A Quick Note

Anyways, The work here is going geat! We only had one baptism this last weekend. We were hoping for 3... But the good news is that the 2 that didn't get baptized are planning on getting baptized this weekend. So hopefully we'll have 4. Which is going to be great because there will be 12 baptisms in the stake which is pretty amazing. Hopefully the work will continue to progress. I can't really think of too much that has happened. And I don't have too much time, But I'm still seeing miracles and everything is going well. Sorry if this e-mail is kind of a let down, but I promise I will have more for y'all next week!

HAPPY ST PATRICKS DAY!

Well, I had interviews with President Sonne this week and he told me "I don't know why, but God wants you to be fluent in Spanish." Then he followed it with "I don't know maybe your girl will be a spanish speaker." He's trying to get me to think about marriage. I think he's trunky. Then I talked to him about March Madness a little bit. It was a great interview.

Anyways the work in the area is going pretty well. We were able to have 2 weddings, and a baptism on Saturday. This weekend we're planning on having 2-3 baptisms. It should be grrrreat. I'm excited. Then we have 2 or 3 baptisms set up for the 27th, and then the 3rd is General Conference, and right now we're working on getting some people on date for the 10th. Which we should be able to do. There is so much work in this area it is crazy. I don't really want to leave after this transfer. But if I do, it's all good. It just means I'll have to go baptize like crazy somewhere else. But we still have 3 weeks left in this transfer. A lot of time to work.

I can't really think of any thing that's happened. Oh Sunday, I confirmed someone a member of the church for the first time. So that was an interesting thing. I think he's going to serve a mission. I hope so. Well I know this church is true and that I'm doing the best thing with my time. I've grown and learned so much. I've seen so many miracles and changes in the lives of the people that are here, it's amazing. right now I wouldn't want to be doing anything else.

Happy Birthday to Me!

WOOOOOOOO!!! The big 2-0. Man I spent my birthday with a CrAzY party! It started around 10:30 at night. We said a prayer. And went to bed. I think I woke up around 4:30 told myself "happy birthday" and went back to sleep. I probably had a sick birthday in my dreams. Then I celebrated by sleeping in 2 minutes until 6:25 A.M. Went to the study room and read my birthday cards and then, celebrated by running a mile. Shortly after I took a cool down shower, then ate some breakfast. A banana and a Slim-fast Shake ( I'm trying to cut the lb's before General Conference). Then I had some Personal and companion study. We made a baptismal program. During language study, my colleague in the work of Zion, Elder Hiatt, brought me a wonderful birthday surprise. He made me the best birthday card I have ever received, and some cosas to make S'mores. Subsequently, this later got us in trouble with the Zone Leaders and District Leader because it was midway through language study. But I'm alright with it. Because 1) It was Elder Hiatt. 2) It was my birthday 3) My spanish is perfect and I don't need language study 4)It was an act of love not of selfish sin. 5) I sinned in ignorance. 6) We had a lesson to help them with at 11 so they needed us to come over anyways. So I'm pretty sure that justifies it all! Then we helped him with his lesson. I had the opportunity of having 2 lessons with Elder Hiatt that day! Then our dinner appointment last night was sick. The guy offered to take us golfing whenever we want, so we'll probably go next P-day. Then to finish off the day we had a baptism and confirmation of one of our investigators. Probably the best thing to do on my birthday. Then when we returned to the apartment, we got chastised a little by the Zone Leaders about Elder Hiatt coming over. But it was all gravy, because it was my birthday. That was pretty much the highlight of the week. Oh and Sunday when we got to church the person that we baptized yesterday, asked us to give her baby a blessing to give it a name. So I figured my companion would do it because it was in spanish, but she was like "no you" so I got to bless a baby and give it a name for the first time, and the best part is, is that it was in spanish. Oh man. I went to Temple Square Monday night. The investigators we went with felt the Spirit pretty strong. The girl/wife ( who has been the hardest to convert) cried at one point. Then one of them said that they felt a little sad at the end of the Joseph Smith movie because he died. The guy that said that is getting baptized on saturday, and his sister and her boyfriend are getting married on Saturday. So this weekend should be good. 2 Weddings and 1 baptism! Well I think I've said about all that needs to be said.

The first two pictures are of the baptism. The kid in picture 2 is always dressed in slacks and converse it's sick. The next picture is the banner that we all sign.  The last picture is the of the SLC Temple that night.

Transfers

Well, we had transfers yesterday and it turns out I stayed in the area So it's pretty good I guess. I wouldn't mind seeing a little more of Salt Lake. I've been here for pretty much my whole mission. But it's all gravy. It got pretty crazy last week. The family that we helped get married ended up getting baptized on Saturday, and so did the other family where the dad came back for some reason. So we had our 5 baptisms and confirmation last weekend. It was amazing! It turned out to be a pretty good transfer. We had 12 baptisms and confirmations. Which brings my total to 25 baptisms/confirmations during the mission. Hopefully I'll be able to have this much success again next transfer. It was sad seeing all they missionaries that went home. There were some good missionaries there. But oh well. My new companion is Elder Dominguez. He's from El Salvador, but spent the last year in Jamaica Queens, New York. Pretty rough part. So we're a little different. I don't think he likes too much fun. He's pretty serious, but I'll be able to change that. The lady that we found had to go to California for a little while, so she kind of fell off date. But when she comes back we can baptize her. But I'm not too worried about it. There's so much work here. Last night we found a family that seems really receptive. We should be able to baptize a lot again this transfer. At least that's what we're hoping for. Well I think that's about all that's going on around here.

Pictures from the baptism. The family with the three little boys is the other family we baptized. Those 3 are always wearing matching outfits.

HERMANOS! HERMANOS!

The marriage turned out pretty well. We got a Samoan bishop to marry them because the english ones didn't want to/ some were out of town. And the Spanish one was working. But we got them married. We went down to the marriage license office on Thursday and got the license with them. So I got to see how that whole process works. It was great. And the two baptisms we were supposed to have last week fell through because he got called to work early. But he left early and he came back the other day. So if all goes well, we will have 5 baptisms this weekend. The other day a miracle happened. We were walking in the trailer parks the other day towards an appointment and this little girl comes running out of one of them and says "HERMANOS! HERMANOS! Mi mama quiere hablar con ustedes" Something like that. So we went to the house to see what was up. So we got to the door and their were two women standing there and we started talking. And one of them just moved here from California a few days ago. Before she went to California, She was talking to the missionaries and going to church in Mexico. When she moved to California she looked but didn't find the church. And then she came here and 4 days later found us. I have no idea how they saw us, but it's good they did. She's preparing for baptism on March 13. It was amazing. Well that's all about the work right now.

Here are pictures from the wedding we helped with. A Samoan bishop performed it.

Happy Wednesday before Valentine's Day!

I received the cards from the primary kids and the school kids. I'm going to have to say that Jaimie's card was probably the best. Especially when it said "have a happy valentine day with your wife. PS.- I hope you make your wife happy." Ha. Good stuff. I heard about the Saints winning the Super Bowl. They aren't the "Aint's" any more. I received a letter from Brother Tucker a few weeks ago saying that Josh got his mission call, Chris and Sam are 18 now, Tyler Callens and Brady are now Priests. Man it's crazy how fast time goes by. And to top it all off I'm turning 20 next month. I'm so old. I think I'm ready to enter into retirement and receive my Social Security check every month. I'll have 20 years. Man.

I guess I'll update y'all with what's going on here. On Friday night we were able to have our 2 baptisms. We baptized them and then confirmed them there because we didn't have church on Sunday. Because it was Stake conference. When one of them got confirmed the Spirit was so strong. He told us he wants to serve a mission. So that was a pretty good experience. I'll send some pictures of that. Stake conference was a fun little experience. Saturday someone from the spanish branch asked us to translate his talk for him so that he could read it in english. So we translated the talk and gave it to him. Then during the adult session of stake conference when it was him and his wife's turn to give their talk/testimony. They decided to do it in spanish so we had to get up and translate it. And my companion so unselfishly volunteered me do to the one we didn't translate. So I translated it, thought everything was good until Sunday during the General session of conference. Another couple from the ward was giving a talk so the wife went and gave hers in English. Then the husband got up and tried English but I guess got nervous. And asked for some help. So once again my companion refused to go, so I went. So I got up there, and he started speaking Spanish. For like a minute. He didn't give a chance to translate for that minute and the people in the congregation were giggling. But after that time he gave me a little more chance to translate. So later that night we had dinner with President Kendall. The secound councilor in the stake presidency, and the person we live with. But as we were talking Sister Kendall said that when I was translating her daughter-in-law said "I didn't know that spanish translated into 'all y'all.'" Man these Utahns are relentless when it comes to stuff like that. Then people always comment on "yes ma'am/sir." Man. Well the work is going good here. We have 2 more baptisms this friday. That will bring the transfer total to 9. Then we have a marriage set up for the 14th, the day of love, and then they're getting baptized on the 20th with one of their sons. So hopefully that will bring the transfer total to 12. That's what we're going for. Things are still going pretty rough with my companion. It's hard because he won't let go of his pride. He's pretty prideful and self-righteous. But I'm trying to help him. The other day in Zone meeting the Zone leaders made an announcement that if somebody has a perscription from a doctor for coffee or something against the word of wisdom that they can still get baptized. That's the instructions from President Sonne. In the middle of the meeting my companion started challenging them and saying that's wrong. And so later that night they came over and talked to him. They were saying that we're working on becoming a Zion mission so he shouldn't pull others down and not support leaders, because we're working on building each other up. Then my companion said that this is changing the Word of Wisdom and that it's a way that Satan is trying to get power over us. It's frustrating. If it isn't what he thinks is right or if it's something he doesn't want to do he throws a temper tantrum. But I'm learning A LOT of patience. Which is good I guess. I only got 2 more weeks. I can do it! Well here are some pictures. The first one is us with the 2 people we baptized. The younger one is the one that wants to serve a mission. Next is one of the guy we baptized with his family. Next is the family with both people we baptized. The last one is me with my sweet durag that Tiffany sent. It's pretty sick. with the shirt she sent me. It's pretty sick.

Happy Groundhog Day!

Well there's not much going on here. Just livin the mission life. We're going to have 2 baptisms tomorrow night. Which I'm stoked about. The goal for the transfer is 12, right now we're at 5 and if the 2 tomorrow go through we'll be at 7. At most we're hoping for 15. There's so much work to be done here it is crazy. We found this family of 4 that are really interested. The mom's brother is a member. We're hoping to get them baptized on the 20th. And we're helping a couple get married on the 14th, and hopefully baptized on the 20th. It's exciting all the work to be done here. This is a good area. That's about all I got with this area. I mean I don't really know what's interesting to hear, because it's what I do everyday. Things with my companion are going decent. I'm workin on patience. He get's mad pretty easy, and if you don't know how to handle it, things would get out of control.

So yesterday at the temple was pretty cool. We had 12 hours there. We did 2 endowment sessions, and 2 initiatory sessions. We had a devotional. President Sonne talked to us for a few minutes, and then the temple president talked to us for a few minutes, and Elder Ballard spoke to us for like half a hour. So it was pretty good. I learned a lot. It was a good experience. It was a good day.