11/18/2024 Week 45- running in crocs

 Monday we didn't do much crazy stuff. started the day off by helping one of our members with a garage sale. We then went antiquing of course! I found the jackpot of MoTab vinyl records!! Then we just ended the day by playing mtg at the church!

Tuesday nothing special happened just had a lesson with our friend Phillip and then made some contacts and nobody really answered. 

Wednesday, more contacts and had 3 lessons!! They were awesome lessons for 3 of our friends preparing to be baptized! For young men's they decided to do a "turkey trot" basically just running a couple miles. I decided to run and ran a mile in crocs. Super fun, haven't run in over 6 months 😵‍💫

Thursday we had even more lessons!! It's crazy how many people we are teaching now. God is really hastening his work!

Friday more contacting. Oh and we got a new car haha. Excited about that one!! 

Saturday we got to help with a move which was fun as always!! Had a couple more lessons and we got to go to a baptism of someone in the ward!! I know that's about all that happened this week. Seems pretty boring, but trust me it wasn't! 

Sunday was the primary program and that was so awesome!! Our friend Phillip also made it to church! Overall pretty great week! Excited for what's to come!!

The Lord IS hastening his work and I have a front row seat!

Google photos:

https://photos.app.goo.gl/pVWwYdpohY287osv8

Pictures: 

1-3: Baptism pics from last week!

4: Last district pic

5: Slug bug 👊

11/11/2024 Week 44- Go Cougs (sorry I had to)

 This week was pretty crazy but when is not as a missionary!!

Monday we had a zone pday with President and it was a lot of fun! I just ended up playing volleyball for about 3 hours 🙃. That's pretty much it then, that evening we got to help a member with a school project...lets just say I am a professional actor now.

Tuesday we had a zone council and I got to go on an exchange with Elder Lund!! Got to have a few pretty awesome lessons and I learned a lot from him so that was cool!!

Wednesday was such a miracle-filled day!! We decided to walk a street and knock a few doors and well we found 5 people in the span of about an hour!! Absolutely so insane! And to end off the night we had a lesson with Brayden, he is such a cool guy! And miracle... he's preparing to be baptized in a month!!

Thursday had some more great lessons... oh and I forgot to mention that two of our friends just got married so one could get baptized and they did it in a conspicuous way and well I thought to myself they have to celebrate. Soooo I decided to make them a wedding cake and we delivered it!! (pictures attached) 

Friday was just more lessons and we had interviews with President!!

Ok ok Saturday was the best day of the week!! We got to attend two baptisms!! One for a kid in the ward and one for our friend Syncere!!!!! It was a little scary at first, we got to the church and turns out no one knew who was picking up syncere and then he wouldn't answer our calls??? Luckily a member was able to hunt him down and get him to the baptism. It went smoothly after that chaos 😅.

Sunday!! Amazing day as always. Got to go to church and partake of the sacrament! Had a few awesome lessons as well! Ok and everyone at church was talking about the BYU game against Utah and which if I understand correctly was an absolute miracle so that's really cool!! Overall great day!

 

Pictures:

1-4: wedding cake!!

5: Rachel would like this pumpkin 

6: More baby burgers 🍔 

7: eating another frog 🐸 

11/4/2024 Week 43-The Lord is hastening his work!

 Hey, I finally did something different for pday!! We went to the temple in the morning and were able to do an Endowment session! And then we went over to the Velez's and did a couple projects using their laser engraver!! Made a Book of Mormon belt buckle hehehe! Then after that, I learned how to play Magic the Gathering, brother Velez gave us each a deck so now we've played every night since!! 

Wednesday we got to travel up to Benbrook to administer to a sweet lady who wasn't doing too well. Her name is Erin Thompson so that was a cool connection!! Before that though, I got to stop by and see Marren!!! Instantly made my day 10x better! We then had lunch at my former Bishop's house! Also cool miracle! We were stopping by to visit one of our friends and well she wasn't home :( but her son was so we started talking to him about Jesus and the Book of Mormon like usual and then he told us he wants to be baptized!?!?! So we told him we could help him with that! And now he's preparing to be baptized on November 30th!! Oh, and my best friend Brody opened his mission call and he is going to the Washington Everett Mission "speaking" ASL. Anyway just thought I'd throw that shoutout in there. Congrats Brody!!!

Thursday was pretty sweet! Had three amazing lessons and it was Halloween. because of that we went in early and played Magic!! 

Friday we got to give back up to Benbrook one last time except this time it was with Elder Baker my greenie and his greenie!!! It's pretty cool to see how goated of a missionary Elder Baker has become!! Anyway, we had a cool lesson with our friend Erin and now she is preparing for baptism on Nov 30th. She'll be baptized into my last ward so that's really fun 😁. 

Saturday... a simple move turned into an 8-hour long move 😭. That's all that happened. We did find someone that day so that was cool!!

Ok so absolute miracle-filled Sunday! Started off with church, partook of the sacrament, great way to start the day. For second hour I got to teach a gospel basics class with a group size of 7! It was so crazy the amount of friends that came to church!! Anyway it was so fun, talked about bits of come follow me and then a lot about prophets. I thought the class went well!! I also did not know how much I liked teaching 😁. Maybe I will be a teacher when I grow up... just kidding they don't make any real money 🙃. Ok so then we had an awesome lesson with Syncere who is on date for this Saturday!! Then we had a lesson with our new friend Shaq who reached out to us the night prior. It was a crazy amazing lesson!!!! The spirit was sooo strong! Well so now he's preparing to be baptized December 7th!! This isn't the end if the day?? That evening we had a lesson with Sara and Noah. And that was such an amazing lesson!! The spirit again was soooooo strong and now Sara is preparing to be baptized December 21st!!!! Anyway that was Sunday, insanely spirit filled. The lessons with Shaq and Sara weren't planned 24hrs prior, so it just goes to show you that they really were miracles!!!

https://photos.app.goo.gl/pVWwYdpohY287osv8

Pictures: 

1. The Squad

2. BoM belt buckle 

3. Boomer Sooner

4. New shades 😎 

5. Dad I need this for Christmas...

6-8. What can I say? I have good taste 

9. Need For Speed(Spirit)

10. I want my prince 🤴 

10/29/2024 Week 43- Ice Bath PT. 2

 Mondays seem to be the same repeating day as of late 😅. Antiquing/thrifting and poker with the district. I mean it's like the perfect day, I am not complaining!! 

Tuesday we had district council and then I when on an exchange with Elder Stailey! I went to Mansfield for the day and it was so awesome!! We started off the exchange I'm the best way possible. I took Elder Stailey to In-n-out for his first time! Got to learn a lot of cool things from him, he's an amazing missionary! Surprised me that he's only been out 2 months. 

Wednesday we finished off the exchnage and then we went and visited a ton of people! Found a couple people in the process. We finally got in contact with Syncere who we put on date. Turn out we had his number wrong and he still is excited for his baptism in a couple weeks!! Had an awesome chapel tour with another one of our friends!!! And ended the day off at young men's where I did another Ice Bath in full pros!

Thursday  was a freaking awesome day! Found two new friends to teach before 11 am! One of them was when we were stuck in traffic. I made a "miracle Moment" video about it. It's on my google photos!! Anyway then ended the day with dinner at the Velez's which was amazing!

Friday and Saturday were very similar, just filled with a bunch of member visits. We did meet a bunch of really awesome people and had a cool lesson with our friend Sarah!  Oh and we go to see some Emus!!!

Sunday was pretty epic!! We had 3 of our friends come to church! Our friend Syncere was absolutely swarmed by the young men so that was super rad! Later that night my companion noticed some non-english speakers so we went and knocked on their door. Turns out they speak French so that was just perfect!! I mean I just sat there and let him pop off so that was so cool!!!

Monday was awesome as well! Had DC and then went and visited some members. We met a guy who is from Sacramento and worked in Elk Grove!! That was pretty cool, small world. We also had the best lesson with Syncere! Ok and to end the night, we went to a really good place called Station 330. The Argyle's who took us are also from Elk Grove! Small world frfr. I had a ribeye done blue and dang was it good! 

Pictures:

1. Ice Bath pt 2

2. Exchanges

3. Miracle Moment sneak peak 

4&5. Becoming more Texan by the day...

5. Emus!!!

10/21/2024 Week 41- ELDER Elder Thompson

 Monday was a lot of fun!! Got to play more poker! Oh and we went antiquing! I found a record player and I'm like, well now I got to buy some records so I started looking and then this really nice lady showed us a box of about 40 records and said we could have them for free!! I mean most of them ended up being Spanish lessons but hey maybe I can learn Spanish finally. There were some gems however. 

Tuesday we didn't really do much other than DC and making contacts.

Wednesday we got to visit a bunch of members and invite them to the trunk or treat we were having!! Also got to have a fire lesson with our friend Payton who just randomly showed up to church on Sunday. It was such an awesome day!!

Thursday was just more member visits that's about it!

Friday was by far the best day of the week!!! We had zone conference! We took a deep dive into what it meant to put the Armour of God on as a missionary (found in Ephesians 6: 10-18) we also spiritually "mined" the sacrament prayers and pulled out all the hidden meanings so that was super awesome!! We were there from 8:30-5:30 but I'm not complaining at all!!! Then we finished the day off by going to a high-school football game to support one of our members!!

Ok, so Saturday was super spectacular!!! In the morning we got to go to a cemetery in Mansfield and help clean it up. Apparently, it was a segregated cemetery as of 10-15 years ago?? And the one section was left unkept, you can guess which. Anyhow we did a lot of tree trimming and cutting down. I got to use a wooden hand saw for a while 😍. We weren't able to finish this time but we will be back to finish it!!! Afterwards we got to do a church tour with our friend Spencer! That was so cool!! After that we had the Ward trunk or treat! So as missionaries we aren't supposed to dress up so I did what I could, I dressed up like a Senior missionary hahaha (see the pictures) It was so fun, I did a little acting in order to convince the people. Should've won an Oscar 💯. We got to judge the costume contest for the kids and there was a kid wearing a Beetlejuice costume so we had to pick him!!

Sunday was really awesome as well. We had church and in the evening we got to go to a fireside put on by the stake but they had a Baptist preacher/mayor of Mansfield come and teach and it was so good!!!

More pictures and videos of my Halloween costume ⬇️⬇️⬇️

https://photos.app.goo.gl/pVWwYdpohY287osv8

Pictures: 

1. Record setup 👌 

2. 🐔 

3 & 4.  Reminds me of my sister 🫠

5. Record Haul

6 & 7 ELDER Elder Thompson 

8. Football 🫡