A Great Finale!

Well last week was just a great week to end the transfer!  The baptisms went really well!  Tony, Angel, Raul, and Jayro are officially members! Yay!!  It was so awesome! I'll send some pics in a bit.  We also got a car this week!  A silver Chevy Colorado truck!  It's nice.  Really fun to drive.  Reminds me of the jeep actually!  Which, by the way, I am glad is staying in utah!  Although I'm a little sad I won't be getting a new Rubicon.  Oh well.  Maybe someday.

This last week we were also able to find 5 new investigators!! It was so awesome!  And they have been so prepared be the Lord! They are just Golden!  Two of them are Carlos' and Grace's upstairs neighbors.  Sister Armstrong and her mom Sister Armstrong. We did what it says to do in PMG and asked if we could call them Sister and they really love it haha.  They introduced themselves as Sister Armstrong at church yesterday.  It was awesome!  And they have more family in the home, and they loved church so much that they want us to start teaching everybody so we will probably gain a few more investigators from them!

We also started teaching a guy named Angel Marmolejo (Brother Marmolejo) and his son Angel Marmolejo.  Haha they are super awesome too!   For some reason they weren't able to come to church yesterday, but we met with them twice last week and they are just super awesome.  

So we found out about transfers today!  I will be staying here in Colton for another 6 weeks! And my new companion will be Elder Webb.  I don't know too much about him but he sounds like a super fun guy.  So I'm pretty stoked! 

Also, this last week we got to watch Meet the Mormons.  It was AWESOME!  I would totally recommend going to see it!  It was pretty bomb.  I wish I could see it again.  It'll have you laughing one second, and crying the next.  Oh and guess what is in it?  It shows some people skiing at Snowbird and climbing at Momentum!  It's great.  That part made me homesick though haha.  But anyways, it's sick. 

Well, that's about it for the update here.  I'm glad everything is going well at home!  Way to win your game lucie!  Soccer in the rain is the BEST! Haha I love it.  

Have a great week!! Love you all! 

Love, Elder Wise 

**note from Mom--apparently he forgot to send the photos :(

One down, Four to go!

This week was super awesome!  Nathan got baptized!! Yay!  It went really well!  I'll definitely be sending some pics.  Let's see, what else happened this week?

I think it hit about 112 the other day.  It's soooo hot! Luckily, it's cooled down a lot the last couple days.  Only in the 90's.  Phew! Sadly, we still don't have a car.  It'll probably be coming in the next couple days.  Hopefully! 

I'm sure you've probably heard about it.  But the church has come out with a movie!  Its called Meet the Mormons!  It's even going to be in theaters and stuff!  It's pretty cool.  We get to watch it this coming Thursday. I'm pretty stoked!  It's supposed to be really good!  It follows the lives of 6 mormon families.  It's not meant to be a proselyting tool, just an informative movie so people can see how mormons really are.  

This upcoming week we have 4 baptisms!  Tony, Angel, Raul, and Jayro.  It's going to be awesome!!  They are all really looking forward to it! I'll be sure to take lot's of pics! 

I'm glad to hear everything is going well at home! Sounds like you all had a fun week!  Way to win your game lucie!  That's fun that everyone got to watch the temple dedication!  I wish they could broadcast that everywhere!  That woulda been sweet! 

And I'm glad to hear that the missionaries there are doing good work.  That's really good.  

So Jim isn't going out to utah anymore?  Does that mean they aren't buying the jeep?  I would really miss the jeep, but if Dugan really wants it that would probs be ok.  Maybe we could replace it with a Rubicon?  Or a Wrangler?  Or maybe a Harley.  All of those would be acceptable replacements haha.  :)

Well, I hope you all have a fantastic week!!  I love you all! 

Love, Elder Wise

HOT!

Yeah, this week has been HOT! I've been dying.  Even when there's a breeze it doesn't help much.  It's super hot air.  It feels like a hair dryer is blowing in my face.  Oh well, the good news is I probably won't be on bike for too much longer!! YAY!  The ward boundaries changed this last week and so our area's changed as well.  I am now in the Colton 1st ward.  It's a pretty huge ward.  It's going to require a car so they are working on getting us one.  The other cool part about all this is that we only lost like 3 investigators!  We lost Mike, and Leonard, and a couple others who weren't progressing anyways.  Pretty much our entire teaching pool is intact.  Plus, we gained a golden family of 5 from the other Elders, and an investigator from the Sisters!  So all in all, this change has worked out quite well for us! Plus, 9 investigators came to church again!  So we have been really happy this week.  It's been good.  That's pretty much all that has really happened this week though.  It's just been kind of hectic with all the changes.  But this next week should be a great time!

Sounds like it's been fun at home!!  Way to go Lucie for playing soccer! I'm glad you like it!! Those pics are awesome! Go number 7!  haha

The carpenters had their baby!! Congrats!! That's awesome!  I love gingers! 

I'm glad to hear that the ward didn't change much with the rearrangement of boundaries! It would be weird to come home to a bunch of people who weren't there when I left haha.  So I'm glad it's pretty much the same.  

Dinner with the Carlson's sounds awesome! Malawi's pizza is delicious! 

That is the coolest story about Elder Nelson!!  I love hearing cool Apostle stories every week haha!  That is so cool!  

Well, Thanks for all your support and love!! I hope you have a great week!!  Love you!

Love, Elder Wise

One Year Gone...

Whoa, time is just flying by!  I can't believe it's been a whole year!  CRAY-CRAY!  This week was pretty bomb though. Let me tell ya.  I guess the reason it turned out so well was because of church yesterday! We had 9 investigators there!  It was truly a miracle.  Because of the special meeting, we had church at the stake center which is pretty far away, so we figured it might be kinda hard to get everybody over there.  The majority of our investigators are youth, or don't have cars.  So that's a bummer.  But everything worked out and we had a whole bunch of members help with giving rides and we were able to get everyone there!  It was awesome!

And the special meeting was because the stake has reorganized all the ward boundaries!  As a result of this however, Elder Urry and I no longer live in the Bloomington ward boundaries, and so we might be switching to a different ward.  The Colton ward.  We won't know for sure though until tomorrow.  

Let's see, what else happened??  Umm, oh we had MLC last week! It was pretty good!  We learned a lot of really cool things.  It was fun because normally in these meetings, the President covers a lot of things about rules, and other nuts'n'bolts type stuff.  But in this last meeting we were able to dive more into doctrine and stuff! We talked a lot about conversion and how our investigators can become more converted if we as missionaries are converted.  We also talked a lot about the Book of Mormon.  It's so cool!  There is no way that the book of mormon isn't true.  Just sayin.  :)

This is kinda cool too.  The Mission President has allowed us an extra 30 minutes of companion study in the mornings! This is to be used to watch the District 1 DVD's which are all about planning.  For the last several months there has been a big push on planning and how to plan correctly and the District DVD's help so much!  So we are stoked about that! 

I'm so glad to hear that the baptism went well and everything!!  Congrats lucie!! :) I'm so proud of you! It sounded so fun!! 

I got all the packages this week!  Thank you so much!!  They were perfect!  We ended up going out to eat the next day.  Cause hump day was the day we had MLC so there wasn't much time.  It was delicious! Thanks so much! 

Wow!! That story about that girl is incredible! 

Well, I'm just about out of time.  I hope you all have an amazing week!!  I love you all!! This church is true and being a missionary is the best!

Love, Elder Wise

Oh boy.

Well last week was interesting.  Most of our appointments fell through and stuff just did not work out. Plus, I have some bad news.  Both Tony and Nathan's baptisms have had to be pushed back :(  They are both doing super awesome! But Nathan's mom ended up not being able to have work off this saturday, so we have to push Nathan back to September 20.  And Tony is still doing amazing with not smoking and stuff but due to certain things outside of our control, they want to push his baptism back until he has come to church 4 times in a row consecutively.  It is a huge long story and we were sure that it wasn't going to be an issue because he's been to church enough times to be baptized, but they want him to come consecutively.  I'm so sorry Lucie!!  I tried my hardest!  We almost had it!  The good thing is that they will still be baptized this transfer.  I was so so sad though.  Ugh.

Our investigator Angel is doing really well also, but we just found out yesterday that his family has to move to Fontana (a neighboring city) and will be gone before his baptism.  So he will have to be baptized into whatever ward he is moving into.  Hopefully!! We will have to get all his information to the missionaries over there.  

Carlos is doing fantastic.  It's kind of fun because we have been able to teach him things that are a lot deeper in doctrine, than we have before.  He's heard all the simple basic stuff so often that he has it down.  So this last week we got to teach stuff we don't normally get to teach! It's lots of fun! 

There is a special meeting with all of the English wards in the stake this Sunday and we think they are changing the ward boundaries out here as well!  So we are really excited to see what happens on sunday.  It could change a lot of things! 

Sounds like you all had a lot of fun this last week!!  I'm so jealous about the story telling festival!  That is so fun!! Haha I miss that!  And sounds like things for the baptism are going to be awesome!! I am so sad that I'll be missing it! I'll send the talk in another email though.  I wrote it about baptism.  So hopefully it works! 

I'm glad we have some good missionaries in the stake finally!  That's awesome! And I know Sister Sablan!  I don't know her really well but I've met her.  That's super cool! She's a great Sister! 

Well, sorry this wasn't the most awesome letter.  It's kind of a let down actually.  Lots of bad news. :(  Next week will be better though!  Lot's of stuff going down this week! 

Love you all!!

Elder Wise

Carlos was Baptized!!!

 
Wow this week was awesome!!  Carlos' baptism went so well!!  There was only one problem.  I forgot my camera!  I was so sad.  Luckily, everyone else had theirs and they are sending me all their pics.  So don't worry, there will still be some pics coming.  Carlos wanted Elder Raff to baptize him, so we got to see him too!  All the Elders who have worked with Carlos over the last few months were there.  Elder Hayden, Elder Raff, Elder Urry, and Myself.  Plus a few others.  It was very well attended!!  And then he got confirmed yesterday during church!  It was so awesome!  He felt the Holy Ghost so strong!!  He said "I've never felt anything so strongly in my whole life!"  It was just awesome.  And now his brother David is even more stoked to be baptized!!  And Carlos is getting ready to get the priesthood so that he can baptize his brother.  It's just so sweet!!

Tony has been doing really great as well!  Although he has been sick the last couple of day so we haven't been able to meet with him.  But we had an amazing lesson with him earlier in the week!  The night before he had had a really amazing experience where his prayers were answered pretty much immediately and so all during the lesson he was just bearing his testimony that he "Knows without a doubt that God is there, and that he answers prayers".  He was so happy and full of the spirit it was unreal!!  The best part though was that after the lesson, which was about missionary work (which he has been doing!), he was riding away on his bike and he didn't know we were watching and he punched the air.  Breakfast Club status haha! It was just so awesome.  He is so excited to be baptized!  

The other elders in our ward had a baptism last night as well!  And guess who was there?!  Rick Willinsky!! He's my favorite!!  He drove Elder Thompson down here so he could be at the baptism and Rick new I was down here so he wanted to come see me!  It was so great to see him again! 

That's really all the highlights of the week.  Everyone is just doing great! 

Sounds like everything is going well at home! I'm glad to hear the first week of school went well haha! I haven't gotten your package yet but I'm sure it'll come this week! Also, my 7-11 card is just about out haha.  It's crazy that I've been out for a year!  Cray-cray!! 

Well, Hope you have a great week!!!  Love you all!!

Love, Elder Wise

Solar Flare

It's just been one of those weeks.  Totally awesome!!!! There's all sorts of stuff to talk about today haha.  First off, what does Solar Flare mean?  Well I will tell you.  Solar Flare is the new flavor of Mountain Dew that is only available at my favorite place, 7-11.  I drank a lot of it this week!  It has been quite hot!  That gift card really saved my life this week! haha It's delicious!

The biggest news is this:  Carlos got off probation early!!!!  He is being baptized this upcoming saturday, August 23, at 10:00 in the morning.  It's so awesome!!  He is super stoked.  I am too! And we have started to really teach his twin brother David and we set a baptism date with him for October 11 and Carlos is going to do it!  It's just so great! 

The second biggest news is that I'm not being transferred!!  Elder Urry and I will be together for one more transfer.  It's kinda crazy cause he goes home at the end of this one!  Cray-Cray!

Third biggest news: although Mike isn't going to make his baptismal date for September 6, we have a different investigator that is going to be baptized that day!  The one and only Nathan Pacheco.  Alex's little bro.  And we are going to have Alex baptize him! That's going to be totally awesome!  Also, Tony is still doing really well, and if he can go the next couple weeks without smoking, will be baptized on september 2, as planned.  Also, Angel is doing really well, and we are still planning on baptizing him on september 20.  

The fourth biggest news:  We had a really good turn out at church yesterday!  A total of 7 investigators came to church!  Talk about awesome! Three of the investigators who came are three new ones that we picked up this last week.  A family was moving into the apartment complex where Carlos lives and so we helped them move some stuff, and it turns out that the mom was baptized about 5 years ago and she want's her kids to be baptized as well and the best part is they actually want to do it too!  Not just cause their mom wants them too.  So that's awesome!  We will be setting baptismal dates with them this upcoming week probably.  

So as you can see, this week was just super awesome!!  Although I had some bike troubles this week.  A couple flat tires.  That's always a pain.  But it's alright.  All taken care of.  

But yeah, that's about all the exciting news for this week!  Sounds like everything is going well at home!!  School is starting again huh?  That's fun!  Sometimes I think I miss school and then I remember that I don't haha.  Maybe in another year I will miss it more.  Hopefully, cause I got a lot of school left! 

Those games for the sophomore day sound super fun!!  I wish I could watch them haha! 

Chances of me going back to the desert?  Hopefully high!! I love it out there!!  In reality though, I don't really know if I'll ever get back out there. :(  I'll be praying for it though!

Haha that's awesome you are going out to lunch with the carlsons!  I think I will have to go out to eat somewhere that day too!  It's so crazy that we've been out a year already!  

Well, I hope you all have a really great week!!  Thanks for all your prayers and love!  This church is true.  No doubt in my mind!

Love, Elder Wise

Hola!

Well this week was pretty good!  It was a lot cooler this week than last week so that was good.  It was only like 90's all week.  Nice and cool!

The investigators are doing well.  Carlos is still progressing great!  And we have started teaching his twin brother David who is super cool too! So that was awesome!  Tony and Mike are doing alright.  The smoking thing is definitely an issue.  They need to stop smoking like today, if they are gonna make it by september.  We are praying so hard!!  Angel is doing really well too!  He is just such a little stud.  Haha he's so cool.  Shery is doing ok but she has to move out of her apartment, so she might be moving away.  We will probably refer her to the missionaries wherever she ends up moving.  

Let's see, we had MLC this week!  I really enjoy MLC.  We learned a lot about how we can work with members. Tomorrow is Zone meeting so we get to teach all the other missionaries about it now! Woohoo!  I am kind of excited to be able to go home and just be a member missionary haha.  They get to do all the really fun stuff!  That's not to say I don't have fun as a full time missionary though.  It's a blast!!  

This is the last week of the transfer, so it's gonna be a boss week!  Next monday I will find out if I'm staying in Colton or heading on to another place.  I kind of hope I get to stay one more transfer.  Then I will get to see Carlos and Angel and Mike and Tony be baptized.  That would be the best! 

Well, that's really all that went down this week.  I'm glad you are all having fun in Montana!  I am seriously, SOOOOOO Jealous!!!  

And I'm glad to hear the auction went well mom!  That sounded super fun!! 

Well, I hope you all have a fantastic week!! I love you guys! 

Love, Elder Wise

P.S.  I'll send some pics since my letter was kinda short.  Sorry!

Sooooo many black widows by Carlos' house!

This is George.  Sherry's son.  He is pretty much the cutest kid ever!

Rain Rain Rain

It cooled down this week!  It was only high 80's!  And it rained.  Hard.  Torrential downpour for like 3 hours.  Luckily, we were able to camp out at a members house for a while.  When the rain finally slowed down we were able to ride again.  We got pretty soaked.  The roads were all flooded.  We were riding through like a foot of water.  It was really fun!  It only lasted a day though.  Now it's back to being hot.

This week was pretty good!  We had a Zone Conference which was pretty good. We learned a lot about how we can help members with their missionary work.  It should help a TON!  So I am excited to start working on that.  

Our investigators are still doing well!  Mike is still kind of struggling with smoking and drinking.  So pray hard for him!  He's the one being baptized on the 6.  And Tony is also still struggling with that.  Carlos is still doing awesome! Still no word from the First Presidency yet though.  Hopefully soon! 

Other than that, this week was kinda boring.  Nothing much really went on.  

That auction sounds super fun though mom!  I bet that will be sweet!  

I'm so sad to hear about Gunnar.  Darn. I will keep praying for him.  

When do you need the talk for Lucie's baptism?  I need a deadline haha.  

Yeah I got the Montana Package!  It was awesome!! Thanks so much!! 

And I will definitely write to Sadie this week.  No problem haha.  

Love you all!  Have a great week!!! 

Love, Elder Wise

P.S.  Sorry this one was kinda short.  I'm super short on time today. 

Can you say HOT?!

Man, this week was HOT.  111 degrees Fahrenheit with over 50% humidity.  And we ride around on our bikes in that!  It's a good time though!  We have a pretty good excuse for just knocking on someone's door and asking for water.  Which then we can talk to them while we drink! So it works out. 

This last week was really good though!  My new bike came in so that's good.  It is a bit cheaper version of my last one.  Cheaper shifting mechanisms and handles and stuff.  But a bike is a bike!  So I'm glad to have that back. 

Let's see, what else?  Umm we had quite a few lessons this week! So that was good!  Had several people come to church and found some new investigators.  We are pretty stoked about that.  And this last week I also got to go on exchanges with Elder Seright!  That was a great time!  It was fun being his companion again for a day.  Even though it is kinda weird, cause now I'm my trainers ZL which means I'm supposed to train him now on stuff.  That was kinda weird.  Fun though!  We had a really good day!  Plus, In'n'Out is in his area so we got to go eat out!

This morning for a P-Day activity we went and played soccer at the park again!  That was lots of fun!  I think I got a little sun-burned though.  Haha

This week should be pretty fun!  We have a mini Zone Conference on Thursday, and we just have a lot of work lined up for this week so it should be awesome!

Here's a little update on some of our investigators.

Carlos: Still waiting for approval

Angel: 12 yrs old, getting baptized sep 20  doing really well!

This is Angel.

This is his sister Angela.

Tony: Still trying to quit smoking.  Getting baptized Sep 2

Mike: Still trying to quit smoking, Getting baptized Sep 6.  Doing really well.  He's so awesome!

Hopefully this upcoming week we will be able to get some more of our investigators on date for baptism.  We have quite a lot of people we are teaching, just most of them don't want to progress.  It's kind of annoying.  I love them all though. 

Well, I hope you all have a great week!!  Missionary work is super awesome! Love you all!

-Elder Wise

Loooong week

Well this week was pretty good.  I didn't get my new bike in the mail yet.  I've been using Elder Haydens bike for the last couple weeks since he doesn't need it out in the desert.  The bike guy told me he was sending me the same bike I had before, so if he sends me a cheaper crappier one I'm gonna be mad.  Although it'll be nice to have a bike of my own again haha.  Elder Hayden's bike is pretty beat up.

Let's see, what else happened this week?  Umm, not really anything super exciting I don't think.  We went on exchanges this week.  I went with Elder Woolf.  We had a really great time! On Thursday Elder Urry's eye swelled up really huge and was super red so we just hung out at the apartment for a couple hours until the swelling went back down.  

Our investigators are all doing really well!  Mike, Carlos, Angel, Tony, and Alma are doing great.  They are just so awesome!  Mike, and Tony and Carlos all came to church.  We are working on getting Angel and Alma there.   This week for sure!! 

I wish I had some cool stories from this week, but it was a pretty laid back week.  Which is probably why it felt so long.  Not very many exciting things went down.  Just lots of work.  Everything is going great! 

Sounds like a crazy week in PG!!  Sounds like a lot of fun though!!!  

Man this email is short.  Sorry!!  Hopefully next week will have a lot more things to report on.  Hope you all have a fantastic week!  I love you all!  Cali is a great, hot, sweltering, skin burning, place! 

Love, Elder Wise

ARE YOU FOR REALS????

People here have problems.  The main one being thievery.  Let me explain.  Last tuesday started out like any other day.  We had Zone meeting in the morning though which Elder Hayden and I have the opportunity to teach.  So no worries.  Well, we get to the church, put our bikes in the back room, set up the chairs, prop open the front door so other missionaries could come in, and then waited for everyone to show up.  Well, they showed up and the other elders put their bikes in the same back room, and zone meeting started. 2 hours later zone meeting ended and we cleaned up and went to go get on our bikes and head to lunch.  Well, my bike wasn't there.  What??  How could it be gone?  Yup, someone walked in through the front door, sneaked past the room we were in, grabbed my bike, and walked back out with it.  How rude.  It is still missing to this day.  Although we have many people on the look out for it. Did we buy the warranty/insurance thing when we bought the bike?  Might want to look that up.

The rest of the week went really well!  I got a new companion.  Elder Urry.  He's from Ogden Utah and he's super cool. We get along great!  He is almost done with his mission actually.  He only has like 3 months left.  Cray-cray! 

Well, other than my bike getting stolen, this week wasn't super exciting.  Although we did teach quite a few lessons which was awesome!  27 total for the week I think.  We currently have 6 investigators on date to be baptized, and hopefully we will get a couple more this next week. 

Sounds like we will be having another mission conference coming up!  In august, Elder Evans of the First Quorum of the Seventy will be coming!  He is the Seventy who is in charge of everything missionary related.  Like everything.  He speaks at every mission presidents seminar, and is in contact with the 12 all the time.  So that'll be super cool!  

Well, I hope you all have a super fantastic and fun week!!!  I love you all!!!  Missionary work is the BOMB!

Love, Elder Wise