Pics from Salem Transfer

Nate, Elder Thomas, and Carolyn

Nate, Elder Thomas, Matt and Melanie

Portland Temple

Dec 17th, 2012

Hey mom,

Thanks for your email. I just talked to President Young and he said that it was okay that i skype on sunday evening instead of Chirstmas. So I hope you got by box i sent home. it was basically just a ton of stuff that i cant really use right now and didnt have any more room to carry it around. so our direct address to where we live is 3601 Inland court #6 North Bend or 97459 just send my Christmas package here and any other mail send through the mission office. transfers have been pretty weird lately so i dont really know if i will be moved randomly or not.

so as an update on cool things going on 2 weeks ago when i didnt really have time to email you it was a pretty good week. i dont have my old planner with me so i cant really remember everything that was going on so i will just tell you the highlights. Carolyn came to a baptism to see what it would be like and is really excited for her own. We told her that Elder Thomas and I were both being transferred and she was devistated. She was crying a lot and wasn't happy that she was getting sister missionaries. I was really bummed to be going because her baptism was the 15th so i just barely missed it. Elder Thomas was able to make it because he was just moved up the road. we had a really good final goodbye lesson sunday evening and she came to church as well. also a less active part member family came to church for the first time in 10 years because we were leaving. it was great! they seemed to really enjoy it.

So a lot of changes have been going on in the mission. The Capitol zone that i was over split and they just called a lot more zone leaders. I am now serving in North Bend with Elder Covey over the Coos Bay Zone that goes from Florence to Brookings and over to Coquille. There are a lot less missionaries in this zone which is a lot easier to deal with. It rains everyday here. and not the misty rain like in salem its a down pour. Elder Covey and I white washed the area kinda so we are trying to figure everything out still. There is a lot of potential here which is exciting.

So I think one of the reasons why we were replaced by sisters was because our apartment wasnt a dump. President and Sister Young came over to our apartment and were really impressed with how nice and clean it was later in zone leader council he said "In the past 2 weeks i have been in 2 Celestial rooms. One was the Portland Temple and the other was Elder Berg and Thomas's Apartment." Every apartment that I have been in that was nice and clean we get kicked out and replaced by Sisters. That happened in Grants Pass too. Moral of the story: make sure your apartment is a dump so you don't have to turn it over to sisters.

Anyways we do have a baptism set up this weekend for Juan. It will be great because he is really excited to get baptized. We had dinner at the Pecks home which was great. I will probably be skyping there sunday. hopefully.

We have a pretty big ward here which is cool. A lot of less acives so we have quite a bit of work to do. We just had our ward Christmas Breakfast which was good.

But thats pretty much it for whats going on here. Im looking forward to talking to everyone on sunday because we are still new we are trying to figure everything out so keep skype on and i will try for 7 our time but maybe 6 depends. anyways gotta go love you 

Visiting Dr Warner on Election Day 2012

Studying the Zone

Nov 26th 2012

hey mom! thanks for the email. our thanksgiving was pretty good. We had dinner at the Matthews which was a lot of fun. It was a lot like home because there were 13 kids running around. Thanksgiving we played football with 1 of our districts, then we went bowling with another district, had dinner then watched 17 miracles at the church with some other missionaries.

Monday we went finding and it was pouring rain. we had everything in ziplock bags so it wouldnt get soaked. it rains so much here. i have to cycle through 3-4 pairs of shoes because they don't dry out fast enough. but its been pretty fun.

We went on splits with the priests and taught Carolyn and Melanie. I taught Carolyn while Elder Thomas taught Melanie. Our lesson with Carolyn went very well. she is really excited to get baptized on Dec 15. we taught her the plan of salvation and she really liked it all. She came to church but left her dog (wolf) Shonca in the car. I guess its trained to detect if her blood sugar is on the fritz and she was planning on taking him in but decided against it. The Bishop over our ward is awesome! during sacrament he had all the youth stand up and told them how much he loved them. How much the savior loved them, and how we all need to do our best in helping them. After sacrament meeting we took Carolyn up to meet Bishop Moore and the first thing she said was " Hi i'm Carolyn. Will you baptize me?" We talked earlier before sacrament that any male that had the Priesthood could baptize her. So she asked Bishop right then and there. It was pretty awesome. she told him how much she appreciated his words and that basically bore her testimony to him. she talked about the spirit feeling like a big sun in her chest and how everything just rang true to her. she is set on getting baptized. she said that since she has made that decision everything has been like a tornado. But she knows what is trying to stop her and said she was a "fighter". She is without a doubt one of Heavenly Fathers elect children that had been prepared.

as to other stuff going on. My companion and I are getting along great! we are working hard and having a lot of fun. He sings a lot and does acting. so other things that are going on. we had another thanksgiving last night that was good. there were a ton of people but it was very enjoyable. We have specialized training tomorrow and teaching Carolyn with President Young. So we got to get ready for that. Anyways that't pretty much it for this week. I have some pictures to send however I left my camera back at the apartment so you will get them next week.

November 19th

Hey mom,

Everything is going pretty good. I enjoyed your letter. I think I will probably just eat a bag of marshmallows a day instead. that way i can actually enjoy them. so our p-day has been changed to Thursday so we may or may not email on that day too. our p-day today ends at 1. We set a date with one of our investigators Carolyn who is pretty set and really wants to get baptized. so that was pretty exciting. she is going for December 15. Anyways that's basically all for this week. btw can you email me your tamale recipe for an investigator so i can print it off thursday? thanks love you!

Nate's First Week as Zone Leader

Bro Jones

Nate with the Birts

Service Day in Prineville

Nov 12, 2012

Hey mom,

So this week was pretty interesting. We did however have some great lessons this week. We were at the doctors during the election day and were in the waiting room while it was going on. it was funny because everyone was so focused on the tv until we walked in. then they just stared at us to see what our reaction was like. so we tracted in to a part member family last week or so and this week we had a lesson with them. the first one went pretty good and Matt (the less active) said he knows its all true and his wife was interested.

Thursday we had a day of sacrifice where we just parked our van (Btw we have a mini van) and walked all day. it was great because our area is pretty small. but we ran into a ton of great people.

So friday I got my catheter. not fun at all. afterwards we trained a district leader, went to lunch, and checked out an apartment for the Turners coming in to the four corners ward. saturday we had a breakfast for salem stake so we went to that. it was pretty great actually. after we went to introduce our bishop to matt and melanie and that went pretty good. we ran some errands delivering supplies around the zone and went to dinner at the putnams. after dinner we were on our way to the stake center and got a surprise call from president young saying that he was at the stake center at some single adult thing. so we got to visit with him for a minute then had our lesson with lauren. then we visited with our ward mission leader and came in to prep for our talks in church. 

Sunday was a interesting day. at around 3 Am a less active we were working with called us but we didnt answer because we figured it was a drunk call. but then he called at 6 am and asked if we could get him from the hospital. so we had to get him take him home, finish our talks, and get to church. we were suppose to give our talks on missionary work specifically inviting and the blessings that come from that. It was interesting giving a talk with a bag of pee strapped to my leg. but it was cool because if i was nervous it was all good because it just would all just drain into my pouch. so that worked out great. i would just have to try and hide the big bump above my knee. I told the bishop afterwards that he can now say that while he was bishop he saw someone pee themselves while they gave a talk. we tracted a bit, but now my catheter is no longer. and i dont miss it at all. anyways thats pretty much how my week has been! 

11/5/12

Hey Mom!

Sorry I didn't really have time to write much last week. It's been pretty crazy lately. 2 weeks ago we went on exchanges up in Madras and had a pretty good time. we basically only did service on the exchange. The Elder I was with didn't really do anything except drink soda and play with their horses while I split most of their wood. But it was still pretty fun. During our lunch hour we went to a members home so that we could go see their horses. they have 4 huge Percheron's. We went in and I almost got trampled by the biggest one named pete. it was crazy. they were a lot of fun though. after lunch we went back to split more wood. but then i broke the head of the splitting maul. anyways that's pretty much it for Prineville.

Now I'm in Salem! It's pretty nice here but it rains a ton. either its raining or there is a mist in the air. I think for the first few days being here I didn't even see the sun. But it is a really nice town. our area is pretty wealthy so the work is harder here. The members are doing good with helping us out but it is just really hard. our boundaries are pretty small because there are so many wards here. When I first got here I has freaking out a little because of how much we have to do. The Zone Leader I was replacing stayed with us for a day and taught me a little about what i need to do. It was pretty intense because he is SUPER organized and I felt like a new missionary again. Our Zone is about 37 missionaries and I believe is the biggest zone in the mission. I kinda feel like I have no idea what I am doing but I think it will be alright.

We are staying pretty busy with everything even though the work in this area is hard. We met with the Stake President of Monmouth stake and had a breakfast with him and two of the four districts. 

So we had Zone Leader Council this week at the mission home. It was weird going to the mission home for the first time since i came in to the mission. It was really cool experience and there like 5 squirrels going crazy right outside the window at the zlc. it was hilarious! anyways thats pretty much all for now. Love you!

Oct 29, 2012

Hey mom!

so we are sitting here at the transfer spot in Eugene and I am waiting to be transferred. They are moving me up to capitol (Salem) to be the Zone Leader with Elder Thomas. Elder Thomas was my second district leader in the mission and is an awesome elder so i am excited. I am very grateful to be getting an awesome missionary for a companion. So I don't really have time to email because we are suppose to be leaving soon so i cant really tell you everything this week so expect a longer email next week or possibly another email today. i dunno it depends on time. i have a few pictures to send you. some highlights for this week: I made a game like werewolf but with those who said cards you gave me and did it with the gadianton robbers. so we read scriptures about them and played the game for a FHE. it went pretty good. The Bishop was pretty bummed that i was leaving. we did have a good visit after at his house.  anyways we gotta go right now hopefully i will be able to email later the driver from prineville is freaking out about something so i gotta go.

Amy's Baptism

Just Divorced in Prineville

Oct 22, 2012

This week went pretty good. we had a Baptism! Amy got baptized on Thursday which was a battle but everything went well. she told us the day before the baptism that it had to be about 30 minutes because she had to be at a school concert for her kids. everything turned out though.
That is pretty much the most exciting thing that happened this week. we went to the conformation in first ward and afterwards they had the primary program. I always love that one kid that seems to yell the words rather than sing. There was a little girl who is just starting to really talk who sat in front of us. during the Primary program, one of the kids in his script said "...Jesus died to..." and the little girl turned to her mom and yelled "Jesus died?! OH NO!" she was hilarious. anyways thats about it for this week.

Oct 15, 2012

Hey Mom!
Thanks for the email. Sounds like Noah's blessing was pretty awesome.
This week was pretty good. we had interviews on tuesday with President and Sister Young which was great. we finished teaching Amy all of the lessons and she is ready to be baptized on the 18th of this month. So this week will hopefully be an awesome one. It seems like everyone in the zone is taking turns getting sick because madras is doing pretty rough right now. I think I might be getting something but I don't know if it will get any worse.
This week we did a ton of service. we were helping some people prep to paint their homes. we did some wood splitting. BTW juniper stumps are a pain to split. We went on exchanges with Redmond 1st and it was pretty good. I was with Elder Earnshaw who has been out for a few weeks. He is a pretty quiet guy. other then that nothing really exciting happened this week. anyways that's about all that's going on.

Oct 8, 2012

My mind has officially been blown.
General Conference was incredible! that was so exciting that they lowered the age for missionary service for both Elders and Sisters. That has been the hot topic since the announcement. I can't wait to see more missionaries coming out soon! now people will have less time to be distracted from missionary service. I hope everyone goes now.
I thought Nelsons talk was awesome but now i'm thinking "Oh great now I really need to know my stuff." Afterwards a member sitting behind us said "so what kind of glue should I use?" I thought it was pretty funny. But really I think that if members actually apply that talk it will help both them and us.
I am still just blown away by conference. All the talks were just incredible! I think it is interesting to see how much they are an answer to prayers. We had an investigator at the 2nd Sunday session and in all the talks they basically answered a majority of the questions he has asked us the past few days. This is an awesome time to live in especially as a missionary. I would recommend everyone to serve a mission.
So basically conference was the biggest highlight of this week. we had a ton of meetings this week. we had a good meeting Tuesday in Eugene but it took almost the whole day. we had another meeting in Redmond on Wednesday with stake pres Palmer. and we had to help out at a zone training meeting in Bend on Thursday. So this week was pretty much terrible for everyone in the district.
Something I learned this week was that if you ever have any real questions or concerns or doubt about the church, read the Book of Mormon. We were discussing some things with our investigator Martha and Robert and it was getting a little crazy. We would explain something but it just wouldn't make sense to them or they would just say that isn't true. After this going on for a while I just decided to turn to 3 Nephi 11 and just read about a page with them. I bore my testimony about the Book of Mormon and afterwards Martha said "okay now that makes sense. I understand." The Book of Mormon is simple. Satan doesn't want us to read it. He knows that as we read and pray about it we will know it is true and in turn draw nearer to our Savior, Jesus Christ. He will try and out doubt in to our mind and try and prevent us from picking it up. I have learned that when things seem unclear or we can't recognize our answer, pray and then read the Book of Mormon. It's just that simple. That book is here for a reason. I hope everyone has the chance to read it and invite others to do the same. As we read the Book of Mormon and apply its teachings we will see if it is of God (John 7:17). I hope that we all will do our part in bringing people closer to our Savior Jesus Christ.

Investigator's Pet

Elder Frank and Elder Fred in Prineville

Oct 1st 2012

Hey Mom!
Thank you for the package! It was awesome! Sounds like you are all having a ton of fun back home.
So some of the highlights for this week:
we had zone conference which was very good! we learned a lot that I think will really help us in the work here. President really wants us to understand the significance of the Restoration. It is really the greatest news on the Earth today. To know that there is a living Prophet that leads The Church of Jesus Christ so that we may be able to know the true doctrine of His church. That the Priesthood authority is again on the earth so that we can perform those saving ordinances. I think that is news that we all need to share with Everyone! If we don't, then we are being selfish because we aren't sharing a gift with people that we know will bless their life. It's great to be able to be here and share that awesome news with the people of Prineville.
This week we went to visit a less active family and while we were there a guy named Joe showed up. He is a really cool guy who has been there the past three times we came over. But this time when he showed up he told us his address as soon as he saw us and said he wants us to come over on friday. He then continued to go on saying that the times that he has been over there when we showed up he has been testing us. He says that he realizes that we don't judge and that he really trusts us. He said that in the past he has had missionaries knock on his door but he doesn't let them in because he is afraid that they are going to judge him. He has never really let anyone in his house except one other family (the less active family we were visiting) and now he wants us to come over. so Friday we went over and they wanted us to have dinner with them but it wouldnt be ready for about 3 hours. so we taught them the restoration said we had an appointment and that we would come back. by the time we came back he had already read the first few chapters of the Book of Mormon and had some questions for us. We answered them had dinner and they said to come back anytime.
Lately we have just been seeing cool little miracles like that all over the place. It sure is awesome to be a part of.
Elder Cooper called us a while ago and wanted us to visit a family that he use to be working with. The husband is a member but his wife isn't so we went to go see them. when we got there her husband said "yeah I know she would want to take the lessons again and get baptized. I am surprised that she actually hasn't called you sooner about getting baptized. so we taught her a few days later and set a date for her to be baptized october 18th! Awesome little miracle. then we celebrated by holding their 9ft 90Lb boa. fun times. there were 5 baptisms this week in the district so we had to drive to madras for some interviews and to redmond for some interviews. it was awesome to be able to see. we stayed for one baptism that happened right after the interview and it was great. it was a mother and son and after they were baptized the daughter decided to be baptized as well. anyways awesome things are happening! but that is pretty much all the highlights for the week.

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is the fulness of the gospel restored on the earth today. The Priesthood Authority is the key part that holds this all together. I am Excited for the chance to again hear from a Prophet of God this General Conference. I hope everyone else gets the chance to do the same. Go out and invite others to listen to the Prophet so that they may see for themselves that there truly is a Prophet on the Earth today.

Sept 24, 2010

Hey mom thanks for the letter. I don't really have much to say this week. Elder Shorten is a pretty chill cat so we have a lot of fun. we get along pretty good and we have the same sense of humor. we found a Mary-go-round while tracting this week so we stopped for a little bit. we are going to probably go back today and play on it. we have some pretty cool new missionaries. Elder Earnshaw came from the MTC and he is pretty quiet and serious. but he is opening up a bit.
we talked to this lady named shorron who was a lot like Ashland it was great but it just made me miss that place. today we are going to go play ping pong with the first ward bishop. we had some good lessons this week and hopefully getting some people closer to baptism.
I am pretty excited for those pots and pans. we have the little things but every apartment here doesn't usually have a good size pot or skillet. they are usually really small and you cant really make gravy or a big pot of rice or jumblia or something. but someone did give is a fairly good size skillet. anyways we are hoping to get Donald ready for baptism he is just stubborn. I hope Jo is doing well.
It is really interesting being on a mission during an election where there is a mormon running. people either really like him or they really don't. It is really getting down to the wire so it is kinda intense. not very many people are really interested in the church because of him. mostly it's that people have a huge misunderstanding about what we believe but think they know everything. In a way it just makes it more frustrating. But at the same time people have a lot more respect for us too because of him. they say they don't agree with what he believes but that he is a good guy and they respect him. we can i believe vote but it would be on leave and you would have to basically send me out the paperwork for it. anyways that I believe is pretty much all for now.

Sept 17, 2012

Hey Mom,

sounds like everything is going good. I don't believe it is Rocky getting blessed considering I was at that blessing, I think you meant Noah. I am hoping to make that chicken and rice but i cant until i get a pan and pot. we dont have anything that i think i can make it with. i did buy a crockpot so i can take it with me as a go through the mission. so if you have any crockpot recipes that would be great.

This week has been pretty good. we went on exchanges twice. one with Elder McKenzie in Redmond so I could Interview someone for baptism, then later in the week with Elder Delis in Madras to interview 2 more. It was a lot of fun being on exchanges. When Elder McKenzie came back to his apartment there were two guys in our apartment changing light bulbs. It was a little awkward to come back to but it was funny. One of the guys was this super buff black guy from NY. He was really cool. We had some interesting lessons this week with some people. One kid that we talked to drove me nuts he was rediculous. I got so sick of it. people here think they know about the mormon church but really they know crap. It's still pretty antimormon here but its alright.

So Elder Moua is gone now. And right now we (Elder McKenzie, Delis, and I) are waiting for our new companions. I am getting Elder Shorten, Elder McKenzie is getting Elder Williams, and Elder Delis is getting Elder Hatton. So they will probably get here around 5. I am pretty excited for Elder Shorten though. I don't know him at all but I think we will be able to do a lot more in Prineville. anyways thats all I can think about that is going on and this computer is horrible! anyways love you tons!

Sept 10, 2012

Hey mom! thanks for the recipe! Everything is going pretty good. we have two people with a baptismal date we are hoping will go through. we had exchanges last week and i was with Elder Gosar in Redmond. it was pretty good. President and Sister Young were in Redmond last week which was great!  we had a few meetings with them and learned a lot. We are changing a few things that we do now in the mission. Hopefully it will work out great. I think we are already seeing more success. so on Thursday we had 2 dinner appointments. the first was with a regular white family and we had Fajitas. And the second dinner was at the Ortiz family and we had chicken Fajitas. There is definitely a difference between white man fajitas and mexican fajitas. the white ones were good but the mexican ones were probably the best fajitas i have ever had in my life. afterwards they had us teach 3 people that they had over. it went really good even though they didnt speak english and our translators didnt have the best english either. we are going to meet with them again so elder Hawkins in Madras (the spanish missionary) can teach them. so we have exchanges again. tonight I am going to Redmond to go on exchanges with one of our Zone Leaders Elder McKenzie so I can do a baptismal interview. then on wednesday we are doing another exchange with Madras so I can Interview two more people and that way Elder Hawkins can teach the spanish people here.

I think one of the Pluses to serving in the US is being able to have a variety of cultures. Diana white invited us over for dinner and we had Cajun Jumbolia (i have no idea how to spell that) while she told us about growing up in south Louisiana. It was awesome and the food was soooo good. 

for service this week we helped bro moss buck some hay which was super fun. there wasnt as much as last month but it was still good. anyways thats pretty much all the highlights of the week. Love you!

Nate's 20th Birthday 8/28/12 Letter on 9/3/12

Hey Mom! thanks for the email, This week has been pretty good. It was a pretty good birthday week. I don't think anything really happened on my actual birthday but it was still good. I appreciate all the packages I got they were great! I was never more excited to see ties in my life. on monday we had dinner with a member that had a cake for my birthday and it was a lot of fun. they are a part member family and we had a good family home evening with them. on tuesday we didnt do much had a few lessons. had a few fall through. our dinner appointment forgot they were feeding us and were up in portland so we ended up calling someone last minute to have dinner but it ended well. This week one of our main investigators came back after being gone for 2 weeks and we are sure excited about that. so hopefully we will set a date with him. On Thursday we were having a really rough day so we had a prayer that we would find someone. after that I thought that we just just walk for a while and saw some cool miracles. we were going to contact a referral and a these people pulled up next to us and started talking with us. It was a Less active member who said that he wants us to come buy and visit him. his name is grady and his girlfriend debora. so we set up a time and went to visit them. we had a good visit, and debora said she knew the book of mormon was true but to not try and convert her. we are teaching a former pastor bill who is really awesome and said he would love to come to church with us this week. so we are looking forward to it. anyways that is pretty much the highlights of the week.

Aug 27, 2012

Hey mom! yeah I know what you mean when you say I can't believe you are turning 20. I can't believe it either. It is really weird. thank you for the CD. I don't really like country but I like the blue grass style that they use in the lower lights CD. But I really enjoyed the package it was great! THANK YOU! I think i might be sending a package home soon. I need to get rid of a lot of books we are only allowed a few (scriptures, gospel library, pmg) and that is pretty much it so I think I will send the rest home so it saves me room. i have a ton of junk that I dont need with me so I will just send it to you to put in my room.

so this week was so-so. we had dinner last monday with this crazy navy seal guy who went nuts in the restaurant swearing and stuff. He loves to talk about military but I learned that if he starts you change the topic immediately! I was surprised we didn't get kicked out. so we set another baptismal date with a girl named Karina but she called today unsure about meeting with us again but luckily we have another appointment with her. we had dinner with some investigators that went well. he is a minister at the jail but he is very friendly. we talked about the plan of salvation and everything. it went good and we are going to go back soon.

 so we were basically out of miles so we had to walk everywhere. I loved it! we got to talk to a lot of people which was cool. So there are whats called "rainbow people" here in town which are basically just a ton of hippies. The town seems to hate them but I love it! Its like a splash of Ashland in Prineville. So I almost got to try goat this week but we had to leave the kids birthday party before it got there. so that was a bummer. but who knows I will probably get a chance another time. anyways I actually got to get going but thanks again! Love You!

Aug 20, 2012

Hey mom!

thanks for the email. this week has been pretty crazy. we went to Eugene on Wednesday as well as Saturday for general authority visits. first on wednesday Elder Snow of the Seventy toured the mission with his wife on Wednesday and Thursday so we got to meet them and shake their hand. They were a lot of fun and they taught us a ton. We had to drive our own car there which was a beast because it killed our miles. but it was a lot of fun. it was about a 3 to 3.5 hour drive so it took basically all day. we left at about 9 and didnt get back till 10:30. but it was good. we had a good meeting and afterwards they had dinner for us. at the dinner it was super weird because this 60 something year old guy came up and started talking to elder moua. it was fine at first because he was just asking about his ethnicity and explained that he just got back from china. then he started crying telling him that when he looks at him he sees all the kids that he taught. which was fine except he kept stroking the back of his head. then he kissed elder moua on the forehead which was incredibly awkward for everyone at the table. i thought i would have to protect my companions from the young ladies, not really old guys who love asians. so we had a really slow week because of the meetings but Elder Anderson came to the mission on Saturday with Elder Stevenson head bishop of the church, Elder Rasband, and Elder Hansen. It was awesome to be able to shake their hands. Elder Anderson is actually really funny so we had a good time. the whole mission was together for that so it was awesome to be able to see all the missionaries. I found out that Angela, a investigator down in Ashland that I with Elder Gamez and later Elder Jackman taught went through with her baptismal date that we set for the 28th of July. so that was awesome. btw i finally found someone to give that book of mormon away to that sister starr gave me. it was the first family that i found that had anyone close to the ctr5 class. their names are Sergio, Sherry, Morriah(6), and  Victoria. so I when i have time will write up the story so i can give it to you to get to her. 

There was also a baptism last night for a kid named Tanner that the Birts (the senior couple here) were teaching. I got to interview him for baptism and while we were filling out his address i realized that he was in our ward. so they were poaching which i wouldnt suspect a senior couple to do but oh well. we love them anyway. they are super awesome. they just bought us tie clips and they are taking us out to post later to get milkshakes. I am pretty much adopting them to by my 3rd set of grandparents. they can be my utah grandparents. anyways that is pretty much all that happened this week! love you all!

Elder Berg

PS how is my dummy bob doing? and tell Allen to send me that Dominican style chicken recipe and rice. and beans too. 

Aug 6, 2012

Hey Mom!

Everything is still going good. we just had transfers and everyone stayed the same in the district except one of our zone leaders elder thompson went down to medford. so i am in prineville another transfer. so when i got on today i was expecting to see pictures of baby noah but i guess not. how was it seeing my on google maps? that is pretty much the top of my bucket list checked off right there. This week went pretty good. we didnt talk to too many people however the people we did talk to said we could come back which was pretty good. Elder Moua made a Vietnamese dish called Pho for some members. um not much else happened this week other then that. we went on exchanges and i went to redmond to be with Elder Shipley. we had a pretty good time but walked all over the place because we didnt have the car. I almost got on a bike but thought that it probably wouldnt be a good idea. during the exchange i had to meet with the stake president to talk about the district. it actually was pretty good we had dinner with him and talked about how the district is doing. currently it is doing really good! 

So i have no idea what is going on in peoples head to make them think that they need to answer the door when they arent dressed. i guess we are that important or something. but it makes for really awkward conversations. anyways that is pretty much everything that happened this week!

8/6/12

July 30, 2012

Hey mom,

thanks for the email. this week was so so. we were told that we would have a baptism here because someone was coming over from sweethome to get baptized. his name is tarrence. his family lives here so we got everything set up here for him. it doesnt count towards this area but oh well. Diane is getting baptized this weekend though and she seems really excited for it. she personally invited pretty much everyone. she is so involved in ward activities and events that everyone basically thinks that she is just a member from first ward. she even helped in the kitchen for a funeral we had here.

Elder Wells and I went over to Eugene for District Leader training. we had a pretty good time over there. I learned a ton. but that day was kinda tiring. the morning of the trip we had to wake up at 5 so we would be there on time. but i didnt sleep too much. we had a storm in the middle of the night and a cat fight right out side of our window. but the day was still pretty good. we spent most the day tuesday traveling to eugene, sitting in the meeting, and traveling to bend from eugene. then tuesday evening and wednesday day we were on exchanges and i was in bend with elder wells. anyways thats pretty much everything that happened this week. love you!

July 23, 2012

Hey mom,

thanks for the email. this week was so so. we were told that we would have a baptism here because someone was coming over from sweethome to get baptized. his name is tarrence. his family lives here so we got everything set up here for him. it doesnt count towards this area but oh well. Diane is getting baptized this weekend though and she seems really excited for it. she personally invited pretty much everyone. she is so involved in ward activities and events that everyone basically thinks that she is just a member from first ward. she even helped in the kitchen for a funeral we had here.

Elder Wells and I went over to Eugene for District Leader training. we had a pretty good time over there. I learned a ton. but that day was kinda tiring. the morning of the trip we had to wake up at 5 so we would be there on time. but i didnt sleep too much. we had a storm in the middle of the night and a cat fight right out side of our window. but the day was still pretty good. we spent most the day tuesday traveling to eugene, sitting in the meeting, and traveling to bend from eugene. then tuesday evening and wednesday day we were on exchanges and i was in bend with elder wells. anyways thats pretty much everything that happened this week. love you!

June 11th 2012

Hey Mom,

Sounds like everyone has been super busy recently. i loved the package you sent especially the pictures. it looks like a blast. Thanks for getting Eriks CD to me it came just in time. i wanted to give it to him for his birthday which is today so that works out. everything is going good in the mission. Naomi was blessed in Sunday which was great. we had a few investigators at church, and some good lessons this week.

we had interviews with president on wednesday and thursday morning we went on a 2 or so mile run with president and sister young. it was really nice we had a good devotional and afterwards they got the entire zone oatmeal with blueberries from McDonalds. its was pretty cool. thats pretty much everything that we did this week that really stands out. in interviews i was told that it was time for me to move so on the 25th i will be leaving Ashland.  so after wednesday the 20th if anyone is going to send me a letter send it to the mission office until i get my new address.

6/4/12

Hey mom

Thanks for the letter! Everything is going pretty good its crazy to think about who all is coming home or leaving for their missions. it does not feel like i have been gone for 8 months at all. i wish i could just push a restart button and start my mission from the beginning because it doesnt feel long enough.

The mission is going great! last night we had a baptism! I was glad to finally have a baptism after 8 months. and it was just perfect. I've gone to other missionaries baptisms that were pretty good but this one i will say topped them all. we showed up to fill the font at about 4:30 for the baptism at 6. usually it takes a font about 2 hours to fill but our ward missionary said that it would only take an hour. so we got it filled, set up some things and waited for everyone to show up. at first i was pretty nervious because almost no one was there at about 5:50 except jose who is this random homeless guy that comes to church but doesnt want to meet with us, the bishop, and the case family. but then Naomi showed up with her parents, and then at 6 everyone showed up. the entire relief society room was pretty much full. it was the most well attended baptism that i have seen. this ward is awesome at fellowshipping everyone. everything went great with the program. i have the program in my email so i will forward it to you. oh also we had 5 non members at the baptism (Naomi's parents, jose, and our investigators Liv and Grace) it was great.

Sacrament meeting here was awesome. we were the 2nd and 3rd ones up and after that the entire meeting fast and testimony meeting was on missionary work. it was awesome. there here 4 investigators there and a sister that i tracted in to a while ago who was less active for probably over 40 years but came back sunday. so it was probably the best sunday ever. other then that i cant think of anything really awesome that happened this week. i did see a kid kicking a racoon down the street on his skateboard. that was pretty neat. oh and some old guy with dementia stopped us one the steet to talk then at the end of our talk said: "They call me a hug slut. Well at least in San Francisco." and then gave us a hug. he was a neat guy. oh and a semi investigator that we had died on us last week. i felt pretty bad but he was in really bad shape. anyways thats pretty much everything that happened this week. love you all tons! oh and i will send pictures in another email

5/28/12

Hey Mom!

Thanks for the email everything is going pretty good just a ton of stress. Even though its p-day we had a lesson with Naomi. It was only suppose to be her but when we got there it was her parents, her brother who was in town and his girlfriend. we were suppose to go over the Gospel of Jesus Christ and the commandments. we started talking and she said that she wasnt ready to be baptized by the 3rd because her schedule was too crazy and she didnt like the stress. we started the lesson and we changed it to just the Gospel of Jesus Christ because they only wanted us to be there for a half hour. but because there were so many people and because they asked a lot of questions we were able to teach the commandments through their questions. after the lesson we told her that she was set and all she needs to do now is have her interview and then she will be ready for sunday. so she is back on date. she is having her interview on wednesday and hopefully getting baptized on sunday. i really hope that it goes through. it is a ton of stress. but her family is behind her with it. the parents will be there for the baptism and everything. and they liked everything that we were talking about. she has been basically our main focus right now. we started teaching a lady named sarah who is really nice. she has a lot of struggles but we are working with her and she is doing pretty good. we are trying to help her quit smoking. so other highlights of this week. we were tracting in a moble home park and we ran into a catholic lady that does some of the reading at church services. we talked with her for a while and then she blessed us with holy water. that was a neat experience. in that same trailer park we ran into a german guy named christian who worked in a coal mine in germany when he was younger, then had to serve in the german army. he moved to hawaii lived there for 15 years and now is here because his sons go to school here. we have met with him 3 times this week and he came to church. he talks a ton so its a little hard to teach him but he is nice.

I think it is interesting how when we meet with most people and teach them about what we believe they have some similar belief or they think that it makes complete sense. i went on exchanges in Jacksonville and we taught a family the plan of salvation. we had a really good lesson and at the end they said that they believe it is true. it was a really awesome experience to have. so that is pretty much everything exciting that happened this week. i hope to hear from you next week!

Ps Jo I am pretty sure you get this email and there is this lady here that needs some dirt from a piece of property in midway. i guess her family use to own it she says she only needs a little bit (a small container or so) so if you could get that for her that would be great. i will get the address for you when she tells us it.

5/21/12

Hey mom,

 Thanks for the email. i can see what matt means about people not being very religious here. there are a lot of athiests, or the environment is there religion. also a ton of them dont believe in organized religion. but they need to be taught anyway so the mission goes on!

thats sweet that spencer got his call to Arazona to be on Indian reservations. Intoducing The Book of Mormon will be a breeze. all he needs to say is that the book is about their ancesters and that it contains promised blessings as they read it and apply the teachings. i havent ran in to too many Native Americans but when I do they seem to be way more interested then everyone else.

So the mission is going pretty good. this week we taught Naomi who has a baptismal date for the 3rd. I am pretty excited for that. She has definately been prepared by the Lord. she is the perfect investigator. we taught her about the plan of salvation and the word of wisdom. she said that for about a month she has stopped drinking coffee so that was good. we had stake conference sunday and it was really good. we had 4 investigators at it so that was great because they had to drive to medford to go to it and i was nervious that they wouldnt want to come. Last stake conference here the stake president challenged the stake to read the entire Book of Mormon before the next conference. now he has challenged the entire stake to now write their testimony in the cover of the Book of Mormon and give it to someone. I think every missionary wanted to jump for joy when he said that. Sunday was super busy. we had stake conference. then taought naomi met a guy through tracting that went to BYU as a nonmember and is now writing a book about Abraham, taught a lady named Dawn and 2 member lessons (ps the member emailed a picture to your yahoo account) so it was a pretty crazy week.

so also this week I was in our second car accident. it wasnt bad we here stopped at a crosswalk and this lady rear ended us. that makes it the second accident in one transfer.
so you know you are serving in a super healthy town when you see blind people out jogging. we were driving down Syskiyou when we saw this blind lady running down the sidewalk with her blind stick. i think that would be pretty dangerious but that wasnt stopping her. she wasnt going too fast but still. anyways i think that is pretty much everything that happened this week. we are at the start of a new transfer so i forgot my planner that shows what i did so thats all i can remember.  but anyways i hope everyone is doing good! 

5/7/12

Hey mom,

Thanks for the letter I did finally get the last email. thats awesome to hear about everyone leaving on a mission i know its an awesome experience that has helped me a ton.  transfer calls are coming up. we are suppose to be getting them this saturday. Im not sure if i will be staying or if i will be going to a new area. i have been here for 4 and a half months but i want to stay here for about 3 more months. i dont know if that will happen but i hope that i will be here for at least one more transfer. because transfer calls are coming on saturday hold any mail till sunday when i skype i will know if i am leaving or staying so you can know where to send it. i think that we will be on skype at about 6 our time which is 7 there so be on at that time. i figured that would be the best time for the fam and i really dont have another time that i could do that. so just tell the family to be at home so that i can see them. i only have an hour and a half to talk so tell everyone to be there early. if you need to tell me something or change something before then snailmail me asap because we wont be able to email. also make sure dad does it too.

so now thats out of the way this week has been great! a lady and her daughter (liv and grace) who have been coming to church set up a time with us so that we can go over and teach them. they already comsider themselves mormons and the daughter told a member that she wanted to get baptized. so we are meeting with them tomorrow to talk to them more about that. we also had a lady named maranda contact us through mormon.org who basically said that she wants to be baptized. so my comp and one of our zone leaders met with her (i was in medford on exchanges with the other zone leader) and they set a baptismal date with her for the 26th. i really hope that i will be here next transfer for that. she has 2 kids and one of them is 4. we are meeting with them tonight and i am going to give zoey (the 4 year old) the book of mormon the primary gave me. so i will write later and tell how that went. total we had 4 new investigators at church which is awesome because we have been struggling for a while. but tons of miracles are happening. we had zone conference this week with president young and it was great. but i think the best day this week was sunday. we had an incredible fast and testimony meeting. oh and some kids in the ward made me an Elder Berg Jr. so now i have a son. i and to sign adoption papers and everything. i will send pictures of it.  so thats pretty much everything awesome that happened this week. at zone conference we had a OEM idol where we did a sing and dance thing. i think i will try and send the video later if i can. oh and i bought a awesome singing bowl. i was thinking about the drum but i dont have to room to lug it around so if i really want one i will get it at the end of the mission. anyways i think that is pretty much it for this week so i will talk to you all on sunday!

4/30/12

Hey everyone! specially those that didnt email or write me last week (which is everyone),

just kidding hopefully i will find something in the mailbox today. but anyways.. the mission is going good. we had an awesome lesson with a less active and his wife who says that she wants to get baptized. but the only thing is he is trying to fill out some devorce papers so that they can get married. he said that their goal is that they want to be sealed. so i figure that is a great goal to work towards. we also had an awesome lesson with another lady but she left to boston so we wont see her till june. we did some service for some people that we tracted in to earlier and when we got there they wanted us to weed mow and get rid of these barrels of dirt that they had for growing weed. but they said it was okay because they werent doing it anymore and that it was for medical purposes. you know you are serving in oregon when for service you have to help get rid of dirt that was used for growing marijuana. the people were pretty crazy and my companion forgot his jacket there so we had to go back to get it and the guy said that he would listen to our message. before he was a little harsh about things so it took me by suprise when he said that. oh and another long story short that happened this week is that the guy that we were doing service for was trying to lie to get in to the temple and talked to our district leader who referred him back to us. so we have to deal with that as well. and he calls us all the time because he is stuck in bed and just wants to talk to us but doesnt want to listen to the message or become a mormon. so yeah.

on sunday we had two people (a mother and daughter) who showed up to church randomly for the 2nd time and the daughter told someone that she wanted to be baptized. but we arent sure and we will have to meet with them to see if that is true. but if it is that is awesome. and we are starting to teach a father and daughter who the dad says he knows that Joseph Smith is a prophet and that the Book of Mormon is true so we are meeting with him on tuesday to see if he wants to be baptized. so this week was pretty good. but thats basically everything that happened.

write me back!

4/23/12

Hey mom! thanks for the email and letter this week. the mission is going great. this week was a lot better then last. i called that guy that i hit and he is doing good and i dont have to pay to buy him a new tire. but im not sure if i will have to pay for damage to the car. it isnt too bad but we will see in about 2 weeks. so this week was great. we got a media referral and he seems like a pretty solid guy. we taught him about the plan of salvation and we are going to meet with him this tuesday.  basically everything awesome that happened this week for the most part happened on wednesday. we had lunch at taco bell and went to goodwill on our lunch break because i was looking for something and stumbled upon this beautiful 3 piece suit. as you can tell from the pictures its brown and if you look really close it has orange blue and  green pin stripes. it fits great and only cost me 8 bucks. goodwill is the best. we had that awesome lesson about the plan of salvation and we went to dinner with brother rocke. brother rocke is an old german guy in the ward who always takes us out for dinner. this time he took us to this place called the wild goose. it is somewhat expensive because everything is for the most part is 15 or more. except for lunch. i got shark with a lemon hollandase sauce and shrimp on top with steamed veggies and rice. oh and it came with a curry chicken soup. i think that that was the first time a had seafood on the mission other than clam chowder and it was really good. i think that i overcame my hate for seafood here. who knew that shark is actually really good. oh and brother rocke told us that we better get dessert so i had a marionberry cobbler with a cinnamon struesel and whipped cream on top.

something else that we had this week was specialized training where the mission president came down and taught us a bit about how to work harder. it was pretty good. i was going to wear my new super sexy suit but unfortunately the day or two before i realized that the suit started to smell more and more like weed. i figured it wouldnt be a good idea to show up to specialized training smelling like marijuana so i just wore my regular one. i have been hanging it outside and spraying it with frabreeze to get the smell out and its been working so far. i wore it to church and it didnt smell too bad. i think that i might get it dry cleaned but i might spray it with another bottle of frabreeze first. it really isnt too bad unless you stick your face in it so i wont give up on it. its too beautiful.  if your have any tips or tricks to get a hint of maryjane out of a suit please send me the info. i figure i might be good with the smell i mean all of ashland smells like that ill just say it smells like that because i have been out working hard. jk. but seriously you run into that smell everyday without a doubt. i dont really understand why anyone would smoke that stuff it smells awful.

so today is pday and we are going to check out some stores. there is a guy that we ran in to that sells awesome drums that he makes i am considering getting one. some of them are about $250 but there is no way i would but that the ones that i was thinking about are around $50 to $150 they are about 3 ft tall and had made by the guy so i think i might get one. some people with dreads ride skateboards while playing them. i think it will be awesome to get one. they also have these things called singing bowls that are really cool. look it up. i learned how to play one last week and they are really relaxing i think i might get that instead or i will get both. one i was looking at was about $60 but there might be some that are less. i will look around. if you could write me a letter telling me what one to get that would be great. i might just wait till next monday. so if you email it might be too late. i have leftover christmas money that i think i will buy it with.

so something else that is happening is all the weird hippies are starting to crawl out from under their rocks now that it is warming up. its nice because it gives us more people to talk to but at the same time its really gross because they are shedding their clothes a bit and they really seem to enjoy hairy pits and legs. but whatever thats ashland for you. anyways i better get going but here is a quote that i think jim can use for ben franklin plumbing " when the well is dry, we know the worth of water" Ben Franklin. I love you and whoever else you might be sending this to and like the people in Ashland say "Blessings."

4/9/12

Hey super awesome mom,

Thanks a ton for the package. it was awesome everything was great. the pictures were just what i wanted and that Alex cd you sent me. i have another one of his but that one is the one i like. the mormon message DVD you gave me was awesome. it has a great easter message on it that we used at some appointments last night. it was great. some people even cried. they are really helpful to use for dinner messages. oh and i loved isaac and ethans drawings. i put them on my wall. sounds like Easter and owens birthday was a blast. ours was pretty good. we had some investigators at church and some other less actives that havent been in a long time. this week has been good. i forgot to bring my old planner to email so i sort of forgot some of the stuff we did.

My new companion is Elder Jackman. He is a really good missionary. He is a former zone leader, so I guess I did something wrong and need to be baby sat. jk. lets see he loves: musicals, singing all the time, saturdays warrior, dancing like highschool musical, (he was an extra in high school musical), loves saying Sarene, and Loves laughing loudly at everything. On paper he sounds like my living nightmare but actually I get along with him very well. I think its due to the fact that he is a really good missionary and works hard. I have learned a lot from him so far.

So I realized that the warmer it gets here the weirder the people become. we tracted in to this house and a girl answered and had super hairy legs. people love to be "natural and free" here. last night we went over to visit a member who didnt answer their door, but their Muslim neighbors let us opened the door and let us in. they were 3 guys that were very nice. it was interesting to see their side of things and how they relate to us. they said that they expected us to swing by and visit every once in a while so we will.

Today was a pretty good pday. we had Elder Burton, Hales, Gowen, and Davis come down to spend the day. its was really fun, Burton, Hales, and Gowen all came out with me so it was cool. we checked out some of the stores in Ashland and it was pretty cool. some of the stores here are Awesome. one store had those Buckyballs that i wanted but they were like 30 bucks! that was rediculous. and they had a ton of books that i wanted to buy but they arent mission approved and i dont want to lug them around for the rest of the mission. i think that i will come back after the mission and buy them. oh but i did buy a bacon air freshener and bacon lip balm. i havent tried them yet. oh and at another ashland store i bought some prayer flags that are all over ashland. its part of the culture so i thought i should buy them.

hmmm oh last week also Elder Gamez and i corralled some dear in the field behind the institute building.

well anyways thats pretty much all the cool stuff that is going on right now.

love ya tons and thanks again for the package!

Love Elder Berg