24 Hour Flu, for a Week

This week we basically took turns being sick.  We room with the zone leaders and so one of them got sick and we had to go on exchanges with them until they got better.  We basically had to do 4 back to back exchanges, and in one we had 3 dinners, ours, then the zone leaders and a YSA member took the ZLs out to dinner it was awesome. We all took turns being sick, and because we were all trading spots being sick we just made up games and scenarios that we played to see who could get out of them the most creatively, but the Game master (Elder Madsen) likes to give handicaps to us as we play, it was so fun.  I'm doing better.

Walked and Walked, A...n...d... Walked

Dear Family,

So you may have heard already, but I have been transferred down the Hill to the Highlands ward in Rancho Cucamonga.

We have been spending most of our time walking, trying to find people and we have been planning like crazy to try and find new people.  We have been out in a miracle all week, it has been raining like none other, and we can go out in it and not be drenched in seconds, but rather over time in minutes instead of seconds so its different. We currently live with the zone leaders and they are Elders Memmott and Croft and they are RIOTS.... Elder Memmott LARPED (live action role played) and Elder Croft is a really chill zone leader, so far to the point that he laughs and jokes and talks about how him and my companion Elder Madsen were companions and all of the stuff they did in Big Bear. #it's so funny. And we get to tract like crazy,

I only have a minute left so, I Love you all,

Ammon Van Engelenhoven

Through the Pass

I loved Jakes story about the microwave.  (Briefly, his cousin Jake is in Chicago, Spanish speaking mission.  They came upon a guy who didn’t speak English or Spanish, trying to move a microwave.  Jake and his companion helped this man move an ancient microwave out of his apartment and placed in the trunk of a running car.  Another person came out of the apartment building and drove away in the car.  Man who can’t speak English or Spanish walks away….. So some random person has an ancient microwave in the back of their car.  Awesome!)

In more news, I have been Whitewashed out of my area Mojave Narrows, and I am now down the Cajon pass and in the valley, serving in the Highland B area. Interesting thing to note here I have been whitewashed out of Mojave River B, Maple A, Maple B, now Mojave Narrows B, I have white washed out of all my areas, and I have shotgun technically an area (not really, but they say it counts). So in my new area, I live with the zone leaders.  My companions name is Elder Madsen, he seems really cool and he is really funny. He knows anyone and everyone, and knows anywhere and everywhere, it should be fun. Oh, and I got to drive a Truck, that is right a truck, not a car. I got to drive it down the Cajon pass, and man, oh man, I miss driving. We accidentally left the mission, but we found our way back in a relative short amount of time. I have never been so excited for that on my mission, to go from no Car to truck for a day... Awwww, man it was bliss, #Haven't driven for 8 months, and only got 1 speeding violation, #unheard of in California, #missionaries understand my pain with the dreaded TIWI......   (FYI, Ammon was pulled over by an officer because he was riding his bike too fast.)

I love you all,

 Ammon

Love you mom, bye

Hmmmm........

Transfers are next Monday.  We do get plenty of rain, and there has been some flash flooding, but not anywhere near me. So, we'll be in the rain, and hope someone takes pity on us and lets us in to talk about Jesus.  This past week fell to crap because we had a member who is going through a break up, crash at our apartment because he didn't know how to deal with a break up.  He stayed for an average of 6 hours and we recently started a 1 hour study with him, to kill/cut the time down as much as possible.  No it is not appropriate for him to do any of this and bishop is painfully aware of it :)  We didn't really teach anyone because of that fact but here's hoping for this week as an atonement week for this past week :)

Where exactly in Lincoln Nebraska are you planning to move?  I don't know how I would feel, I don't know anyone there, but that is not so bad.  I could meet new people.  I would only be there 3 months out of the year, so it won't really affect me, and I only have to change the home address.  When would we see family, Thanksgiving and Christmas or not, but either way I will be fine.  When I come home, do I go there or to Fulton for my home coming talk, and when would we visit?

Yeah I know its kinda short I am writing up a report for the week and for President Taylor, it will make more sense when dad gets done and reads the email I sent him.  He can explain why it is so short.  Yes, you can send me stuff and it will get to me, and I ran out 5 months ago ;)

Yes,  I would like chocolate, in any form, cocoa, candy, cake, anything I am not picky, Pringles, and cookies, brownies.

I got to go,

I love you all,

Ammon

"Nutty" but Not a Nut

January 16, 2017

So this week in a shell that is nutty, but not a nut ;P

 

This week we had to do a mini exchange with our Zone leader's, to do a pass off lesson to pass Mitch off to the YSA. The ZL's showed up and Elder Conder and I were debating on who should go. Basically, had the ZL's flip a coin, I was chosen to go and in the lesson we taught the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Mitch just started in to the lesson and plowed through it and we were tying in how he needs to be in the YSA ward to get Baptized. He accepted the fact that he needed to but he wanted to have one more lesson with Elder Conder and I before the ZL's take over. (Inside my head, I was thinking, "Crap, No he is attached to us and won't want to be passed off) and that went great. We got a text from the sisters that night to take pictures of the temples to one of their recent converts. The next day we went and dropped them off first thing in the morning. We then had to give service at a squash farm, and that day we had to dig trenches for a sprinkler system, and yeah, I kinda over did it. We were only supposed to go down 1 foot and I went about 4 feet down and did the high majority of the trenches. They took me out of the trench digging, and I received the comment that" If WWIII happens when Trump is elected that they would want me on their side because I could dig a hole that would go to China and not die" LOL :)

 

Right after that we had Aaron Boston cancel our appointment so we then, came home and we had a Member named Neil, come to our apartment to talk with us because he got DUMPED hardcore Sunday. He found out that his girlfriend was cheating on him the entire time and for the rest of that day we talked with him, and he gave us a RISK game. We played until he felt better for that day. We then did exchanges right after he left and I was left in the area  (interesting fact I have only ever left my area on exchange 5 times in the past year.) I had another Greenie that I was with and we basically had to stay inside. We had Sushi which I have to say is good if you get it fried, because I had a fried roll and a raw roll on 2 separate days, the fried tastes better and doesn't make your stomach sick. Oh, and the Companion that I had here for the exchange is a cousin to a less active guy that we are teaching (what are the odds LOL.) The entire mission up here in the desert had interviews with President Taylor. Right after we got home Neil showed up again, and again he was struggling with the break up so our day fell to crap, again. Right as he left we had our DL show up for more exchanges and guess what, I was left in the area. That next day we finished the game of Risk and Neil felt better a little (Seth when we get home I want to play a game of risk with you.) After that we set up a return appointment with our investigators and had dinner. Then had to re-exchange and when we did that we had to go to a Choir practice and I was the only one that could drive, because I was the Oldest missionary, and I was Green dotted meaning that I was the only one that has a clean driving record on the mission. So I got to finally go driving in a bike area (YEAH!) Sunday we had a lesson with Mitch and all 4 of us the missionaries were there instead of the 2 like last time. This time we taught him the Law of Obedience, which he told us that he has started already to keep the WOW and the Law of Chasity, and that is my week in a shell of a nut LOL

 

Love you all,

Ammon

Building Relationships of Trust

Dear Family,

I am doing okay. Thomas is an awesome guy, he has been very helpful to me on my mission. Dad is sub-ing yeah people love dad, it is hard not to. Remember that people just flock to him to talk to him. And is Bro Hart okay, I mean what is stopping him from coming to church, has he been Elder's Quorum for to long or what is it? And I hope that Bro Brake is doing okay with that, and how is his little boy been? And Josh is getting sealed in the St Louis temple that is awesome, please send me pictures of it. 

 

Now to my week, is was good, we had a lesson with Mitch an investigator, we got him on a baptismal date, and we have taught him the restoration and the plan of salvation. He was gulping it up, but bad news he doesn't live in our ward so we have to pass him off to the YSA elders, because he is 21, and wants to start a family right now. We had a killer lesson with Aaron, we met with him for our second lesson and he started asking us about the Word of wisdom. We planned to teach the plan of salvation, but we jumped off the tracks and got on his level and taught him the WOW and he committed to start keeping the WOW. Right after the lesson we went down to a local gas station and threw his tobacco and cigarettes in the dumpster there. Still working on Coffee with him, but he is slowly weening himself off of it, so we will see how this goes. 

 

Yes, there is rain in our forecast...FINALLY.... although it kinda sucks here if it does rain because, we have to bike over dirt paths to get anywhere in our area, and we get muddy if it rains and people won't let us in if we are muddy. Most members take pity on us and let us in to get dry and warm, which is something to be thankful for #tender mercies. Yes, I am warm, but next week is forecast with high winds, so we will see how well we get through it. :) Teaching people is like a bear, it is hard, fun, and weird all at the same time but it is totally worth it to see them progress. 

 

I do make my bed, Elder Conder before that picture was taken was poking and prodding me to get up even though I told him I needed a nap, and I got tired of him doing that so I got up and did something else to make him stop pestering me. I have been getting enough to eat. We have been working on getting a dinner calendar coordinator to get us dinner, but we have been working on that for 4 months. The crab was fun, we kept on thinking of what we would do if it came to life right then and there, and we got several laughs out of it. I always try to be a nice guy, and there is an Elder that finished his mission and he was giving all of his stuff away, and I got his GPS and Pokemon deck and the kids love it. It is apparently getting popular again with 7 year old's, so I am ready for when a 7 year old wants to play. The guy with the gun has worked everything out and is okay and so is his mom. We are working on ward trust, it is hard particularly as there have not been solid missionaries for 6 months and we are trying to start something that the previous missionaries broke, so we are working on it, and we are trying to fix it.

 

Love,

Ammon

Church and a Gun

January 2^nd, 2017

We were shipped Crab and we got to cook it and have crab. I learned that there is a way to eat crab. I burned a shirt, we built a Bonfire (missionary standard=confined to a grill) and we went to bed early because there was so many things that we had to get done at church the next day.

 

Dear Family,

This week was crazy we were rained in for most of this week. I know that all of you are thinking "RAIN...REALLY AMMON," in my defense I have to say people are not home, because they are usually in the riverbed tearing it up and if they are home they are usually tired because they just got back, and they don't want us to bring " your Mormon mud in my house.” So, we don't usually go out, but we did get out and visited people and set up some return appointments. We taught an Eternal investigator about the restoration and about the Resurrection. It was touch and go with her but it all worked out in the end. 

 

Now fast forward to Sunday our craziest day in our transfer and was the way we started our new year. We got up, church time was moved back from 9 to 11, but we still had meetings to go to and we had to be there by 9 to make our meeting. We got there after biking HARD to get to the Church we were a tad late but they had not started yet so we were good. After the Ward Council meeting, we were sitting outside in the foyer waiting for our investigator to show up when the executive Secretary walked up to us and started a conversation. He was funny and witty to no end and was telling us his mission stories from the south. When he left to go to the bathroom, right around the corner and he came right back out and said take a look at this and showed us the bathrooms urinal. It was flooding, we turned it off and fixed it as quickly as we could before we were soaked anymore and before we had to go home and get changed. After that we were waiting for our investigator to show up, he never did but don't worry we got his number. :) 

 

We were sitting in sacrament meeting and the door opened to the Chapel and we see that it is one of our investigators, who is the son to another one of our investigators. He comes over and sits next to us, (now pause, our ward mates think that all we do is sit around and do nothing so when they saw that we had an investigator show up for Church their faces hit the floor it was priceless) resume; he asked us if we have seen his mom (our investigator) she didn't show up to our church that day. So I look on over to answer his question and I see a .44 magnum in his jacket pocket sticking out, barely enough to see it (I only recognized it because I have had similar guns pulled on me (thank you Quantico rd.)) We said right after the sacrament was done being passed we could step out in the foyer and help him. He was trying to find his mom, because he heard a woman scream that woke him up and he saw a car drive off and he couldn't find his mom. He used the last of his data to call his girlfriend and she told him that his mom was at church. So he got dressed in a jacket and pair of Combat boots and ran to the church to see if his mom was there, he saw us and asked for our help to find his mom. Out in the foyer, we called his mom and were waiting for her to call us back. While we were talking about the situation he commented on one of the speakers who was giving a talk and said, “Man, that was a solid talk,” and he started talking about Nephi's Ship and quoting it to us (now I was not following the talk, but he did it, he is awesome.) He told us about the first time that he read the Book of Mormon and how the missionaries at first sat down with him to read it and when he did and he said, "In the first Couple of Chapters a guy gets murdered just because he simply had too much money... THIS BOOK IS LIT!!!!" He then read the entire book of Mormon in a week and said that it is a true book and that "The Mormons are by far the closest to the truth if not the truth." We got in contact with his mom and we talked about book of Mormon stories that he loved, and we then sent him on home to deal with the cops and answer their questions. 

 

After that we went back inside to church to get to Gospel principles class and we got stopped by an member, who then gave us a referral and said he brought a nonmember friend who wanted to learn more. The nonmember friend walked up to us and I asked him what do you want to know? He just simply said Everything, so we set up an time to meet with him that day and he said that when he was at church that he felt at peace and at home and that he wanted to be part of it. After church we had a referral that we received from HQ and we knocked on her door when they pulled up and we had to set a return appointment because they were going to have people coming on over and it wasn't a good day for them. 

 

We visited some less active members and helped them with their roof, it is leaking from all the rain and we put a tarp down to divert the rain. We then stopped by the investigator that was mentioned earlier and his mom and everything was all right and we got to teach a little more on the meaning of baptism with them. We then had to get a ride to dinner because it was so cold and the wind was blowing really hard so we got a ride and had dinner. We then taught the member referral from earlier, he wanted to know more and he accepted the invitation to be baptized but couldn't pick a date because he didn't know his schedule so we couldn't set a date and when we finally got back to the apartment we didn't even have time to finish weekly planning. We got changed and FELL into bed and planned to do it tonight. That is this week.

 

Love you all, even you Kyler's Girlfriend,

 

Ammon

Armor (Of the Lord?)

December   26^th, 2016

Dear Family,

To describe my past week I would have to say that it was short. There was not to terrible much that we could do, due to the rain we got. I find it funny that I have been praying for rain and when we finally get it, it pours for 3 days. We couldn't really leave the apartment because of all the mud and stuff, because to get anywhere in the area we have to take dirt paths, so when it rains it turns to mud and when we get to the house we are covered head to toe with mud. So we usually walk, but that was not so much the case here, we wanted to walk but our rain gear was soaked in the first hour. We were already having chattering teeth by then so we decided to go back to the apartment and get warm (no one was home or letting us in.) We stayed there till it started to clear up and we got cabin fever so we made armor out of cardboard. We had some sushi. I had a tablespoon of wasabi it was awesome. I was a fire breathing dragon outside but when I got back to the apartment I had to use the bathroom, and I turned into a rocket ship from the wasabi. We had some lessons with some less active families and we got invited back on over for breakfast the next day (today). That is the sum of my week.

Love you all,

Ammon

Working His Magic

Suck it Up Buttercup

Dear Family,

 

To quote Hagrid "you're a wizard, Dad!" I hope that the party goes well for everyone in attendance. Please send me some photos of Ian's and Mackinzee's wedding. If the sister missionaries are allergic to anything, I share this motto that has been going through the zone here "SUCK IT UP BUTTERCUP" I am just kidding. No, I haven't gotten my Christmas package yet. It will probably get it the week of Christmas. Yeah, Nicole told me about going on over to help Ambria with her  Personal Progress. We may or may not get snow, most likely it will not. Sadness (not really it gets down to 26 degrees when the sun drops and snow would make it harder to bike home.) It is going pretty well with Elder Conder, we have been talking about how we could better understand each other when we say idioms from where we are from. Transfers were today and we are still together and will be together until January 30th, so we’re good. No, you didn't tell me that Josh is getting married on the 14th of January, please send me pictures. I hope that Ari and Sam do well on their exams and that they make it safely. I hope the tree looks amazing and that the quilt comes out amazing.

 

Love you all,

Ammon

Opening an Area

No new investigators, we have basically been having to "open" the area, we basically threw out our area book because all of the people, notes, and records are really, really, really, REALLY BAD. We have started out "new" in our area, We have been doing more contacting, I had to give a talk in sacrament meeting on the restoration.  We have been going through the area book and pulled out everyone that had almost okay notes and are starting to visit/find them, Pencil lead for marking scriptures, ties yes, and chocolate bars, and other things.

Elder Conder has not been able to teach any investigators, because we don't have any right now, so we have been teaching less actives. Training is difficult and it is really frustrating when they still have the mentality that "I worry about me and you worry about you" but we have slowly been getting that out of his system. We have been keeping our apartment clean, I have officially, unofficially taken the position of Desert Office Elder (I am not a real office elder) if there is an apartment that needs to be cleaned then the housing inspectors call us up to come help clean apartments.  I haven't really been writing in my journal, it is like 11 by the time I finish planning and past bed time, and we have to be up at 6. It is very cold it has been getting down to high 20's but it climbs back up to the 50's. And yes there is a surprising lack of Green in the mission, I have only seen green on the mission for 3 days out of my entire mission thus far.

Love you mom

Addict

That's great that Uncle Nathan won the trophy, who took what place in the Shoot-Out. It’s great that Melissa and her family showed up. Yes, this year has been flying by I can't remember what life was like before the mission it seems kinda distant and far away kinda like a day dream or something like that. Thomas IS HOME?!!! The "kilt" is called a Lava-lava and all of the missionaries (the Elders) out here have been trying to get one. All of us have agreed that we will wear them to p-day activity. Thanksgiving was awesome we went to an elderly couple’s home and they stuffed us like nothing else. They had their grandson and his fiancé there and they basically talked about some dumb things that they did on their missions. I have several ideas for if anyone tries to prank me :)

 

For Christmas, I would like Long John Garments top and bottom (2-3) the kind that goes down to the ankles. Cookies, all kinds. 2 white shirts with a 16 and 1/2 size neck line. Socks (wool blend is preferred for winter.) A sweater. Could I please get Dads Hot Chocolate recipe, the people out here have no idea what real hot chocolate is like. I think I now know what a crack addict feels like when they don't have crack because it is the same for me but with hot chocolate. The hot chocolate that members out here make is just watered sugar water with little flavoring. Please, save me from this lack of real chocolate!!!!

 

Love you all,

Ammon

Winterizing & The Missionary Moving Club Redu

Well this past week has been very stressful, me and my greenie have been going through the area book, and all of the people that were "investigators" just were places were the missionaries would go to hangout, so we have been having to drop people and find more people, and we haven't been able to get my greenie any solid people that we could teach the restoration too, so we have been looking for the past week for people and haven't really found any one, but we are building our relationship with the ward. we have been putting the miles on our bikes and we have been winterizing a lot of peoples swamp coolers, I can probably do it in my sleep now with the number of times I have done it. And not a lot has happened, but a cool thing that happened was we got called by a member of the ward to help some of his friends who were moving up from LA to the high desert, we were there for 3 hours and we unloaded 3 u-huals and we had some of the elders qourum help us, no for the news of a not as great scale, we helped them move into the ward next to ours, but that is okay the missionaries there haven't had a person investigating for the past 3 years, so not so bad. and that is our week in a nut shell, i got to go and get groceries.

I love you all,

from,

Ammon

Reenacting the Best 2 Years

Hello, I am still alive, California is still crazy, and people are still people.

Well, for the past week I can only describe my week as crazy, I have been in a trio companionship for the past week and a half, and it was an awesome time, I basically had to stay with some Elders that live with the Zone Leaders, so we had 5 Elders in 1 apartment, we had a fun time doing stuff, and one of the Elders I was with got Dear Johned, and it was his first break up, and he had no idea how to handle it and what made it worse for him is that she wrote a letter to him, and then wrote an email to him saying and I qoute "Oh, yeah, this is everything that I forgot in my letter" and he got the email before the letter, so for 2 days he could not function at all and basically we went to sonic and bought 7-10 milk shakes each(59 total, we had a ton of coupons and a member gave us a 50 % discount during at happy hour) and we pounded them till he felt better, and he was on such a sugar high that we decided to reenact the best 2 years.

After that we covered both of our wards, mainly theirs because they were low on miles, we are given a set number of miles for that month, and they were really low, so we covered their ward until the miles reset.  I went down the hill for the last  2 days, and was Spanish for those days till I got my Greenie, and we had to go up the hill that night, and we had to fit 3  greenies luggage in a Chevy Cruz and go up the hill with 4 elders in the Cruz as well, needless to say after some 3D tetris we managed to fit everything and everyone.  We got  up here and it was like 7 at night when we got up the hill.  The roads were so bad (it was election day) that we left at 5:30 and didn't get back till 7 pm and we had to greenie shop, and we have been busy ever since.  We got to go and learn an area. Oh, and an Elder that was Spanish that died that transfer, Left his GPS and his comp didn't want it so I got a free GPS, and it has saved our butts so many times already, we put every ward member's address and every investigators and potential in it, and we were able to go and see if people still had a pulse and still lived there. We have a new ward mission leader,  our old one wanted us to get 20 lessons a week, in an area that we could only get 2 lessons a week , and he didn't even give us the time of day, but our new one has been more then helpful.  He gave us a split calendar and an updated ward list (ours was out of date, and we asked for one when I first got here) and he his been keeping a growing list of people that past missionaries taught that we could go visit so we should be on the up and up and that is all of what has happened in the past week.

love you all,

from,

Ammon

His First Son

Well mom, I know you called the office because I was there and was about to pick up the phone, when the mission President came in and wanted to start the meeting. So, instead of me, one of the office people answered and said my name so I assume that it was you on the other line. I haven't gotten a chance yet to see if they have a package for me, But I found out tomorrow, and I am training a new Greenie, I am the senior Companion, and I don't know yet his name. (His name is Elder Conder.)

This past week I have been in a trio, with another set of Elders, that live with the Zone Leaders, so 5 elders in 1 house for 1 week, yeah nothing could possibly go wrong ;). I have never had so much fun in teaching people, it was really awkward, but it helps if you acknowledge it in the beginning. I have been covering 2 wards and trying to juggle dinners. Yes, I am still in Apple Valley, I will not be leaving for another 2 transfers (3 months). For Ari, all that I can say is if you keep putting in Preach My Gospel in and applying it then he will eventually come along and the spirit will testify to both of them. (Ari was called as a ward missionary.) I hope that Fulton will push Dad's plan on through and give the money necessary to start it up. (He took 2^nd place!) Thank Bro White for the gifts that he has given me.

I got to go talk to you later,

I love you all,

Ammon

The No Good, Very Bad, No Fun Halloween

THAT IS AWESOME THAT MR.HALL went to the Trunk or Treat; you have no idea how great of a missionary opportunity that is for inviting people to come to the building and get to know the members of the ward. Out here, they base the ward activities around the missionaries’ investigators helping them feel welcomed into the ward. Please, have dad send me his recipe for Hot Chocolate before Christmas so that I can get everything and make some. Tell Mr. Hall that I am on a mission and that I say "Hi.” I hope the quilting is going well, and it is pretty funny that Ambria is listening to 80's Christmas music. Send me something that put a smile on your face and left you feeling Happy.

 

That is all that I can share, and I am doing well, and I am helping Elder Muhlstein pack, he is going down to the office to be an office Elder. President wants him down there with him to keep an eye on him, because up to this point Elder Muhlstein was done, but when president told him that he is coming down there with him, his eyes lit up, because he gets to be on a computer from 8 am to 3 pm, and gets to fix all of the technology problems. We may actually get I-pads. We did go to the Trunk r Treat but we had to cut out early because we had to do weekly planning. We had people from all wards and all walks of life come in. Oh, send me the Cocoa Cola Chicken recipe, because I made some out here but it was lacking something.

 

 

Love you all,

Ammon

Shower Power Naps

October 10^th, 2016

Dad's Report: I found out that we don't have any anymore investigators. They have left or they only let us in to get out of the heat because they felt sorry for the Elders. The new ward is different, it is very much so a just starting ward. There are a lot of single moms with their kids, that became converted to the gospel when their boyfriends dumped them because they got pregnant. They had their kids and are now the ward. They are a ward of single mom's trying to raise their kids in the gospel that they converted too, and they have some awesome testimonies that they bore over the pulpit this fast Sunday. It is cooling off, not that I would notice because my companion likes to keep the temp at about 60 degrees all the day long. The biking is not as bad but it is still bad, we have to take dirt paths to go ANYWHERE in our area, and Goatheads, stickers or whatever you call them are a problem. I’ve had 2 popped tires with tire liners and now I upgraded again to now I have a new tube and another Tire liners. Dinners are a struggle here because the ward is mostly single sisters, we don't get to be fed often, but we do get dinners from the families that are supper cool. There is a member here who started out homeless, he met the missionaries and it turned his life around and now he is a multi-millionaire, and he has a 2016 stingray Corvette that he put a super charger in it. Yes, I am keeping the apartment clean, you know how Jesus Said "Greater things then I have done you shall do" yeah I have proof of that statement, I raised from the Oblivion of death that apartment to where now it is a resurrected apartment. Spiritually, I am growing like crazy if you count how often I am repenting and I have been slacking in the Journal Entry department I have gotten out of the habit, I will do better. I have been studying a talk on the atonement I will try to send it to you, I suggest that you listen to the Whole thing and follow the scripture chase that he leads you on in it. 

Love you all,

Ammon

 

Dear family,

 

Well Monday was crap we did nothing and we didn't even get to leave the apartment because both of us were so tired that we passed out in our study chairs waiting for dinner the next day to text us back, this is after we did all of the p-day necessities.

 

Tuesday, we had district meeting which was not very good because not everyone was there so we had to make a goulash of the zone. It sucked because our zone is so big that some thought that it was cancelled and were informed as the meeting was starting that it is indeed happening. So by the time everyone got ready and got to the meeting, the meeting we had was over, but on the good side of things I got to play a game of sorts that elders play. It’s missionary Hide and seek but you only play it if someone is going to the bathroom, and the person who went has to find everyone. That day we had nothing planned because we fell asleep the night before. So that is our own fault. Oh, we did have a dinner that night and the couple showed us their custom-built computers they work from home. They basically compile all of the data that companies send them into usable data. The husband has a Killer World of Warcraft Set up; he does that while the other computer is crunching the numbers.

 

Wednesday, we did service. We picked tomatoes and I got to use those agricultural skills that I learned from dad. Talked to the guy about hoop houses, raised beds, best type of soil for different plants (usually it's squash that they are growing.) We did a ton of cleaning of our apartment when we got back so much that we fell asleep. I was so tired that I fell asleep in the shower standing up, and didn't wake up until the water went cold, which sucks because it wasn't a gradual thing it was like someone turned to valve all the way to cold. We had stake Coordination they want to know our numbers so we gave it to them. We found a tennis ball and started to play tag with it, the Youth were ruthless because they would slide on the polished wood floor, we couldn't because it would rip our pants.

 

Thursday, we cleaned a lady’s lawn. We visited people all day trying to get to know them and that is when we found out that we have no one in our area to teach. We have to find more.

 

Friday, we were weekly planning and we had a long session in that and we didn't get out till about 5 pm because we were trying to think up ways to find people to teach. I received a call from President Taylor. He does a random call thing and he called me and wanted to know how I was so it was weird. We talked to an eternigator and she wants to be baptized but she will give up coffee in her own time, so we are working with her on that

 

That is all I got for you because I have to go,

 

I love you all,

Ammon,

 

PS: I would love some Jerky.

Mr Clean

Well before I get to the investigators, there are several things I would like to ask, How badly did Seth break the truck? What are the companies are saying they would be interested in hiring Dad? Some talks I liked were Uchtdorf's and LeGrand. There is also another thing that I have to say MOM, I LOVE YOU, you have no idea how many people out here don't have a normal family, and have nothing but crap family lives, THANK YOU SO MUCH for loving me through all of my crazy growing up.

 

Apple Valley has the nickname Crapple Valley, because the people out here REFUSE to take care of their things, even the missionaries. We spent the entire week just cleaning the apartment, the first day we threw out 3 bags of trash, and another 3 bags of recycling that we would only have gotten 56 cents so we set it by the dumpster for the homeless people to go through and take. The bathroom was NASTY, you thought that ours is bad, this one was worse. There was a layer of Pee on the floor. DUMPED a bucket of water on it, about 3 gallons worth and the water turned a brownish yellow color and we scrubbed for 30 minutes with bleach and it finally started to lose its color of yellow and turn white. Another 30 minutes we scrubbed and finally got it clean to white floor. We vacuumed and the carpet, before we vacuumed it was a dark Charcoal grey, and after was a light grey. We spent the Entire week just cleaning and we had to make several runs to the store because we used up our cleaning supplies. So when I come home, I can clean whatever you can throw at me, so you should be happy about that Mom, I finally learned how to clean but on my mission. My Companion is cool; we are very different on what is funny. I have been told that my sense of humor is drier than the desert in summer. I have yet to meet any of our investigators because we have been cleaning the apartment, but I will tell you as soon as possible.

 

I love you all,

Ammon