October 23, 2017

Back in San Fran!

So Elder Call actually got in super late at like 7ish because he missed his first flight!

MOMMA!!!

San Fran is doing well! Ya It's been pretty awesome being back not gonna lie, most of the members (at least the really cool ones) remembered me from last year so it was a lot of happy reunions on Sunday which was super cool! A few of them approached me and ask if they can feed me and wanted to give me refferrals haha! It's kind of weird becasue we haven't exactly done anything yet. Relearning the area is a little harder than I though it would be, and we are working with all new people now since they divided up the areas, so I'm not always entirely sure where I'm going yet haha! But it's really cool because we already (thanks to the other elders) have 3 people on date for november which is super awesome! OH Ya and so my comps name is Elder Call, he is from Houston Texas and we are getting along super great, just like most new missionaries he's super pumped to go out and baptize SF! His mom is from Nicaragua so he's already got Spanish down which is a blessing for me, not because I don't speak it, but because now I don't have to teach it again haha!

Ok so a little bit more about the area, most missions call it a white wash but we call it shotgunning here for some reason, and ya it's still the same thing because we are opening up a new area that just so happens to be my last area, so like I said we are just working with a lot of different people now. But we are still using public transportation which is good because I kind of know how to use that already. Oh and I wanted to ask you if you could send a Missionary Language learning guide for Portuguese to me, I know you can purchase them online but I'm not sure where you would look to find it. but that would be cool to have! I think thats all Love you!! I'll send pics in a sec!

 

So here's me and Orlando! Good guy, offered to feed me!

Here is my dad and my new son

Here are the elders in my dist at the temple for new missionary training stuff

 

and a casual selfie of me being back in SF

October 16, 201

Transfer Week

We got this text from an Amazing family in Concord, CA letting us know that Elder Dayton was being transferred  this week! This awesome family feeds the missionaries every Sunday night!! We love the Merrils!

MOMMA!!

I am doing well! I'm glad that counts as my present haha you know im pretty bad at thinking of gifts. And sorry for never writing a letter, it's hard to remember to buy stamps and then actually write the thing haha, but I will make a better effort to do that this next transfer! (The present I counted was Sis Merril sending me a video of Brigham singing a duet at their home with a sister missionary!!)

So the fires are insanely big, so i'm told, and I have to assume people are telling the truth because we were seeing smoke throughout the whole day for the past 3 or 4 days! I think I woke up on thursday and went outside to head to sports and said to myself, "wow, it's overcast today" but it was not... So the temperatures have been going down here because of the smoke and schools in the area closed for the weekend, (but missionary work didn't close, it's more important than school work:) but today it's starting to look better so that's good. But I've heard similar stories of people thinking the fire was far enough away (10 miles away) for them to sleep through the night and get out in the morning and then people knoking on their door at like 1 in the morning saying the fire is here and they need to leave now! So the destruction of so many homes is super sad, we are all praying the fires get controlled soon. I'm still not sure what the cause was, if you know I'd be curious to find out.

So San Francisco! I will be in pretty much the same area I started in, thank goodness! Except now its just like the whole northern area, which is the actually city!!! Sister Betty will totally be your best friend again because I live super close to her! just one street down from my old apartment so thats pretty neat!! Ya i'm training another missionary! It's the exact same situation as when I was trained by Elder Galaz! I am shotgun training and the district leader haha, it's gonna be a crazy couple of first weeks! So the transfers will be on Tuesday and new missionaries get here Wednesday, so I'll be sticking with my ZL's over there or something until I pick him up.

Thats so cool you got to go to San Diego again and see Rudd get baptized! And yes I'm pretty sure my return date is Aug 8 but i will have to double check on that. Ya i will need to apply for school huh, maybe I'll ask President about that if I see him tomorrow during transfers. So our last week here in Walnut Creek was super great actually! We were able to find 2 new investigators on Saturday and Sunday!! So that was super fun, we had dropped a lot of our investigators a couple weeks ago and Elder Bird was nervous he would have nothing to do with the new missionary coming in but now we're good:) So the sister I sang with is Hermana Lattin, she and I sang that song in Sacrament meeting that day because we are both leaving and ya she's a really good singer, and they are the ones that had the baptism. Ya I have been saying good bye but there are still some more people I will need to talk to tonight but it's been a pretty good time here but I'm ready to move to my next area and find some more people! I'll send some pictures in just a second! Love you!!!

So it's hna Lattin, sis Perry, bro Perry, y yo. They fed us Sunday night

and then here is all of us :)

We went and said bye to the Merril family on Sunday as well, I'm gonna miss them a lot!

October 9, 2017

October Break

so here's a nice picture of me looking real thin. Corn dogs for breakfast all day! 

MOMMA!!!

 

I am doing super well! Ya it was an interesting baptism but great, and yes they are Spanish Sisters. Ya i guess we are pretty blessed that we don't have to scrape out garbage cans to have baptisms like Africa, haha. 

So S. is still struggling, we don't think he has found a job and this past weekend his phone wasn't working at all so we think he wasn't able to pay his phone bill:/ So we hope things look up for him soon, we just need to break into his apartment complex some how so we can talk to him. 

This weekend we were able to find 2 new investigators which is awesome! Both on Sunday night and they were the only people we found this whole week so that was super nice haha. Transfers are next week, we will find out on Saturday what's happening and I'm kind of hoping I get transferred haha, Elder Bird and I are doing good but he does a lot of little things that I find pretty annoying but it's all good. 

Psh 45 isn't even that old! But lucky you got to go birthday shopping haha, Grammy & Grandad are the greatest! Dang Rudd is already 8?! I remember Dax getting baptized not even that long ago! So are those kids in surfing classes or something yet?! Good for Ammon getting some playing time in football! Ya he wrote me a little bit, it says I can't do the chat thing with him though, thats kind of weird.. 

I don't think it's that bad to wish for something to be done... haha but no I am not wishing my mission to be done, too many great experiences to be had still, and I don't want to stop learning! Ya conference was super cool I can't wait for the Ensigns this next month haha, that way I can read them in Spanish for language study haha. Love you so much I'll send some pictures in a second! 

dinner at the Merril's

this was from last weeks zone activity

and here is Elder Bills my Zone leader, he's a cool guy!

October 2, 2017

General Conference

First letter of the Day...

Hey mom I'm doing good, Just got told I only have 10 min left from the Employment center lady because there are other people here (eye roll emoji) so I will be back and hopefully be able to get on, But I'm doing super good, Conference was awesome!! But I wish you the happiest birthday ever!!!!!<3

Two Hours later...

So things are going great, the sisters baptism was awesome! So many people were able to attend it actually was out the door at the very back of the room watching haha, so there was a little technical difficulty though, the plug for the font was in but the water was still exiting through it, there was this thin plastic flap thing that we put over it but when we started filling it moved it a little bit, and so water was still draining. So when the time came for her to be baptized the water level was pretty low so she went forward instead of backwards! Super interesting, never seen it done that way before. And then later that night the sisters put someone else on date which is awesome! And earlier in the week the zone leaders put 2 people on date, which isn't very common in a YSA ward so good for them! S. is doing alright, still no job but he came to the Sunday conference sessions which is good, I think he is becoming super dependant on the missionarys for everything though, rides, information and invitations to things. The branch hasn't really started reaching out and helping him with anything past saying hello and stuff at church, which is a good thing to do but he calls us almost every day and he needs to find friends in the branch because missionarys move and change so idk whats going to happen when i leave:/ 

I was able to watch all of the sessions of Conference and it was super awesome! It's so crazy how much more exciting it is for me as a missionary than it was before the mission. I will try and send a pic or video tomorrow for your Birthday if i can be we don't have a dinner with anyone tomorrow so I'm not sure if I will be able to:( but I will try! If the opportunity arises I'll take it! I love you so much! I'll send picture in just a second!

So we just switched Elder Bird as the designated driver haha

September 25, 2017

Busy Times!

District bowling was a party...and as you might have guessed, those are the only pics I took, hehe

MOMMA!!!

So things are going pretty well for us! Sounds like you guys are out and about having a lot of fun which is super awesome! We got some solid return appointments with some of our investigators who weren't progressings so much so that's exciting! S. (our recent convert) is struggling a little bit, he can't seem to keep a job right now which is too bad so he is struggling with rent and stuff so we are hoping things go better for him this week. 

We got to do this really cool service for the Salvation Army where people come in and sign up for the Christmas program and we helped them sign up, and every one I helped was in Spanish except for one person who was Greek and she did not speak the greatest of English, but it was a super cool experience and I was really glad I could be there to help out, we're going to do that same service again next week so that'll be fun! 

The sisters in our Branch are going to have a baptism this upcoming weekend which is super awesome! I actually got to interview the person, which is a really interesting experience, but I liked it. Hope you enjoy your travels and take lots of pictures for me!!! Love you! Be safe, tell everyone I say hi!!