Clock Is Ticking!

 I'm staying here for my last transfer, yay! I love it here, now we need to pick up the work and get some solid investigators! we have many potentials and almost progressing investigators, but little things are keeping them back. A big one is work, many people are busy here!

 We had a cool experience on trade offs last tuesday. Elder Hawker from West Jordan Utah switched with Elder Miller for the day. It went real well, saw some people, beat 2 tall white guys in street ball, and got 2 new investigators! It was dark and so we didn't want to travel far, so we went to see some of the people in our complex. We knocked on the door that I thought was the right one and said to Hawker, what if this isn't her apartment? He said that we'll just say we were sent here to help you! The door opened and we didn't recognize the lady, nor her big doberman... it was a nice dog though! She thought we were her friend paul, and we weren't... She asked us if we would bring a load of stuff from her car up before we left, we agreed. Her car was filled with tubs and other stuff she needed moved in, so we moved it all. If only we said we were sent to help you...! We found out she was from West Jordan Utah also, another coincidence! We talked to her about what we do, and she said we could give the sisters her number! So it worked great!

 We are looking forward to halloween, we get to be judges of the chili cookoff, I'm excited! This week could very well turn out badly, with not many visits because of the holiday, but we'll pray and move along!

 I asked about tati and ashton because in your email last week you said you are going there to help them move home... but anything sounds good! I love hearing about the other missionaries! Nate is awesome, I wouldn't want to be in that predicament, it would feel gross and smell bad! But he will do very well! If it turns out anything like Carson, I wonder what he will look like when he gets back! :)

 Make sure y'all let me know what goes on with halloween! :)

 Love y'all and take care, till next week!

October 21, 2013

That sounds real fun! The biggest trip we took was 8 miles on our bike going east! It would've been much longer had we gotten to our destination, and had to have gone back, but a screw in my tire stopped that... :)

 This week wasn't the best of weeks, but we foresee this week going great! We have a return appointment tonight for dinner with a nonmember family interested in learning about the gospel. We had a great visit with them last week. It started with a nonchalant visit and when the time was right, asked them questions about their background and talked about what we offer, and now we are going back! I heard they own many boats, one is an optometrist and the other is a dentist. So they have plenty of money. haha. 

 The weather is continuing to cool down, and we don't have any hot days anymore. Things are looking up!

 Nothing much else exciting has happened. I learned that there is supposed to be a color run here in Destin sometime in November. I wonder if we could volunteer at it... :). And I did get the package, thank you! More than half the food is already gone, and the wrist band and head band are sweet! I also got a package of letters from the young women. There are many names that I didn't recognize, how many new move-ins have there been?

 It's weird to think that I only have 7 more emails! I don't know how much is going to be said in the last couple. 

 But I decided to wait to apply to college, and then have time to work on some scholarships and ldsbc takes applicants 10 days prior so that's good. I haven't found out much more info on how to send my bike home, but i will soon enough. And also, is Ashton and Tati going to be living with us next year?

 Love y'all and I laughed when you sent messages through sister Smartt, it made my day!

October 14, 2013

 I am sending the memory card today! So expect it later this week. You don't need to send it back...

 Cousin Jenna is getting married!? Finally! :) Jk haha. I think I said that about Ashton also, but I'm glad I'm going to be there for it! Maybe I'll actually get to meet him before their hitched! That is very exciting, and I'm way happy for her, and for us, it's good to have rich in-laws :)Jk! I'm also glad that Dad is alright. I bet he is making very good use of the time away from insanity. And how do you de-ice a plane? With an ice pick?

 Our week has gone good! Could have gone much better, but can't force anybody to be home or answer the phone! :) Good 'ol missionary work. I'm very glad we have members that are willing to take us around and see people. Bro Pehrson Hawkley took us around for 3 hours yesterday, and an hour and a half the day before. He is awesome.

 Our talks went real good yesterday. I prepared for a 14 minute talk, but only got 5 minutes to give it! It felt real good giving it, and the Spirit was guiding my words... Thank goodness for prayer! I had the feeling before the second speaker that I wasn't supposed to use my notes, have you ever got that feeling? You kinda think, Oh man... but thankfully it was only five minutes. We now have 2 potential investigators, and recieved 1 before the talks and also a nonmember decided to come back to this church after 20 years since he stopped taking the lessons. So yesterday went great, now we have to be sure to follow up and teach some lessons!

 Got a pretty good haircut last week, from myself...:) it doesn't look bad at all... plus Miller helped me a little. We used a set of clippers that almost didn't work!

 The weather is great here, how's it there? Any snow yet?

 Love y'all, and hope your week goes well!

October 7, 2013

We had a notice that we might have been evacuated, but the storm dissipated and there was no threat, just a day full of scattered rain fall. Conference was great, and I did get to see all 5 sessions. We had a member feed us breakfast and let us watch it there. We had to help them with their garage sale in return. This week we had a great lesson with an investigator, and now we have a baptism date scheduled! Elder Miller's first one, he is pretty excited. Here, it is hard to not get a member to come out with you for lessons. I love it! Everything is going fine out here, and things are still a little slow, but it is much busier than when we started!

Thanks for the information on the job and schooling, I talked to a member who is in that sort of stuff. He's not an agent, but works mainly with the information part of it, the name escaped me right now. I'm thinking of maybe taking online classes until I am able to get into school, and working. Do I have to apply to a school in order to do that? I know what classes I want to get into now, I'll email president and find out what I can do though. I don't feel like I need to immerse myself into schooling, but I do need to use the time I have and get some things done.

10 more weeks, it's going fast! For our mission to reach it's baptismal goal, our zone needs 30 baptisms, which divides it to 6 baptisms for our district, and we have one coming up in november now. We have plans to work with certain people, and know what people God wants us to prepare, now we need to get working! Our branch mission leader and us 4 missionaries depict at least 4 baptisms here in november, it is a good goal with names behind it! Definitely not a time to slip up!

Thanks for all the support and encouragement. Love y'all!

September 30, 2013

I will talk to sis smartt again about the video, not that it's great or anything...:) This week went good! For some reason no less-active members are letting us in, but we were able to teach 2 new investigators, we are excited about them. Funny story, we ate with two members at longhorn steak house, and they let us order what we wanted. I ordered a 10 oz. NY strip, my comp ordered a 20 oz. steak, it was pretty big. As we were all talking having a good time, my companion spits out his lemonade on the table. I look, thinking he just laughed it up out of his nose, and he stands up motioning to jay shaver, the member, that he had something in his throat. Miller turned and jay stood behind him and did the Heimlich. A huge piece of steak came out on the floor, and miller picked it up, and we continued to eat. It happened so fast, it was funny! We were laughing so hard about the experience, and it was jay's first time doing it, so he was making tons of jokes. It was the hardest I've laughed on my mission! There were many people staring, but we didn't care. I wish my camera wasn't dead when it happened... then after we biked home, and I was still laughing about it! What added to the humor is the seriousness of the situation, yet it happened nonchalantly!

Well, two weeks in and we've already made a name for ourselves! haha. Next week is General Conference, so stoked! We are giving a talk the week after, a little less stoked! And before we know it all the holidays will come up and it will be time to go! We have a goal set for two baptisms before I leave, we are going to accomplish it. I have one in mind, but we'll have to find the other, but I have a good feeling that there are two prepared for us. We'll see what the Lord has in store!

Love y'all lots!