appointments, and An Accident!

This week has been great and full of blessings!

Disk Golf last Monday (October 24) was really fun, the grass was wet and kind of mushy and really muddy in some spots. I actually slipped and got mud all over my left pant leg and my arm. Had a blast!

Tuesday October 25, 2011: We had a district meeting today instead of Wednesday, because we had interviews with President Holmes. After interviews, we stopped by a referral to give him the Book of Mormon that he requested, he was really interested to read it and to find out what it is about. He said that he would read it with an open mind, and he said that we can come back to talk about the Book of Mormon more with him. We were also able to get in contact with some investigators that have been hard to reach lately.

Wednesday October 26, 2011: We did a lot of service today. We helped Bruce. He moved into the ward from Utah. We helped him rip up the carpet in his house so that he could start fixing things up. We then went to Danita's house and helped her paint her living room with Greenfield Elders (Elders Whicker and Bingham). After those service projects we went an saw Malissa, she is hoping to come to church on Sunday.

Friday October 28, 2011: We helped Danita with a little more painting, it's turning out really well. We helped set up the ward Halloween party. Sister Pangelly asked us to help and we knew that she really needed it because people who were suppose to help I guess bailed out or didn't do much. The decorations were sweet! (because we did them)

Saturday October 29, 2011: We taught a few people in the morning and afternoon then at 5ish we went to the ward Halloween party. It was great. There was lots of chilli for the cook-off and there were some really good ones. Sister Pangelly asked us if we could be in charge of the beanbag and ring toss. It was a lot of fun.

Sunday October 30, 2011: Today was really interesting, probably one of the craziest days I've ever had on my mission...so far. We are just about to walk in the door of the church for the PEC meeting when Brother Hayes (ward mission leader) texts us and says "Church has been cancelled this morning." We thought, "Yeah right, he's just messing with us." We walked into the Bishop's office and they told us that there has been some water damage done in the building and that the Mother's lounge and one of the rooms to the chapel is flooded. The water came from the ceiling and ruined it. Because Dearborn Ward was cancelled we attended the Grand River Branch with the Pickett's. After church we had an appointment with a less active/part member couple. They are really kind and like to have us come by. The wife is having surgery right now on her knee and she was glad that we could come by yesterday to give some comfort and a blessing. After this appointment we were going to stop by to see some people before our next appointement. On the way, we saw a car accident. It was the car right in front of us so it was really close. The light was green so everybody was going. A lady, not paying attention, went through the red light and hit 2 cars, a car in the right lane and the car in front of us. It was definitely an experience you don't see everyday. We parked off the road a little after the light and went to see if everybody was alright, nobody got hurt so that was really good. We stayed until a police officer showed up. The appointment later that evening was good. We had dinner at Sister Manner's with the Corless family too. We got to play Air Hockey with everybody. When we got home Elder Lewis carved his pumpkin, an eye thing. And I painted Jesus on my pumpkin. I took pictures of them, but unfortunately the computer I'm on right now can't upload my camera right now so I'll email you all the pictures later this week :)

Monday, October 24, 2011

#60- Mormon.org

This week has been really good.
A few things have been picking up, and we are finding a lot of people. As far as new investigators it's been a little hard, but we have a few potentials. Most of the people that we have been finding are inactive members that have allowed us to come back to their home. It feels great when people say that we can come back because we know that the people know why we are coming and they realize that they need to get back to the straight and narrow path.

I'm going to write about the highlights of this week.

Thursday October 20, 2011: We helped a member move into the ward from Ogden, Utah. He is really interesting, nice and cool. He has more books than I have stuff. He is the son of a less active member and his sister Linda is investigating. We are hoping that he has a strong influence on them and helps them all come to church. His mother came to church with him yesterday, so that is a good note. Later that evening we stopped by someone that we didn't know, Maureen, she was baptized at 8 and became inactive a few years later when her family was broken up. I forget if it was divorce or death, but she hasn't been to church since. She is one that invited us to come back soon, she is going through some hard times. We also saw a part member family, The Kelleys. The dad is investigating and we had a great lesson about the Plan of Salvation, he has a hard time comprehending things so we used Mormon.org ~ http://mormon.org/plan-of-happiness/ ~ with him. We feel like it helped out because its really simple and there are a few videos.

Friday October 21, 2011: Leola was reactivated just a few weeks ago and she is making great progress. She invited a friend to come to church with her next week and we are hoping that her friend likes the ward and wants to learn more about the gospel.

Saturday October 22, 2011: HAPPY 2nd BIRTHDAY GRAHAM!!! Today was super BUSY. On Saturdays we play Basketball with some less actives and investigators. It was a lot of fun, the guys that play are really cool and are trying to teach me so I can play better, and I'm getting better. We then went to Detroit to Joy Road and Hubbell Road to do some service at the Baptist Church on the corner. We help out every Saturday with the Food Drive that they put on to help people in need get some food. After that we went right across the street to the car wash that is owned by a member and we washed the van. Danita, who owns the car wash is really awesome, she takes care of the missionaries really well. She goes to the Grand River Branch where the Schaffer and Greenfield Elders go. That's our district Schaffer, Greenfield and Dearborn. All 6 of us do the service here at the church. Later in the evening we found another inactive member that said that we can come back.

This has been another week full of helping others. It really helps make us feel uplifted.

I love you all and hope that you have a great week. Elder Lewis and I are going to go play Disk Golf now! Talk to you guys next week!

Monday, October 17, 2011

#59- Service

This week has been pretty good.

We were able to get a hold of some investigators that were super busy the last few weeks. Malissa is doing alright. She has noticed a drop in her life since she hasn't been to church. She is going to be out of town on the weekends for the next 4 weeks. While she is in Arizona for a few of them she said that she is going to go to one of the wards out there, but I told her that she still needs to come to our ward a few times before she gets baptized. We are probably looking towards December.

We also saw the Velasquez family, they are doing good and have the same feeling about not coming to church. They weren't coming because their son had Football games on Sunday, they said that the season is almost over and that there are no more Sunday games. They are also looking at Baptism in December when family comes out for Christmas.

Tuesday October 11, 2011: We did some service for a member who is going to be renting out her house, she needed some stuff painted. Elder Lewis painted a door and I got to paint part of a fence. Now this fence is not a wood fence its a metal one, the links. Like the ones around parks or schools. I got to paint it with a roller (not the best on that kind of fence) and a brush. It was kinda hard to do it but I had a lot of fun. Apparently I did a lot better job then the guy who did the other half of the fence.

We saw Malissa on Wednesday October 12.

Friday October 14, 2011: Happy Birthday Molly!!! Up bright and early. We had to pick up some other missionaries because we all went to do service at the Roseville Building for a huge clothing drive. DI in Utah sent a ton of clothing to give away and we were asked to go help set up and help people as they cycled through. The experience really made me appreciate what I had. There were a lot of really poor people going through and were trying to get what they could. I was over in the men's section organizing and helping people find things they need. I was doing pants a lot of the time, and we didn't have a large variety of pants and I had to turn people down because we didn't have their size. It was a great experience to help others in need.

Saturday October 15, 2011: More service for us. We went to the Schaffer Elder's apartment and walked to the clean up site in Detroit. The Grand River Branch set it up and we showed up to clean up. This was an abandoned apartment complex covered in trash. If you want to look on Google maps to see were it was it's on Fullerton Rd. and Grandmont in Detroit. It shows how nice it was before it was left. Picture it covered in garbage. I'll send some pictures of it. We also saw the Velasquez Family today.

Sunday October 16, 2011: I got to speak in church. I think I did pretty good. People kept telling me that I did great and that they all really like it. I talked about gaining a personal testimony.

We had a pretty fun, crazy, busy week. Definitely had some awesome experiences, and helped a lot of people.

Hope you are all doing well!

Monday, October 10, 2011

#58- Story of Job

This week has been great.

Tuesday October 4, 2011: Transfer Meeting, I now have Elder Lewis! We went to dinner at the Pickett's apt, right next to ours, and did a lot of planning for this transfer. Things are looking good.

Thursday October 6, 2011: We have a new investigator, Paul. He is really awesome. He's on probation for the next 20 months, but we'll continue to work with him so that he can fix up his life. He's been to just about every religion and found faults. He's really interested in The Church Of Jesus Christ Of Latter Day Saints. He's been taught before, a while ago, and he's read the Book of Mormon twice already. It's amazing to see someone with that much desire to want to change his life.

Friday October 7, 2011: We stopped by an inactive member to see if they lived there and he invited us in. We shared a great lesson with him and he said that we could come back to see him and his wife. It feels great when people invite us back into their homes.

Saturday October 8, 2011: It was a nice day. We played some Basketball with some less actives and investigators. Did some service at a church in Detroit, across the street from Mama D's car wash. And in the evening we went to a concert thing at the Saline building. It's called The Story of Job. It was awesome. The lady who wrote it all is from the Dearborn Ward and they went to San Diego to perform it, and an LDS producer wants to produce it. So if you ever see or hear it, remember I saw it first!

Sunday October 9, 2011: HAPPY BIRTHDAY MOM!!! Hope it was a good one, sorry I wasn't there to party with you!

Wednesday, October 5, 2011

#57 1/2- Companions

I was so busy on Monday when I was emailing that I forgot to tell you that Elder Buahin was getting transferred.

My new companion is Elder Lewis, he's the same Elder Lewis that came out with me from the MTC and he's the same Elder Lewis that I served with for 3 weeks with Elder Kitchen in Livonia when they were looking for an apartment in Ferndale. It's cool that we get to serve together again.

I was thinking about companions earlier, I've had 6 official companions and 5 unofficial companions. A total of 11! Next to each one is how long I've served with them.

Official Unofficial
Attwood (6 weeks) Kitchen (3 weeks)
Fogth (3 months) Lewis (3 weeks)
Turley (3 months) Jones (1 week)
Adair (4 months) Elder Pickett (to be determined)
Buahin (6 weeks) Sister Pickett (to be determined)
Lewis (to be determined)

Its cool. I'm still in Dearborn, just to make that still known.

Monday, October 3, 2011

#57- Sicky

This has been a really slow week. It's another week where everybody cancels appointments and aren't home. Oh well what can you do?

Thanks everybody who helped with the mission experiences.

To be perfectly honest this is going to be a lame email.

Monday September 26, 2011: Six of us got together and went bowling, it was a lot of fun. We bowled 4 games and I won 3 of them, sorry about boasting. We then went to eat, nothing too special and then Elder Buahin and I took Elder Kitchen and Green back to their apartment where we hung out for a little bit, before we had to go to an appointment in Detroit.

Nothing really happened between Tuesday-Friday. We did service, taught a few lessons and did some finding. I also got sick on Wednesday. Woke up with a small sore throat, woke up on Thursday with the sore throat worse. Friday woke up with a huge headache and stuffy nose. Saturday and Sunday had a stuffy nose and cough. I still have the stuffy nose and cough but it's not stopping me.

General Conference on Saturday and Sunday, wow it was really good. To me it seemed like a lot of people talked about reading scriptures, praying, and repentance. It was really good, a little different this time but it was really good.

That's it for now, we got to go help a new senior couple move into Riverview.

Monday, September 26, 2011

#56- Temple

What a super long week. Its been super full.

Tuesday September 20, 2011: We went and stopped by a bunch of people in our GPS who we didn't know, all were inactive members and we taught 4 out of 6 stops. It was really great. We went and saw Mary again, she is doing pretty good. She has a desire to come back to church! We are waiting until she is ready to make that step.

Thursday September 22, 2011: Today was my year Temple Trip. Elder Anderson came and picked me up, his companion stayed with mine. We drove to the Mission Home, got in the big huge van, and off to the Temple we went. When we got there, there were some others waiting for us. Total out come were ten missionaries; Elders Orme, Willard, Johnson, Anderson, Barclay, Lewis, Seymore (didn't come out with us) Sisters Vance and Klingler, myself, President and Sister Holmes. We had so much fun. After the temple we all went back to the Mission Home for dinner and a sweet discussion. Two hours later, the fireside was going to start. Elder Anderson and I called Dearborn to let them know we were coming, but they said they were busy, so we told them that we would switch at the fireside. During that gap period Elder Anderson and I couldn't go back to Ypsilanti it's too far away. We stayed in Livonia's area and tracted a street for them. We got them a potential. The Fireside was really good.

Saturday September 24, 2011: I went on an exchange to Greenfield. I was with Elder Whicker, we had a blast. We went with the Schaffer Elders, Kitchen and Green, to do some service at a church. We were helping people get food and we helped the older people or people who needed help carrying everything. It was really fun. We all then went to Sister Cupp's and did some service for her. It felt so good to be in my old area. They changed the boundaries, it used to be in Livonia. After Sister Cupp, we all went and saw Shontae. We had a great lesson with her. The rest of the day was really good. I was on my bike again it's been 5 weeks.

Sunday September 25, 2011: Church was good. Wanda was baptized. The Pickett's were teaching her. President told us to count it as well. There are a few pictures here, if you haven't looked at them yet.

Its been a really good week as far as teaching and keeping busy. Hope that you are all doing good.


Monday, September 19, 2011

#55-

What a long, rewarding week!

Tuesday September 13, 2011: We had a Mission Tour, it was really cool. Elder Alan Packer from the Seventy came to address us. After we did exchanges Elder Phinny came to Dearborn with me. That night we stopped by a few people and we had an awesome experience. We stopped by to see James, he's had a rough life and didn't want to hear much at first but after we talked to him about the Plan of Salvation he opened up a lot more. The Pickett's are going to to continue to see him.

Thursday September 15, 2011: Another stop by miracle happened. We were trying to see Sister Cook, no answer. We got back in the van and looked to see where we should go next when a car pulled up in the drive way. We got back out to see who it was and it was Mary, Sister Cook's daughter. We had a great lesson with Mary, she has really interesting work. She mates bumble bee's.

Saturday September 17, 2011: Michelle, the investigator that we got the bed for and she got bed bugs. Our lesson with her went a lot better than we thought it would have been, she sees that we were just trying to help, and she still wants us to come teach her, so that is really great. There is a Hispanic family that moved into the ward, the mom doesn't speak English really well, so sometimes it's hard to understand but her sons translate when we don't get it. She is a really sweet lady. She took us to a Mexican restaurant, it's was so good. It's hard to find good Mexican food here in Michigan.

Sunday September 18, 2011: After church Candice asked if we could come and give her husband, Mike, a blessing because he was sick. He was really appreciative, hopefully he's warmed up a little more and will sit in on a lesson again. We have had 4 re-activations this week. Olga, Edward & Cathrin, and Leola. We have been working with Leola a lot and we are so happy that she's been coming to church, she still needs to correct some things in her life but she is showing a desire to become better. Bishop Presscott called us and said, "I've been teaching a part member family and they are ready to have you guys over to teach them. You now have 7 new investigators" It was really cool, truly a miracle from God.

I have to ask a question from everybody for District meeting next week I think: Have you had any recent Missionary experiences that you would like to share about?

Love you all so much and hope that, I was going to say, "stay warm as the temperature starts to go down," but then I remembered most of you are in California, and it's still warm there. The weather here is really weird, you should go online and see what we have this week. Rain, sun, thunderstorm, sun, 68, 73, 75, 68, 65.

Lets try it again.

Monday, September 12, 2011

#54- Stressful

Although this week has had it's unfortunate events, there have been more miracles coming our way.

Some things that stood out from it are:

Malissa: We had a really awesome lesson with her about the Tree of Life. She was able to identify what most of it meant. It was great, unfortunately she will be going out of town this weekend and has to push her baptismal date to September 25.

Michelle: We've been teaching her for the last 3 weeks. She is starting to understand a lot more in her life since we've been helping her. She's been doing great until today. She called us this morning and said that she has bed bugs and she is blaming us for it. Someone was getting rid of a bed and Elder Buahin asked if we could have it so we could give it to her. I was cool with it, the man said nothing was wrong with it, he just got a new one. The mattress was in our van for like a week and a half and we didn't get anything from it. We gave it to her like a week and a half ago so it's been about 3 weeks since anyone has had it and she just found them this morning. By the way she sounded like we may not be able to teach her any more. Which is very unfortunate.

The Velasquez family is doing really well. We read a Conference talk with them By President Thomas S. Monson from the May 2009 Ensign. They really liked it and are continuing coming to church. They are still scheduled for baptism in December. On Saturday September 10, 2011, We went to one of the son's Football games with them to show our support. They are a really awesome family.

Other than that, like a daily update, we have been super busy this week teaching a ton and running around. Oh wait I may have a few.

Tuesday September 6, 2011: We were doing some service at a less active member's house that just moved into our ward and right after we finished, Sister Holmes (Mission President's wife) called us and said "We need your help, we are at your apartment." (paraphrasing) So we come home to help. Keep in mind that the apartments that we live in used to be Ford Housing. So Ford had a ton of stuff that they gave to the Mission so we spent a good amount of time taking a bunch of the stuff out to one of the vans and later for a truck. It was a bunch of silverware, plates, cups, bowls, towels, blankets, etc. We got to pick out some stuff that we needed/wanted. It was really cool.

Saturday September 10, 2011: I was on an exchange with Elder Adamson, we had a good day. 3 hours of tracting in the morning, nothing. We saw the Velasquez Family where we read the Ensign, followed by their son's game. Then later in the evening we tried to teach a less active who is back to her Catholic Church. She talked a lot about it. I have some questions of why they believe certain things, it sounds ridiculous to me.

That was our week. Super stressful but over all really satisfying.

Monday, August 29, 2011

#52- Almost Year Mark

Wow! The last email that I will send before I've been out for a year. Thursday is September 1st and will be my year mark!!! It's hard to think that I've been out this long.

This week has been very stressful. Like I said earlier Elder Buahin has only been out for like 4 months and Dearborn is where he was trained. He knows the area, just not really well, so planning is kind of all over the place. It's been hard for me because I've been asking a lot of questions about the area and I can see that sometimes it's making him frustrated. I'm trying to back off a little. Even though this week has been really stressful we've gotten a lot done.

August 23, 2011: We had a few lessons today. The first one was with Danita. I've met her before at firesides and she's been to Palmer Park before. Her car wash place is in our area so we go and see her every once in awhile. She is awesome. Then we saw Dolly and Dave. They live in Detroit. Dave was baptized recently and he has a great spirit. He has a small mental disability, but he is really great.

Then we saw two of our investigators:

Mike: His wife is a member, I think his kids also. He just accepted to take the missionary discussions. He seems like a really nice guy, and I know with the help from his wife he'll get baptized pretty soon. They have 3 kids.

Michelle: We both met her for the first time. She is looking for a church and is pretty happy to meet with us. We did an intro and just got to know her and tell her who we are. We saw her again on Saturday (Aug 27) and had a very powerful Plan of Salvation lesson. She felt the spirit very strongly. She has 4 kids.

Wednesday August 24, 2011: I met Linda, she is on baptismal date for November 1st. She loves Culinary arts. She has one daughter (I think is a member, her mom is a member) and she is trying to overcome smoking.

Friday August 26, 2011: Today was sweet. We meet Liola, she is a less-active member. She said that she would come to church to visit but might not come back too often. She'll change her mind...I hope. She is really nice and friendly (People told us she was crazy, haven't seen that yet). Her daughter lives with her sister. Her mom can read palms it was really cool. She said that I will have a long life. I'm going to have 3 kids. Apparently I'm going to make a lot of money but not know how to manage it so I'm going to lose it once I get it, UNLESS I've learned how to manage it, which I have. Apparently I'm very stubborn, and I don't make friends that easily. I guess I'll find out how much of that is true.

I also met Malissa on Friday, she is an investigator. She is super solid, on date for September 18. Loves the church. Has a 4 year old daughter. Super nice.

There is a senior couple that lives next to us, a few apartment doors down. They have been assigned to work with the less-active members in this area. We do a lot of work with them. They are really cool. Elder and Sister Pickett. They have been here for 4 weeks and they are serving a 23 month mission. I don't know if they will be here that whole time but I'm glad that I get to work with them while I am here in Dearborn.

Thursday, August 25, 2011

#51 1/2- Transferred!

I am now in the Dearborn area.

My new companion: Elder Buahin pronounced Bwaheen. His American name is Josh. He is from Ghana West Africa. He went to BYU-Provo for three years so he speaks English pretty well, but sometimes it's hard to understand him because of the accent. I know in time I will be able to understand him really well. He has been out for about 4 months or so. He is a convert to the church of about 2 years, go figure he was at BYU. It's hard not to be converted when you go there. We have been together since Tuesday and things are going pretty good so far.

Monday, August 22, 2011

#51- Bed Bugs

I'm getting transferred tomorrow! Right when Elder Adair and I start to get along really well they move me. I'll find out tomorrow at transfer meeting where I'm going, so if any of you are sending mail hold on to it until I get my new address or send it to the Mission Office 33505 State St. Ste 101 Farmington, MI 48335

Like I said last week, we got Elder Jones for the week so we get to cover Dexter and Ferndale. It's been a little stressful. There has been some contention between Elder Jones and Elder Adair. I thinks it's mainly because Elder Adair trained Elder Jones and they didn't get along that great when they were together then. Also playing Phase 10 before bed just added to the heat because they hate that I have won a bunch, but they are doing better so things aren't so bad now.

This has been a really long week, probably because we were covering both Ferndale and Dexter. We've biked roughly around 120 miles this week. Going from one area to the other. Last night (Sunday Aug 21) we rode from the bottom of Dexter's area to our apartment in Ferndale, 10 miles. It's not that bad of a ride unless you are wearing a white shirt, tie, slacks, church shoes and a backpack. Oh and going against the wind, which is blowing pretty hard. It took about an hour to do it, maybe a little bit longer.

We've had some great lessons this week. Rita is getting back on track with her Book of Mormon reading, hopefully she is going to be ready for baptism in October after she gets married. She also needs to stop smoking.

Thursday August 18, 2011 - Saturday August 20, 2011 was the Dream Cruise on Woodward. It was really cool, we saw a bunch of really cool cars; old ones, new ones, modified ones, big, little. You get the point.

I can honestly say that this has been one of the most tiring weeks that I've had out in the mission.

There was a story that I forgot to tell all of you. Back on August 1st-3ed when I was with Elder Hunt for an exchange. I went to Dexter and they had bedbugs at the time. The first night I got bit once, the second night I didn't get any. Night of August 3ed I'm back in my apartment and I wake up in the morning with 4 more. We started to freak out. Maybe I brought their bedbugs back to our place, maybe Elder Jones brought them when he came!!! WHATS GOING ON?!?!?! Since then nothing has happened so we aren't worried about it. I can say that I've been bitten by Bedbugs. At home I though it was just the saying "Good night, sleep tight, don't let the bedbugs bite." Well guess what. They really do bite.

Monday, August 15, 2011

#50- Phases

This week has been really good.

We had a Specialized Training meeting, it was very good and I was able to take a lot from it. It was long too, Tuesday and Thursday 9am-4pm.

Tuesday August 9, 2011: They left us a commitment to teach the restoration using short powerful sentences, we were able to use it with Robert, a man that we contacted. As we rode by him, he called out and asked us if we were Jehovah's Witnesses. We were able to share the Restoration and he committed to pray to know if the message we had to share was true. The next day, Wednesday, we went to his house to give him a copy of the Book of Mormon. He said "Give me two weeks. I'll have it read and you can come back a share more with me." "You don't have to read it all before we come back, you can read at your own pace." We are going by this week to see him. He is trying to turn his life around.

Thursday August 11, 2011: It was the second day of Specialized Training. It was really good. One thing we learned was how to address to people who have been exposed to Anti-Mormon stuff. It was fun. After the meeting Elder Adair was feeling really sick, so we didn't do much more that night other than a dinner appointment.

Saturday August 13, 2011: We had a good day. As we were riding around in Detroit, a man called out to us from his porch. "Hey Elders!" We turned around and went to talk to him. Found out that hes met with missionaries before and he knows quite a bit about the history of the Church. He said that he had a Book of Mormon already and we committed him to read from it and ask God if it was true. He didn't want to set a time for us to come back but he said if it's Gods will then we would meet again.

The week was really good and really spiritual. For my studies this last week I've been reading a lot from the New Era and the Ensign and there has been so much that has stood out to me and it has been helping.

Earlier this week Elder Adair bought Phase 10, he really loves it. And I kick his butt every time we play so far I'm 4 for 4 .

Elder Hunt is going home today, believe it or not he's probably on the plane in the Detroit Airport right now, if not he's at least in the airport. Why does this matter you might ask yourself? He is leaving a week early which means that we now have Elder Jones and his area to cover this next week as well. I'm in another tri-panionship. 3 missionaries, 2 areas, lots of biking!

Monday, August 8, 2011

#49-

Sorry to say, but not much has happened this week. I'll try to get the good stuff for you.

Monday night 6pm (Aug 1) - Wednesday morning 11am (Aug 3) I was on an exchange with Elder Hunt. He goes home in 6 days. Our exchange was really good we got a lot of work done and had a bunch of fun. He hasn't taken many pictures on his mission so I got a lot taken when I was with him. Hopefully I'll be able to send Christian and Molly my current SD card soon so that you can all bug them about seeing some of the cool pictures that I have.

Thursday August 4, 2011: We had an apartment inspection. We passed with flying colors. Everything is now super clean, it feels great.

Saturday August 6, 2011: This was one of the best days. We were doing Arise Detroit at our church building. We were giving out backpacks and school supplies to a bunch of children. It was so cool to see their happy faces. I got to wear one of the Mormon Helping Hands Vests, that was cool too. Unfortunately I forgot to charge my camera so I didn't get any pictures of the day.

That's about it for the week. Sorry about the shortness of this email.

Monday, August 1, 2011

#48- Miracles

This week has been really good. We've seen some miracles happen.

Monday July 25, 2011: We switched our preparation day to Thursday so we had exchanges. I went to Hamtramck with Elder Barclay. We had a good day. We switched back on Tuesday at 1pm, but before we switched back we did some service for Brother Baker. He is doing a lot of work in the house that he is renovating so we got to help shovel up the dry wall and stuff. It's a 3 story (above ground) house with a basement. It was built around 1920ish, it has like 8 rooms 4-5 bath, it's a big house. He said that he got it for 20k, a house like that in the condition that he got it in (not good condition) I would guess that it would cost around 200k in California maybe more. I'm not sure but that's my guess. We switched back at district meeting and on our way there Elder Barclay and I went and got some Pączki's (pronounced Punchki) it's basically like a Polish doughnut they are really good.

Tuesday July 26, 2011: We taught 6 lessons, which is unusual. One of those lessons was with a newer investigator, Rosa, it had to be one of the most powerful Restoration lessons that I have ever had. We then stopped by a former investigator that we had and she has accepted for us to come back to teach her. It was an amazing day.

Thursday July 28, 2011: Today was our preparation day. We switched it so that we could go to Downtown Detroit. Downtown Detroit is amazing, it's so cool. I saw Canada again and I walked right past the tunnel to go there. We went to the GM building and walked around. We also went to a few stores. The main reason for going to downtown was because we went to the Tigers game verses the LA Angels. It was a sweet game. The Angles won 12-7. I also had to spend $50 to fix my bike so that kinda sucked, but hey if you want your bike fixed you're going to have to pay for it right?

The rest of the week was normal. We had some fun and taught some sweet lessons.

Today August 1, 2011: Today is my 11 month day. I can't believe that it's been this long. This time next month, time will start going by faster and faster.

Monday, July 25, 2011

#47- Gifts from God

This has been a really good week with a few awesome miracles.

Tuesday July 19, 2011: We stopped by to see Candice. We haven't been to see her for about a month and we decided to stop by and do a drop lesson. She identified that our time is sacred and that we need to be working with people that are interested in learning more about the church. She said that she has a stronger desire to come to church and to progress to baptism. She expressed that she has been noticing that God has been leading her through the last few weeks that we haven't been there. She's been able to live the Word of Wisdom and the Law of Chastity. She said that when she had a desire to break them she could feel God say "No you're not." It was so cool. After that great lesson with Candice we showed up at Rita's house. Last you heard about Rita, she didn't want to get baptized because she didn't want to marry her boyfriend. We knocked on the door, she answered full of smiles. "Rita whats up?" We asked. She responded: "I'm getting married!" She is going to get married on October 15th at the church. she is really excited. She will be able to get baptized after then, and we are super excited for her.

It's been really hot this last week. Wednesday and Thursday got to the 100's.

Thursday July 21, 2011: I was on an exchange with Elder Jones. Elder Jones was trained by Elder Adair. Elder Jones is from Idaho. Today was the record breaking hottest day for a super long time, it was well over 100 we heard it got to 110. This so happened to be the day where everybody that we planned for wasn't home so me made some unscheduled stops with a few people and shared messages with them.

Friday July 22, 2011: We had a really awesome lesson with Sister Goff and her daughter. We talked about gifts from God and how we can get them and use them. It was really cool. I talked about some of my talents like art and that as I practice I get better. And also my gift for music, I guess. How I taught myself to play the piano, which is going pretty good. And how I also taught myself in my last area how to play the violin. It was great.

Monday, July 18, 2011

#46- Golf

I don't really have to much for you this week.

Monday July 11, 2011: My golf experience, par was 36 and I got 67...not all that great. My view on golf has changed so much since I actually got to play. It's not as boring as I thought it to be. I would love to learn more with anybody when I get home.

Thursday July 14, 2011: Elder Adair went to the temple today for his 1 year mark so I got to go on an exchange with Elder Welch. You may remember him from my first area. We had a fun time. While we were in Detroit, I found an American flag. The really cool thing about it is that it has 48 stars on it! Sorry Hawaii and Alaska. It was just laying there in the grass in front of an abandoned school. No I didn't go in it. I'm assuming that some kids got it and then ditched it.

Friday July 15, 2011: At 6 pm we were leaving a members house from dinner and we passed 2 kids. They yelled "Do a catwalk." For those of you who are wondering "What's a catwalk?" most of us know it as a wheelie, but a catwalk is doing a wheelie for a long time. So Elder Adair pops up into a wheelie looses control turns his handlebars vertically and comes down, he bails and bends his rim, no possible way to get it trued. Smooth. We walked to the Bowen's, right down the street and got a ride home. Makes me glad that I didn't bend my rim.

That's about all I got for this week its been really slow.

Monday, July 11, 2011

#45- Yay Miracles!

This has been a very interesting week.

Monday July 4, 2011: Because we didn't go to the Zoo last week we went today. It was really cool. The Detroit Zoo has a really cool Polar Bear Exhibit, I think it was my favorite part. We also payed the 4 extra bucks and did the Dinosaur Exhibit, complete with fake mechanical dinosaurs.

Friday July 8, 2011: We were riding east on State Fair, and some girl was waving people down to buy some drinks to help her pay for something for school. I had the prompting to stop and buy a drink, long story short we talked to her for about 10 min and she said that she wants a Book of Mormon, that's a small miracle. Later that day we went and saw Rita and she said that she doesn't want to be baptized any more because she doesn't want to get married to her boyfriend or kick him out. She said that she won't be coming to church on Sunday. We told her that she is always welcome to come to church. Today was also the day that Derek and Janel took us to dinner, it was really cool to see them. Riley and Audry are so big and super cute.

Sunday July 10, 2011: HAPPY BIRTHDAY DIANNA!!! Rita came to church! That tells me she's not done with us yet. Also the less active family that we've been working with, the Goff's came to church for the 4th time, if I heard correctly they are now reactivated! It's so great to see the Gospel of Jesus Christ change the lives around us.

Monday July 11, 2011: Nothing too exciting is going on today. Actually, I lied I'm going golfing for the first time. It's time to see how much I suck. Go me!

Wednesday, July 6, 2011

#53- Year Mark

What a crazy, full, stressful, weird week.

Monday August 29, 2011: Due to some planning complications we had to switch our preparation day to Thursday so that we could meet with some people who could only meet with us today. We saw Steven, he is a crazy investigator who I think is stuck in his ways of life and doesn't really want to hear our message. Even though he says he wants to learn, he didn't listen to what we were saying. He would interrupt all the time and tell us why we were still young and that we didn't have as much experience and that we needed to study more. He is a really spiritual man, but he doesn't want to hear much of what we have to say. That was the weirdest thing that happened this day.

Tuesday August 30, 2011: We had a really awesome lesson with Malissa. We read from the Book of Mormon and she was really into it. It was great. Later that evening we saw Brother Boyde and after we had our lesson with him we got into a discussion about how Detroit was such a disaster. There is still hope for Detroit, it may take a long time but there is still hope. Detroit is actually worse than some third world countries. Elder Buahin said that parts of Detroit are worse than parts of Africa.

Wednesday August 31, 2011: HAPPY BIRTHDAY ELLIE!!!!!!

Thursday September 1, 2011: Today was preparation day, but more importantly today was my HUMP DAY!!! We had a stressful week and a half so we took most of the time to relax and sleep. The evening was really good. We went to Mama D's (Danita) to borrow her lawn mower and after we picked it up and put it in our van we went to see the Schaffer Elders, Kitchen and Green. While with them we celebrated my one year. I burned one of my shirts, missionary tradition.

Friday September 2, 2011: We used the lawn mower that we borrowed, we mowed Liola's lawn. She is really cool. She came to church last Sunday. We had a really powerful lesson with her. It was great.

Saturday September 3, 2011: The best part of the day was our lesson with our investigating family, The Valesquez. They are awesome, they are waiting to get baptized in December so that their family will be here with them and I think that she said the brother is going to baptize them. I'm really excited for them.

Sunday September 4, 2011: Super awesome Sunday. The Valesquez family was at church. Liola was at church. It was great. We had a lesson later with Brother Lusford, he's an inactive member. He is stuck in his ways and thinks that he is on higher ground than us because he said that he knows so much more than us about God that he doesn't have to go to church. He's a lost sheep within the gates. We later had an awesome lesson with Sister Manner, she's active and is Liola's sister. We talked about how we could help her sister and how we could help her as well. Long story short, this family has fallen apart and we are trying to mend it back together as best as we can.

Monday September 5, 2011: It was Labor Day so the libraries were closed and we couldn't e-mail. The Stake was having a picnic, it was really fun. I got to see some members from the Livonia ward, and I got to hang with some other missionaries. Over all it was a nice day.

Wow, updates for everyday this last week. Hope you all have a great week and that you will be able to accomplish all the things that you guys need to.

Tuesday, July 5, 2011

#44- Birthday and Holiday

Fun and busy week.

Monday June 27, 2011: We did not go to the Zoo. :( By the time we were done with all of our stuff before we wouldn't have had enough time. Instead we went bowling. It's been 3 months since I've been bowling so I wasn't that great. We then went to the Bowen's and helped them finish their chicken run. They are going to get some chickens soon.

Tuesday June 28, 2011: We went to the Goff's (The less active that came to church on Sunday) to do service by mowing their lawn. They don't have a lawn mower so we had to borrow one from a member that lives a few blocks away. Their grass hasn't been mowed in a long time so the grass was about, I'd say 2 feet tall, so it took a while to cut it all down. My service shoes are now green. :)

Thursday June 30, 2011: We biked to our correlation meeting and we got flagged down by two people. The first one was Eddie. He wanted to give us each a dollar to get a drink, because it was really hot, but we told him we can't take money from people, so he forced it upon us by shoving it in our pocket. He was receptive to our message and we gave him a Book of Mormon and he said he would read it. The bad part is that he lives is Hamtramck's area. When we got to the church, Jennifer called to us and said she was looking for a church to go to with her kids. We taught her the Restoration and she said she would come to church. She lives in Dexter's area. We find people for other areas but never for our own.

Sunday July 3, 2011: My birthday. Today was great. Church was fun, we had 2 investigators there. Rita and Betty. Guess who else came to church today...Derek. I saw him drive up and I just about flipped. I was thinking earlier before church, I knew he was going to be in Michigan in July and I though it would be sweet if he came today and it really happened. It was so cool to see him. After church we went to Willie's house and taught a few lessons around there.

Monday July 4, 2011: Since we didn't go to the Zoo last week we went today. It was a lot of fun. We also got to celebrate the 4th with our crazy neighbor/investigator, a man named Murray. He got some fireworks and we got to watch. It was fun.

Hope that everyone had a good 4th, Party hard. Have a great week everybody!!

Monday, June 27, 2011

#43- Prompting

This week has been pretty long. I think because nothing exciting happened 'til Friday. The week from Monday to Thursday was pretty normal. So I guess that I'll start there and go to now.

Friday June 24, 2011: After weekly planning we went on exchanges with the Zone Leaders. I stayed in my area with Elder Matthews. Do you remember him? I went on an exchange with him when I was in my first area, we buried a sheep remember (Mission Adventure #9). So yeah, This exchange was super cool, it went from 2pm today 'til 5ish pm Saturday. It was great to be able to get away from my companion for a day. While on this exchange we did quite a bit of tracting. Elder Matthews made it more enjoyable, teaching me how to play Book of Mormon Baseball (I'll teach whoever wants to learn later). Today we found two potentials. Elder Adair and I are going to go back this week to see if they are still interested.

Saturday June 25, 2011: Still on an exchange with Elder Matthews. We had a few really cool, little, miracles happen. First we stopped by a less actives house and they were home! It was cool, he expressed a little wanting to come back to church, that's a start. Another we were biking down a street and said hi to someone sitting outside. As we passed we got a prompting to turn around and go talk to her. We found out that she was praying for guidance and help a few days ago. Low and behold here we are riding down the street. This happened at her boyfriend's house, she lives in Madison Heights (Not our area, but its all good). Later in the evening, the Luis's had all the missionaries over for dinner, all 6 of us. That is when we changed back.

Sunday June 26, 2011: There was a less active that we got in contact with last week and we have been working with her and her daughter quite a bit this last week. They both came to church today for the first time in about 7 years. It was great to see them come.

Monday June 27, 2011 (Today): Today is Joseph Smith's Martyrdom, did you know that? It's also Elder Adair's birthday. Mine is on Sunday. So to celebrate everything we are going to the Detroit Zoo!!!

Monday, June 20, 2011

#42- Teaching and Learning

Wow this week was crazy. My companion is still driving me nuts, I'll leave it at that. We are trying to get through the stupid things.

I went on 2 exchanges this week. The first one (Wednesday June 15, 2011) was with Elder Greenwood (District Leader), I went to Van Dyke with him. It was pretty fun. We stopped by to see a bunch of people, taught a few lessons and saw some street art. It was really cool. My second exchange (Saturday June 18, 2011) was with Elder Charles, Greenwood's companion. Elder Charles is a super goofy kid, uh, yeah. We had fun.

On Tuesday June 14, 2011: We had Zone Conference, which was really cool. The Mission President is so knowledgeable about the Gospel. It's always great to hear him give instructions.

Sunday June 19, 2011: Happy Father's day all you fathers. Church was good we had awesome talks in Sacrament and great lessons. After church we had ice cream and brownies!!!

Nothing too extravagant happened this week. We taught some powerful lessons to our investigators and some of the less active families we were able to teach.

Monday, June 13, 2011

#41- Dirty Detroit

What a week! This week has been pretty fun and weird. I have a few things to tell you about. Some I thought were funny, others dirty (dirt not crude) and some a little inappropriate that I won't share the entire context of.

As you all have found out, my companion has been getting on my nerves lately. This week has been better, we've had more fun, so things are working a little better.

We've had some great lessons with some of our investigators and with some less-actives. Investigators first:

Candice, she is making some good progress. She has stopped drinking but is working on another commandment and also having some trouble coming to church. She is really cool.

Rita and Toby, they are doing pretty good. Toby is on date for July 17. He is trying to overcome smoking which last we checked with him is that he is doing a little better. Rita is struggling with the Law of Chastity because she doesn't want to kick her boyfriend, Kevin, out. She really wants to become a member. Rita comes to church every week. The last two weeks Toby couldn't come because of a last minute call into work. Not yesterday, but last Sunday Toby was in the parking lot at the church when he got his call for work. Tewan is Willie's brother. He's 12 and pretty cool. His Baptismal date is July 3. He should be ready for that date, he doesn't have problems like most of the kids in Detroit.

Speaking of Detroit, Detroit is such a dirty place. It's like one of the only places where you'll get a black line on your white shirt where its tucked in your pants. Also your white shirt gets dirty just from the air. Also it doesn't help when you play Pros-ball with some kids and the back of your shirt is completely brown and the front has ball prints on it. Two of my shirts were super bad.

As we've been riding our bikes we've been playing tag. Yeah that's right just the two of us, I started it. But it gets pretty fun, biking somewhere and randomly reaching over "TAG YOUR IT" we've been having fun doing that.

We have been having some great experiences with some of our less actives. We saw Brenda (last week I called her Barbara, it's Brenda) She is super funny. Like I said last week she had a bad relationship, her husband cheated with another member and then left with another. She told us who that member was. She so happens to be one of the members in Hamtrack's area who does a bunch for the missionaries so she got the name Mama -----. We told Brenda that Mama ----- takes care of the missionaries, then she said something so funny "She's not Mama nothing........" Not going to finish the rest. I love Detroit so much, the people here are so different and interesting.

Monday, June 6, 2011

#40- Feeling the Spirit

This has been a really interesting week. The end of the week was the best.

Just when things were going good with our companionship, the boat tipped a little. Seams like we are still on different pages but not that many pages away from each other.

Wednesday June 1, 2011: HAPPY BIRTHDAY VERONICA!!!!

Thursday June 2, 2011: The evening was the best part of the day. We stopped by a less active member, Barbara, she came out and we had an amazing lesson with her. We were going to teach the Restoration, but switched to the Plan of Salvation, but it turned out we talked about the temple a bunch. We found out that she really misses the temple and wants to go back. We also found out that she left the church because of a bad marrage relationship. We asked her to come to church on Sunday and she said yes.

Friday June 3, 2011: We had an awesome lesson with Rita and her son Toby. We taught...I don't even remember what we taught but it was such a good lesson. I think I wrote it down in my journal so it's in there. But the lesson, whatever it was, was really good. Toby accepted a date to be baptized on July 17. He wants to get baptized in the river, that would be super cool.

Saturday June 4, 2011: We had another amazing lesson. We taught Willie (LA, I think). He's 19 and a really cool guy. We get along with him really well. He has the same vision as most Detroiters, "I want to make a ton of money but I don't want to work for it." For the last few months he's been selling weed to get some cushion cash. At first he was being really stubborn but towards the end he was seeing where we were coming from and loosened up a bit. We committed him to not sell weed any more and to give us his weed so he wouldn't have it anymore. He gave it to us. It wasn't that much, $20 worth. We got back to the apartment and flushed it. I still can't believe that he actually gave it to us.

Sunday June 5, 2011: Rita came to church but Toby got called into work. Sister Smith was there too!! It was great to have them there with us. After church we had a really good lesson with Candice. She openned up a bit more and I think that she felt the spirit very strong.

That's about it for the week. It as a nice week. I'm glad that I was able to help those people feel the spirit.

Tuesday, May 31, 2011

#39- Rough

I don't have my planner on me so I will probably forget some of the things that we did this week so bear with me. Yesterday was Memorial Day so the Library was closed.

This week has been pretty good in some ways and pretty rough in others. In the good way I've seen quite a few miracles happen. Most of them were being able to meet and talk to some people.

On Tuesday May 23, 2011: I went on an exchange with Elder Hoffman. I went to the Mack area. It was a lot of fun. We stopped by a former investigator who turned out to be a potential that Elder Hoffman ran in to on the street like a month ago. Her name is Flame, that's a cool name.

We've played some Pros-Ball. For those of you who are not familiar with that term. It means that we've played basketball while in our missionary attire. Like I was saying, this week we've played quite a few times. Two of those times we got an investigator from it, so it was good.

Saturday May 28, 2011: This is kinda pointless but we went to the ward Spaghetti Dinner, which turned out to be great. It started raining really hard when we left so we went back to the church and got a ride from the Anderson's.

On Sunday May 29, 2011: I gave a talk in sacrament metting about the Book of Mormon. It was awesome. There was a super big thunder storm while we were out and about. We were teaching the Tennate's, investigators that we found last week. It started to sprinkle a little bit and then stopped. We left, then a few minutes later, when we got down the street and turned the corner, it started raining super hard. We got soaked so fast. It stopped after like 10 min, but the thunder and lightning was so close to us, it sounded like it was right above our heads. It was super cool to me, but my companion, not so much.

Monday May 30, 2011: Memorial Day and P-Day we didn't do much. We played Basketball with a bunch of guys at the church, it was pretty fun. And then we went to the Bowen's because they invited all 6 of us missionariers over for a barbeque lunch and we were the only missionaries there, there were also a bunch of members there too.
Later in the evening we got a new missionary that came out with us. Transfer meeting was today and Elder Adair and I are staying(ugh). So Elder Gardner, who has been in Michigan for 6ish hours got to come biking with us. We played some pros-ball with some kids and taught a sweet lesson and found some potentials. Over all it was a good day, until we got home. Elder Adair and I are on different pages sometimes, we both work differently and experss ourselves differently. To me it feels like he wants me to become just like him. So right now we are going through a rough patch that hopefully we can solve, if not, the next six weeks are going to be really rough.

Monday, May 23, 2011

#38- Utah? I'm not from Utah!

This has been a pretty good week. Lots of things have been happening.

Some of our investigators are really cool. We have 5 on date.

We've also had some interesting things happen too.
Tuesday May 17, 2011: We went over to Sister Whitehead's house to mow her lawn, found out that her lawn mower doesn't work so we couldn't do it. I've observed that many people in Detroit don't cut their grass that much so their yard looks like a little forest, it's pretty funny. We also went to Betty's house and taught her, "Follow the Prophet" and "Keeping the Sabbath Day Holy." She understands it all, the only thing that is holding her back a little bit is having to be baptized again. She wants to become a member and understands that she has to be baptized again, she is slowly overcoming that.

Wednesday May 18, 2011: It rained so hard on us!!! It was really hard to be mad. We got soaked.

Thursday May 19, 2011: Today was a district meeting because of leadership training yesterday. Elder Adair didn't want to bike to the church because of him getting hit by a car so we went to ride the bus, but guess what? The bus passes we had were invalid for that bus (Smart bus) we only had DDOT passes (Detroit Department of Transportation) so we started walking. We went about 2 1/2 miles and the Zone Leaders picked us up at 7 mile.

Saturday May 21, 2011: Super fun day. We were on exchanges with Mack. I was there with Elder Chaus, he's my brother. We had tons of fun. We taught a few lessons got denied a few times. We got yelled at: this black guy walking with his kid and his baby's mama said "F you!!!" I'm accepted in Detroit!!

Sunday May 22, 2011: Today was a really cool day, church was good, I got to bless the Sacrament. After church on the way to an investigator lesson some guy drove by and yelled out of his car to me "Go back to Utah!" of course he was still driving and is far a way, And I said "I'm not from Utah!" I thought it was funny. Then again I was to only one that heard myself say it.

It was a really good week. Today we are going to go to the mall and hang out there for a little bit.

Monday, May 16, 2011

#37- Football = New Investigator

This week has been really busy. Nothing too crazy happening, just out on a bike all day trying to stop by to visit everybody in our area to meet them. It's been really tiring. Yesterday after Stake Confrence we were out in the rain, cold and wet. The perfect day to be a missionary....NOT! It wasn't that bad, I just like to make it sound worse than it really was, but I was wet and cold.

We've been teaching a lot of investigators here, it has been very nice. One is on date for June 19th her name is Candice and is 22 years old. She has been investigating the church for more than a year. She knows she wants to get baptized, she just needs to work on a few things first.

Something really cool that happened this week. We were going down to the little part of Detroit, that's in our area, to see an investigator that we have, but she called when we were right down the street and said that she had to cancel. A little disapointed we went on our way and found some kids playing football in their yard. We watched for a little bit and then they invited us to play, so we did, it was lots of fun. We got to play a little bit and teach them how to play better and after we played, we gave them all a card and told them a little about Jesus. The cool thing about this is that we had to go home after and on the way home we stopped and talked to Greg, who is now investigating the church. If we didn't stop to play football with those kids we would have never meet Greg. It's awesome to see how the Lord works in our daily life, and the promptings that he gives us.

Monday, May 9, 2011

#36- Accident

This has really been an interesting week. I have had a crazy thing happen this week, read to find out.

It's week 3 starting in Livonia and half way through the week here I am in Ferndale/Hazel Park. Ferndale is very densely populated with gays. I heard that 60% is gay. Things here in area 3 this week have been enjoyable, busy, a little stressful, but all is great. On Friday Elder Sisenrios came over to help transfer the members in our area with Elder Adair. Meanwhile Elder Evens, Aidan, and I went out tracting and found a few potentials, that definitely boosted up my faith seeing the Lord answer my prayers.
I am in the Palmer Park Ward. The church building is really awesome. I've been there once before like 3 months ago. The building is an old Greek Orthodox building, so it's a huge chapel with an awesome dome. As some of you may know already this area has just been reopened, Elder Adair and I are refreshing it and we are on bike. Yesterday, Elder Adair and I were riding our bikes home from church and Elder Adair got hit by a car. I'm not really going to go in to details. He wasn't paying attention, the guy driving wasn't paying attention and BOOM!!! I got a front row seat. We called the Mission President, he came and took us to the hospital. Elder Adair is fine, a little cut up, some bruises, and in a little pain, but he's doing ok now. We are going to take it easy for the next few days. If you ask me later I'll tell you more details.

I also got to call home yesterday after the hospital which was awesome.

So that's the really short week that I had. I enjoyed it, I'm doing great.

Thursday, May 5, 2011

#35 1/2- Transferred!

Just wanted to let everyone know that I am finally in my new area. 2 1/2 weeks after transfer meeting I am finally where I was told I'd be. I'm pretty excited to be here in Ferndale/Hazel Park. My companion is Elder Adair from Monticello, Utah. Before today I've only known Elder Adair for about 20 min, we are getting along good for now.
Things have been pretty crazy the last few days. I'll explain in my weekly email.

Monday, May 2, 2011

#35- Straight Edges

I'm still in Livonia. They are supposed to move me today but said it might not happen. I'm kinda tired of waiting but there's nothing I can really do.

This has been a cool yet depressing week. I'll start with the bad news.

William was supposed to be baptized on Saturday (April 30). Sunday April 24th was the last time that we've heard from him. We've called, texted, and went to his house and we have had no answer. He didn't get baptized, and as of right now we have no idea what's going on with him.

The good news is that we had 14 long hours in Specialized Training Meetings. It was very spiritual. More good news, we taught Carol, a member's friend, and put her on date for May 28th. Oh we also did exchanges, Elder Kitchen and I stayed in Livonia, Elder Seymore came with us, and Elder Lewis went to Westland. That was a fun party!!! Another cool thing is that I got a straight edge razor, it's pretty cool I used it for the first time today, I got nicked a few times, it's not bad though. There is a guy at the Barber Shop here where we get free hair cuts that said if we get one (straight edge) he'd teach us how to use them. So we did and he taught us how to use them. I'll get better at it. Don't worry I won't die from using it. I know how dangerous they can be.

I don't know what's going to happen, if I get moved today or not. If I stay that would be cool. If I go that would be cool too.

Monday, April 25, 2011

#34- Almost to Ferndale

This last week has been a good one. As you may know I got transferred on Tuesday to Ferndale, but here I am still in Livonia because they still have not found an apartment for my companion and I. Living in a trio is pretty fun. It's hard to party with 2, but it's always a party with 3. Don't worry we are being good. I have been showing the other missionaries around, Elder Kitchen and Elder Lewis. They are pretty cool, but I still want to go to Ferndale.

William is getting Baptized on Saturday April 30th at 5pm. I hope that if I go to Ferndale before then that I can come back for that. I'm so excited for him, he has learned so much.

Other than that it has been a pretty normal week. Introducing the new guys to everybody.

As far as Elder Turley, He went home on Wednesday. So sad :(

Sorry it's not much, I'll have more when I go to Ferndale I'm sure.

Wednesday, April 20, 2011

#33 1/2- Stuck

My situation is kinda weird. My new area is Ferndale, and my companion is Elder Adair. The only problem right now is that this is a re-opened area and we don't have an apartment yet. I'm staying with the two new Livonia Elders for a few days, until we get an apartment in Ferndale. I'm showing them around and introducing them to the people we are teaching here. Elder Adair is with the Zone Leaders for that area. So basically I don't have a place to live yet and I'm not with my companion. Oh also Ferndale is a biking area.

Monday, April 18, 2011

#33- Q & A

It's been another average week with teaching and helping others which is always fun, don't get me wrong.

William is on date for April 30th. Savannah and her mom felt like they needed to wait a little longer so she did not get baptized yesterday. Transfer call came on Saturday, I am leaving Livonia after 6 months being there. Yes Christian this means I'm getting my 4th companion and I'm 7 1/2 months out. Want to know something wrong about today.....It's April 19th and it's snowing right now as I type, I can look out the window and see white stuff falling from the sky!!! It hasn't snowed for like a month and its Spring!!! That's Michigan for you.

I don't think I've said much if at all about Elder Turley's back and shoulder problems so here is the debrief. Two months ago his back popped, didn't think much of it, it hurt for the rest of that week. The next week it was gone, the week after it came back. It was on and off for awhile then a month ago it became more constant and he finally saw a doctor. He had an MRI last week and we went to the doctor today to get the results. Bad news his shoulder is super messed up, shoulder muscles are freaking out and starting to shut down. Shoulder is still grinding (really bad). I think the doctor said he tore his Labrum and some other stuff up in there. Some of the plates on his spine are kinda messed up to due to their size. Today the doctor said that he needs to go home and get it fixed there now so that he can get his scholarship back to play Basketball. Not 100% sure on what's going to happen right now. I'll let you know when I know.

Again here are some Questions that Molly has asked and my answers to the:

Has your testimony grown? It has grown a lot and it is still growing. Some of you know about my 6 month problem and my testimony was diminishing slowly, but since then I have been able to pick myself up again and growing it back up.

Do you feel like you've changed at all? I have changed so much but at the same time I am still me. I think I've changed more spiritually and matured a lot but my personality is more or less the same. I just don't have anyone around to quote Futurama as much with.

If so, how do you feel you've changed? The last question I answered as a two-fer.

What gives you the most strength during the day? The most strength definitely comes from faith, prayer and loving support from your companion.

How can we help you? There isn't really anything that I need right now, I'll let you know when I do need help.

What's the most challenging thing about being on a mission? The most challenging is probably when people cancel on us at the last second because we schedule our day around our set appointments and it sucks not being able to teach the people we need to, sure we have backup plans and it sucks in general when people cancel. Also I'm trying to have more charity and when you cancel it's hard to say, "I love you for cancelling on us," Figure of speach.

What's the most rewarding thing about being on a mission? Seeing people change. Also change in myself.

What would you say to the youth who are considering going on a mission? People say it's the hardest thing you'll do in your life, and it is so true. But it also brings me so much joy to be able to help these people. It has been so rewarding (like last question) and so difficult at the same time. I'm so glad that I'm out here right now.

That's it for now. I hope that you all have an awesome week, I'll let you all know the details when I find them out.

Monday, April 11, 2011

#32- Anticipation

I have some bad news. This week was not very eventful, so once again this is a very boring update.

Nothing has been different from our regular teaching appointments except a lot of cancellations this week. Nothing awesome or crazy has happened. I don't know how I'm going to be able to revive this email from being super dead, but I'll try.

As you all may know, we spend time every week with Brother Allan, super awesome man. His son, Larry, came over when we were there and was so thankful of all the things we do for his dad, he bought us Tiger tickets for Tuesdays game(Tuesday meaning tomorrow), the next day we realized that we can't go because Elder Turley has his MRI scheduled at the same time :( we had to tell him that we were sorry and hope that he can sell them.

This is the last week until transfers on Tuesday of next week. I have no clue what will happen. I think I'm going to a new area, but at the same time I can stay because they want us in areas longer. I may stay if Elder Turley's MRI turns out bad cuz he my have to go home. We are both anticipating what will happen.

I dont have anything else for you. But I love you all :)

Monday, April 4, 2011

#31- Christi's Back

Im really sorry but this week hasn't been very eventful. So it's going to be very boring today.

Monday March 28, 2011: We taught Christi at the Lavely's today. Christi is an investigator that fell off the path a few months ago and has finally had a desire to come back and have us teach her. If you don't remember her, she is the one who is on probation and won't be able to get baptized for 2 years.

Nothing really has happened through out the rest of the week except our normal teaching.

The great thing that happened this week was being able to watch all 10 hours of General Conference, which was really uplifting and spiritual. So many great speakers and so many amazing things said. I still think it's weird watching the first session at noon and the second session at 4. I sure do like the 9am and 1pm times better.

Once again I'm sorry for the lame boring update this week. Hope that next week will be a lot more eventful.

Monday, March 28, 2011

#30- William Comes to Church!

This week has been a good one as well. I'm pretty excited about having these good weeks.

Tuesday March 22, 2011: President Holmes came with us this evening to teach William, and it went really well. William felt the spirit and he was able to identify some things that he has to work on so that he can get an answer to his prayers.

Thursday March 24, 2011: Today's District Meeting was a bit different. We had interviews with President Holmes and that went really well, he is a really cool, down to earth guy and will try to help you out with anything. Later that night we had a Mission Fireside, like every month, for the investigators, less active and recent converts. William came to that. It was so awesome, he said he had a good time.

Saturday March 26, 2011: We taught William today and once again invited him to come to church.

Sunday March 27, 2011: Today was awesome! Brother Beauchamp came to church with William! The first time that he came and he liked it. Also Kevin, the guy that was baptized last Sunday was confirmed and recived the Holy Ghost too. For dinner we went to the Holmes', they also invited Savannah and Sister Zitlau too. Later in the evening we went back to the church for a fireside where President Holmes addressed the ward about faith and missionary work. We hope that this helped the members understand missionary work and that they can pick it up. Awesome day!

Awesome week!! Of course more stuff happened, but this is the more important stuff:)

Monday, March 21, 2011

#29- Baptisms! YAY!

WOW!!! This week has been awesome. It went by super fast. This week has been full of awesome spiritual lessons.

Tuesday March 15, 2011: On our way to teach Sister Zitlau and Savannah, we were dodging pot holes on Inkster Rd. The guy behind us thought we were messing with him because we would slow down, swerve, speed up and slow down some more. He followed us to the side streets and yelled at us. And I quote "You never know how bad someone's day has been" it's not a 100% quote cuz it was full of bad words. But we had an awesome lesson with Savannah and her mom. Later that evening we had an awesome lesson with William. This was the more interesting story for the week.

Friday March 18, 2011: We had Zone Conference today which was really awesome but even better than that, we went to see Kevin after. Elder Hunt (Zone Leader) came to Kevin's house and did the Baptismal Interview with him. Good news, if everything goes as planned Kevin will be Baptized on Sunday.

Saturday March 19, 2011: Really busy day. Full of teaching people. We had a ward dinner tonight, "Men can cook too!!!" A woman free night of cooking. It was a chilli/mac&cheese themed dinner. It was super awesome food but not so friendly ward. We brought William to it hoping that it would open him up for church but guess what only 3 or 4 people said hello with out us having to tell them, but then again not that many people said hello at all. If there is anything that I can request from you guys at home, it is to pay more attention to the Missionaries and if they bring someone with them, whether it be church, or an activity/dinner, don't wait to say hi. It hurts as a missionary when people in your ward can't do simple things like that. Yes I know it can be hard at times but when nobody does it, that is ridiculous.

Sunday March 20, 2011: The first day of SPRING!!! but it started raining around 6pm. But before that...today I decided to fast for our investigators. Kevin came to church, Savannah came to church, but William did not:(. After church President Holmes drove us to Adrian for a baptism for Tanya, an investigator that Elder Turley taught. I didn't see it because we stopped in Saline and swapped me for Elder Warner (he taught her too), so I got to spend 2ish hours with Elder Barclay which was great. I'm glad that Elder Warner got to go. We drove the hour back to our ward where Elder Turley and I got ready for Kevin's Baptism. It was AWESOME! I'm so happy that Kevin got Baptized tonight. He was happy too. My first Baptism. It was such a great experience. Good things will come for him:). It's been such an amazing week, I'm so happy. I don't really care for the bad or not so good things that happened because something so much greater happened. One of God's children entered into the waters of baptism. Technically there were 6 people who got baptized, just today, through-out the mission.

Monday, March 14, 2011

#28- Baptism Please?

This week has gone by slow and fast at the same time. Slow at some points, fast at others. Also I've been super tired all week too, Day Light Savings doesn't help. Oh and to top it all off, we had no investigators come to church.

Monday March 7, 2011: Today was fun. We started with basketball like every Monday. Taylor came with us again and there was another guy from Westland that came, his name is Eric. Eric came to the MTC the week after I did, but I never met him (2,000 Missionaries there) He went to England for his mission but because of medical reasons had to come home. Don't know how long he'll stay but he has to redo his mission papers. Today was also Shontae's birthday, but like a flake, she ditched us on our plans. So instead, Danielle, Elder Turley, and myself went bowling without her and then went for dinner.

Tuesday March 8, 2011: We went to Sister Cupp's house again to help her do some more stuff. Don't worry, no more window bites. After helping her we went back to our apartment. We had to cancel our mid-day appointments because Elder Turley has been having really bad back problems for the last 3 weeks. Last week wasn't that bad, but they came back hard this week. He had to rest for awhile. We went to the Lee's in the evening and they tried to help him.

Thursday March 10, 2011: Besides teaching today, the only thing out of the ordinary is that I got my hair cut. The reason it's out of the ordinary is because I didn't cut it myself like I have been for the last few years. There is a barber shop right across the street from our apartment and one of the ladies there, Michelle, cuts missionary's hair for free. My hair didn't quite turn out the way that I wanted it to but that's ok. Its seems to be working.

Saturday March 12, 2011: We were super busy this morning preparing for Kevin's Baptism, it got moved from today to tomorrow. It was super stressful. Midway through all this craziness Kevin calls and says we have to do the Baptism next week due to Family/Friend emergency, and then we couldn't meet at the time planned. We got to meet with him later and everything went well, he has to come to church tomorrow. We also had an awesome lesson with William.

Sunday March 13, 2011: Due to Day Light Savings almost everyone was late to church, except for those that remembered, like us. Also Kevin didn't come to church due to his main water line breaking and flooding his basement. Everything bad that could happen has been happening, this really sucks. If Kevin still wants to be baptized next Sunday he MUST come to church next week or it won't happen till the following week. We hope that we can do the baptism next week rather than waiting another week. PRAY FOR US!!!

Hope that this week will turn out a little better. Elder Turley's back is still acting up and he's been getting bad spasms.

Monday, March 7, 2011

#27- Bit By a Window

This week has gone by super fast. Transfers are on Tuesday. Elder Turley and I are staying together. Lets try to do the same format like before.

Monday February 28, 2011: Today we did our District Activity. It was tons of fun, we went Bowling. We've been going bowling a lot lately. It's really cheap on Mondays at the place that we go, it's like $1.50 a game and $1.50 for shoes so for 6 bucks we get 3 games. It's sweet!

Tuesday March 1, 2011: Today is my Bump day, meaning 6 months. Get it, Bump day. every month you have a Click day, which is like your birthday coming into the field. So yes, today is both my Click and Bump day. We went to Westland and blitzed their area. It was fun I got to meet Frank, one of their investigators. He's really cool and talks funny on purpose.

Friday March 4, 2011: We went to Sister Cupp's house to help her with some service. We moved a bunch of stuff and cleaned out the little porch that she has out back. While cleaning the porch, I reached down to move a window pane (that wasn't installed) and as I was lifting it up, the window that it was leaning on bit me because it was broken. It took a small crazy chunk out of my hand. I didn't even feel it when it happened. Good thing I had some Hello Kitty band-aids in my wallet. :)

The rest of the week was just normal missionary stuff. Teaching our investigators and teaching other people. It was a super fun week, except for one thing. But it's ok I'm getting through it, so it's no biggie.

Weather Status: Michigan weather SUCKS!!! It can't make up its mind. Once again it warmed up a little bit, then back to cold, rained for half a day and then turned right into snow after it rained. Come on just get to Spring already. It really isn't that bad it just gets annoying.

Monday, February 28, 2011

#26- Investigators

This has been a cool week. We've had a lot of really cool lessons with investigators.

Kevin- last time we checked with him he was smoke free for 5 days and he came to church yesterday. He basically bore his testimony of the Priesthood. He said that he's been looking for a church and that he likes it at ours and that he thinks he found his new church. Kevin is on date for March 12.

Savanah- is a super awesome young woman, she asks a lot of indepth questions for a 13 year old. Our lesson with her went super well. We were going to teach her the first half of the Plan of Salvation but because of the questions she asked we taught the whole plan and some.

William- is a good investigator too. We have had some powerful lessons with him but the only problem we are having with him is getting him to come to church. We had a Church tour with him on Saturday, Brother Beauchamp came with us and it was amazing. The spirit was super powerful there in the chapel. Sunday morning came and Brother Beauchamp went to get him, he answered the door, but he said he was feeling really sick. NO!!! We thought that the tour really helped, and I think it did help. We haven't lost faith, we know he's going to come to church.
We also had a new investigator come to church, his name is Brother Holmes (I could have spelled that wrong) but he is a really nice guy. He came with a less active member and he agreed to let us come teach him this week, so that should be lots of fun.

I also had two exchanges this week, I don't really like exchanges but they turned out pretty well. Found a new investigator in the Canton/Plymouth area.

On Monday February 21, 2011: President's day, we went bowling with the Westland Elders (Kirkman and Barclay)

HAHA told you that this week was going to be better :) but nothing crazy :( but that's ok because this week was super fun.

Tuesday, February 22, 2011

#25- Lessons, Lessons, and More Lessons!

Hey everybody!!! This week has felt pretty slow. Nothing has really happened. Except teaching 20 lessons! We've had tons of cancellations, especially from our investigators, which sucks big time.

On another note. The weather this week was awesome. It's been in the 50's. By Friday, February 18, 2011, 90% of the snow was melted, then on Sunday around 3 it started to snow again. 10 inches!!!! That's crazy!!!

Didn't get to email much yesterday being President's Day and all. We spent the Day at Brother Allen's house, which is where we do laundry and stuff. Then the Westland Elders, Barclay and Kirkman, came over and we went bowling, which turned out to be lots of fun.

Sorry again for another super short update but I got nothing else. I promise next week will be better.

Monday, February 14, 2011

#24- Missionaries Are People Too!

Pretty cool week this last week. We got two new investigators.

Savanah- She's 13 years old. Her mom is less active and wants to get re-activated. Savanah is a lot more into God than I was at 13.

Matt- We haven't really been able to teach him yet. Brother Cartwright is his wife's hometeacher and invited Matt to church and Matt's been there every Sunday for 5 weeks. We are going to try to see him this week, he's kinda hard to get a hold of.

We've been teaching a lot of less-active lessons again. I love so many people out here, lots of them are super nice and actually treat my like a human rather than a missionary. Not saying thats good or bad, but hey, missionaries are people too.

Other than that nothing really wild or crazy has happened. Well I guess this is kinda crazy, yesterday, Sunday February 13, 2011: It got up to about 45 degress and today, it was 40ish a little bit ago (it's 11:25 am) so we'll see what the rest of the week brings to us.

Sorry it's a little short this week. Hope you all have a good one this time around. Spring is just around the corner!

Monday, February 7, 2011

#23- You Can't Believe Everything You Read

It feels good to be on track with my adventures, but nothing too crazy has happened yet. Some interesting things, but not crazy.

This last week has been great for snow. Had a snow storm on Wednesday February 2, 2011. Then some more snow on Friday February 4, 2011. probably totaling about 10 inches; about 5 inches each day. Also this week was the first time I've used a snow blower, i'ts great! It is so much easier than shoveling, thank you Brother Allen!

Thursday February 3, 2011 & Friday February 4, 2011 were my interesting days. While Elder Turley, my companion, was at a leadership meeting I got to go on exchanges with Elder Wood. Elder Wood is from Utah, he's only been out for a week and a half. He is still trying to figure the whole missionary thing out, but that's ok he's new. I struggled a little bit but not that much, I caught on really fast.

Thursday: I went to Schaffer. Now Schaffer is a Detroit area so they don't have cars. Remember it snowed yesterday, like 5 inches? We were on bike, riding through all that snow because Detroit doesn't get plowed. All the major streets get salted and the residential streets are untouched. we went to one of their investigators and she was having a fit because she found a "Secret Society" Life magazine that blew down Mormons and she was pissed asking us, "Why didn't you tell me this stuff? You guys are a cult!!! You guys practice polygamy! I want to talk to Elder Bradshaw." Elder Wood was getting heated up. I was super calm. We couldn't do anything in that situation. I really wanted to say "Do you really think that I would be a member of this church if we did that stuff?" But I kept my cool and did my best to calm her down. She said that she will let us come back but Elder Bradshaw had to be there(Elder Wood's companion). It was interesting.

Friday wasn't so crazy, but it was interesting as well. We, meaning Elder Wood and I, were in Livonia, my area for the day. The crazyish, funny, interesting, awkward lesson that we had at ShontaƩ's. We wanted to mess with Elder Wood beacause he was new. We propably shouldn't have but I can't turn back time so oh well. ShontaƩ was pretending to be an Investigator and the lesson that we taught was the Law of Chastity. Enough said, I don't have to say more. Except that it was great. Shhh don't tell.

Sunday February 6, 2011: I may be a missionary but that doesn't mean I don't know what's going on it the world. I'm disappointed that the Pittsburgh Steelers lost to the Green Bay Packers yesterday in Superbowl 45, 25 to 31. Dang, oh well it doesn't matter to me that much but still.

Monday, January 31, 2011

#22- Sick

Tuesday January 25, 2011: Today is Fate Day. I woke up not feeling too hot, got ready for my shower, got in the bathroom and started throwing up :(. It was nasty. Just to give you a really gross thought about it, the night before I ate some pizza and red velvet cake. So feeling like you know what, we picked up the other guys in Shaffer and got to the church. By this time I've thrown up twice, both times it was all the water that I've had. "Thats it!! I'm not going to drink any more water!!," I looked horrible. My new companion is Elder Turley he's a really cool guy. After dropping off Shaffer we went home. There I slept for 15 hours till the next morning. On Wednesday I felt great!!!

Thursday January 27, 2011 & Friday January 28, 2011: I was having back and leg pain. Horrible week so far. The pain wasn't external it was internal. It felt like my bones were in pain. Last time I felt it I was having growing pains. I don't want to get any taller.

Sunday January 30, 2011: Kevin, an investigator on date, came to church!!! It was awesome. We were so happy. He's pretty excited for his baptismal date. I'm Super stoked for it. Danielle's grandpa is in the hospital so we went to see him cuz everybody was sick. He is an awesome 85 year old man. We saw him on Thursday because sister Bazzel asked us to come by. He told us, while we were there (just elder Turley and I), that he just got back from Florida yesterday and that he was there for like 5 days by himself. We saw him 3 days ago and he wasn't in Florida but SHHHH!!! he doesn't know that;). Your mind wonders when you're that old. He is really cool.

Sorry I haven't had any crazy stories lately. I'll get one sooner or later.