October 28, 2013

Hey Family!!!

 

This week was pretty good.  We are still trying to find people and get our teaching pool bigger so we can have solid lessons every week.  It is been hard to turn this area around, and we have been working our tail ends off.  The funny thing is that we haven't knocked one door and we have received 10 referrals in 2 weeks.  The Lord is blessing us a lot, and it has showed me that when you put in effort and work hard the Lord will be right there helping and pushing you along.  Most of the referrals scheduled appointments this week so hopefully our teaching numbers go up, and we kick some butt again like we have in the past.  But I am doing good here - just loving life and missing not seeing the witch on Halloween. 

 

This week we mostly walked around and tried to save miles on the car.  We have been visiting people, but we haven't had too many lessons because we have been just trying to find new people and get a fresh new start to this area.  This area is an area where missionaries use to just come and party and break rules.  It wasn't the best area, but we are now in the process of changing that and trying to make it the best area in the mission.  I love it down here.  It is just like Mexico and fun. 

 

We went to go contact one of our referrals this week.  It was from the Relief Society president in the ward.  She told us that her aunt might be interested in hearing the gospel.  We showed up the next day and she supposedly, "Wasn't Home." They didn't say not to come back, so we went another time and supposedly she wasn't there again.  We told them that we would come back another day, and so we did.  We pulled up mid-day and there were a bunch of men stripping parts from a car.  I guess they do that for a living, and it is done right there in the front yard.  We asked if she was home and they were like, "Yep she is home,” and they told the little kid to direct us in the house.  So on the way up to the door the little kid was jumping around saying, "She is here, she is here!"  So we walked to the side door, and it led into the laundry room where there was another door into the house.  It was closed for some reason, so we waited till the kid opened the door.  We walked into the house and waited till the lady came out from wherever she was.  It was weird because there was food cooking that was just left there, but nobody was cooking it.  This other lady came out from a room and said, "Oh she isn't here, come back later."  The little boy was like, "No she is here."  So the boy took off running around the house trying to find this lady, his grandma.  The other lady who probably was the mom of the little boy did too.  We were standing in the kitchen just watching this all unfold.  All of a sudden a hand grabbed this little boy from behind the staircase.  It got silent for a minute, and me and my companion were just wondering what the heck was going on.  All of a sudden the boy and the mom come out from behind the stairs and the little boy was like, “Nope she isn't here,” but then he sprinted to the pantry door and tried to rip it open.  There was a person hiding behind the door, and it was the lady who we were looking for.  The little boy tried with all his might to get the door opened, but he couldn't.  We slowly backed out of the house, and we then heard him say, "Grandma you can come out now, they are gone."  So the grandma who we were looking for was cooking food, heard that we were coming, bolted for the pantry door, and hid herself in that.  It was pretty funny.  So she completely ignored us, so we are going to go back this week to try and contact her.

 

Not much happened with our investigators.  Jesus is still battling cancer, and I love that man to death.  Cecilia is now not really able to talk with us.  She always gives us days when she is not busy, and she texts us later and tells us she is busy.  We can't figure her out.  We don't know if she is just avoiding us or just forgetting what days she is busy.  She hasn't been to church in two week, so that is kind of bad.  We found this new guy named Daniel Gomez.  He is 21 and just has a lot of questions and stuff.  He is pretty solid, and he is a really cool dude.  He is super skinny and has a deep voice that is kind of cool.  Hopefully he gets baptized.  We have an appointment with this other referral who supposedly has tattoos all over his body and just wants to completely turn his life around.  Hopefully he turns out to be sweet.  He sounded dope. 

 

I almost got attacked by a dog this week.  We were walking around at night.  We were walking down this path that was kind of dark and passed this house with a gate that was opened.  All of a sudden we heard barking, and I saw two glowing eyes coming at us.  It was scary, and luckily they didn't attack us.  They stopped halfway and didn't come at us.  But I did get bit by a small dog this week.  It grabbed my pants, and lucky it didn't grab my leg.  So ya, that was pretty much my week.

 

It sounds like everything is going good at home.  I am doing good down here.  Thanks for the package you sent me.  I love it.  Grandma and Grandpa Smith sent me one and so did the Metcalfs.  So I have more candy than I could imagine but I love it.  We are working hard and I can't complain.  Oh, my companion is from the Cache Valley area.  He picks and eats his dandruff from his hair.  It grosses me out, but whatever.  That is good Mr. Rodgers pulled it out for the Packers.  I miss football and watching Tyler play.  I hope you have a great week and a Happy Halloween!  That's sweet Sean and Andrea are having a kid!  Its birthday might be 3 days before mine or on it!  It better be named after me!  Haha, jk jk!  I miss you guys tons and love you lots!  You’re always in my prayers!

 

Con Mucho Amor,

-Elder Smith   

 

October 21. 2013

October 21, 2013

Hey guys!

Welp the Alaskan boy is long gone.  Now I am stuck with a complete nerd, to say the least.  I don't know how to describe him to you.  I don't think I have ever heard more about video games, Dungeons and Dragons, and just weird things in my life.  The one thing I am grateful for is that we work hard, and you know you can just get past the weirdness for the hard work.  He is strange, but we work hard and that is good.  I am now surrounded by 3 nerds, and I am just the kid in the corner whose mind is being blown because of the things they talk about and how weird they are.  I enjoy lacrosse, NFL, and that stuff, and they enjoy the nerd weird stuff that I have tried so hard to stay away from.  But we are working hard, and that is important.  

This week was definitely hard.  We have been trying to get new investigators this whole week, and we had no luck till yesterday.  We have been walking a lot lately because we don't have that many miles left on our car for the month.  We even had to walk to Anthony this week to save us some miles and, oh my, it was a trek but we made it.  We tried to contact people on the way but it end up there was no one on the trail that we were talking to Anthony.  So we were bummed that we didn't see anyone.  But yesterday we found 4 new investigators, and we were really happy because our hard work paid off.  We talked to this new Margarita, and she has 2 kids that listened to our lesson as well.  We also found this old investigator whose name is Rodrigo Rodriguez.  He is a pretty cool dude.  He is younger, like in his 20’s.  The missionaries stopped talking to him, so we picked him back up, and he is super cool and fun to talk too.  Jesus is doing good as well.  He always beams with excitement when we stop by and always tells us to never forget him.  I was going to count that small little chat with him as a lesson because we talk to him, saw how he was doing, and closed with a prayer but, nope, my companion shot back at me and told me why we couldn't count that as a lesson and gave me a super detailed long description why.  I just tuned him out and just let him win the argument.  I have been kind of doing that a lot lately.  I sometimes tune him out because he starts talking about something I don't really want to hear, but I just look like I am listening to show him I care, but I think of other things.  It is also hard too sometimes because he always listens to music.  When there is a dull moment in the day he blasts music.  The first thing he does when we wake up is blast music, and the thing he does when we get home is blast music.  I sometime just want quiet time to think, and I don't get that anymore.  Pretty much my quiet time is in the shower.   I am now staying there for a while because I don't want to go out and listen to more music.  It is what it is.  Cecilia is doing good as well.  We didn't see her this week so it was weird ,and she didn't come to church so that bummed me out.  My companion didn't count her as progressing, but she is.  I didn't want to argue with him so I just let him have his way.  He always goes into detail when he argues something.  He is also the district leader, and it is the first time in his mission when he has been the senior companion.  It is kind of getting to his head, and he thinks he has all this power.  Every time he answers the phone, and it is missionaries on the line, he says , "This is district leader Elder Lamunyon.”  It is super annoying, and he thinks he is baking in power.  But that was pretty much my week for you.  We didn't teach much because we were finding. 

I don' think I need much - maybe some shampoo if that is ok?  I am happy the Packers won this week and Tyler and Scott pulled off the "W".  That is good the Titans are kicking butt.  The school needs that, and it is probably way fun.  I kind of regretted not playing football.  I wonder sometime what would have happened if I played and I should have given it a second chance.  But I am happy I did my own thing and played lacrosse.  I miss not being as active.  I am just hoping I don't gain weight on my mission because they feed us so much at dinner, and it is not healthy.  But I am doing good, and I miss you guys tons and think about you always.  You guys will have to see this place sometime and see how ghetto the ABQ is.  It is more dangerous than El Paso but I can't complain because it is an awesome city.  I hope you guys have an awesome week, and I miss you guys tons.  Just know how much I love you and you’re in my prayers!

Con Mucho Amor,

-Elder Smith          

 

October 14, 2013

Hey Family!!

 

We didn't teach much this week because my companion has mostly been getting ready to leave.  We had a baptism yesterday for Gina, and I am going to try and send you some pictures of it.  It was a neat experience, and we were happy that she got baptized.  Cecilia is doing good, just trying to get through her divorce and take care of her kids.  She tells us that she feels the Spirit every time that we come over there, so that is awesome.  We invited her to be baptized, and she said in the future and that she still has to figure out this whole Mormon thing and the church.  So that was neat, and she is an awesome lady.  That was pretty much they only true lesson we had this week.  Transfers are tomorrow, and I am nervous.  We will have to see what the Lord has in store for me.  But that was my week for you.

It sounds like everything is good at home and everyone is in one piece.  The football news was awesome, and I loved reading about it.  Have an awesome week and know you guys are always in my prayers!  I love you guys tons!

Con Mucho Amor,

-Elder Smith 

 

October 8, 2013

Hey Family!!!,

Sorry you didn't get an email from me yesterday, I was up in ABQ at the temple.  I forgot to tell you guys last week that I was going to the temple this week.  We go every 6 months after conference.  It was a wonderful day yesterday.  You could feel the spirit so strong in the temple, and they had a new temple video and it was pretty epic.  Have you guys seen it yet?  The drive was wonderful too.   It is weird that I say that because it is 4 hours but I enjoyed it.  I thought about Breaking Bad as I pulled into ABQ.  The drive was beautiful and pretty much there is desert, farms and mountains.  You have to go through border check to get through the New Mexico border.  So we had all are windows down, and they asked each one of us if we were a US citizen.  It was pretty nuts and fun.  The ABQ temple is stunning.  It is pretty small but so sweet.  We had so many people in the session that they had to pull more chairs from who knows where.  It is something I will remember for a long time.  We can't drive going up so we had this dad and daughter in our ward take us.  The dad is like 90 and went through the temple with us, and the daughter went shopping because see is less active and hasn't been through the temple.  We will have to go through the ABQ temple sometime in the future.  The temple is a pinkish color that matches the mountains that are behind it when the sun goes down.  It’s way sweet.  President Miller pulled us into a sealing room after and talked with us.  I love him and his wife so much.  They are seriously so awesome.  We got back around 9 last night and went straight to bed after because we were shot.  But everything was so great yesterday.

This week was pretty good.  Not much happened.  My companion is on cruise mode big time, and he needs to just go home.  We didn't teach that many people this week and that was bad.  We were in the car one day, and we don't have many investigators, so I was like we need to knock some doors.  He turned to me and said, "That's a funny joke."  He doesn't want to put in any effort, and it is bad.  I am excited for a new one, but I just hope he is good and I don't continue my streak of bad companions.  I swear those are all I get - just people who aren't putting their full heart into the service of God.  But, like I said, not much happened - just the normal teaching and more teaching.  We did service this week and that was fun.  We did it for Chewy and his sister Virginia.  We had to clean up weeds around their house, and it was super infested with weeds.  She likes to save everything that she ever gets, so it is all just piled up in her yard.  We can't throw anything away because she likes everything, even just a piece of sheet metal.  We were moving things around so we could pull weeds, and as we did this we found 4 black widow spiders and tons of cockroaches and stuff.  Mom, I don't think you would like it down here because there are cockroaches everywhere.  When I see one I think of the Chili's in Mexico and our experience there.  But we made a small dent into the weeds.  We have to go back some other time and finish it up. 

   Our investigators are doing good.  Cecilia is progressing slowly but surely.  We found out that her ex-husband was and still is a major problem.   He is crazy, and she keeps on telling us that he needs help.  It is always an adventure going over there, and I always enjoy it.  Jesus is doing pretty good.  He is just battling cancer and stuff.  He is a stud, and I love him.  Our other 2 new investigators, that I told you about last week, fell through on both of their appointments.  We haven't really been able to contact them.  Hopefully this week we will be able to.  But that is pretty much all our investigators right now.  We need to get more.

The weather has changed big time down here.  It gets really cold at night, and it is that crisp fall air, but it still manages to get in the 90s sometimes.  It makes me think a lot of home and the wonderful fall nights at home and Halloween at our house.  Mom, you have officially made me fall in love with Halloween.  I am happy Dad that your birthday went well and it was a good one.  I am sorry I missed it but we will do something when I get back.  I am doing good down here and transfers are next Tuesday, so that will be an adventure.  Thanks for all the updates from home.  It sounds like everything is good there.  I miss it a lot at times but I am doing the right thing.  I hope you guys have an awesome week and I miss you guys tons!  Love ya!!!

Con Amor,

-Elder Smith