Innisfail Chapter 16

4 Months! Where has the time gone!

This week was a lot of fun. I don't know what really made it such a great week, but I really enjoyed it.

Tuesday

Well Tuesday was interesting. We had a rough morning. I wasn't feeling all to well. Something went wrong with my stomach. I'm perfectly fine now, but it was a rough day. Well I don't have much else to say about it. We held basketball at the church for anyone who wanted to come and it went really well. We were told that we could play just we had to be in pros. I didn't want to get physical with an upset stomach, but Elder Sorensen did. It was a good time. We had an appointment that night so we only played for an hour. It worked out much better than before.

Wednesday

Well today we had a District meeting and District lunch. It was a lot of fun. Elder George and Elder T were going on exchanges with the ZL's, Elder Knaphus and Elder Dutson, so we had a district meeting with everyone (us, Innisfail 2, Rocky and RD2). 4/5 of the Innisfail Elders were there we were just missing Elder Marsh and we would have had all of the Elders that have served in Innisfail this past year. I have probably told you before, but Innisfail used to have sisters. Elder Knaphus and Elder George were the first Elders here in the last 4 years. Elder Marsh was with Elder George for one transfer and then I came. and the rest is history. It was a really good District meeting. We then had a pancake district lunch. We had a bag of mix at our apartment. The sisters brought some hot chocolate and juice. Rocky brought some syrup and Elder T made some egg sandwiches (stayed away from those). The ZL's brought some strawberries. It was super fun. Later that night we had dinner over at Bro Day's. It was pretty cool since he is the Ward Mission Leader, both the sisters and us were there. It was good to be able to talk with everyone in just a casual setting. We then had correlation.

Thursday

Thursday was a lot of fun. Most of our plans went out the window. We had interviews with President Manion today. We have interviews right before conference. Well our interviews were supposed to be at 12:20. Well according to the schedule, each missionary was only going to have about 10 minutes with President Manion. Well that was never going to happen. We ended up leaving about 2 hours later. We didn't end up getting back down to Innisfail until around 3:30. Well we ran around and tried to see some people. The ward was having a Food Storage night. We went to that and it was really good. They had a "Thanksgiving Dinner". Well it was a "Thanksgiving Dinner" if you are in dire circumstances and are using what's in food storage. It was just rice and beans with various toppings. It wasn't too bad, just not what we were expecting. It was a really well attended event. We even got Lori our investigator to come. She didn't exactly like some of the food, but got super involved in some of the wheat and rice bagging. It was really good.

Friday

Well Friday was really cool. We had our weekly planning, which I'm pretty sure will never take just two hours. There is so much to go over and think about that it just can't be done in two hours. So all of our plans got pushed back a little while. The Christensen's were going to have us over for dinner, but they were working on their new house so told us to meet them at the Penhold Family Restaurant. We have driven past that place many times and have been scared to try it. There sign says

Penhold Family Restaurant

Western

Pizza

Chinese

It never really looked to good to us. Well the Christensen's were going to take us to we went anyways. It actually was a great place. The food was really good. I had Shrimp Alfredo and I loved it. We decided they really need to redo the sign and Exterior to make it look more inviting. We then went and talked with Bro Young and had a really good conversation with him.

Saturday

General Conference was so amazing. I don't know whether if it is the fact that I'm on my mission, but I loved it so much. It really seemed to be such a different conference than ever before. I had one of my little leather notebooks and I took 19 pages of notes total. It was amazing. Watch it if you haven't and rewatch it if you have. SO AMAZING! It was kind of nice trying to plan out the day because every two hours we had general conference. We tried by some people in between the first two and then tried a couple more after the afternoon session. We had dinner with the Georges and then went to Priesthood. Afterwards the ward had Ice Cream. It is super cool to be in a small close ward.

Sunday

Well yesterday was great too. More conference to learn from. Inbetween the sessions we went with Bishop Mower and went to visit some LA's. It was a good time. We got to do some missionary work with the Bishop. After conference we were back to normal missionary work. We tried by some people. We then had dinner at the Wells. It was a good Sunday dinner. Chicken, potatoes, stuffing, carrots, asparagus, cauliflower. It was good. Sister Wells was also baking some bread and sent us home with a loaf of bread that came right out of the oven. The ward is so great to us.

Monday
Well so far today we went over to the Ellis' to do laundry. We had our studies over there and then played a little pool with Bro Ellis. I won to games in a row. I found out that I play pool left handed. Thanks Dad for splitting my hands on different things. It was fun.

Thank you for all the love and support.

Love you all,
Elder O'Neill

P.S. Did I tell you that I bought a Pineapple last week. It cut it up and it was super good.

PPS That is Elder Sorensen's hand
 

Innisfail Chapter 15

Hey there everyone,

First off I want to say sorry for not being able to email yesterday. We ended up having to do some service for a LA in Penhold. She is moving from Penhold to somewhere in the Stettler area. It was kinda weird. She is so LA she wasn't on the records, but after yesterday we figured that she called us because of a member in RD2. We went up to RD afterwards to go do some shopping. So we had no time to email yesterday.

This week has been pretty good. We are really able to see the success of the PMG member lessons.

Monday

We had P-day. We ended up just playing around at the church. We had a fun time. We took a new take on basketball practice. Elder Sorensen went back and forth trying to make basketballs, while I was running around trying to hit the ball out of the air with a volleyball. It was pretty fun. We then had dinner with the Georges' (our across the hall neighbors). We then went to the Byam's and Ellingson's to continue on the member lessons.

Tuesday

Today was interesting. We had a pretty slow day. We went out and helped at the Food Bank again. It's good for us to get out in the community and help. We had dinner at M&B Ellingson's. They are such fun people. We then finally had a pass-over lesson with Charlie and Lee with the sisters. It was good that they finally got to meet them and now I don't have to worry about that anymore. We then had to bust down to the Church for Basketball. There was a tradition of Tuesday night basketball with Elder George and Marsh, but it stopped during the summer. So we started it back up. It was kinda a waste of time. It is supposed to be a good way to find potentials. We were there to 'supervise' but we just sat on the sidelines the whole time. We thought about some more beneficial ways to go about it next week. Elder George also told us that we can play, but in Pros.

Wednesday

Today was a pretty good day. We were able to meet with Ron (LA) again today. He is the one that lives in a retirement home. We walked down to his room to find him and he was in the room next door, working on a puzzle. We sat there and talked with him for a little while. We couldn't help it. We ended up helping him finish the puzzle. It was a bummer though. It was missing one piece. AHHH. We were able to have a really good visit with him. Later we were able to have a lesson with Nathan (RC). We talked about the priesthood with him. He is ready for it, just has been gone and not going to church. It was a good lesson with him. Coincidentally we also had dinner with the Joseph's. So we were in the house for about 2 1/2 hours. It was good and fun. I may have told you, but they have 2 year old twins. It's like having two Williams running around. Super fun. We then had correlation meeting and were able to talk about things that will really help.

Thursday

Today was interesting. Nothing really happened until that night. We had dinner at the O'Connell's. I was surprised to actually go to their house for dinner. They usually pick us up and have something else planned that they take us along with. It was cool to be at their house. We then waited around until Bro Woodruff and Bro Day showed up so we could go on splits. SPLITS!!! We were finally able to work it out for once. I went with Bro Woodruff and went Home Teaching with him. His regular companion was busy to go. We went to Cindy's and the Christensen's. It was a lot of fun. Elder Sorensen went with Bro Day to the Wolfes to teach Lori. Apparently it wasn't a good lesson. We usually go over to the Wolfes at about 7:00 and then Lori comes at 7:30. Well about 7:20 Lori texted and said that she probably wasn't going to make it. She said she had a rough day. At about 7:50 she finally showed up. The lesson was more like a therapy session and she was just asking a bunch of questions. It wasn't really helping her to progress, but she still wants to meet which is good. She recognizes there is a better feeling when she is at the Wolfe's, but doesn't quite recognize what it is.

Friday

MARKERVILLE

Today was a fun day. We have been doing super well on klicks this month so we decided to go out to Markerville today. It is a little bit east of Penhold. There really isn't much out there, but Elder Sorensen had heard a little bit about it so we went out and did some tracting. Not much success. We only had 1 QGC, but it was a solid QGC. It was a ton of fun to go somewhere new.

Saturday

Today was a lot of work. We went out in the morning to help D&L Ellis with their roof. They were re-shingling their roof and it didn't sound like they were going to get much help. We went out and there was a pretty good turn out. We helped for a while and then we drove up to Penhold to help Lori get her yard ready for winter. We drove up there and found out that she wasn't there and was at her boyfriends house with a headache. We just went back and help re-shingle some more. We stopped at about 3:00. We were supposed to have a lesson with Rob, but when we got there he wasn't feeling good. The rest of the night was just trying potentials and tracting.

Sunday

Today was church and I really enjoyed it. We had a combined Preisthood/RS lesson about family history work. I really enjoyed it. It was a couple of videos talking about different aspects of it. One part that stuck out to me was the number of names possible to find. They talked about going back and having a 10 generation pedigree chart and how many names that is. They also talked about if you take one of those 10th gen ancestors and find a brother or sister and come down the line from there. how many people on average you could find from that line. Then times it by the number of 10th generation ancestors that you could do it with. It came out to be about oh 419,000 names or so. It was an eye opener. I wish I could just spend some time and do more. I guess if I have extra time on my p-days I can. We then had some really good member lessons that night.

Monday

Like I said earlier we helped some LA move and then went up to Red Deer to shop. I'm just going to warn you now, nothing is cheap. Good news is that the US dollar is worth more than the Canadian dollar so it was cheaper in US than I thought. We were able to get some good stuff that should last for a long time. We then went and played basketball at Bower with some of the zone. At the end of the night we went over to the Ellis. We have started to do laundry there. We had to leave with our colors in the dryer so we went to pick them up. When we got there the Millers and Mower's were also there. They were having a FHE lesson on The Savior's Earthly Ministry and Atonement from Preach My Gospel. We have started the PMG member lesson with the Ellis' and Millers', but not quite with the Mowers'. It was really cool to see that the members are really getting involved.

Well that was this week's summary.

I love hearing about what's happening at home.

Love ya,
Elder O'Neill

Innisfail Chapter 14

Hey there again. This week was pretty busy and we did a lot of tracting.

Monday

Monday was pretty fun. First thing was that we had to meet up with the RD1 because through the craziness of transfers we left some stuff behind. We then came back went shopping. Did the usual. We went to the church and played around there. We also walked over to a park and took some fun pictures. We had dinner at the Smith's. We didn't really have any set plans after that so we went around trying to find some LA's. A lot of people have either moved or we don't have an address and their phone number is 'not assigned'. It can be pretty tough.

Tuesday

Today we had a lot of plans that didn't ever go through. We ended up spending a lot of time just tracting out a street. We were able to talk to quite a few people. We had supper on own own that night and guess what I made. Pizza cups. I decided last week that our apartment needed some things and so I got a muffin pan and the things for pizza cups. They were great as usual. We then went up to Penhold and were able to meet with the Collissons. They are a LA couple. He is a trucker and isn't home all that often. He just happened to be home that night which was great. We had a great visit with them and hope to go back sometime this upcoming week.

Wednesday

Well we had exchanges today with Rocky. I was with Elder George in Innisfail. It was pretty crazy. He was the missionary I replaced when I first came to Innisfail. He went up to Edmonton for a little while and now is in Rocky as the DL of his first area. CRAZY. It was cool because we both knew the area and so he had some potentials or formers that he wanted to try and spark something new and I already knew where. It was good to be on exchanges with him. He was able to tell me a lot of things that we could start focusing on in our specific area. It was also good to be able to get to know him. We kinda knew each other, because Elder Marsh and Elder Knaphus both served with him and so for transfer meetings and mission tour they would talk to him. Going on exchanges with him was good because we got to fill in the missing connection and really get to know each other a little bit better. Like I said we stopped by some formers and other people that he knew and tried to spark some interest again.

Thursday

Thursday was crazy. We pretty much had the whole day planned out already which really helped. We went and saw Bro McLeod and Bro Burns in the morning. We were going to have a district lunch, but the Ellis' invited us over for lunch. It wasn't my call. We did have district meeting and were able to get to know each other a little better. Elder George also gave a really cool training on finding. He gave us some really great advice on how to improve our approach. Later that night we had a lesson with Lori. We weren't able to have it at the Wolfes', but the sisters came with us and it was an amazing lesson. We were able to help her resolve a lot of her concerns. We had talked about baptism before and reinvited her to be baptized. She accepted and we set the date for January 3 (her birthday). It was really amazing. It was a really good day.

Friday

Well today was a lot of tracting again. We had weekly planning. We went and helped Bro Kinder stack the wood that he split. The wood splitter machine was really cool. It was a hydraulic machine that had a wedge that would push against the log and cleave it down the middle. It was impressive to watch. We helped him for a little while, then went and did some more planning. We ended up also going to the Kinders for dinner that night. Their kids are crazy as always. I love it. We then went tracting for a while. And then went to introduce the PMG lesson to another Ellingson Family.

Saturday

Today was ok. We didn't have to much planned other than tracting. We were able to meet with Rob and find out a lot of his concerns. We are really able to get somewhere with some people now. We tracted around some more and had dinner. We went up to Penhold and meet with Bro Young. We had a good time talking to him. We then went tracting a little more. It was a little cold and there was a breeze. It's 8:00 at night and people are slamming doors in our faces. We often wonder if people think that we actually enjoy doing this? We drove back to Innisfail and still had some time. So we decided to do some phone tracting. There are a lot of people in the phone that we don't know who they are. So we decided to call them. It was pretty interesting. One lady we called. She answered and asked who it was.

"It's the missionaires. We had your number and wanted to know if you were interested in learning more?"

"Oh sure, I'm in Grand Prairie, but will be back down in Innisfail in a couple of weeks and would love to meet with you again."

It was quite a shock. Another lady we called told us that the sisters had run into her earlier that day. It was pretty cool.

Sunday

Today at church as a little crazy. We had ward council and discussed a lot of things. We then had to help Sister Mower pick up Bro Votary for church. We brought him in and then went and held the doors while waiting for Lori to come. She never did at it probably was a good thing. Tell about it in a minute. It was the 4th sunday so we were asked to bless the sacrament. Well in the middle of the sacrament you could hear a beeping. It was Bro Votary's oxygen. Some people in the ward were trying to help him. Well I was focused on what was going on over there trying to make sure he was ok, that I missed that the deacons were done passing. I caught a glimpse of a wave and caught on. It was also the primary program. That is why it was probably good that Lori didn't come. She was complaining last week about the reverence. She would have gone crazy with the primary program. Everything else was pretty good. We had a lot of lessons set up and we only really had a little bit of time that we had to fill, but did it pretty easy.

Today is pretty good so far. We started doing our laundry at the Kinders. They just live down the street and were happy to offer. We went and started our laundry. We tried to start our studies but really weren't able until Bro Kinder took all the kids for school. And now I'm at the Library emailing.

Hope everything is going well at home. Sounds like it is.

Love ya,
Elder O'Neill

Innisfail Chapter 13

Well this week has been pure craziness. I mean I'm really glad I learned how to deal with my frustration when I was with Elder Marsh and was able to keep calm throughout the week.

Well like I mentioned last week, Elder Marsh is no longer my companion. He was called to be an AP. That is one thing about President Manion that is weird, he is totally random. It was usually, that someone would be a District Leader, then a Zone Leader, then might become an Assistant. Well this last transfer President Manion destroyed any speculation. Elder Marsh went from DL to AP. Elder McFall who was in Rocky, went from normal missionary to ZL. It was crazy to hear the changes. So now, no one can be sure of where they might go. 

 

I really do miss Elder Marsh. I totally understand what everyone says. 'When your with your trainer you hate them. When they're gone you love them.' There were many times that I was very frustrated with Elder Marsh and I just couldn't handle it. We were always getting pretty chippy with each other. I knew that the things he made me do would help me, but at the time I just couldn't handle it. Now that he is gone I really do miss him. I am really able to see how much he really did help out.

Well now my new companion is Elder Sorensen. It really is crazy that we are companions. We were in the same MTC zone and came out together. He was also in Red Deer 1st ward which covers the southern part of Red Deer. guess which area it touches....Innisfail. He moved just south of where he used to be. Really pretty crazy. We already get along really well. We have many jokes and are very open with each other. We are going to enjoy the next little while. He is also learning the area pretty fast.

We also have sisters in the area so we had a lot of things this week that we have had to work out. There is Sister Coull and Sister Tanner. Sister Coull is from Scotland and Sister Tanner is from Huntsville, UT. Sister Coull has been out for 6 months and Sister Tanner has been out for about 6 days. Innisfail really likes to train. It has been crazy the last week trying to get everything sorted out between us, but we were finally able to go through the whole ward directory and be able to know who is in whos area. We have a geographical split for members and proselyting. Investigators and specific LA's are pretty much decided on gender and who would be the best to teach them. It is a split area but with a lot of overlap.

Well I've decided for at least this week I'm not going to do the daily recap, mostly because I don't have any clue what was going on. Also a lot of my week was spent in Red Deer and what we did up there I was just following along. We also had a lot of meetings with the Sisters to get everything worked out. There really isn't much to really talk about.

But I can talk about Lori. I don't think I have told you about her. She was a potential investigator of Elder Knaphus and Elder George when they were in Innisfail. There was no address listed until I went on exchanges with Elder Knaphus and he told me where she was. Elder Marsh and I stopped by and got to know her a little bit. It was on September 1 when we stopped by again. We were going to see if we could set up a time to meet with her and ended up briefly teaching her lesson 1 on her porch. We talked to the Wolfes afterwards and started teaching her there. We had a lesson with her on the 5th where we retaught lesson one clarifying any points. We then went back last thursday the 12th. We taught her about having faith. She came to church yesterday and stayed for Pot-luck. She was at church for about 4 and 1/2 hours and actually enjoyed it. A lot of the members went up to her and introduced themselves. She was really able to get to know some of them. She is great and we really have a great thing going on with her. She is so open and receptive. We just have to keep going.

Well hopefully I will be able to resume normality soon and will be able to write a daily run through again.

Love you all and love hearing from you,

Elder O'Neill

Pic 1- Elder Marsh and I at the Darby's. We had found out he was leaving about an hour before that and had dinner at the Darby's. They wanted pictures with us, before we left and they took a picture of Elder Marsh and I.

Pic 2-The picture of the cake. We were tracting down a street last night and I told Elder Sorensen we can't go too far or we will run into the Hallman's (members). He wanted to go and introduce himself. We went down and said hi. Sister Hallman was about to go see if the neighbors were home to give them this chocolate cake. Bro Hallman just asked if we wanted it. I wasn't going to say no, so we now have a chocolate cake. It's really good too.

Chapter 12 Innisfail changes

So I really don't have much time this week either, so I'm not going to be able to do my usual.

Well pretty much all that happened this past week happened this weekend.

1. Elder Marsh was transferred Friday night because he is the new AP. It was a shock. I guess President Manion was talking to the AP's about transfers this week and was talking about Elder Coe. He was happy that Elder Coe could stay as AP one more transfer and then have two more to train a new missionary. Well President found out that Elder Coe only had 2 transfers left. 15 minutes later President called Elder Marsh. So we had to drop all of our plans, because he had to go up to Edmonton to learn how to be an assistant. So I was left with the ZL's, Elder Vega and Elder Knaphus. It has been a pretty fun weekend. Tri-panionship!!! :)

2. We had transfer calls this morning. We were expecting it because I was going to need a new companion. Elder Vega was pretty sure that he was leaving too since he has been a ZL in Red Deer for 7 and 1/2 months. We were waiting for it. Well my new companion is going to be Elder Sorenson. The same Elder Sorenson that I was in my MTC zone and who I have seen many times since because he has been serving in RD 1 in my same zone. It was pretty crazy.

3. Innisfail is going to have 2 sets of missionaries. Because there are going to be so many missionaries coming out, Most areas in the mission are going to be or are split. So in Innisfail it will be Elder Sorenson and I, and then a set of Sisters, and they are going to be training. So I know that one of the Sisters is going to be a little older in the mission, but other than that it is going to be a pretty young area. It's crazy. I have to fill in everyone on the area. Good thing Elder  Marsh helped me plan out everything before he left.

Well that is the main points of this week. I hope that I will be able to tell you way more next week.

Love you all,

Elder O'Neill

Innisfail chapter 11

Wow!! I can't believe I've been in Innisfail for 11 weeks already. Sometimes it seems like I just got here yesterday.

Well I'm glad to hear about all of the fun at Swiss Days. I almost forgot that it was labor day weekend. The only way I was able to know was because it was September long weekend up here. First monday of every month pretty much is a holiday. Kinda sweet. Except nothing changes for us.

Well this week was a little crazy. A lot happened and I hope that I will be able to explain everything.

Monday

We had p-day today obviously. We just relaxed around the apartment a little, until the O'Connell's picked us up for dinner at the Dyck farm. Well we had to work for our dinner a little. They have a cattle ranch and some of the cows had hoof rot. We had to give them some penicillin. So we had an experience herding cows. Not too much fun. It was just trying to get a few of them down the chute into the squeeze to give them the medicine. Dad it reminded me of Weimer's Neighbor's. Darcy, "Looks like there having problems down there" :) It made me laugh. We had dinner then went back and met with the Byam's to share the PMG lesson. (YLM turned into the PMG lesson)

Tuesday

Today was pretty great. The afternoons aren't usually too exciting. We had dinner with our neighbors which was fun. Across the hall from our apartment is the Georges. It's cool to have member neighbors in an apartment building. We had a fun time there and then shared the PMG lesson. She is a school teacher and really enjoyed how we are presenting everything. She is also going to help us to make the lesson more kid friendly with pictures. We then had a lesson with Rob. He is a great man. He knows a couple of families in the ward really well. We were able to go over and start talking to him. He is incredible. He really wants to find out more and really wants his whole family to be baptized, He is just trying to find out if this is the right church. It is a really promising situation.

Wednesday

Today we had exchanges with Rocky again, but this time we drove out there. They weren't doing so well on clicks and we were so we drove out and had a district meeting. We Then exchanged and I brought Elder McFall back to Innisfail with me. It takes about an hour to drive out to Rocky and an hour to drive back. I was a little sick of the car. We had a couple of cool experiences. We were just getting back into Innisfail, when the mission office called. You never know if that is a good or a bad thing. It was actually good. Someone had a referral for us. It was sweet. We also went to try by a former and went tracting around there. We were able to meet Yesenia. It was so cool. We talked with her for a minute or two and set up a time to come back Tuesday (today). I loved it. Possible new investigator. We then had dinner with the Ellis'. We then had Ward correlation. It was pretty much all on me and I actually did really well. I felt really good about it. I was able to talk about each of our investigators and talk about there situation, all by myself. I was impressed.

Thursday

Well we tried stopping by the referral that we got, but she wasn't there. The referral is actually one of the hotel managers. She is apparently gone for another week. We then went to drive back to Rocky. We planned some extra time to stop in Spruce View to do some finding. Spruce View is in our area, but it is like half way between here and Rocky and there are no members. We really never had a reason to go to Spruce View, but since we would be driving through we thought that we could try. Nothing really happened, just were able to share some mormon.org cards with some people. We then continued to drive out to Rocky. We came back and I had time to do some family history. Mom again you might want to check my progress, but I do feel pretty comfortable with it. I checked out Maria. I was able to find some Census records with her and Henry. Then a couple more with her kids in later years. As I kept searching I was able to find more about Henry's family. I found a Census from when he was 8 and added His parents and siblings to the picture. It was really amazing. I pretty much ran out of time before I could continue on. It was pretty amazing. I'm really finding a love for it. I'm just very limited. We had dinner with the Clarks and then went to one of the Ellingsons for the PMG lesson.

Friday

We had weekly planning today and we tried to do it as quickly as we could but it took an hour longer. The goal is to be able to do it in two hours and I don't possibly see how that can be done. We always take longer. We were able to get another haircut from Sis. Dyck (they are the ones that live in town). We then shared the PMG lesson with her and her kids. They gave us a great idea for kids. We then went for dinner at the Blanchard's. They had a crazy day and were both just getting home right before we came and planned on that so they bought some Thai food. It was Spicy fried shrimp with rice. I call it rice with inferno Thai shrimp. It was way too spicy for me to finish. I graciously passed on taking the leftovers. Elder Marsh did which surprised me. The Blanchards are so incredible. They have really taken the PMG lesson seriously and the next step with them is to start learning lesson two. I didn't think that we were going to go that far for a while. I guess it has been a while since we started it though. :) We were able to see Todd for a little bit though. It was his first day off of work yesterday. He was off until Monday, so he said he would be able to come to church. It's a miracle!!!

Well I know that I didn't get through my whole week and I hope that I will have time next week to finish up and write about this week. Things are going great up here and I'm truly loving it.

I love you,

Elder O'Neill

P.S. I finally was able to get the package home yesterday. Thank you for all of the clothes. That was definitely more than what I was expecting. Thank you. I'm wearing some of the Khaki's right now. :)

Innisfail Chapter 10

Wow I have been here for a long time. I have been here for 10 weeks already. Where did the time go. Half of the time I still feel like I came out of the MTC yesterday.

Well this week was jam packed with a lot of crazy, exciting, inspirational, incredible experiences. I don't know if I can tell about it all.

Monday

Today was a pretty relaxing pday. We did the usual. We cleaned up the bedroom and then and met some of the young men at the church for some basketball. Oh joy basketball. Well I needed to catch up a ton in my journal so I pretty much just sat on the sidelines and wrote in my journal. I didn't mind. We then went back and got ready to go to the Ellingson's for dinner. We had a lot of fun over there. They kids are so much fun to be around and the Ellingson's are such great people. We then went and met with Charlie and Lee. We taught them the first part of Lesson 1 that we hadn't before. It was really great. They are really starting to understand. We invited them to take a church tour. They aren't interested in going to church, but wouldn't mind a church tour. They are incredible.

Tuesday

Today was kind of a disappointing day. We left and went to talk with James. We ended up having to drop him. He wasn't willing to act on the things that we invited him to do. He still wouldn't take a Book of Mormon. We then went and did mormon.org time. I still love that hour each week. We then went and tried by a lot of potentials and formers. We had dinner with the Ellis' in their house. They are official moved in now. They still have somethings to unpack from boxes, but they can live there now. I still love going over there. We then went on exchanges with Rocky. I was with Elder Talauega. He is from Samoa. We went and tried by some more formers and then just went back. It was the first time that I was ever really on my own to plan out the day. It was rough, but I was able to plan out a pretty good day.

Wednesday

Well I thought I had planned out a good day. We had our studies and then went to the Stonehockers. We then went back for lunch. We were supposed to meet with former after that, but she had to cancel. We went to see Bro Votary instead. We shared a Bible video with him. "I am the Bread of Life." It is really an incredible video to watch. All of them are. We spent the rest of the day trying formers and potentials. We had a lesson with the Blanchards. The point of the member lesson that we share is to get them into PMG to the point that they could teach us the lessons. They have really taken to it and are ready to teach us on the next appointment. We then had Dinner and then went and met with Darren. He is super cool and we were able to start teaching him. He had a lot of concerns from his church and what's to know what we believe. We were able to have a new investigator. We then drove up to Red Deer to switch back. We had to wait for a little while, but we switched back and then drove to the ZL's apartment to stay the night, since we were going to ride with them up to Edmonton tomorrow.

Thursday

I honestly don't know if I can accurately tell everything that went on today. Well today was mission tour. Elder W. Craig Zwick came to our mission to talk to us. The whole mission, except for the elders in Yellowknife, came. We were able to hear from him, his wife and President and Sister Manion. I took so many notes. When Elder Zwick first got there he wanted to shake everyone's hand and be able to meet each one of us individually. That was cool. He then talked to us for a little while. He talked about how we should "simplify and intensify" our teaching. He wanted some of us to come and teach the rest of the mission. That would be scary. The Assistants were to choose one companionship from each of the 8 zones to come and teach. The companionship would come up. One would announce what principle anywhere in PMG they were going to teach. The other would then share a recent experience that they had with it. The other would then share a scripture and testify. It was supposed to be about 3 minutes long. Well as soon as he told us what was going on, everyone started to panic a little bit. You didn't know if you were going to be called on or not. I had a feeling that we would. So the assistants picked one companionship from each zone. He started with some from the Edmonton zones. Then it started to go to the outlying. I was right. We were picked. Lucky us. I was truly pretty terrified. We went up and did really well. I was shaking, but tried to stay calm. After each companionship taught, he would ask what went well. He got up after us and asked the mission, "What could they have done better?". No one raised there hand. "Exactly. What did they do well". A lot of people had comments. It was incredible. It really made me realize that I know what I'm doing and am doing it well. The meeting kept going and we were really able to hear a lot of inspiring messages. We had lunch which was really fun. I got to see everyone from the MTC again. We are still super close. Each of our zones was also able to have a picture with Elder and Sister Zwick and President and Sister Manion. It was cool. We then went back and were able to hear from Sister Zwick and more from Elder Zwick. It seemed like revelation was just pouring out of his mouth. Originally the meeting was going to be finished at about 4:00. It lasted until almost 5:00. I just wanted to stay and hear more. It was so incredible. We then went and talked with some more people. We were almost some of the last to leave the building. We were lucky to still see people from our zone there. We rode with some of them and ran to subway to grab a quick sandwich before we had to be at the temple. Yes we got to go to the temple. It was incredible. The new temple video was amazing. I just loved being in there. We don't get to go very often as missionaries and I really loved the chance that we were able to go this trip. The temple workers had to tell us to leave so they could close. We got out at about 10:00. That is the latest we have ever stayed out. It's about and hour after curfew. We then struggled, but finally caught a ride to the Assistants' for the night. I was in spiritual overload that night.

Friday

Well today we had to drive back to Innisfail and return home from our Missionary Vacation. We got back to our apartment a little after 10:00 am. It was hard to try and refocus and get back to the work. The only thing that really happened that night was we went to see Jeff. We went and read the Book of Mormon to him. He is able to understand it a little better that way, but we just can't keep going as often.

Saturday

Well I can't really say that much happened today either. We were able to have a good visit with Mary w/ the Ellis'. They hadn't talked in a while and we were able to show them all some of the bible videos. We were able to have a pretty good discussion after each one. We went down to Bowden later that night. We went down and within 30 minutes we had blown through all of our ideas and still had an hour and half left. We did a lot of tracting that night.

Sunday

Today was amazing. Shauna came to church. She is solid. She told us she won't make a commitment if she doesn't think that she can follow through. She came and is willing to come again. We just have a hard time meeting her. We are really hopeful. We had lunch with her at the Ellis' after Church and were able to talk to her about somethings that she learned. She really enjoyed it. It was amazing. We were finally able to get someone to church!!!

Oh this last week was pretty crazy. A lot happened. I'm still trying to let everything sink back in. We had a pretty great week.

I hope all is going well. I love to hear about what's going on.

"If it isn't worth it, it won't be hard. Because it's hard, it is worth it."
Elder O'Neill