Hey there family! Mom and dad
I am happy you are going on a cruise to celebrate and relax. You both deserve
it! I hope you have a great time with Ry and Keelie. That should be a ton of
fun. It sounded and looked like a fun birthday party for Get Away Today. Pretty
cool that Mickey Mouse came and celebrated with you all! Then that is the
craziest thing I saw when I saw Jacs getting asked to be someones valentine. I
wonder how Dave is feeling about that? haha That was a cool way he asked her
though. What was Jacs reaction to that? Well I am glad everything back home is
going well. It seems just like yesterday that we were emailing. I love it
though! I hope the whole family is doing great. I love you all so much!
This week has been another
crazy week. Since we had Zone Training Meeting we had to plan that out. So on
Monday after P-Day we spent the rest of the night planning with the Sister
Training Leaders. We received from the Assistants what President Hansen wanted
us to instruct on for ZTM. He wanted us to instruct on Obedience, Urgency, Frog
Alerts (Flirting), and a bunch more stuff. Once we found out what we needed to
instruct on we set up the program and decided who was going to do what. It took
us a while, but we got it all situated. It was a good pday full of fun and then
full of planning. I have noticed we do a ton more planning as a ZL. You plan
for instructions, exchanges, meetings, and so on. I enjoy it though.
Then on Tuesday we had
District Meeting. It was really good. We set some good goals. It is so nice not
being a District Leader anymore. I think that is harder than what I am doing
now. After we ran and got some lunch as a district at a pizza place. I
instructed everyone there about different kinds of fats in foods haha! Everyone
wants me to be their nutritionist. They all want to eat healthy so I am going
to help them. It was going great for the whole week until this morning when I
walk into the kitchen and all 3 of the elders that live in our apartment were
eating cake and ice cream for breakfast... It was pretty funny! Well after
lunch we went and did some service up at a lake by us. We unloaded a truck full
of boxes and put them into a restaurant down on the water. It reminded me so
much of Pineview. I envisioned the Mastercraft out there gliding through the
water! haha But dont worry I am not trunky! :) Then we came home and planned
some more and figured out our instructions since we wouldn't be able to do it
on Wednesday or Thursday because of exchanges. So we figured everything out. I
told some stories about Golf and obedience and I brought up the story about at
Region my senior year at hill air force base when I caught that kid cheating.
It was a good story. Well anyway that night we made some brownies and took them
to our investigators and had dinner with a member who is very sweet. She made
us deer meat spaghetti.. No Bueno... But at least we were fed. Then we came
back home and made the final touch up for ZTM.
Wednesday we headed up to
Natchotoches to go to their District Meeting and for us to do an exchange with
the District leader and his new trainy up their. The meeting was good. They
have a legit district. Elder Sabey, Netzley, Smith, and Barney with sisters
Merrill, Call, Arntz, and McMullen. Fun District. Then I stayed up their with
Elder Smith... That was fun having 2 Elder Smiths together. Everyone enjoyed
saying "hey Elder Smith" and then both of us would look. He is a cool
kid. We saw some of their investigators and helped out with some service on
Thursday. It was a 2 day exchange which was pretty long, but it was fun. We did
some service for a guy on a ranch of only 40 acres. I was in love.. I wouldn't
mind having a bunch of land with a sick house on it and then being able to be a
little bit more of a country boy. I will send home a picture of the service.
While we were their he let us burn a huge pile of sticks and tree branches and
stuff like that. Since they can do it because everywhere around is so green. So
we did that and acted like some country boys for the day. I loved every minute
of it. It has been some time since I have done any service. Then that night I
tried squirrel for the very first time. Elder Sabey is from Canada and he eats
squirrel all the time. A member gave him one that he had just shot and so Elder
Sabey skinned it and then he slow cooked it for 20 hours and then fried it up
and let us all eat it. It was pretty good. I wouldn't eat it again though if
you know what I mean. :) It was a fun exchange! Oh and it is the very highest
north our mission goes. So I went from the very most south part of the mission
to the very most north part!
Then Friday
morning we drove down to ZTM. It is an hour and a half drive or
so. All the areas are so spread out here. I like it. You feel more like you are
in the country and it is nice having the rolling hills. Well ZTM went great!
All of our instructions went great. Elder Gosch and I did a skit for our
activity and snack time. Well I dressed up as a girl and we did the whole frog
alert thing... I just put on a wig and then a skirt and took off the tie. I
have a video of it so I'll send it home after I email. Everything went great!
Then afterwards we went out and saw 5 people. I finally met someone who loves
golf and is as crazy about it as our family. He is an older Gentleman and he
plays about 4 times a week and mows the greens so he can play for free. We
talked for a good 45 minutes about that! It was awesome! We had a good day with
that.
Saturday we started our weekly
planning since we were not able to do it on Thursday due to exchanges. Then we
went to a members farewell party since he is leaving on his mission this week.
Mitchell Viafanua. He is legit! It was a fun little party. He and his family
are all from Utah but just moved here recently. Well during the party I
received a phone call from our councilor to the bishop.. He said that one of
the speakers for tomorrow had just dropped out and wasn't going to be able to
make it so he asked if I would give a talk on the Plan of Salvation for 15
minutes. I was actually pretty pumped when he asked! I have been wanting to try
out a new technique for giving a talk or even instructions. So the way I
prepared for the talk is I just studied the topic and wrote down some scriptures.
I didn't write down a talk. Instead I wanted to go by the Spirit and say what
he wanted me to as I was giving the talk. I noticed all of the general
authorities do that when they visit the mission so I wanted to try it out. Well
I was praying my hardest and going out on Faith because this was the first time
I had met a lot of the ward and I wanted to make a good first impression. Well
the talk went Great! I was very thankful for the promise the scriptures say
about first seek ye to obtain my words then seek to declare them. So I was
humbled and the talk went really well. It grew my testimony of Faith and
believing in somethings and following through with that belief. OH and the
other awesome thing was our investigator J.S. came to church!!!! And he loved
it! He is a deacon for a baptist church, but he loved ours and said he wants to
come next week too. It was so awesome! We are starting to see little successes
everywhere. It is just as Alma 37:6,7 says. Small and Simple things. It was a
great day and we ended it well with going over to an awesome members house.
They fed us some great food! Loved it.
So as you can see this week
was very busy. Whenever we don't have anything to do we tract. That is how we
have found investigators up here. It is great. This week will be full of many
more cool things. I will be in Oakdale for exchanges and then Friday we have
Zone Conference down in Baton Rouge with a general authority so that will be
awesome as well. Well that about wraps up this week. I love you all so much. I
miss you, but not that much ;) just kidding! I am pumped that we are busy. This
zone is pretty cool and I am excited to continue serving them. Well I hope you
all have a great week! Mom and dad enjoy the cruise. Oh and I did get your
package. Thank you so much! :) And Happy Valentines to you all and Happy Marti
Gras tomorrow! Love you guys! :)
Love Elder Nick
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