Received Monday, March 31, 2014

QUESTIONS:

Tells us about your new companion, Elder bushnel!

He grew up for a while in the bay area of CA (don't remember the city) and then moved to st. George Utah. He started his mission just one transfer (6 weeks) after me. He has been a zone leader for a while already. He has 3 younger sisters. He has a Jeep that he loves back home and his favorite hobby was "jeeping" (off-roading, rock-crawling, etc with the jeep).

How many elders came out with you to Boston when you started your mission? Well, I know you came a few days or was it a week later, are they still considered on the same track with you? Will they go home when you do? Do you see them often?

there were 6 of us that came here (including me). We are all on the same track, the 1 week makes no difference. I can tell you a little about each

Elder Kilgore: I didn't see him a ton. He was one of the Assistants to the President (AP) for a while, (just changed away this transfer) so after I became a zone leader I saw him or talked to him pretty often

Elder Watson: I've seen him a ton. he's been in my zone for probably half my mission, we always end up getting transferred near each other. There are 2 zones in the Cambridge stake, I'm a zone leader for the cambridge north zone, and before just getting transferred he was a zone leader of Cambridge south zone, so we would see each other a lot on p-days and coordinate rides and things together for transfers and stuff (almost no one is that zone has a car). Him and elder Kilgore are from Bountiful UT and went to the same HS. there are probably 10-12 missionaries who are/were here from bountiful in Pres Packard's time as mission president. and along with that, President Haight's (councilor to pres packard) son just got his call to one of the SLC missions which includes bountiful inside it, so he may be seeing some MBM missionaries there.

Elder Taylor: he had a special assignment for a while driving the mission trailer, so he would drive around the mission and everyone would see him. He did a lot for finding new apartments for missionaries and moving furniture around and stuff. He would also go to all the zone conferences so I always saw him there.

Elder Nash: I have not seen him a lot. for like 2 transfers we were in the same zone, and of course we see each other at the occasion zone conference or something. A while back when I was in Canton CT he trained Elder Stevens for just one transfer, and then elder Stevens got transferred to canton with me to be his 2nd companion.

Elder Orgill: I have not seen him in a while. back when I was in Canton we were in the same zone for a while, but haven't talked much since. We were MTC companions.

Also President Packard got here just about a week before us.

I know you will watch General Conference this weekend, do you plan on watching it at the/a Ward building? Is it available on people's home TV's there? We love watching it at home; the ease of it all; the ability to pause the TV and re-watch if wanted.

the plan is at the ward building. For the priesthood session they have a little pizza dinner beforehand at the chapel too.

Did your Ward do anything different because it was a 5th Sunday?

we did fast and testimony meeting because of general conference, but the 2nd/3rd hours were normal. We also have stake conference coming up on Easter (did you know, Elder Packer, president of the Quorum of The 12, is in charge of picking when all the stake conferences happen, and you have to get special permission to change it. That is when ours was chosen to be)

Have you heard of Groupon?

heard the name. Isn't it a coupon related thing?

Christopher didn't like the acupuncture as much as Kylie? kind of creepy?

Add on: Plans for today?

Probably going to the Revere chapel and doing mostly soccer there. I think the zone got a little less "sporty" after transfers. Elder Bushnell is not a big fan, especially of basketball. we'll see how things go.

It has been a good week. First I have to point out you started your email saying there was nothing earth shattering, but then wrote about an earthquake, which is the pure definition of "earth shattering"

It has been a week of changes. Of-courses transfers always brings a lot of adjustments, but this time we also changed apartments! we are now staying in another city is our area, Salem. (same as the witch trials. Lots of witch related stuff, museums and shops and people of the wicken religion). it's our old "vacation home". We still have the reading apartment for now, but it'll probably be closed down in a couple months. We'll still pop in there occasionally to check on mail and stuff, and there's a few other things we still need to get from it. (sorry I forgot to write down our salem address! i'll get it next week).

Elder Bushnell's full first day here we were looking for an innactive member, and their neighbor told us they had moved but we got talking and they were interested. We went back 2 days later with our ward mission leader and had a lesson. It is a young'ish couple with 2 small kids. they both grew up in America in christian religions but ended up converting to Islam. they both have similar stories about looking into different churches and coming away dissatisfied. the things they heard about God were conflicting and confusing and what we need to do for salvation, for god's love, etc all didn't seem to fit. They also liked the diversity in the Muslims they met. Not sure yet how open they really are versus just like to "talk about religion". It was an interesting visit. It was important to them that they still believe in Christ as a prophet and did miracles, i'm not sure whether they really think of him as a Savior or not (I think the religion formally does not, but especially the wife I think still might). They said they may come to church sometime, and I think that would be especially great for them.

Also this week we got a call from Idaho from a fairly recent convert who told us about his sister here who was also baptized, but never really stayed with the church, but wants to get back in it. We had a great first visit with her, her name is Anita. She was excited to come to church, but got cold feet sunday morning (she said it was because of the rain). She is in her low 20's and has 20 small kids. When we thought she was coming we called 2 of the youth and asked them to bear their testimonies (remember it was fast and testimony meeting), so that Anita could see how good it is to raise your kids in the church. 1 of them did end up doing it, the other chickened out. We did not tell them beforehand that Anita didn't come. It was still good to hear the testimony of the other youth.

Mary our investigator accepted a "calling" yesterday to work in the nursery (I think technically it's just an assignment, but whatever) which is cool, and will hopefully get her to come to church more. Also we need to make sure she doesn't start trying to run the whole primary, which would be a bit like her.

One of our other investigators, Sara Kemer (baptisimal date for may 24th) went visiting teaching for the first time yesterday. I guess we're good at getting our people working and serving in the church, we just got to actually have them baptized!

That earthquake sounds fun. I think someone mentioned that to me earlier this week. 

I've heard very little about march Madness. I think after the first week we were at dinner or something and somebody was talking about the upsets, but none of it really meant much to me. I heard BYU lost and I think the good mormon player's team (Duke?) lost too, which is too bad. Is Jarbarri Parker his name? I like the names you have. I guess guessing sometimes does work. I do not think Messi is tall enough to dunk.

Sounds like you guys had a good church day. Glad the ward mission plan is likeable and doable, it's similar to the one we have here. I also learned this week that the first ward mission plan was made in Belmont ward, MA with the ward mission leader being Clayton Christiansen and the Bishop Mitt Romney.

Tell Steven he doesn't need to join that soccer league, he can just come play with us on P-days. The last two weeks we played a soccer'ish game on the indoor volleyball court. We brought the volleyball net down so it was touching the ground. you can play with 6 people like volleyball, but no hands, like soccer and play with a soccer ball. Someone serves (kicks) the ball from the normal serving spot. It has to go over the net, but other other team is allowed to let it bounce 3 times, and touch it (soccer style) as many times as they need to. If it bounces too much or ever goes out of bounds (but walls are ok) it is the other teams point. It was fun.

We're really looking forward to general conference this weekend. People talk often about going in with questions, and they'll be answered. I've done that sort of in the past, but this time I want to take it extra seriously. I'll really pray and pick like 5 or so things that really want to find out, and write them down beforehand. I think I'll take my notes on the talks like normal, but also think a bit on the questions during, but especially after the sessions reflect back and see if I think/feel anything that could be an answer. I hope you really liked the women's conference yesterday, we heard it was really good!

thats everything!

Love zak

Received Wednesday, March 26. 2014

do you want to live with Brad Sears?

That would be awesome, that would be my ideal set up. I don't know much about the different housing places or anything, but I am happy to trust. It was with Brad that I (unsuccessfully) bet 50 push ups I'd beat him in our Physical Science class. He also is a great 3 point shooter in basketball even though he has a fully 2-handed shot.

have you heard a CD of Vocal point on your mission or before?

I heard a bit from them before and during. I'm not crazy about them like other people, but they're fine.

have you heard talks from John Bytheway before?

yes, I think they're good. I heard him talk about the Lamanites who gathered on the top of a hill to stay away from Amalickiah who wanted to become their king and convince them to war the Nephites. Amalickiah eventually convinced them to come only a little down the mountain, which was all he needed to eventually take over (he used killed their leader using "poison by degrees")

did you get transferred? If yes, please tell all

did not! but my companion, Elder Jones is! it was somewhat predictable. It was fun to serve with him. I'll probably serve with my new companion (Elder Bushnel) here for my last two transfers. He is already a zone leader, not sure where he's from. I've only talked to him a couple times.

Snow lately?

no, but It's supposed to snow a bit tonight. Only a few inches. Hopefully the real, last time. 30 degrees is cold here.

For Quinn's mission, it is common that people wear shoes that are easy to take off because that is the custom, to take off your shoes at the front door! Have you ever done that? Been instructed to do so by the homeowner? I don't mind the custom, just that I would think those missionaries would wear nice, hefty, warm, tied up shoes. Not easy on and off.

What percentage of the time, during winter, have you worn your big, warm Mr. Mac boots? Have you had to take them off at the door? Explain your answer as fully as possible.

I have done that a lot, enough that I think it's a little weird that you think it is weird. I feel like I did that in homes in CA and a lot out here. Shoes that are easier to slip on do make that easier. Sometimes I'll just slip in and out of my shoes (that have laces) but sometimes I'll untie/retie. Elder Jones always wears slip on shoes. usually when we go into a house we ask "should we take our shoes off?" and sometimes they say whatever you want (and I usually keep mine on) but sometimes they say "yes, that would be good" or something. During the winter we especially will take our shoes off because they are likely to be wet and snowy and dirty. During the winter I would wear my boots about 50% of the time, I liked them, they were very sturdy and really kept my feet warm. It was not a big deal to need to untie them to take them off. Was that a full report?

How did you hear this was especially a custom amongst the Canucks?

Best thing that you ate this week?

hmmm tough to say. One night we were getting back and I wasn't feeling 100% great, but I wanted a chocolate milk shake and got one at the gas station while we were filling up and it really hit the spot.

What activity will you do today?

Transfers have usually been thursday, but they were not moved to wednesday night. This is so President can have more time for the departing missionaries last interview with him. Because of that we have to leave a bit early to drive and get there on time. We are going to the stake center here where a lot of people in the zone will be. There may be a bit of sports (no one wants to get sweaty before transfers) but maybe just talking and journal signing.

How often do you go out on splits? Do you think you make your "split companion" a little nervous?

we have a member with us for something almost every day, but actually "splits" where we go different directions, not very often. I think most people are not nervous. You can tell some people are a little, especially if they haven't done it before (like recent converts especially). Would you be nervous to go with the missionaries to help teach someone? You don't really have to do that much "teaching" often just friendshipping the person and bearing testimony is the best.

Someone just came and gave us homemade egg sandwiches (on homemade bread). They're really good. He gives them to us every week. He's a really nice guy, does a ton of service. He's actually an excommunicated member, but comes to church every week, kind of interesting.

we're going to leave soon to go because we have to pick up another missionary early today to make everything work out with taking him to transfer meeting.

This was a good week. President Haight (counselor to President Packard) came to our ward last sunday. It was great. Like always he had a great sharing the gospel experience to share that had just happened the day before. Him and his wife spoke at sacrament meeting, taught the youth 2nd hour, and taught combined priesthood/RS 3rd hour.

Sorry for being so short, I'll be emailing again monday! good job sharing the gospel and sharing about the goodness of sharing the gospel!

I love you

Received Monday, March 17, 2014

QUESTIONS:

what time is your church?

9:00 ward council is every week, switching from 8:40 (just quick to talk about which investigators or innactive people are coming) and 7:30.

are you going grocery shopping today?

probably. We'll run out of milk and bread if we don't. With those life can pretty much always be sustained, but when their lacking things get hard.

What is the name of your grocery store?

Zak's Convience. My main sales pitch is that instead of nutritional facts on everything I'll put on a scripture. The more faithful you are the more nutritious it'll be. I'm still searching for investors.

What is the name of the grocery store you shop at?

usually a place called Market Basket. Before we found that we went to Stop and Shop. There is a walmart, but it has hardly any groceries. 

Have you ever had your suits dry cleaned while on your mission? If no, just keep moving forward and don't worry about it; I am just curious. We have never talked about that.

No. I always planned on it, but i never actually felt like paying for it or going and actually doing it.

Have you ever bought any garments like Long Underwear Garments?

I never did.

What is the activity you will do today?

Volleyball. It should be good. Last week we played for an especially long time, basketball and dodgeball, which was really fun. We usually end up doing soccer too because most churches have mini soccer goals in them (especially the language units) because all the non-gringos love soccer.

Oh, how is your haircut?

good, but probably not as good as how you do it.

Did you cut your companion's hair in return?

I just did a little in the back.

I think your companion ran track at BYU, true? What was his event? Did he know Allysa Hansen?

He did the Decathalon (where you do 10 events, including pole vault) at UVU. His best is High jump (6 feet 8 inches). BYU has a really good decathlete already so I guess he wasn't likely to get a scholarship there. He set a new conference record at UVU though. He had a teammate that was timed a 4.1 second 40 yard dash, which is crazy.

I have heard that the New York Mission also has Ipads. Hear any talk of your mission getting them? Maybe while you are there?

I've also heard NY has them. we've been hearing talk about getting them forever now. About 7 months ago President was told we'd get them within the next 6 months. That came and went. In February he was told we should get them in the next 6 months (again). So basically we don't know. It's doubtful I'll ever see them, which is too bad.

what did you eat this morning for breakfast?

Honey nut cheerios (bought by a member) with milk (we bought) and Granola (we found at our "vacation apartment")(you can tell from the packaging the granola is from the bishops store house).

Anything you need? Something we can do for you?

hmmmm I don't think so. I think I still have a couple packs of Pez left.

I'm tired this morning. we worked out at planet fitness.

I had a goal after last general conference to read all the talks before this conference. I started well reading about one a week, but then I stopped and now have been reading 1 a day which has been cool. This morning I read president Monson's priesthood session talk about home teaching. I really like to look at those talks and find the promises they make.

 We had a dinner appointment with a member who's a single sister, convert to the church and actively comes to church, but never totally caught on all the way I guess. She hasn't been to the temple and is still trying to figure out her testimony. It was up to us to find a chaperone to come with us and we made a ton of calls and found someone like 10 minutes before we were supposed to be there. It turned out to be perfect because it was a member we teach sometimes who is only semi active and we had a good lessons with both of them about prophets/revelation/general conference.

this is an exciting story. we got called by our investigator to come and help her sick friend she lives with get to the car to go to the hospital, we got there but she ended up calling for an ambulance instead. She gave us her keys and asked us to feed her dogs and a few things and asked if we could help find her a ride back from the hospital later that day. Everything turned out ok. We ended up going on splits that night, Elder Jones was with our ward mission leader and I went with another member to pick her and her friend up from the hospital, so that was all different from our norm.

We had to drop 2 investigators this week because they just don't want to change (drop=stop teaching), which was tough but was the right decision. For one of them it was his birthday so we made him cookies.

the weather is getting better a little at a time here. Still some snow on the ground.

I did recognize most of those football names Dad said, but not all, and I didn't remember where they all were.

 Good to hear Grandma is feeling good enough to make some good steak and potatoes. This week someone asked me what my favorite food was and I said "Idaho food, like meat and potatoes".

For district meeting we were all asked to bring in something that "represents us". I brought in my Thor pez dispenser.

I think that is all for now!

Received Monday, March 10, 2014

I'm not sure what my total opinion is of the time change. The spring forward isn't fun, but the change is more helpful here than in the west. It gets dark soooo early here in the winter, so it is nice to have a bit more sunlight (which was the intended purpose of it all). We could have like a 4 hour change here and then it would be lined up to about normal. maybe we should have a 4 hour time shift and have the day off the next day! that would make everything work perfect.

now that that is settled...

QUESTIONS:

did you get my postal letter with your account info?

I did! It had some good updates and funny stories and kylie's schedules. I wonder if she'll end up going to all those track meets, I think my schedule would look just like that, but I didn't have to/get invited to the many of the saturday meets and a few other exclusive ones. My senior year I went to more. I think the All-comers meets were more for before the actual season started

 

talk about your gym, planet fitness....was it your companion's idea to join, is there loud music playing for all to hear, what about girls and their workout attire...do you workout every day...what is your workout there, like lifting weights, do you do cardio work there...are there many people there in the morning when you get there? have you been able to set up the "pay straight from your checking account" that you wanted to do?

It was his intial idea to join, but I was happy with it. There is music playing, but it's not super loud. Even though the music is obviously not mission approved music, President has said you are not allowed to bring headphones to listen to anything else, headphones are always prohibited (biblia blanca). 

Generally the people are decently modest. We've seen 2 different members there before. There are usually like 20-25'sh people when we get there. We haven't been great about going lately though. My plan has been to have 1 day to do bench press (chest), dips (tricepts) and a shoukder workout (with dumbells), another day to do a back workout, pullups, curls (bicepts) and a forearm workout and a 3rd day do to do lower body workouts and abs. I just rotate those. 

When we stay at the apartment and I work out it's still push-ups, crunches and maybe pull-ups. Also when we go to the gym we usually run (like 4 mins away) and I start by running about a mile on the treadmill. Also at planet fitness they have free tootsie rolls. I have not figured things out with the gym paying system yet, so mine is still hooked to Elder Jone's bank and I will use the info to switch it to mine.

I can't believe the person you were talking to on the phone didn't comment on the fire going on in the house or on my missionary service. Good try though! Good job getting to share a success story during ward conference. our WML yesterday shared about how he was in a taxi and ended up saying something like "off the wall question: Have you ever read the book of mormon?" and ended up having a great conversation and giving him a copy/the #of the missionaries in his area.

 

How did you do with the new daylight savings time change? I hate it. I just hate the time change. I vote to just stick with one and be done!!

Oh, I jumped the gun on this one.

 

Anything interesting happen at  church today?

hmmm. So Saturday night we had the Lynnfield ward annual "lasagna bake off", and we were given some extra cookies and lasagna, and the member who usually bring us food on Sunday brought us her stuff Saturday (4 pork chops with stuffing and green beans). On Sunday she brought us casserole (because she won't be here to make us food next week) and then our Sunday dinner appointment gave us some leftovers; so over the weekend we went from running out of food to having quite a lot! Also we helped set up for a nearby branch to have a baptism in our chapel. There were like 50 less people than usual, probably because of the time change.

 

Sorry to ask again, but how many sets of missionaries are in your Ward? I keep hearing of Wards with mulitiple companionships! I heard today that the Chinese branch, Mountain View, has 4 companionships!!

only 2! there used to be 4, but the others got outed as soon as I came in. now, there is only us. I think if there were more cars we would have more, but this area doesn't have good public transportation. 4 companionships is a lot!

What was the best thing you ate last week?

Probably a tie between the turkey at our sunday dinner, and the roast beef (shredded, not the slices) sandwiches we had at our Mission Leadership Council meeting (all zone leaders and sister training leaders, we have it once a month then we have zone meeting 2 days later based on the trainings we got) we had earlier in the week.

Our zone meeting went really well this time. It was about finding new investigators through the people you are already teaching, asking good questions in lessons, using the area books to organize all the things we've been learning/creating a finding pool, and also a quick zoom out big picture that there will always be a ton of ideas about how to do things, some are essential to be effective (like working with members), and there are also some bad ideas that never work (like playing Uno in your apartment), but for all the rest you have to figure out what is best for your own area and be a bit creative and really make it your own.

They told us there will be a "finding" part in every zone meeting we have from now on because as soon as it stopped being an emphasis the # of new investigators dropped all throughout the mission. During the finding part of our ZM we had everyone do role plays, for questions we had everyone come up with a really good question for L1. We had the meeting in a cultural hall with everyone's chairs in a big semicircle and for the area books part we asked a ton of questions and whenever someone answered one well they got to try to shoot a basket from their chair, and the district that had the most points by the end got a reward. We really used our packet we made up for this part. After that as the "reward" we brought ice cream with a plethora of choices of toppings for everyone, and the winners got to go first. That was the object lesson for the last idea, because everyone got ice-cream, but with all the toppings ideas each person had to really take charge and "make it their own" just like with their areas. There were some essential parts (ice-cream, bowl, spoon) and some terrible ideas (ranch dressing, olives) that no one would want and lots in between. One person did use olives though.

the Sister Training Leader in our zone had changed since last time so we were training with a different person than last time.

The Lasagna bake off thing on saturday went really well. It mostly a fund-raiser for the youth, an auction a lot like ours. For the Lasagna part the rule is the Elders quorum is supposed to make lasagnas, with no help from wives, and it is a contest, with the missionaries as judges. It was fun. Hard to judge 20 different ones though, many were very good. 1st, 2nd, and 3rd as well as "most creative" were chosen and given a plate as prize. Most creative was easy because he made "apple pie lasagna"; technically I don't think someone should win a prize for making something that I wouldn't call lasagna, but I guess it was creative. He always wins that part.

the Auctioneer was very good. The youth got a good sum of money. the only priest in the ward auctioned off a service: "4 hours of looking cool with me at the mall". It was purchased for $55. Someone made stained glass which was cool, there were a lot of good things/desserts.

 We had 5 investigators come (one was someone we don't really teach anymore though, he just likes to bash, but we still called to invite him for lasagna), and another that came and walked in and got a little overwhelmed and then left, which was a little sad. She is an older lady who's taking care of someone in her home who's dying. We got to talk to her a little before she left and we brought her a plate of lasagna afterwards. She was doing fine. That was her first time coming to the church. For one of the other investigators it was also his first time coming to the church and we gave him a church tour during the auctioning.

We had a lesson with Mary, who's the investigator who befriended a member at the YMCA pool. She is so interesting. She totally believes Joseph Smith was a prophet, loves the book of mormon (read it for 2 hours saturday) but doesn't totally believe the church is true because she's catholic. I think she mostly needs a bit more time, and she doesn't really understand a few key things like the Plan of Salvation which really help tie it all together. Also she is hanging onto the idea of the trinity, and for me it's easier to pray and ask questions to the God that we know in the church. She prays, but still likes to use her prayer book (which I think is basically fine to use, especially as a starter, but not exclusively. Those prayers say great things and I think can be meaningful, but no book can write out what your true thoughts, feelings, insecurities and joys are. If you come to believe God is your Father in Heaven you realize you don't read from a book to talk to "abba").

that's all for now. It was fun to get emails from the StevenHeather and Christopher.

I love you

Received, Monday, March 3, 2014

***FROM MOM to BLOGGERS: this week, I happened to write late to Zak. He got to the computer and started writing before I got my letter to him. So, he started writing first, then he saw my letter and answered my questions. Hope that clears up any confusion! Enjoy!!

I'm not sure I have too much to say, I'll start typing and see what happens

I remember last week you wrote about Kylie and track. Hopefully she'll learn to enjoy feeling a little miserable and totally exhausted by the end. That's just your bodies way of giving yo a high five for doing a great job. Saturday practices and things can be a little bogus too, but also fun, especially if there was nothing else planned or going on. Try all the different races and events and see what your strengths are, I liked the 400, but was not great at the shorter races (100, 200) or the longer ones (800, mile). You get better as you do them more. One thing that helped me was I ran a bit during the summer, and I was in the year round track system, so early in the year when everyone else was farther out of shape and kind of lazy, I ran hard and got to a bit of a star for a while. It's a little different just being thrown into it after soccer. Also in my 400 running, I was always on the B-team, 4 by 400 relay, and I really liked it, even though I kind of new I wasn't going to beat the A-team runner. My favorite was to be the very 1st runner on our team and beat all the runners from the other teams, so I know I was faster than the A-team of the other schools.

This week was good like usual.

We got rides for everyone for Zone Conference, and it was a good meeting. It's really interesting to think about the new missionaries, so this is there first one. The whole mission is very different from right when Pres Packard first got here and began training what our priorities were and everything. Often it's a lot more detail oriented now, but then every once and a while he'll have to zoom out and re-explain the big picture so people understand why they're doing things. He'll need to re-visit old topics that have gotten forgotten. President Haight was there too. During his training he spoke about driving home from the zone conference of the day before (for the other zones) and when he stopped for gas he ended up talking to someone who wants to learn from the missionaries. With us he pulled his gas receipt out of his pocket where he wrote down the guys information and gave it to the elders who live in the area with the guy. He seems to have stories like that all the time, he had 4 different people talking the lessons in his home sometime last month.

----I am now taking a break from writing to read your email ----

Good letter! Pole vaulting was the only thing I was technically A team for, so she's doing good, and will get better.

Sounds like things were really good for the Juarez clan! sounds like a great ward.

I have long hair (for a missionary) now too, Elder Jones is going to cut it today.

Zone conference had a ton if ideas of things to do to be productive, most especially 11 ways to "work with members". In order to really help everyone in the zone really know how to do those things (especially the new guys) we've (us 2) been making a packet with questions that really breaks it down. We plan on probably giving everyone one packet this Friday and if we really make it good, ask them to fill it out in the next 2 weeks or so. We're going to do it ourselves first to make sure it's worth it. one of the things to do is: work with members who are inviting their friends to actives (which is what our mission calls the "Low Lying Fruit"). Our packet has questions like What activities happen in your ward? how will you know what non-members are at them? who are the members inviting their friends? then it makes it really easy to know what members you want to meet with etc.

We did have good lessons with our investigators as well. No exciting story, but they were good.

I had a good time on another exchange in a spanish area again. I got to talk to a few people on the bus, which we never get to do in our area. In that area there is a set of Elders and Sisters who share a car/bus pass.

Yesterday we got to our dinner appointment early, so we decided to know on some doors int eh neighborhood. We ended up getting to the appointment late (which we felt bad for on fast sunday) because we got into a 30 min conversation with a lady at one of the houses. She was a strong catholic, and told us about many of the miracles that have happened in the catholic faith. She said she read the book of mormon when she was younger. We shared about the restoration. She didn't really didn't change, but it was a fun good conversation. She said we could come back but she would "preach us the roman catholic church". We might go back this week just to invite her to the Lasagna bake off our ward is doing this weekend, which maybe she'd come to and like even if she believes doctrine different than ours.

I'll go to answering questions now

any interesting stories about your driving?

not really. we're still switching off every day.

how has your weather been?

cold.

were you ever red dotted this week?

(Quinn said a few days ago that all the snow is gone in Rexburg!!) It is cold, but no snow. I am sure more will come.

I don't think it really snowed this week, despite reports saying that it would. I think it was last week we had like 3 warm days, with rain that melted a lot of snow, but there is still a lot laying around too.

Any activity planned today?

going to the revere chapel (which you can read about in the Power of Everyday Missionaries. It's one of the big miracles in there, it started with a small group, but they kept setting up more seats then they needed and asking "who's not here?" until they got a full sized chapel) to play soccer probably. That's the place we usually go for P-day because it's most central for the zone. Also we sometimes go to the Cambridge Stake center because it's bigger and has volleyball, the cool thing about that place is that I've heard it's the most expensive chapel the church owns. It is two stories and has underground parking.

How often do you actually vacuum out your car?

We just vacuumed last week! A more complete/honest answer though would be to admit we just do it every 3 months before zone conference.

How often do you wash your car in the winter?? How do you wash your car, or maybe where??

If it's just up to me, the same answer as above. I've had companions that like to do it more often though, which is probably good.

I have a couple questions
How does Steven like having best calling in a ward, Executive Secretary? 

What is Christopher's Calling?
What about Chase?

And Heather too?
Does Dad do as good in his classes as Kylie?

That's all

Love you

Received Monday, February 24, 2014

QUESTIONS:

When you get "red dotted" does that go for all day? When that happens do you just walk, or can you call a member for a ride? Do you HAVE to stay in the house?  I know it is for your safety.

Usually it's just part of a day. We just can't drive a car ourselves. 

how many sister missionaries are in your mission?

there's just over 300 missionaries here, and I think about 40% are Sisters. 

how was church for you yesterday?

It was good. 3 investigators came. 1 has a baptismal date, she's the wife of a member. 1 is the guy we've been working with to stop smoking, he came for all 3 hours for the first time. and the other is the grandma aged lady we always teach at a members house.

any investigators come to church?

yup

tell about your most tasty dinner appt last week.

the people here are good cooks. at one home she made chicken rolls (I think we called them chicken balls at home) but she made them a little creamier, which was also good. She also had a bowl of a sliced cucumber and carrot sticks, which the kids loved and just gobbled. Lucky taste buds, I guess. Also two different people gave us food yesterday at church to eat throughout the week, and then someone also brought us egg sandwiches this morning (he does that about once a week).

how are your cold symptoms? All gone? 100% better?

Alllll better. 

by the way, I find nothing wrong with eating expired food. I wouldn't if the color was off, or if it smelled bad, so charge on with the cleaning out of your cupboards!

it's mostly eaten by now.

 

What activities are you going to do today? (Jane Colton told me tonight that maybe the YW will play volleyball on Tuesday night.)

I think we are going down to the stake center to play volleyball as well!

It was a good week. I went on exchanges to a spanish speaking are, which was really fun. I was there with a greenie companion, about 3 months out from Utah. He did really well. I feel like my spanish was improving throughout the day, not that I could really say a ton, but I could through in a sentence here or there. Coming out of an appointment with a member we talked to a guy in the elevator who I think they are going to start teaching this week, so they was super cool. I think its great you mention having a missionary son/being a member, that's a good way to do it. Sometimes walking around for me there's no time but to give a card and one sentence testimony, and ask if they'd like to learn, but when there's time to talk to someone a little (like on a bus, etc) I often mention being from California, which makes it easy to segue into being a missionary and the church, etc. Just 1 minutre after talking to that guy in the elelvator while walking to a car there was a hispanic guy I started to try to talk to, but he only spoke spanish, which gave me a perfect chance to throw my companion under the bus and get him talking. He actually really liked being forced to be on the front lines a little more. He talked to that guy a little, he said he was interested, but didn't have a phone, so my comp wanted to ask him his address, but he forgot the word! he ended up saying "tienes un casa?" (Do you have a house?) it was a little funny but worked. The address we got was 3 "Jamiton" which we later together discerned was 3 "Hamilton" street. I'm not sure if that guy was really super interested, but if they do get to teach him it's be super cool. Later that day we had a dinner appointment with a bilingual family, and the Sister missionaries in the ward came too (one of which is a native spanish speaker). My companion took the chance to ask a lot of spanish questions, so he could speak it better. There was 1 question only I knew the answer too, which was funny. The other people could tell him how to say any sentence, but there was one situation they didn't know how to explain the grammar rule he was messing up, they just knew what was right. Since I had learned it in a classroom I wasn't really good at saying things right, but did remember the rule (it was about when you use reflexive verbs, when is the "se" before the verb, and when does it come afterwards). Anyway, it was ironic for the gringo to figure out the answer (it goes afterwards with commands and when the verb is infinitive, otherwise before).
There, you got a missionary story, and a small spanish lesson.

We also had a "mini missionary" for saturday/sunday. He's a youth from another stake in the mission who's preparing for his mission, so he was basically another companion with us for the weekened. Like missionary for a day we did in Arcadia but longer. They get temporarily set apart and everything. It was cool, he was a very excited and confident kid. He got to come to Stake Reporting with us sunday morning, where we (the zone leaders and Sister Training Leaders) in the stake report on how the different units are doing with the stake president and President Packard. it's cool because not many people report right to the stake president. I guess I don't think it's always as effective as it could be though. I'm not always sure what he's really looking for, like what type of info he wants.

Thats basically all for now! Have a great week!

Received Monday, February 17, 2014

QUESTIONS:

how is your weather?

very wintery. Snow and cold. the cold honestly hasn't been too miserable, but htere is just snow on top of snow. sometime I somehow convinced myself winter season was almost over, which now makes it feel dragging out. Its really not too bad, the snow brings service and things, but we were red dotted a number of times (no driving/cancel appointments) many times in the last couple weeks. Also i may be getting slightly paranoid that it will just keep snowing forever and ever and eventually we'll all just drown in it. and freeze to death. After a while it's getting harder to figure out where to put the stuff!

do you wear a knit cap or hat on your head when you go out?

not this month I probably have twice, so sometimes, but not often

is Boston in your current area? Hmm, is Boston in your zone?

no and no. We are in the Cambridge north zone, there is also a Cambridge south zone which is closer to Boston and there are Boston East and Boston West zones which actually encompass the city. The missionaries are much less spread out here closer to Boston where there are lots more people.

did you ever get a valentine's card from me?

yes, it had a yummy hershey bar and a little poem type ditty

Did you ever get a chocolate kiss from me for Christmas?/ did you eat it?

yes, and of course. it was scrumptious

I am guessing you do not do quite as much regular missionary work as when you were not a zone leader. Correct?
How do you like all that? 

yea, not quite as much. At our recent MLC (mission leadership council. Once a month all the ZL's and STL's and the president/AP's have a meeting) president talked about how for ZL's you should spend about 60% of your time working your area and about 40% of time helping with the zone (but the balance depends on the specific zone and area.) That was a bit of a call to repentance for us who have been spending probably about 80% of our focus just on our area. It's all fine, some things feel like a hassel (organizing rides for people, paperwork, and some things) but there are a lot of really good things too. It's what i've been assigned to do, like being transferred to an area, or getting a calling or any assignment, I think it's usually part of the job to learn to like it so you can do your best.

we have our MLC once a month and later that week we do our Zone meeting (with the STL's). Each week we get all the numbers from the district leaders and report them. Also we talk to all the district leaders about there districts, who's doing great, who's struggling, why, what will you do to help, who doesn't see the big picture, hows DM, etc. Also we talk to the STL's about how the sisters are doing. We need to help all the DL's more understand what they can do and the impact they can have (epsecially with helping there people focus on the priorities, monthly goals, and especially the people tghat have baptisimal dates. President thinks we are losing way to many of the people who have baptisimal dates and there's a lot missionaries can do to help that.). We've had trainings on this stuff lots of times and specific leadership training on it too, but of course all the new people (new missionaries and new leaders) haven't, so it's a continual process. A lot of times President talks to us (leadership, especially ZL's) as if we're perfect and have everything down (which I think he does on purpose), and I know I don't, there's lots I'm not good at, but I do understand the theory behind a lot of the stuff even if I'm not great at doing it yet.

is that an ok rundown?

Also we do the baptisimal interview for the district leaders' investigators.

Do you like being a zone leader, do you like all those responsibilities?

this is a bit of a repeat question, but I can expound. I've never really been a big fan of having additional responsibility. I think there are additional trials in some ways and many additional blessings. I think there are additional ways to "mess up" and sometimes on a bigger scale, so you can't live your life or make decisions based on your fears or doubts. President likes to say you don't live based on what you don't know, but on what you do know. I've never really thought about it that way as far as leadership, but I think it applies. Its cool to get the extra trainings from President. He'll often go off on short tangents on things only slightly related but useful life skills/knowledge (about families or anything gospel related). One neat thing is you get to be a little more apart of everyone elses success and it helps you to really feel part of the group and enjoy the collective success and happiness.

 Do you have much interaction with the STLs?

yea. We try to talk before/after they do there exchanges and whenever else we feel we need to. Also we plan zone meeting together. 

What is the area of your mission called?

Lynnfield area/Lynnfield ward, either works.

           

How do you pronounce Reading? like how you read, or the color red?

red (the color) ing (the ing sound)

What are your feelings about us, your family, coming out to get you and look around, at the end of your mission?

that would be fine if you want. I probably wouldn't want to wait too too long before going home, but I think whatever is fine

How are your cold (sick) symptoms?

pretty much done I think

How do you like doing exchanges? Really, what is/are the purpose of those?

they can be fun. So district leaders do exchanges with everyone in there district (not sisters, the STL's do that) and the ZL's do them with at least the DL's and maybe more. I think we'll do them with everyone this transfer. So we get a lot of trainings and things from the mission about finding, working with members, learning from PMG, about how to plan about everything. Some people are god at learning these things ion a classroom and internalizing it and applying to to their area. Some people are not. It is helpful for really everyone to see these things in action to really learn them. That is the reason for exchanges to demonstrate/learn together how to actually apply the things we're learning.

with everything I think I made leadership roles sound like a bit bigger deal than they actually are, but that is a lot of the stuff we do/are supposed to do.

Was that a good leadership responsibility rundown?

We went to the temple today! it was good. It was a fine week. Lots of snowed out evenings, like I mentioned. we had one fun exchange this week with some elders that I think was helpful, especially since we had like an hour conversation at the end to try to help them establish a big picture game-plan which will help. Especially to see how they can fill a finding pool (and write all of it down). Not sure if they really translates into anything in non-missionary speak but thats what we did.

other stuff from this week, hmm. We have a sort-of investigator we shovel snow for and when we weren't able to have a real lesson, we did a spiritual thought with Elder Jones playing his guitar. Tonight we have a dinner and an FHE with our WML's family and an investigator is coming too. We might not teach him too much longer though if things don't take a good turn. He says he likes to learn and is basically a good guy, but said he has no intention of changing religions or coming to church. Also tomorrow we are in charge of mutual for the older boys, we haven't decided entirely what we're going to do for that yet. We hope to have a less active member come in and tell his conversion story as part of it.

About Hingham, I used to serve near there in my first area, in the same zone. Also (I hope I'm not mixing the city up) in my 2nd area, Canton, a lot of (wealthy) people worked there for insurance companies, i guess it's like the insurance company of the world.

That may be everything untill next week.

I love you!