Monday, November 25, 2013

Wait for iiiiiiiiiit...

Hey!!

This week has been pretty good!!  I got all the rest of the letters and stuff from everyone on wednesday so that was awesome!!!  Thank you guys so much!!! 
The rest of the week was interesting.  It was pretty rainy, which is weird, all last week so we didn't do a whole lot of tracting and stuff.  We still got quite a bit done though.  I can't remember, have I told you about our investigator Roger?  Well, he is a guy we've been teaching for a while and this week, we were finally able to extend the baptismal invitation!!  My first one haha!  He said he would pray about it and get back to us haha.  The only thing that would hold him back from getting baptised really though is his wife.  She isn't very supportive of the whole thing.  We aren't really sure why.  So please pray for him! Thanks :)
 One of the other cool things of last week was that we had a little visitor.  We didn't find out until thursday night, but apparently a ward out  in Palm Dessert worked with Pres. Van Cott and set it up so that a few of the young men of that ward could come out to Yucaipa and hang out with us for 24 hours.  So friday night, we picked up Brother Brown, and he spent the night and saturday with us.  He was cool.  He's half brazilian and apparently they are going down to brazil for the world cup and the olympics and stuff so I was SUPER jealous haha. 

Our 24 hour missionary...Brother Brown!

 The last crazy thing that happened this week is that Chris might be getting married!!!  I guess Toby, her boyfriend who moved out a while ago, has just missed her too much haha.  He wants to get married next week.  It was all kind of sudden so she hasn't said yes yet.  She is thinking about it still. It's exciting though haha. 
Well, that's really all the exciting things that happened this week.  Oh actually, there was one more thing.  I called up Joanie to see if we could meet with her, and she said yes.  But she is super busy this week cause of the holiday so we won't be able to see her till the 2 or 3 of December.  So I'll call her then and set something up.
Holy cow!  There are a lot of eagles getting cranked out!  That's pretty cool. 
I think I heard about lucie taking swim lessons.  I bet she is the best in her class!!  I've heard that HS meets are better than HAST meets but I'm still not sure I would enjoy them haha.  Sorry sade. 
That's exciting about the senior couple missionaries!! That's the first time i've ever heard of it.  That'll be sweet!!! I wonder how it will all work out. 
And congrats mom on the missionary experience!! Being a missionary is awesome haha :)  Hopefully that will go somewhere!
So I'm super bummed I will be mission (see what he did there?) out on the Wise Family mashed potatoes and turkey and homemade rolls and all that!  Thanksgiving is looking like it'll be pretty good up here though.  It looks like we will be having two dinners! I'm gonna be fat.  Pray for my stomach!
Christmas will hopefully be spent here in Yucaipa!!!  I really want to stay at least one more transfer.  Transfers are on dec 10.  We will find out if we are staying or going though on the 9.  So hopefully I'll be staying. I have no idea what I want/need though.  I'll start thinking. 
The man I'm playing chess with is named Francis and he lives in a convalescent home.  He's less active and doesn't have any family or friends either alive or in Cali so we go and visit him every week.  Last week we played chess haha.

Well, I love you all!!! Missionary work is the best!!

Love, Elder Wise

Tuesday, November 19, 2013

Happy Birthday Elder Wise

Hey Hey!!!  Thanks for all the B-Day wishes!!!  I can't believe I actually turned 19 haha.  Let's see, today we did a bunch of stuff.  This morning, I opened the package you guys sent!! Thanks a ton!!! The hole punch and pencils are perfect!!! I don't think I got all the other letters you guys sent.  I got one from Lucie and that's about it.  I loved the leaf haha.  I also loved the sweaters and stuff.  Those will be great!!  And the twinkies were so great!!  I've already eaten some haha. 
We went to Kohls this morning and bought some new shoes.  They are great.  Thanks!!  After that we went out to lunch.  A place called Angus McCurdy's. It's pretty dang delicious!!  Possibly one of the best burgers I've ever had.  They also have Tri-Tip steak sandwiches, which are to DIE for!!!  Past that stuff, we haven't done much else today.  Tonight we are going to a member's for dinner and then hopefully we will go see some investigators. 
 The mission conference was super awesome!!  President Van Cott invited all the stake presidents in our mission to come speak, as well as a bunch of the bishops and stuff.  Elder Hyam of the fifth quorum of the 70 was also there.  It was totally awesome.  If I have some time I'll tell a cool story that they shared at the end. 
For Thanksgiving we are planning on going to a member's house.  I don't know if we will get more than one dinner or not.  Hopefully not cause I am getting fat.  Really I am.  I don't know how accurate the scale is that I'm using but according to the scale, I've gained almost 10 pounds.  AHHHHHHH!!!!  Not good.  I eat so well out here.  We need to start waking up a half hour earlier and going on runs or something.  It's not good.  Haha
 It sounds like it's been crazy at home what with all the people and stuff.  It's fun that Zach and Sara showed up!!  And super crazy that Gma and Gpa were in Yucaipa!!!  If I'd have seen them that would have been unreal. 
Congrats Sadie on the swim meet and stuff!!! That's great!!  And Duck Dynasty season 4 sounds like a blast.  I saw a toy today at walmart that was really awesome.  It was Si's head and it talked and said lots of funny quotes and stuff.  It was really great!!
I'm glad to hear that there were no more major catastrophes in the ward this week.  And I'm glad people are getting better for the most part.  I didn't get a chance to call Joanie last week but I will for sure do it this week.  I promise. 
Well, I will tell you that story now. So one of the bishops in our mission, Bishop Luna, got up and bore his testimony and stuff and he told us a sweet story.  Well first, a little about Luna.  He is the bishop of a spanish ward and they lead the mission and a ton of other missions in baptisms.  They baptized 68 people so far this year and they've had to split the ward twice.  Unreal.  Anyways here's the story.  Two missionaries were in Mexico and in their area there was a town out in the middle of nowhere and they could only get there by train.  The train went out to the town twice a day.  Once, sometime in the mid day and once around 11 at night.  So usually the Elders would take the 11 oclock train out, spend the night, then get to work early the next morning.  Well the people in the town hated the missionaries.  Really hated them.  So much so that they wanted to kill them.  So some men in the town found out when the missionaries were gonna be coming and made a plan to kill them.  They were gonna hide on the side of the road in the ditch or somthing and kill the Elders as they walked the mile or so from the train station to the town.  So the night came and the men hid themselves as the train pulled up, and they saw the 2 elders get off the train and start walking towards the town.  Well, the men lost sight of them for a bit around a curve in the road so they sent one of the men to scout it out and see how close they were.  He returned a few seconds later and brought some incredible news!! The Elders weren't alone.  They had brought an entire army with them mounted on horseback! Sure enough, a few seconds later the Elders rounded the curve and behind them marched thousands of soldiers on horseback.  The men didn't dare try and kill the Elders.  Well the procession marched past for several minutes.  As the last horses marched by the men hiding were shocked.  Well, they wanted to see where all these soldiers were going and stuff so they started on the walk home and as they came into sight of the town, they saw two missionaries, alone, walking through the streets of the town, looking for place to stay the night. 
Isn't that a sweet story!! The Lord protects his missionaries!!  I hope I was able to tell the story alright and that it made sense.  I know I'm a lousy storyteller. 
Well, I love you all!! I apologize cause I don't think I'll be able to reply to everyone who sent me emails.  But I appreciate them all and I did read them so thanks!!!!
Love you guys,
Elder Wise

Monday, November 11, 2013

Hey Hey!!

Last week was pretty good!  It didn't really feel like we did too much cause a lot of our appointments fell through.  We were able to see Leonard, and Guy, and Chris.  Leonard still isn't interested in really learning about the gospel so we just talk with him and share little scripture thought.  When we saw Guy he cooked us up his mom's famous tai recipe for Fried Rice.  It was amazing!!  And then we went out and played some B-Ball on the hoop that's finally done!!  I'll send some pics later.  
It was Chris's B-Day yesterday so we didn't teach her a lesson.  I had offered to make her a birthday cake for her birthday but she didn't want one.  She told us she wanted a white flower.  So we went and found some white roses and took them to her.  She loved them!  So that was fun!

But past that stuff, the week was pretty slow.  I wish I had more to report.  Maybe next week!!
That's so sad to hear about all the crazy stuff happening in the ward.  It's fun that you are getting a baptism though!! That's sweet!!  

I wasn't ever able to get a hold of Joanie.  I will try again this week and we will go and try to see her.  

Way to go Sadie on the swim meet!!  Cedar City was Keven's favorite swim meet ever.  I'm sure you'll love it!!  

I'm super jealous of the young men!!!! I wish I could go on a helicopter ride! That's the best thing ever!! 

Thanks Uncle Eric for the ideas!!  We have been trying to get with the bishop about people giving talks and stuff.  And I told my ZLs about talking with the Mayor.  So we will see what happens there :)  Thanks!

Love you guys!!! 

-Elder Wise 

PS  I think I will make a cake for my bday.  That's a great idea!!

Monday, November 4, 2013

Hello! Hello!

Hey guys!!  Last week was pretty fun!  Let's see, where to start?  Well last tuesday some members invited us over to dinner and afterward they pulled out some pumpkins and let us carve them.  It was a party! I was really glad we got to do it cause I was really bummed I wasn't going to get to.  They have a daughter who is 7 and she is super cute.  She reminds me alot of lucie!!  I carved a skull into my pumpkin.  I'll send a pic. 


On Halloween they told us we weren't really allowed to go out and about but we got permission to go and chill at an investigator's house for a while.  He lives up in the rich area.  Actually, it's the guy who owns the Ferrari.  I guess I shouldn't really call him an investigator.  He isn't really interested in learning about the church.  But he told us to go to his house on Halloween cause apparently it gets pretty crazy up there.  And he wasn't kidding!!  I have never seen so many trick or treaters in my whole life!!  There were thousands!!!!  I'm not even exaggerating.  They had multiple trucks pulling trailors with hay on them so they could transfer the masses to the top of the hill and stuff.  There was a house that had multiple cotton candy machines and popcorn machines going and the line for that house was crazy long.  People were waiting like 30+ minutes to get some.  It was out of control.  But pretty fun!! We just sat out in his front yard around a fire pit for a while.  It was a party!
Pretty much all of our appointments with investigators fell though last week.  We didn't really see any of them.  Of the ones we did see, we committed them to come to church with us yesterday, but none of them showed up.  So that's kinda disappointing. On the plus side though we finally saw Chris!!  Well kinda.  She wasn't feeling well so she didn't want us to come over but we asked her if she wanted a blessing.  She obviously didn't know what it was and first asked us if we could do it over the phone haha.  But we explained how it didn't really work like that and so we went to her house and gave her one.  So that was fun!
The other thing we did was do a lot of service for Guy, one of our other investigators.  Have I mentioned him before?  I can't remember.  He's a pretty cool guy.  He's been seeing missionaries for forever but up until now, it's been kinda impossible to get him baptised.  His wife teaches at a catholic school and wants nothing to do with the church.  But I think they are getting a divorce now.  I'm not really sure.  They are separated for sure.  Anyways, we helped him put a basketball hoop in his front yard.  It was quite the ordeal. Fun though.  The best part is that at one point, we had to heat up the bottom end of the pole to get some metal off, but he doesn't have a torch.  So my redneck mind thought up something wonderful.  Why not use the grill??  So that's what we did.  We propped the whole hoop up on some garbage cans and stuck the bottom in the grill.  Worked like a charm!!!  I'm brilliant.  haha just kidding.  I wish I coulda gotten some pics of it.  I was laughing so hard.  It was funny.  But I had left my camera at home :( 
This whole project took us about three days to complete.  Saturday Sunday and this morning.  Phew.  It's finally done!!
But really, last week was pretty dull.  Like I said we didn't see too many people.  A few less actives.  That was good.  Elder Seright and I are doing great. 
Halloween in Utah sounded fun!!!  I'm super jealous that I missed out on spudnuts.  Although I have good news.  I have redeemed myself.  We finally found some rhodes dough balls and I cooked up some butterscotch rolls this morning!! Super delicious!!!!  The Massey family loved them as well.  So that was good. 
It sounds like life in PG is just as crazy as always.  Way to swim hard at the meet sadie!  And way to go dad!!  Working hospitality!  Good times.  Not really.  That's the worst. 
Well I hope you all have a good week!!!  Love you all!!
-Elder Wise
PS  The gospel rocks!  California rocks!  I love it