August 18, 2014

August 18, 2014
Hey!!!!

Thanks for all of the birthday wishes!!! It was a good day. We didn't do anything too out of the ordinary, but we happened to have key lime pie at lunch and my companion bought me cookies! Thanks for the package everyone! It was a fun thing to share with my companion. He was super excited to have rootbeer because it is super hard to find here. We enjoyed it. Well I'm glad to hear that everyone is doing well. It sounds like you guys had fun at the cousins reunion and Madeline with Lauren and Cam. I am happy to hear that. It sounds like you did a lot of fun stuff! It´s crazy that it´s already the middle of August. Ella will be here before we all know it. It sounds like the baby shower was a success! It´s a good thing that you all got inside right before it rained. It has been raining like crazy here too. There has also been a ton of lightning. The thunderclaps have been literally ginormous. I have never heard thunder so loud before. One night this week I woke up to an earthquake and a huge thunderstorm at like 5 in the morning. It was like the second coming or something haha. It was pretty cool. It was just a baby earthquake though. That´s a really cool story mom! Something similar did happen to us.

Well this week was good. We had a zone conference this week and our Mission President talked about the importance of really studying the scriptures. He talked about when Nephi was commanded to build a boat and helped us to analyze his obedience and all of the work that he did that sometimes we don´t really see when we read the scriptures. This week was pretty good. We are teaching several good families right now. R should also be getting baptized in about three weeks. If you want to keep them in your prayers they are the C. family, the T. family, the B. family, and R, O, and A. We have been blessed to be able to find several new people to teach these last 2 months. Some of them have obviously gone cold, but they have been the means of finding others.

We are working really hard to excite the ward about missionary work. It has not been easy. We are finally seeing some changes. Our bishop finally talked to our investigators this Sunday for I believe the first time ever. It is a small thing, but it is improving. My comp is really good. We are trying to work really hard, but have fun at the same time. I really like a quote that he always says,¨ I´m so optomistic that I go after Moby Dick in a rowboat, and I bring the tarter sauce with me.¨ Well that´s all folks. Love you all a ton!

Elder Schow

August 25, 2014

August 25, 2014
Hey everyone,

Well from the sound of it it has been a pretty eventful week. So you finally broke down and bought a new fridge, eh? Hopefully dad didn't blow up the old one so that you can still get a bit of use out if it haha, assuming that it still works of course. Ah...and the blue couch is gone. That´s too bad. That´s crazy about Jimmy´s house. I had no idea that he had alarms etc. Crazy. Good luck with the 5K. I´m so proud of you guys for going for it. I hope that it goes well. Where is it going to be held? Sounds like you've had a lot of rain. We have too. I´ll be honest. I´m a bit tired of getting wet...and staying wet, but it´s alright. Just part of the job description I guess. Yea dad from the sound of it the city has changed quite a bit since I left. It´s crazy how much can change so quickly.

Hmmm... what to say about this week? Well all in all it was a pretty good week. Like every week in the mission it has it´s ups and downs but over all it turned out well. We had a good turn out at church yesterday. Many of the investigators that came were coming for the first time. We started teaching a family this week named the G family. They had gone to church with one of their family members that lives a couple of hours away a few times, and several of them are very well prepared. Three of them accepted baptismal dates yesterday for the 28th of September. We also started teaching a woman named R. She is 18 and has 2 children. She had her first child when she was 14. Super sad... She came to church with us though and we think that she really liked it a lot so I will keep you posted on what happens with them.

I am grateful for the mission and all that I have been able to learn so far. I can definitely see personal growth in a lot of areas as well as a lot of room for growth in others. Right now I am learning the importance of setting goals. Without meaningful goals it is hard to progress. I an also learning the importance of patience. It is probably something that I have struggled with the most on my mission. I know however, that when we are obedient and work as hard as we can that good things come. Thanks for all that you do. Love you guys a ton. Talk to you all in a week!

Elder Schow  

August 11, 2014

August 11, 2014

 

Hello there everyone!  Well, there is some groovy techno going on in this internet cafe so I feel motivated to type faster haha.  Hopefully I will have more time to write to some of you today because of it.  Sorry that the last few weeks I have been a bit short on time.  Thanks for all of the birthday wishes!  To be honest I doubt that we will do anything that exciting haha.  I haven't really told anyone that it is my birthday so it will probably just be a quiet, normal day.  Thanks for putting money in my account, though I really don't need it.  How much were you wanting me to take out?  Also, the package got here.  I will open it on Wednesday :) !  I`m glad that you had a good time at the wedding and that it was a nice time.  That`s also nice that you got to visit with so many members of the family.  What?  Kim Barker got married?!  That`s crazy haha.  I thought that she was a lot younger.....Now I feel like an old fart haha.  Like dad said, time is a really strange thing.  It goes super slow until we stop and look backwards and realize how fast it has gone.  So I think that the beg bugs are gone.  Last Monday we stood my matress up and punched it a bunch and I prayed that night that we would not have more problems with them.  We haven`t received any new bites like all week, but we will see what happens.  I'll keep you posted.

So we had transfers this week.  I said goodbye Elder Mendoza who is now in his house (CRAZY!!!) and I recieved Elder Martinez.  He was Elder Patey`s trainer....so in mission terms my grandpa is now my companion.  He's a really really hard worker.  He goes home in 3 months so I'm guessing that I will leave the area the next time that we have transfers so that I don`t end up staying here for 9 months.  That would be a ton of time in one area.  He`s a really good missionary.  He's a bit bossy haha....it`s sort of a I know everything about the mission and we are going to do things my way sort of attitude, but I have a lot to learn from him.  We made a huge map of our area this week.  It`s like 6 feet by 3 feet.  We marked all of the members, everyone that we are teaching, and all of our future investigators with different colored stickers.  Hopefully it helps us to plan a bit better.  

We found a few new people to teach this last week that are really great.  I'll don't know them super well yet so I`ll tell you more about them later.  We had an entire family come to church on Sunday.  The C. family.  I think that I told you a little bit about on of them.  The ex-Jehovah's Witness.  We were super surprised that they all came.  I'll keep you posted on thier progress.  We are still working with R. and M. and the T. family.  We have several that have a lot of interest and we are receiving a lot of names of new people to teach.  Things are going well!  Love you all!

Elder Schow