mis-sion-ary (noun): someone who leaves their family for a short time so that others may live with their families for Eternity.

Tuesday, May 31, 2011

PICTURES

Bike Tricks
Is Hunter in Colorado?????
My New Hometown

HAPPY MEMORIAL DAY

That is pretty sad about everyone getting together to be around the graves and everything, i dont think that i would have really
wanted to do that if i was there because it would be sad. but yeah, that is cool that the family got back together, maybe they
can remember about the plan of salvation.
FOr my memorial day we didn't do too much, we just went to a old families house and played pickle ball and horseshoes, which i am totally
amazing at by the way, not to brag or anything but i'm the most humble person i know. We had some awesome food though. tell dad
that i had grilled pineapple just to make him jealous and make one of those sounds that homer simpson makes when something is good.
Yeah we have had rain a ton this week too, its been like washington, always cloudy and raining a ton and i'm sick of it.
but i guess for the next two days its supposed to be in the 70s and 80s, so i am kinda excited for that.
Yeah i've heard about that book of mormon thing from south park. it sounds pretty lame. One of my roomates in college watched south park
a lot and it is not a good show at all. And yeah they are just stupid because they have nothing better to do than make musicals and things
about anti mormon stuff.. yeah that doesn't suprise me at all though that parker and pierce have watched it. That is just pretty stupid about
parker, he is just a pretty lazy kid in general and so with laziness satan will get you even harder beacuse you are being idle and there are
plenty more opportunities to do bad things when you aren't doing anything. that kid just needs to get out of the house. and just for the
record, being on my mission and looking at people that play video games all day is freaking annoying to see people like that. I know that i
played quite a bit but yeah when i get home i'm definately not going to be a couch potato. haha just yesterday we taught two kids and all
they wanted to talk about was halo and i was just like cool, i couldn't care less about that but i had to act interested to get them to like us.
yeah some people are weird. Being in the singles ward at least gives me examples of how i don't want to be when i get home from my mission.
I don't think i will even go to a singles ward at home because they do some weird activities. but who knows, we will see how awkward i am
after my mission.
Oh yeah those refferrals that i was telling you about, yeah she was actually moving like a week later so we never did get to teach her, she is
going to be in boulder so those missionaries are lucky. Zone conference was really good, president and sister ely were just giving their goodbyes
basically the whole time so it was pretty weird and it was like a long farewell and i was tired from sitting down for like 7 hours straight. Me and elder
smith gave a training to the zone that day for like 55 minutes. I have given so many trainings lately that it isn't even funny. But i think that i have
gotten pretty tight with a lot of the missionaries in the zone which is good because i can just tell them what they are doing wrong as a person and not
as a leader that has to do it. The day after our zone conference, we went to another zones zone conference and we did the vehicle expection, and
we were just going through checking tire pressures and oil and stuff like that and I gave out the clean car award to the people in the other zone.
It was a lot of fun, it seems like as a zone leader we are constantly just doing things either teaching people or doing things for the zone. which is good
and i like it.
Yeah i'm actually writing back in forth with derek right now. Yeah i went to like 1st through 9th grade with that girl, she is really nice, i like her, she is a cool girl. i am actually pretty excited to see what happens with the two of them. lets hope for the best.
anyways, i gotta run, i do have my camera so i will give you some pictures. hope that you guys have a good week, love ya bye.



Monday, May 23, 2011

BUSY WEEK

HEY HEY HEY
whats goin on! you asked if i'm getting used to the new responsibilities that i have. haha
well let me just fill you on for what i had to do this last week. So tuesday i had to go on exchanges with a companionship in the district. Wednesday i had to go on exchanges with one of the AP's. Thursday we had leadership training from 9 to 4, i had to give a training in that. And we role played for half the time.. really boring. friday we had breakfast with the stake president and we had to give a training for the zone. Saturday was like the only day off from to ZL things. And Sunday, was the longest day. 5 different half hour meetings 2 sacrament meetings, we were at the church from 830 to 3. oh
and also i gave a talk in both of the wards that i serve in. Different topics too. haha, pretty crazy week eh? yep. i'd say so. Luckily this next week shouldn't be too busy, we have an exchange to go on, and we have zone conference and me and elder smith do have to give a 55 minute training to the zone. That is forever long. So yeah Zone Leader life is a hassle, but it keeps me busy and the time is going by super fast which is good i guess.
That is pretty crazy that dad is still the bishop, i thought that he would be released for sure. Maybe he will just be in for another five years, our stake president has been in for 10 years now. Its cool his name is president Garrett and he actually grew up in kaysville. YOu know that house that is by the Barnes bank, that is by itself and is like an antique store, across the street from where i got my braces. Yeah thats the house that he grew up in. haha in my talk in church i said that i was from kaysville utah and he was there. So after sacrament he comes up to me singing, "Dear old Davis High SChool" haha the fight song. It was pretty funny because he is super old. I get to meet with him every Sunday down in Fort Collins, and it is awesome to be able to be around the stake president and just see how he works and how much he loves the missionaries.
So yeah as far as the work goes this week, we didn't have to much happen, we didn't meet with any investigators, because we don't really have any. But we did get two refferals last week so hopefuly we can see them, one of them is supposed to be pretty golden. so i'll pray for that. That is definately the Lord blessing us though, because he knows that we are trying to work hard, and we are receiving refferals right now because our tracting isn't really doing to much. The berthoud ward that i serve in is such a weird little place. haha they are all old and their sacrament meetings are pretty much a joke, at the pulpit they will like say a joke and then people will just yell out random comments. haha its a weird place.
SO yeah that is cool about the shoes, but yeah i still think that i would want to send these ones to either derek or tyler beacuse during transfers i dont' want to be carrying around a million pair of shoes. So yeah if you could send me the money, i could send these shoes home and you could give them to derek, they don't hurt my feet anymore, i think i just needed to break them in but now that i know there are cooler nike shoes, that are better, yeah i really kinda want those. Yeah i totally forgot that my birthday was even coming up, i would have no idea what else i would want. i don't really need anything. The only other thing would be if i get with a companion that doesn't have a gps. My comp does right now and we definately need it because we cover such a huge area. But if i got with a different one that didn't have one i would definately need to get one.
SO i gotta get running, but i'll give a tiny spiritual thought that i gave in one of my talks yesterday. SO i talked on the blessings of missionary service in the singles ward, in the berthoud ward i talked about plan of salvation and related it to jerry sloan having a plan for the team just like heavenly father has a plan for us. haha it actually turned out well ok! but the other one i read a talk from the new conference ensign from Elder Ballard about the pieces of gold. I want you to read that for FHE or something k! and the point was small and simple things is how we reach salvation, and i just told the people that they think its hard to get people baptized but thats not what they have to do they just have to do small things like invite them, and bear their testimony.
So yeah thats what i talked about. Anyways i love you guys, i totally forgot my camera again this week, so hopefully next week.. Love you bye.

Monday, May 16, 2011

LIFE AS A ZONE LEADER

ok. i'll start of by answering your essay.
1.We are in the singles ward, so we actually cover loveland, longmont, some of fort collins and a town that we live in called berthoud. Yeah its a huge area, we drive more than 60 miles every day. And we cover the berthoud ward as well. haha that is such a weird little city, and that is where its mostly huge nothings full of open space. the ward their is super old too, and they haven't had a baptism in that ward for over 3 years. haha, so yeah i got another area with not too much going on.
But yesterday in the singles ward we had a baptism, so i walked into a baptism there. The singles ward is usually pretty slow too, now that she just got baptized we have a total of 2 investigators in both wards combined, and we don't see them too often. So yeah looks like i will have another hard area, i'm starting to get used to it cause i don't know what a good area feels like.
The cool thing about having such a big area though is that we have longmont, and we can go to estes park. Everyone tells us that its way cool there, and its fun to hike and mountain bike. Its also the place where the hotel is in the movie the shining, so thats pretty cool i guess. I think we are going to try to get hiking and stuff next week since today isn't too warm outside. haha that was a long answer
2. We are living in a house in the small town of berthoud. We live with old service missionaries that work at the cannery. We don't see them too often and we have our own basement so it is kinda nice.. oh wanna hear something funny, so in my last area the people that we lived with were kinda crazy, that would do magic with terrot cards and they would....have "intimate times" at weird times of the day and we would always hear it and stuff...and after i left my last companion told the ward mission leader about all this so they are leaving that house today and if they can't find another house to live in they are going to be emergancy transfered. haha. yeah that was kinda funny i thought.
3.My new companion is awesome. He is a hard working but fun missionary. Unforutunately i didn't bring my camera today so i can't send pictures, but we have had two people from the ward that have told us that we could be brothers or cousins cause we look pretty similiar. i dont really see it but what do i know.
4. Being a zone leader is alright. Yeah there are definately much more responsibilites. We have conference calls to make p days, we have 4 trainings to give just next week. And i'm still a district leader which means i have to go on all those exchanges, and get numbers from people at the end of the week, so yeah its a lot to do, but it keeeps me busy which is good,.. i guess. A lot more meetings to go to too.. and its super boring.
5. So the wards. I like the singles ward, people their are different, and i don't know if i even want to go to a singles ward when i get home, but its pretty fun cause some people are really cool and its cool to be with people my age. The berthoud ward is just a bunch of old people, the best thing about that is they feed us the good meals because the singles ward isn't too good at feeding us.
SO YEP
hopefully those answered sufficed to what you wanted to hear.
Nice job of trying to be a missionary. Some guy came yesterday for the baptism and he was from fruit heights and he was telling me about how hard it is to be a missionary in Utah because everyone is already mormon and its frustrating him that he can't be more of a help.
Hey you never wrote me back about those shoes. cause i really want to get some other shoes, mostly because these ones hurt my foot when i played today, and maybe they wont hurt dereks. so yeah please don't ignore this and let me know!!
anywhosers i gotta run, but i hope that you guys are doing good, and that all is well in zion. hope that you have a good week, i gotta go make a conference call to president. so love ya bye!

Monday, May 9, 2011

I'M IN LOVELAND

WHAT UP
so i'm here in loveland right now. So i'm living in berthoud, its a way small old town, and i serve in the berthoud family ward and also the
twin peaks singles ward. i'm excited. out here there is like nothing though, there are just huge farmers fields and just like one house in the
middle of nowhere. haha i'ts definately far away from the city. I don't know anything about the work yet, cause we haven't had any appointments
we have just been getting moved around and doing a ton of stuff for the zone so far. I think that i am giong to have a fun transfer though, my
companion is from canada and he is really legit. Just pray that i don't destroy or corrupt the zone as a zone leader.
SO yeah it was awesome to talk to you yesterday, you guys sounded good. YOu sounded way good because you didn't cry. haha
yeah i'm proud of you, i didn't think you would be able to do it but you did a good job.
I have a question, i just barely, like a week ago bought brand new basketball shoes. Then i get transfered here and we have a nike outlet store and there
are shoes for cheaper that are better than the ones that i bought. SO here is my question, if i sent thoes shoes home, do you think you could give them to derek or ty, and then maybe if you wanted give me like 45 bucks cause thats what they costed so i can buy better ones? that would be awesome
anyways, i gotta run, sorry its short, i love you have a good week!! BYE

Monday, May 2, 2011

WILL I GET TRANSFERRED???

Parentals
Whats crackin? so just to let you know about what is going to be going down on mothers day. We have church until 2, then we are going to be eating at a families house right after, so I think we should be calling around 4 or 5 or something if thats cool. Yeah i am kind of excited to know what is going on with transfers, i'm not even gonna lie. SO we had interviews with president this week and we didn't talk much about the work, because we were talking about the district the whole time. But he talked with my companion and they were talking about this ward. And my comp was just saying how it is a hard ward and how members aren't really helping us, and president was saying yeah i know that this is a really hard ward, and he is thinking about taking missionaries out soon, but not this tranfser i dont think. But he did tell my companion that he seriously reccommend him getting a bike, so that could mean two things. One i'm leaving and the car is leaving so he needs a bike. Or two he is leaving and i'm staying here and getting a new companion. Heres hoping that its number 1. But oh well i guess we will find out in like 5 days. But yeah i'm pretty stoked to talk to you guys too, its gonna be pretty cool. I guess theres not much to talk about with this ward, because i've been here so long and not much progress has been happening so hopefully you guys have stuff to talk about.
Thats legit that you wrote steve, yeah we just write each other little emails every week because letters would take way to much time. That is cool about dave lloyd because he went on his mission like a hundred years ago so that is pretty cool that he can still keep in contact with some of those families. There are definately going to be so people that i would like to keep in contact with. i think the powers cause we are related, The olsons are one of them. Its going to be bitter sweet to leave this area, because i've been here so long that some people i just feel like we are family, but at the same time the work here is terrible so i want to leave it really bad. So it will be hard kinda but it will be good. So yeah same thing here our investigators are not really progressing, a lot of them are kind of avoiding us right now too, and its kinda frustrating. We are lucky to even teach our investigators in the week, the rest of the week we are just visiting less actives and stuff, its a little annoying. Oh well, i'll just have to suck it up and trust in the lord that i am here for a reason.
So yesterday was fast and tesimony meeting and i basically gave a farewell talk, haha i was like, i've had the priveledge to serve in this ward for 5 and a half months, and its been awesome thankyou, i don't know how much longer i'll be here. haha people were like wooh are you leaving, i'm like haha i dunno. but it wass good i talked about youth going on missions, and told the ward to strengthen their testimonies and to share it with others. I'f i do stay in this ward another transfer i'm just going to start being super bold with the members to have them help the missionaries. because it is a little hard when the ward isn't helping to find us people to teach or anything.
Tell walker i said good luck, that seems like its come up so fast since you told me that he got his call, time is flying by. Soon i'm gonna be home and i'll look back and think that these two years were just a blurr.
Anyways, i'll talk to you guys on sunday, around 3-6 or something like that. k cool , have a good week, love ya!
ELDER GNEHM