email: November 18, 2013

Subj: I love SUNNY Southern California :)

TODAY IS CORINA'S BIRTHDAY!!!! I can't believe my baby sister is 16 now. That is crazy! She told me all about her party and how it went. I love that sister of mine! She's one of my sweethearts :). The other one is Mom and then the last one will be my future wife, when that time comes. I watched the video of Carson wrestling and I was basically cheering in the library! I was getting some funny stares from people... I love hearing about how Jake is doing. I am soo stoked Jake is getting ready for his mission! He is gonna be twice the missionary I will ever become. I am so excited for him. I am going to make a call into one of the senior couples who helps with that process of applying for schools. I want to apply to BYU and Utah State and maybe even that school in Bismark Dad told me about. I want a few options so I can be taken care of. Ready for me week? Leggo :)

On Tuesday we emailed in the morning after DDM and that took a big chunk of our day. DDM went well, Elder Passmore trained and it was awesome! I love that missionary so much. He is such a character. I am having issue with one of my Zone Leaders so DDM is kind of hard for me. We then had a bomb lesson with Karmen and finally introduced the Book of Mormon to her. We hadn't had the chance to do it before because sitting down with her has been impossible so we decided to teach her about it on her doorstep. It went well and the scripture I shared hit her deep. Hopefully that will be the spark she needs! We then had dinner with the Jones family and that was fun. They have a one year old that came and sat next to me during the lesson with them and it was awesome. I can't wait to be a dad one day :). Our lesson with a recent convert/part-member family went well too! His name is Cale and we just picked him up. His wife was just baptized and so we are now gonna work with him. It was a good lesson, Elder Anderson and I teach really well together. I have been blessed to have him. We then got our OYMs and called it good for the night!

We had visits to do all Wednesday and we ended up picking up a former investigator and teaching Richard again! He started to dive deep into some deeper doctrine so that was a fun lesson haha. Our dinner with the B*** family went okay. The bad thing was that I voiced my opinion a little too far and kind of made Sister B*** mad.. Whoops. Oh well, she's not going to hold that against me I hope. We then went and saw our ward mission leader to have our correlation meeting. We hadn't seen him in a week and a half because of some family stuff but it was good to see him. We got our OYMs and called it good for the night.

We had our lesson with Ivan on Thursday and it went better than we had thought it was gonna go. He is willing to give us another shot and to keep praying. We came down on him hard but with love so hopefully he really felt that. We had weekly planning and made some visits to people. Our dinner was with the H*** family and that was a good dinner. I had some really good tacos and had a good conversation. Our follow up lesson with Cale went awesome! We brought a receipt convert with us (just baptized four months ago) and he testified so well to Cale! It was awesome. We then went to the church to meet his friend and we are going to hopefully start teaching. The Elders Quorum was practicing some football for Thanksgiving and so we jumped it. It was a fun way to end our night!

Friday was a good day, we gave a blessing to a less active lady in our complex and then had a bomb dinner. However, I wrecked my bike pretty bad before dinner. It was my fault but it still was pretty bad. We were riding a dirt trail doing 180's in the dirt with our bikes. I went a little too hard and I tanked it super bad. I was fine but it was right before dinner and so I showed up all dirty and stuff. Good times! We had some bomb carne asada with the M**** family. Our appointment cancelled and so we went on an obedience ride. I stayed on two tires for the rest of the night haha.

Saturday was rough for us because Elder Anderson came down with a head cold and I had a pounding headache from the night before and so we had a really slow morning. We studied and then got a call from Brother G**** about taking us to go ship our books home we got from the sister who passed away a few weeks ago. He paid to ship almost a 100 lbs of books to North Dakota. It was such a blessing to me. We then did some service for Cale's in-laws and invited them to church. The G*** came back and took us out to eat because we didn't have a dinner. That dinner was so much fun. They have a 27-year-old Down syndrome daughter that is so much fun. She has a "boyfriend" and she talks about him all the time. She told the waitress she wanted "aqua" and that she can speak Spanish. Classic! It was so much fun. We got our OYMs and called it a night.

Sunday was full of ups and downs. I can get really frustrated with our ward but I am learning patience with them though so it’s okay. I was in a pretty bad mood at the end of sacrament meeting when Janae, the G****'s down syndrome daughter, came up to me and showed me her temple book. She talked to me for about five minutes and then called me her pretty boy and then gave me a hug. It was super funny! It made my day. We then had a brief lesson with Ivan and invited him again to church. Our dinner was super cool, it was a young couple and so it made me a little trunkie.. But coming home for the night, both Elder Anderson and I wrecked on our bikes. It was a good time! We were haulin' down the sidewalk and there was this puddle that he decided to try and skid through. He went down on his side and I braked to try and avoid hitting him when my bike skidded and sent me flying over the handle bars. It was a good time haha I loved it! Didn't feel too good but it was quite an experience for me.

Well, that's what's going on with me. I am doing just fine, still trying to figure out who I am. There have been a lot of changes that have happened to me and the Lord is making me into the man He needs me to become and I am so grateful for that. I love y'all and miss y'all so much. I love my Savior and His Atonement for me. It's real and it changes peoples lives. Open your mouth this week and share the gospel!

Elder Tonini