Innisfail Chapter 3

Hey there everyone,

This week was such a great week in so many ways. So much happened and I don't know if I can even remember it all, but I'll give it my best shot.

Well first off, I was going to tell you about last Tuesday what happened before we came to email. So the basic run down was that we got up did our studies and then went and helped on a farm. Pretty much we went to help because of Bro Day, the Ward mission leader. He is constantly volunteering our help to his staff at his dentist office and none of them have ever taken him up on the offer. Well finally John Mills (his wife works for Bro Day) took him up on the offer, so we got to help on a farm. We helped them weed the carrots and helped lay drip tape (like a soaker hose) next to some arugula and spinach so help keep them from flowering. It was a cool experience and I also got really dirty. Mud up my arms and my legs. the only part of me that wasn't muddy was my face which was covered in sweat. We were outside for a while doing that. He also let us pick some radishes, spinach, and arugula and gave us some garlic somethings. We were then going into the cooled down barn to help break apart some old boxes and palates. I was so cool in there compared to outside all of the sweat and moisture on my body just condensed and I had rivers running down my forehead. Oh but it felt nice in there. We put the veggies in the staff fridge while we were in there. We helped with that and then we had to get going. As we were driving off we realized we left the veggies in the fridge. Oh well. It was a great experience and we did exactly what Bro. Day wanted, to not preach. We just went and helped him on the farm. He did ask us some questions, but we did not push any doctrine. We just hope that something might come from it in the future and that the rest of his staff will let us come over and help.

I have also found out the help that exercise can be. In my mind I never liked exercise and would rather just run around with friends. Well this week exercise became important in my life. I was struggling to get up in the mornings and struggling to get ready on time. It was Thursday morning when this all happened. Most mornings I would get up and try to find some position that I was trying to be awake, but kept finding myself with my eyes closed dowsing off. I just wanted one day to be able to sleep in. By the time I finally got in the shower and got ready it was about 8:20 I tried to hurry and grab a bowl of cereal and sit down for personal study. It was more like 8:30 by the time I started. about 9:00 was companionship study. The first thing that Elder Marsh talked to me about was the morning schedule. He showed me the Missionary Health Guide. Why didn't I get that sooner. It has really helped ever since. I'm feeling more energetic and more awake in the mornings. Who knew exercise was important? :)

Thursday we also got to meet our new mission president. Did I mention that we were getting a new one? President Manion and Sister Manion are so amazing and will really be wonderful for the mission. Our zone went up to Red Deer for it. Before hand we grabbed lunch and we were all eating in the kitchen. I got to catch up with Elder Eyler (from the MTC) and hear about what's been going on in his area. We then went in and got to meet President and Sister Manion. They shared things about them and some of their experiences. They are from the Fort Worth (don't let Sean read that haha) area. Then all of the outlying areas had interviews with them. We were the last ones, so while we were waiting we got to talk with everyone else until it was just us and the zls. We then had our interviews ( I would rather say get to know each other times) and really got to know what great people they really are.

Well I also had a really cool experience Saturday morning. I was really feeling down and feeling like I wasn't really progressing and becoming a better missionary. I was really just feeling upset and discouraged. Before we left the appt. I sat down and read through my Patriarchal Blessing. It truly is a blessing. I read through it and was really suddenly just feeling happy and hopeful. I love the guidance and comfort that you can feel from it. It is like your own personal book of scripture that is only yours to read and directly applies to you. It was a much needed blessing at that time.

Yesterday at church was really cool as well. Sister Woodruff, who is a single sister, texted us the night before and asked for our favorite colors and the spelling of our names. We thought it was kinda weird, but didn't really think about it much. We got to church and she asked if we could come in her primary class for the last 10 minutes. We actually almost forgot, but went in and got to talk about how the Lord has blessed us as missionaries. Her class had written notes and taped them to different bags of treats. They were all put into this burlap bag that had a name tag and a colored tie on it. It was really sweet of her to do that for us. It was hard to not eat some of it, since it was fast sunday. I love the members so much. They are so kind to us missionaries.

Bishop Mower here also is really awesome. We have been trying to get the Ferences to come to church. The parents and the oldest child were baptized a few years ago, but went inactive. Elder George and Elder Marsh were teaching the younger kids. Well I really shouldn't call them kids. They are 15 and 13. They were teaching them and had a baptism date for them that is past and gone. They wouldn't come to church so that date came and went. We took Bishop Mower with us to their house last night, mostly so he could just meet them. Pretty much they still aren't going anywhere, but we are. Since watching the Work of Salvation Broadcast we have been trying to get more member support from the ward other than feeding us meals. I guess the Bishop is the first one. He told us he wants to go every Sunday sometime and visit LA's or PM's (Less Actives and Part Members) that he will choose. That is exactly the kind of thing that needs to happen. The missionaries should be going with the members, not bringing the members. It will be a really opportunity.

We also got to go over and do another dump run with Bro Ellis, one of the best people of Innisfail. He didn't know it was going to be that nasty. He had a pile of debris that the dry wallers that were building his house just through outside the door and left it there. That was before all of the rain came a couple of weeks ago. So as we were picking up the pile we found out it was mostly old rotting drywall and gross drywall paste in a puddle of mud that was fermenting for a while. It was a really gross clean up job, but it had to be done. He said if he would have known it was going to be this bad he wouldn't have called us to help. We didn't care because we got to help out.

So overall this past week has been really good. We really didn't see any progress from anyone we taught last week, but I could sure feel myself progressing immensely. I know that the Lord is always with us to help lift us up. "Where two or more of my servants gather, there I am, in the midst of them"

Love you all,

Elder O'Neill

Innisfail Chapter 2

I'm trying to come up with subject titles, but this is the best I got.

Besides the 30*C weather and the 60% humidity it is wonderful. (question what is the stupid C to F conversion???) All I know that it is hot and humid up here. There are a lot of trees around, but they are kinda spread out, since around here is a lot of farmland.

Oh sorry, that I wasn't able to email yesterday like I normally would. The first Monday of each month or sometime in that first week is usually some Canadian holiday so we can email the next day. Yesterday was Canada Day (like July 4th) and I'll hopefully be able to talk more about it later.

Well I wanted to pretty much give a run down of my week. I'll probably forget some details because there is a lot that we do in just one day. I could probably spend a couple hours talking about just one visit, but I'll try to keep it semi short.

Tuesday

Studies this morning were interesting because we had to get some tire work done on our car so we had our studies inside Kal Tire. It was kinda interesting trying to practice teaching inside of a business with people constantly walking around. Well later we got to meet Tayden and his cousin Charles. Elder Marsh and Elder George ran into him on the street and he wanted to know more. They met us at the church and we gave them a church tour and tried to answer all of their questions. We hoped that they would come to church but that didn't happen. We then had correlation with Bro. Day the ward mission leader. He is such a great guy. I could really spend hours talking about him and what he has told us. He is such a funny guy. He is one of the 4 dentists in town. 3 of them are mormon. It's pretty funny really. We then went to dinner at the Teskey's. We had a hot dog roast outside. Ya campfire in a shirt and tie. Strange to me. After dinner we went and I finally got to meet Jeff. WOW. That's about all I can say is WOW. He has such an interesting story that he got to spend that night telling me. WOW

Wednesday

Oh so I don't think I mentioned it, but Elder Marsh LOVES birds. He went bird watching with one of the members before I got here. So that will be important later. Anyways, So we had our studies and then had mormon.org time. After that Elder Marsh had an impression to go see Bro. Ellis. I wish you guys could meet him. He is so awesome. I love spending time with them. I might have mentioned him. He is the one living out of his trailer, behind his house that he is building. So they were working on the molding in the basement and when we came he showed us around. We then went out and were sitting on the deck. One of his friends came by and poked his head around the back of the house. There aren't stairs off the deck yet so he had to come around and in. To keep it short, we are going to go to the Ellis Bird farm (no direct relation) some time with the Ellis' and their friends the Beckwoods. It is about 20 minutes east of Red Deer, so out of our area, but we got permission to go since we would be going with some non-members and being able to share the gospel with them. We then got to go talk with the Blanchards. I can't tell you how amazing the members are up here. Anyways we talked to them about some possible lessons in the future at their house.

Thursday

Today was fun, because we had district meeting today. Our district consists of 4 missionaries. Us and Rocky Mountain House (Elder McFall and Elder Coombs). We had a meeting at the church and then got Subway and went to our apartment. (FYI Dad the Subway card doesn't work. Something about US to Canada). It was really fun to get to hang out with them. We then helped Kerry move some of his stuff. He is moving to a house farther out of town. Can't remember why. We do a lot of service work out here. Anyways we went to the McLean's for dinner and it reminded me of Grandma's cooking. (Their Wheat salad=Her fruit cocktail salad).

Friday

Today was super fun because we went on exchanges with the zone leaders. Since Elder Marsh is the District leader we have exchanges with the zone leaders. We had weekly planning and had to break for lunch. We met Bro. Day and Garrett at Boston Pizza. Garrett is thinking about going on a mission and we met for lunch just to talk with him. Bro. Day is super nice and paid for all of us. He called it a business lunch. We then finished up planning and went on exchanges with the ZL's. I went up to Red Deer with Elder Vega. He was awesome and so much fun to get to know. There are a few wards in Red Deer so the ZL's meet up with dinner sometimes with other companionships. So we had breakfast for Dinner at the Tuckers with the Elders from Sylvan Lake. They were a great family and were very sarcastic.

Saturday

I slept over at there apartment because exchanges are 24 hours. So I was there for lunch with Elder Vega. He apparently doesn't read cooking directions very well. We were going to have a Calzone. He read 350 for 15 minutes. It was really 350 convection oven 400 for a conventional oven. So we were running a little late that day. He was supposed to have an interview with me at the end. They usually go to the church and do it in the chapel, but since we didn't have time, we had our interview in the car. I'm making some great memories. We met back up with our companions and took some great pictures. I'll probably save those for myself. We had to hurry and leave to go back and change so we could go to the Teskey's and do one of my favorite things in the whole world (saracasm). WEEDING. Ya we have actually been doing a lot of that lately. Well we also had dinner at the Woodruff's which was special. Saturday was Elder Marsh's birthday so they had cake and presents for him. I love how thoughtful this ward is.

Sunday

It was a pretty normal missionary Sunday but the cool thing was the tracting that we did that night. So after our dinner appointment, we went to drop by some less actives or formers. If they aren't home or are busy we do 3x3. Tract 3 doors on the right and 3 doors on the left. We kept getting shut out or they weren't home. Granted it was a holiday weekend so most people might have left...but someone HAD to be home. We decided to say a prayer about where we could go. I picked out 44th street in between 50 and 49 Ave. We started just flat out tracting the left side. The first house the guy was out smoking and abruptly sent us away. A few houses down there was a Lady from New Zealand. We tried to talk to her but she 'wasn't interested in the least'. We kept knocking on doors but nothing. the last house, we heard people in the back yard so we knew they were there. It was a Phillipean family that was setting up for a party. We talked to a 22 year-old guy that was very kind. He invited us in for some water. We were able to sit down and talk to him about his past and share some of our beliefs. He is strongly Catholic so I don't think it will really end up with much, but we gave him a mormon.org card. His aunt is LDS and we urged him to go to the website to find out more about our's and his aunt's beliefs. It was really a cool experience.

Monday

Well having a Canada Day Ward Party on P-day was great. It was supposed to be from 2-6 or 7 and well Mormon Standard time applies everywhere. We got there a little before 2 to help set up and no one was there. Probably around 2:30-3 some people started to show. We decided that since it was p-day we could not wear our pros (proselyting)(shirt and tie) clothes so we went and changed into shorts and had a great time.

Well I don't think I'll have much time to tell you much more about my week. But that will just mean I have more awesome stories to tell you about.

Well I've got to go. I love and miss you all.

Elder O'Neill

Welcome to Innisfail

Wow I can't believe everything has happened in just one week. It is crazy how time has flown by.

Quick question. Have you gotten my letter? A lot about the rest of plane ride is included in it.

Well let me start off by telling you about where I am. I am in a pretty small town called Innisfail. It is the second/third most southern areas in my mission. I'm in the Red Deer zone and the different areas are Innisfail, Olds, Red Deer, Three Hills, Rocky Mountain House and Stettler. Olds and Three hills are farther south, but they are both about equally south. The Innisfail area covers Innisfail, Springbrook, Penhold and Bowden. It's quite a big area.

Innisfail is built pretty much on top of a hill so we haven't had to worry much about the floods. Some families farther out in town that are closer to the river were effected and we might go and help them once the water has receded enough.

My companion is Elder Marsh. He is from Holiday, UT area. He is just a great trainer. He is really encouraging me to put myself out there and be able to share the gospel.

Well I hope by telling about everything that has happened will tell you a little more.

Well Tuesday we went to a church and had lunch (it was 4:00 and we were all used to having dinner at 4 so we were surprised later that we were going to have dinner), We then watch a driving video and had to read through and sign a bunch of papers about driving. I don't get to drive for at least 6 weeks, but I don't care. We then were supposed to meet with the assistants and individually meet with President Campbell. Well the last two to meet with him were Elder Sorensen and I. Sister Galovich had just come out and I was about to head in when he said he had gotten a phone call and dinner was ready back at the mission home. So we loaded up and went there. We had dinner and then we got to meet with President Campbell. We then had a little devotional in the basement. The sisters stayed there in the basement. 3 of the Elders (they were 3 of the 4 odd men out, aka not in my MTC district) were upstairs. The rest of us went to the Assistants apartment for the night.

Wednesday morning we all got up and went to the Stake Center right next to the temple. (yep even in Canada) The temple is actually really small. The Church might be bigger than it is. We brought all of the luggage and piled it into some side rooms. We then had a small meeting about our allotment cards and medical stuff. (talk about that in a minute). We then went into the Relief Society room and got to meet our trainer and find out where we were going to be serving. I guess I was too excited to here who my trainer was that I didn't really pay any attention about where I was going. (like I would have known anyways). I kinda looked stupid later when I couldn't remember. We then got our pictures taken and those are the ones you saw. After a little while we went into the transfer meeting where everyone who was being transferred came to meet. We all stood and told where we were serving and then heard the departing missionaries testimonies. Afterwards we went into the gym and got to talk and say goodbye to everyone. We then jumped in the car and drove down to Innisfail.

Well the members here are so great. We have a meal at a members house pretty much every night. They are so wonderful. I have found out that I really need to be doing more exercise in the morning because those 30ish pounds that I lost I'm going to be gaining back pretty quickly. The members here are soo great. They love the missionaires. They are strong families and even though many of them are part member they are still so great.

Well I better wrap it up.

Dad did you say that you went to the worldwide training? Did you hear the announcements about Facebook and Church tours? Crazy, We might be able to get on facebook.

Well I love you and can't wait to tell you more.

Elder O'Neill

P.S Here are some pics. The one of the sky was at 10:00 June 22. Crazy how bright it still was. One of them was from dinner with the Kinders. We had a green meal for the "greenie". The others are of me at the airport in front of the Canadian flag there is one that I cropped that I hope you can use for my plaque.

Last Day at MTC - Pictures 6/17/2013

The computer that I was using upstairs wouldn't let me attach any pictures. So I finally got on a computer in the laundry room that will. So here they are

Elder O'Neill

Last Day at the MTC

Hey there,

 

So today is my last day in the MTC. It is so weird how it flew by so quickly. I can not even believe it. They said the days were long and the weeks were short. We truly know how true that is. Oh and apparently the you can email anytime after p-day was a false rumor. We can only email on p-day or during the gym time that we use for laundry time the day before we leave.

 

So first off I want to tell you my flight schedule for tomorrow.

• 2:30 AM Report to Travel office
• 6:00 AM Depart SLC
• 9:28 AM Arrive Minneapolis, MN (MS airport)
• 11:35 AM Depart MS
• 1:34 PM Arrive Edmonton, Canada (YE)

Ain't this a lovely schedule. Well I do get time to call home when we get to Minneapolis. I think it will be around 9:00 here when I get to call. Dad hopefully you are able to stay home for a little while.

 

Well let me tell you about the rest of my week. Actually I don't know what to tell you about it. I love my district and we really don't want to leave because all of us will miss each other soo much. We have really been able to come close to each other.

 

So apparently there were some confusion about my district. We are district 64-C. There is Elders Christensen, Hatch, McMullen, Webb, Monk, and I. Along with Sisters Karford, Budge, Galovich, Teuscher, and Dougherty(?). Elder Hatch, Elder McMullen, and Sister Dougherty are going to the Halifax mission. The rest of us along with district 64-B are all going to Edmonton. So pretty much 2/3 of our zone are going to Edmonton this week.

 

The Devotionals here are great. There is one Sunday night and one Tuesday night everyweek. Tuesday night was a special one, in that it was the first time that both the Main and West campus' got together in person. As you saw we were all walking over to the Marriot Center. That walk was a little touching for me since I used to park there everyday of my college life. It was a really inspiring devotional by Mervyn J Arnold. I was able to sing in the choir even though we forgot about choir practice the week before, we just kinda join in. The choir had to leave early so our district just came along. Well apparently so did a lot of districts. We had a choir of about 2,000 missionaires. It was really awesome.

 

Well then we had classes and the usualy things for the rest of the week. I finally did run into Sister Tafua. Actually yesterday I kept running into here everywhere. It was really pretty funny. We got a picture that I will attach. I also finally got a picture with Hermana Lewis. And I warn you about the pictures. There is I guess a rule that you are supposed to include your companion in every picture so that's what ended up happening. Elder Christensen is really funny and turned around in one of them. Hermana Lewis's companion would play along so that one kinda looks awkward. The second one is just fine I think. Also we didn't realize until it was over that my name badge was in my suit pocket and hers was hidden under her scarf. It was a funny moment.

 

Oh so in class on Saturday with Bro Anderson, we had the opportunity to prepare a lesson for someone else in the room. Since we have 6 elders and 5 sisters one of us had to pair up with Bro Anderson. He had it already planned out and I ended up being the lucky one. I already knew that he was an amazing teacher, but the message that he shared with me was so uplifting to me personally. He shared with me a scripture in Moroni that I can't remember right now. Then he shared D&C 68: 3-6. That really touched me. It really gave me the faith, hope, and confidence that I really can do this marvelous work.

 

Well I love you and hope to be able to talk to you tomorrow from Minneapolis.

 

Love and miss you,

Elder O'Neill

Hi there,

It is finally p-day. We are so excited. We actually have time to kick back and relax a little. Well even though we have some free time we don't know what to do with it.

Well first off. I get absolutely no sleep. Mom you knew I would have a tough time getting up at 6:30 every morning. Well I don't get to get up at 6:30. I have to get up at 5:45 pretty much every morning because we have the early schedule so we have to be at breakfast at 6:30. Ya I guess I deserve that.

Well let me tell you about my district. There are 6 elders and 5 sisters in my district. There is Elder Christensen (my companion), and Elders Webb (our district leader), Monks, McMullen, Hatch and me. We are all in the same room. Yep all 6 of us. There is also Sister Karford, Budge, Dougherty, Tuecher, and Galovich. Even though we have only been here for 5 days we are all super close. We are bonding super well. Our Teachers are super awesome as well. Brother Anderson and Brother Blatter (pronounced blotter) are amazing.

The other day during our 3 hours of study (yes super super long study times) we would getting talking about movies and other things. Later that night when Brother Anderson was teaching us, we were all pretty much chastised by the spirit. We all thought that Brother Anderson could see it in our faces that we were guilty of what his was speaking about, but we found out the next day that he had no idea that that was exactly what we needed to hear. It was pretty amazing.

So about my companion Elder Christensen. He is so awesome. We really get along pretty well. He is from Gilbert Arizona. From what I can tell we are both really similar. We are both usually pretty held back and reserved when it comes to teaching, but he is much less reserved than me. I have had to challenge myself to talk more during our lessons.

So I regret to tell you that I will not be coming back with an 'eh' accent. Elder McMullen and Hatch are from Alberta and are going to Halifax. They said that the accent mostly comes from the weirdos in Toronto. Ha Brock is going to get the accent not me.

I have run into so many people that I know. I don't have my journal with me so I can't say everyone, but I will try my best. I have seen Regan (obviously you heard about that), Bridget (her classroom is down the hall from mine), Krysta Moss (say her as she was saying goodbye to her family), Nalia (Dad she says hello), Stewart (from my choir class last semester, He is a teacher here. Tell more about that in a minute), and some other people from high school and college. I can't remember everyone right now. It is super fun to run into everyone.

So about Stewart. I found out last night that he was Sister Bangerter's teacher. She is Elder Christensen's girlfriend going to New Tork, Yudaka (?). Ya it was a weird connection. My companion's girlfriend's teacher is one of my friends. It is so crazy.

Anyways I have loved the letters that you have sent. I love how stupid the people and Valtek/Flowserve are. I love to here about what is going on.

Tell Sean, Emily, Olivia, and William thank you for the package. I love the mentos and reese's a lot. Thank you for another tie, but not really sure what I'm supposed to do with the pocket square.

I know Dad I thought I wouldn't be writing super long novels but it looks like I will be. The emails probably quite as long since while we are still here at the MTC we can get on email for a little bit each day after this. We didn't have email privledges until p-day. It was a weird rule but I can understand it.

Well, even though the MTC is hard it is still a great experience. We learn so much and really get a lot of teaching experience. A mission really does change someone. I have been here for 5 days and I already fell like a different person.

Here are some pictures of our district at the temple Sunday.

Love you lots,

Elder O'Neill

(still getting used to that)

P.S. Mom you can post this on the blog.

Entering MTC June 5, 2013

Well Folks, He is in the Lord's hands now! Entered the Provo MTC @ 1:45pm. We took the picture got in the car and never looked back. Wouldn't be able to see anything if we did.