March 4th, 2013

Dearest Family,

Hello! It is so great to be able to sit down and write to the people that I love most in this whole world! I am so thankful for all of your prayers in my behalf and on the behalf of the people that I am teaching! There is great Power in the mighty prayers of the righteous!

So, I got your letters on Saturday this past week! I was a little nervous at first but I knew that you would come through!! I cant wait for those girl scout cookies! California has had them for awhile now! We had Samoa's for dessert at one of our dinners this week. I know those are your favorite mom so I thought of you as I ate them but I don't like them at all!

That is really cool that you got to see glade! And I cant believe that you are all done with parent teacher conferences!! Did you cry? Isn't that a little bit weird to think about? You are like a little over three months away from being an Empty Nester!! Well, that is until I get home and live in the basement the rest of my life!! Okay I probably wont be doing that. But yeah that will be SO weird for me to come home to!!! Oh my goodness I didn't even think about that! I will be the only one home for a bit!! WEIRD!!! Life will pass you by if you don't pay attention.

 

Im glad you got the box! Take good care of all that stuff please!

So Stew is in play mode eh? That's good. No time for girls! You should get him started on his mission papers as soon as he can turn them in so that it starts to get real for him. It started hitting me a little harder when I started filling out my papers. But it never really hits you until about...well probably now! I'm on a mission!! WOW!

 

So anyways, This week has been great! Ukiah is NUTS in case you were wondering! We talk to a ton of people every day out on the streets and their are so many people that are just off of their rockers!!! IT is fun stuff! There are a lot of good people too especially in the ward! I LOVE the ward here so far! We have some great members that are very willing to help us out and give us rides!! There is this one guy, Brother Jones, Dad you would LOVE him! He reminds me of you in some ways but oh my gosh he is so funny! He is pretty old, like seventy, and he is just the nicest man I have ever met! And He is so funny because his personality is just, well he is very childlike and innocent in an old person way! So I guess a good way to explain it is the world is changing to fast and he cant keep up so he lives in his own world..if that makes sense? Anyways he just cracks me up! He has come out with us quite a bit already so i really look forward to working with him. He has a strong testimony! Also another funny thing about this ward is that it is very small and all the young families have moved out to Utah and the oldies are all still here and not leaving any time soon! Really though we have like fifty or less at church on Sunday..and most of them are old! Everyone is getting out of Ukiah before they get stuck here!! There are some great young families here as well and some great youth preparing for missions! But anyways, there are a lot of older people! So every time they give us a ride somewhere or come to a lesson with us almost everyone asks us "well do you elders have enough time to grab a treat?" I haven't figured out how to say no to them yet! So we have gone to Baskin Robbins and Mcdonalds for ice cream cones! It is so funny! So the ward so far is good! And A bishop change is coming up soon I guess.

So while it is on my mind It looks like I should have waited to get those new scriptures! They are just coming out with the new 2013 version of the standard works!! So SICK! New foot notes and more things in the topical guide and oh my gosh you know your in missionary mode when you get pumped over new versions of scripture!! BAHA.

Things with my new companion are going great!! Elder Kunz is very cool in his own unique way! To be honest, he does a lot of weird things that to me are pointless and stupid and annoying But who am I to judge? Why Should I be bugged? So I simply made the decision to not be bothered! ha for some reason it working...It is still going to be a harder transfer and a test for me but I think something that helps is that he is a fantastic teacher and Missionary. I have learned so much from him already! He is VERY smart. Like nerd smart. Like on P-day he studies all day smart. And he knows a lot of deep doctrine so it has been very fun talking about that stuff... It is pretty cool some of the stuff..and he has showed me a lot of it in church books so I know its true... It is no wonder that the first principle of the Gospel is FAITH. So yeah My new comp is interesting but great! We will get along really good.

Alright the people. We are working with this guy named Geoff (Jeff) Walsh He is the man! We found him because he is part of a part member family! He had been taught awhile ago but he couldn't get baptized because he wasn't married and had some word of wisdom issues. But when we went and talked to him we found that he has gotten married and straightened up! So we have begun teaching him and he is SO PREPARED TO BE BAPTIZED. His date is for march 16th and I feel very strongly that he will make it! I am excited it has been awhile since my last baptism!!

Another lady we are working with is named Francine. She has been taught for awhile but cant get baptized because she is on probation and has word of wisdom issues. She is almost insane as well. Okay not really but her personality is....very intense yet relaxed and frantic and stressed at the same time! She has been through a lot in her life though... This Sunday she bore her testimony in sacrament meeting..it was sweet!! She could get baptized as soon as she stops drinking smoking and gets off of probation. She is having a REALLY hard time understanding why she cant be baptized until she is off of probation. Her argument is that she hasn't made any promises with god yet and as soon as she makes the promise she obviously will try to keep the promise and her past transgressions will be washed away and wont matter. So why should her probation stop her from being baptized? We have tried explaining it to her but i figured i would pose the question to all of you. I hope her concern makes sense.

So Something Else SUPER exciting is that we have like 119 baptismal dates set for march....our mission Goal is 101 a month!!! Isn't that awesome?? We could potentially do it and we have all been praying and talking and teaching about the 101 since my first all mission conference when Elder Gavarett of the seventy came to the mission and challenged us to make that our goal! I don't know if i have told you the story behind the 101 or not so if i didn't tell me and I'll let you know next week!

If you didn't notice this email is quite long. At least it seems long! Well that is because I found out last week that Basketball in this zone STINKS. No one is or ever was an athlete...So It is not in the slightest competitive, whereas in my last area our basketball games were INTENSE and way fun and a good workout..here it is sooo lame and boring. So I figured I would spend more time talking to my family..and eating Reese's Eggs... Oh I'm fat!!

But I cant think of anything else to tell you.. Lots of crazy things happen to me that I WRITE IN MY JOURNAL BUT I JUST FORGET THEM BECAUSE crazy is normal for me now! The weather here is picture perfect in case you were wondering. I am stuck in my weight loss quest! It is so hard when people are buying you stuff and feeding you so well every night! I cant just not eat a lot when all these old Mormon Grandmas/moms cook us feasts and expect us to eat our hearts out!! It is all good though.

 

I love you!

Elder Nelson