email: October 21, 2013

Subject: Transfer Monday!

I got a transfer call and I am going to Jurupa! I am pretty excited. It's gonna be a rough four months though. The area is dead, I am getting doubled in with a missionary who is struggling, on a bike, and I have four months left. This is going to be a huge test of my faith. However, Elders Coleman and Moss are gonna be there so it will be a good thing. I am going to miss this area a lot. There have been a LOT of things happen to me here. I have received a lot of revelation about my future, the people here in Hemet and seeing how much of a blessing the gospel can be to people's lives. I am sorry to hear about Mom's headaches. I've got a huge headache because I was fielding ground balls in the gym and I faced planted it into the door frame. Yeah, that didn't feel too good so I can relate haha.

Ready for my week? It's gonna be a quick email because I've gotta go soon. Brother R**** is taking me to Jurupa so I've gotta be mindful of him :).

Monday was fun having dinner with the S**** family. I got to play with the boys and wrestle with them. I seriously can't wait to be a Dad. I’m gonna love it! It was a fun dinner appointment.

Tuesday was the usual DDM and it was weird because I knew that it was going to be my last one. I got Anita to come up and give her testimony. She did so well! I was so proud of her. I have a really hard time when I hear people talk about how good of a guy I am and how amazing I am and stuff. I guess I don't like drawing attention to myself. I do things to not be recognized and when I do get recognized, it's hard on me. She ended up taking a whole group of missionaries out to Red Robin for lunch. She is amazing and I love her to pieces. She also took us out to dinner that night too! I love her so much. We got our OYMs and taught the G**** family that night too.

Wednesday was exchanges and I got to go with Elder Figueroa into the other side of the ward. I did get to bash with a Jehovah's Witness at a doorstep so that was super fun! I shouldn't love bashing but I do. I have gotten really good at making people feel dumb when it comes to religion. What we have to offer is so true that people cannot deny that. They try to do that to me but they can't do that to me :). Okay, I am being a little cocky so I'll stop.

Other than that, things are going well. I am excited for this new adventure and I am going to work as hard as I can. I have found new drive to work and be motivated so I am excited for that. Sorry this is such a short letter. I love y’all so much and hope things are going well there in ND!

Elder Tonini

email: August 26, 2013

As we speak, I am sitting in the family history center in the Hemet Stake Center dripping in sweat after playing three games of basketball, fielded some ground balls, and caught a brief bullpen. I love having Elder Feist here so I can have someone to throw with again. That is crazy how big the Church is there in Minot! Everyone keeps reminding me that I am 18 months in and is going home soon so home has been on my mind lately. However, it hasn't made me too trunkie so it's all good. It has been a busy PDay already. Ready for my week? Let's go.

Oh my goodness, this last PDay was terrible. I got roped into the pizza challenge. It was a pizza of 2 feet in diameter and weighed 10.5 pounds. I ate it with Elder Ringwood and we couldn’t finish it... It was super gross! It had 13 toppings and was freaking huge. We had to eat it in 40 minutes and we couldn't get up from our seats along with other rules. I got to the point where I started to dry heave. Yeah, it was bad. Ringwood even threw up in his mouth then swallowed it back down. I jumped up out of my seat so we got DQed but I wasn't gonna get barfed on! It was miserable; I've never been in a food coma like that one. I slept for three hours when we got home. I didn't eat dinner or any meals for almost two days. It was GROSS. I love pizza but that took it too far. Our dinner on Monday was with the S**** and it was fun to pick President's brain about being a California Highway Patrol officer. He does hand-to-hand combat training right now for the CHP officers but he's going back out into the field here in about a month so it'll be fun for him. Our lesson with the St****'s went well. We taught the Plan of Salvation and the family really didn't know much. Do the Elders there teach active families for the ward mission process? I think it would be a good idea to have them in our home and then have the kids invite their friends over to teach them! Every member a missionary :). We taught the family a lot about the Plan of Salvation and how important it is to be a member missionary. I still wasn't feeling that great so we came home and I slept. Bad idea with eating so much pizza haha.

Our Tuesday was actually quite productive. We had DDM which went fairly well. I kinda had to improvise because I wasn't exactly sure what I wanted to train on but it still went well. I enjoy teaching but I am getting tired of preparing something every week. Oh well. We then had lunch and went out to hit the pavement. We had a follow up appointment with a lady named Janice that we street contacted last Sunday. We went to go see her and we ended up getting into the door. When we were talking with her, she actually wanted us to come in and see some else in the house. We ended up talking to Mrs. M****, an old black lady and is from the deep south. Along with Janice, we gave them a blessing. We had a return appointment set up to come back and teach them but it ended up falling through later during the week but we got their number so we can stay in touch with them. Our dinner was with the R**** family which is always a blast. I love that family so much. Good news! Brother R**** doesn't have cancer in his chest! It was awesome. The dinner always goes well with them and we then ran off to go teach the G**** family. We taught them and then afterwards was throwing the football with Junior until it got dark. Bad news was that I ripped my pants playing ball... My favorite pair! Good thing I have Momma N**** to help sow them back up. After the lesson, we finished our OYMs and then called it a night.

Our Wednesday, sadly to say, wasn't the most productive. We had studies and then had lunch with Park H*** and then came back to their house and talked all afternoon. I know it wasn't the most effective but it was much needed. I can already feel my body and mind getting burnt out. So I called it my mental health day to justify it. Terrible, I know but yeah. Our dinner with the J****'s is always fun. I like having all four of us come to dinners. It makes things interesting. Nick is awesome; I actually knew his family in Yucuipa and his brother took a picture with Austin O'Harra in Guatemala! It was fun to see Austin again. We taught the G****'s again and they are making huge strides with them. The girls are getting comfortable with the ward and so it is a good thing to see. We get to go to the temple on Thursday! We called the R**** and they said that they would love to go with us. It was awesome because we get to ride in his 2012 Ford Raptor! Hmmmm yes! So bad news about the temple... We missed the endowment session :(. We got there and the session was full, super fast. It was insane so we didn't get to see the new movie but we did get to do sealings! That was intense. I loved it. We got a lot of work done in the sealing room. The sealer was the former temple president and he was in my first ward in Beaumont! It was good to see him again. After the session, we went to Cafe Rio and had lunch with the R**** and all the missionaries. Even though Cafe Rio started in Utah, it was still good! He then wanted to go to the Yamaha store to look for something for his bike while we were in Redlands so we made a pit stop at the Yamaha store. Oh my goodness, I was in heaven. I want a bike so bad! I saw a really nice Suzuki GSX 600 for only $3600. Oh yeah! We then went back to the house and he gave me some new slacks and a full suit! Sure love that family. We went and made some visits and then had dinner with them again! They love us. And I love them back haha. Our appointment that night was the G***'s lesson and interview. They passed and so they are good to go! Two baptisms on Sunday!

Since we didn't weekly plan on Thursday, we did that on Friday. That took most of our day and we tried to figure out how we are going to find more people to teach. It was a good weekly planning session. It will be a good next week. Elder Child is singing at the baptism on Sunday so before our early dinner, we went and practiced at the stake center. I can still read music, kind of so we were able to practice. Once again, we had our lesson with the G*** and then we walked up and down Florida, the main street in Hemet. There were some CRAZY people out there! It was sure fun. We really didn't find anyone but we were being obedient so that was the biggest thing.

Funny thing happened during the lesson. Nick J**** called like four times during the lesson. I called him back and finally got to talk to him about why he called. I guess his sister is down visiting family and she is childhood friends with the girl that I have been writing in Utah and she wanted to meet me. It was kind of weird but it made me laugh. Nick didn't know anything about that until she told him. Small world haha. I didn't get to see Nick's sister but it still made me laugh.

We found a pretty awesome Part Member Family on Saturday morning. We had been driving around with no success when I felt prompted to go by and see this lady that I've never met before. We ended up sitting down with her and having her tell us she wants us to help her grandson. So maybe that will be something good. And then today the ZLs got a referral from her to their phone haha. Listening to the Spirit always pays off. We tried to get in to teach Stevie but she wasn't there when we got there so we started to help her mom and grandmother to install a toilet and some tile. Bad idea, we didn't get to finish it but we made a good dent into the project. Our lesson with the Gu*** family went okay, I guess. I love Elder Child but sometimes he ticks me off. He threw me under the bus a couple of times during the lesson with them and it really got to me. But I got over it and we talked it out. Our dinner was with the N**** and that is always a blast. I seriously feel like a part of the family. Their family picture that Hawkins and I are in is their computer screen saver and I'm on the fridge! It's like home away from home. Our lesson with Holly and Bob went okay. They really aren't progressing so I am not sure how we're gonna fix that. After that, we ran over to Park H***'s house to burn my slacks. I hit my 18 month mark on Saturday so I got to burn some slacks. It wasn't as epic as when I burned my shirt and I threw all the pictures into the fire but it still was a good time. We then talked with Park until we went home. Wasn't a bad Saturday!

I love baptism Sunday's because it is always rewarding. Funny story with the baptism. I baptized Natalia and Elder Child did Junior. So I baptized first and mine went off without a hitch. But Junior gets in the water and Junior doesn't know his middle name so he says his sister's! Child baptizes him and we start to get dried off when Elder Wilkinson poked his head in and says that was the wrong name. We were confused because that was the name Junior told Child. Come to find out, he didn't know his middle name! Goofy kid. We then confirmed them right after the baptism so the baptism was complete. Yessir! By the time we came home for lunch, it was almost 4pm. We had lunch and had some studies and then we went off to dinner. Dinner was super funny, it was with the S**** family and they had a ball. At first it was kind of awkward but then we got to know them and then it was fun. We then taught them the Restoration with my Rubik's cube (I love that thing!) and had a good talk with them about the gospel. The mom then says that their daughter up at BYU-I wants to write the both of us! I was kind of taken back with that because that doesn't usually happen. Child was all over it though! The older I get in the mission, the less I care about mail haha but we gave them the address anyways. We got our OYMs for the day and then went back to Park’s house for some deep doctrine discussion. Ohhhh boy, I love me some deep doctrine! The Church is so true, it is insane. And that was my week. Not too bad but it could have been a lot better.

Alright well, I am super nasty and want to go shower so I'm going to close. Something I learned this week was the difference between the milk and the meat of the Gospel. The milk is WHAT gets us into the Celestial Kingdom but the meat is the HOW and WHY. All of the answers are there for us to find, we just have to mine those little nuggets of treasure. The Gospel is so simple that primary children can understand but it keeps scholars like Bruce R. McConkie and James E. Tamlage to keep searching. I am starting my senior year, I am on the last 6 months. Now I really don't have anytime to waste. Talk to Darren and ask him about the poem he sent me. It is super powerful and I can't read it without getting emotional. I love all of y'all and miss the family dearly. Talk to y'all next Monday! Time to be a finisher. Let's go!

Elder Tonini

email: August 5, 2013

I emailed on Wednesday of last week so this may not be the longest email but we had a lot go down this week. Ready for my week? Let’s go!

So after I emailed on Wednesday, we ran off to see the R****' family. Sister R**** got Hawkins and I speed Rubik’s cubes for our Restoration lesson and so we went over to see them. I can't remember if I mentioned that the doctor's found a tumor in Brother R****’ lung so they have been struggling with that recently. They actually called on Tuesday night to have us come over and give him a blessing so we went over there Wednesday afternoon to see him and give him a blessing. I love that family; I have a huge soft spot for them in my heart. After that, we ran to get some OYMs and went to the C***'s for dinner. We ate some awesome chicken and then had correlation with us four elders. It was a long week in regards in getting the area all organized and ready to go. We did though pick up a new part member family. The G**** family has two kids that aren't baptized and have been coming to church every week since they moved in to the ward. Hopefully we can get them baptized this month! Later that night, Sam A*** called me and said he would like a blessing because he's getting anxious about leaving for his mission so I sat down with him and we talked. At the end, I gave him a blessing. It was a good way to end the night.

Thursday was planning day and we seriously planned all day long. We had to go through and split our ward list for the two wards. So we sat down and punched every address into our GPSs and made the decision if it was on the north or the south side of the 74.That took all day to get done basically. I set an appointment to go by and see John P**** again and to introduce his family to the new elders. It went really well, John said that he would be open to being baptized so they are going to keep working with him. Our dinner was good: Chinese food with fried chicken haha. That night, we sat down with the bishopric and went over the ward list again. We discussed names and families and got a lot down for the area. It was Brother P**** that sent the pictures to y’all. Stay in contact with him, his family is awesome! Although we didn't get that much proselyting in, we did get organized so it was a good use of time.

Brother Langston, Brother Porter, ET, Elder Child, and Bishop Mackie

Elder Child and Elder Tonini

Elder Wilkinson, Elder Figueroa, Elder Child, and Elder Tonini

We had our zone meeting Friday morning and it was weird having the zone leaders call me the "patriarch" of the zone. Then Johnson made some smart aleck comment and said "matriarch" under his breath. That kid... Anyways, it was a good meeting and we got a lot done. It is very humbling to have the responsibility over the two sister companionships and being the district leader in starting a new zone. We are going to work! I am super excited. I committed to the zone and to the Lord that we will have two baptisms this month so we gotta get working! After ZDM, we went to Red Robin to eat. We then had dinner with the K**** family and to see them again. Stevie is always fun to be around. We got there a little early and I sat down to play Skip-bo with her. It was super fun! She was talking some smack and it was fun to play. The ZLs didn't like it too much but they'll be okay haha. Our lesson at 7 pm fell through so we checked up on some people and then contacted down the street. We found two potential families that we are going back to see on Saturday. That night, we had a lesson with a family we thought would be a potential part member family. Come to find out, they were. The wife is super less-active and her live-in husband isn't a member. They live in the middle of NO WHERE in Winchester so it was an exciting time trying to find the house at 8 at night. We find it and had a good lesson. They are super funny together and they have 11 dogs living in the house with them! Bob is the biggest hippie and he doesn't have any teeth. It is a riot. I am not sure if anything is going to come of it but we are gonna keep teaching anyways.

Oh goodness, Saturday was busy. We went back to see the two families and got in to both doors! We left a blessing with both of them and invited them to baptism. They didn't accept but they agreed to have us come back. We taught them about the priesthood and a brief thing about the Restoration of the Gospel. We then back to the stake center to work on the ward list again. We got it all split and ready to go. It seriously took almost four hours. We forwent lunch and went straight to dinner at Hometown Buffet with the R*****'s. I stuffed myself and I felt a lot better after that. After dinner, we picked up Denny H and ran off to our two lesson for the night. We saw an elderly lady named Francis W. She has had two strokes and her body is starting to shut down. She is a spiritual giant though! We talked for an hour and got to know her a little bit more. She is almost blind but yet she can still function. I could've talked with her for hours. After her, we ran over to the T**** family to get to know them. They are an active family with eight little kids! I did the Rubik’s cube lesson and they loved it. Every kid wanted to touched the cube and play with it. It was a fun lesson to teach; it was a fun way to end the night.

Sunday is always a long day for us with meetings. We had our correlation meeting with Brother C*** and then had our ward meetings. I struggled with it for a little while because the spotlight was on the ZLs and how they are awesome missionaries and everything. I felt like I wasn't that important; that all they cared about was their work and not mine. But as church started and sacrament meeting came around, I had an interesting thought come into my mind. When Christ was in the pre-existence, He offered to go down and perform the Atonement with no glory for His name. That struck me because that is how I am kind of feeling right now. It gave me strength and gave me a lot of comfort. We all sat on the stand so we could be recognized and bear our testimony's. Being me, I couldn't hold back the tears when I got up to bear my testimony. My heart was so full and that is just came. I have learned so much about the TRUE meaning of charity and that really struck me hard when I got up to speak. After the meeting, Sister V*** pulled me aside and with tears in her eyes told me that she wishes her son could be as good as a missionary as me when he leaves in September. Now THAT was humbling to me; it showed to me that I AM making an impact on the people I meet and come in contact with. The rest of church went well and we ran home to take lunch and do some personal study. We had dinner with the V*** family and then went to get OYMs. I OYM’ed a guy outside of dinner and ended up teaching him of the Restoration. Even though he didn't accept it, we did answer some questions of his. That night, we went to Sam's setting apart for being a missionary in Portugal. I love that guy, I am going to miss him terribly! But yeah, that was my week in a nut shell. Elder Child is doing well and I love living with the Mackie's. I now live with my pet pitbull Porter! I love that dog to pieces; it's like living at home again. It is funny; Elder Child is from the Mormon Bubble so it is taking him some time to get used to everything. He is a good Elder and I love him to pieces already.

I love all of y’all and I hope things are going well. Keep me updated with everything! I want y’all to know that I know my Savior lives and the He loves everyone. He knows me personally and I am glad that I am starting to understand what charity really means. I love being here and I love all of y’all! Have a wonderful week!

Elder Tonini

email: July 15, 2013

Ready for the week? Here we go :)

Monday was super fun! After we emailed and did some running around Elder Everett, Franson, Wood and I went golfing at our favorite course. Everett has never golfed before and he did pretty well! I had a beautiful nine iron drive that landed seven feet from the pin. It felt so good to hit that thing and see where it landed! I shot pretty bad but I still had so much fun. We really have a good group of missionaries here in Hemet. After we golfed, we changed and ran off to dinner. We had dinner at the D****'s and it was fun to teach a FHE with them. Their dad was away on business so we grabbed Sam A**** to come with us. One of our members gave us a scripture bag with little objects in them that can represent any scripture story that has the item in it. We sat outside on the patio because the A/C went out in the house. It was a lot of fun to be with the kids and to teach them. I have gotten close with the oldest boy, Urry. He is my boy! He just turned 13 and I love him to pieces. He is a super sharp kid, along with all the other kids. The youngest, Obie, was super fun to mess with. They have an above ground pool that they play in and I took Obie and threatened to throw him in. I was just playing around but it was super fun. We got OYMs and dropped Sam off and then the Idyllwild Ward missionaries, Elders Everett and Franson, came over to our apartment and we stayed up wayyyyyy too long. We had zone conference the next day so it was interesting.

Oh my goodness was Tuesday super long. First off because I got zero sleep the night before and because we had to be up at the stake center by 7:30 in the morning. The best part was that I got to see Spencer again to catch up with him. But to top the scale, I got to see Victor! He came down from Beaumont to come to zone conference and to share his testimony with us. He stayed the whole time! It was a long six-hour conference. After that we left to go to Beaumont and to get ready for the temple! It was awesome that I got to be there every step of the way with him. it was weird going to the temple at night. I did get to see a whole bunch of people that I knew back in Oak Valley. I love the O'Harra family, they have been such a good family towards Victor. It was awesome to get to see in the temple. I gave him a big hug and told him I love him. That seriously was the best day of my mission. Plus, the missionaries in the ward got to come with him too so there were six missionaries that came to the temple with us. We then made a Denny's run that night to grab something to eat with the O'Harra's and the crew. Victor and I had a really good talk about what's been going on in my life. I tell that man everything and now I won't be able to call him up anymore when he is in Arizona. He is Utah now getting ready to enter into the MTC. I love that man so much! I got to see Anita on Wednesday and took us out to lunch. We went to Mimi's Cafe and then I gave her a blessing at the church. She was much appreciative towards me in giving her a blessing. She sure has grown attached to me but that is okay, she has been through a lot in her life so it is the least I can do. Our lesson with JayR went... Interesting. He had a pretty deep doctrinal question that we tried to answer. He wanted to understand why we believe we can become like God and why the New Jerusalem is going to be in Missouri so we addressed those issues and it ended up in getting into a deep doctrine discussion. But he said he is super close to getting baptized so we are in crunch time because they are leaving to Utah here pretty soon. We had a good rest of the day and got to visit some people.

Thursday was awesome because we did some weekly planning but then John wanted us to come over and have dinner with them! That worked out because our dinner had to cancel. We got to spend some time with the family and build some bonds with them. We have taught John once and now we need to get the whole family involved. He wanted us to come to his son's practice but it was just out of the zone so I decided that we couldn't go. Hawkins was for it but I wasn't going to break that rule. We didn't get to teach him because he left a lot quicker that we had planned on but we are planning on going over there later this week so it will be good.

Friday was exchanges with Park Hill Ward and it was super awesome. We had service with Valle Vista's former investigator out on his ranch. We were around horses and it was awesome. Ever since MoVal, I love being around those animals. There was a paint that you could tell that had been abused and it was super sad to see how it reacts now. It got pretty close to me and followed me around the pen the whole time. We were at the back corner of the pen, shoveling poop with the horse right next to us when a big semi-truck came down the road and scared the paint and she took off away from the fence. We all surrounded her because she walked in between us and we had to get out of the way pretty quick. But there was another horse, Lucky that was super nice. I hugged him and petted him and everything. I love being around those animals. After we finished with that, we ran home to shower and study for the day. We ended up studying a little too long because we got into a deep doctrine discussion again haha. Our dinner was crazy, he is Bolivian and he just loaded my plate up with food and I had to eat it. Oh my goodness it was gross but I did it! Our lesson that night was with a family and we are teaching one of the son's girlfriend's. It was a good lesson and a good way to end the night.

On Saturday we got a call from Ray D*** that he needed helped moving his family. We just baptized his daughter so we thought it would be good to help him move. It went really well, I wore a long sleeve shirt to try and sweat some fat outta myself haha. It was fun to go help his family out. His wife is expecting so it was the least we could do for them. We took studies after that and then went out to proselyte. Our dinner cancelled so the Cole's invited us over to have dinner. I love going over there to eat. Brother Cole always talks baseball with me and it is super fun to talk with him. Their grandson, Blake, has been talking to Corina so it is fun to give him a hard time. I love that family though and they have been a blessing to us here in the ward.

On Sunday, I felt prompted to fast for JayR again. Fasting always gives me the biggest headache so it pretty much killed me the entire day. Sunday's are always long because we have meetings from 8:30am until 3pm. Yay! But the fasting really paid off because we talked with Sara, JayR's wife, told us that we need to invite him on Tuesday. We are taking that comment to invite him to be baptized on Tuesday so we are super excited for that. I may fast again tomorrow too because this has been on my mind a lot lately and I really want this for that family. The biggest thing we are focusing on this week is him. After church, I had to come home and try to kick my headache. I did all that I could but it still wouldn't go away. I even showered for twenty minutes to try and get rid of it. It wouldn't leave so we went to dinner anyways. I got there and just crashed on the couch, my head hurt so bad. Sister V**** got me an ice pack and I crashed on their couch for almost an hour. I felt so much better when I woke up though, it was so nice. I talked with them until it was time to go home because I missed out on talking with them. The V**** family makes me laugh every time I see them. We came home and everyone came over for PDay eve. We played Risk and rubiks cubed it up! I love my mission so much :) it is awesome to be a part of this work.

Thank you for sending the few shirts, I need them badly. I have gotten pretty good at sowing my clothes up and fixing them! I want y'all to know that I love y'all so much and miss the family a lot. Time is flying and it is really starting to scare me.. I'll be home before I know it and that stinks! But I am not going to waste anymore time and work my hardest on the last stretch. Hope y'all have a wonderful week and know that I love you. Thank you for the prayers and the thoughts on behalf of the people we are working with. This transfer is almost over and it scares me to death! I am doing just fine with everything and I am doing the best I can. Love you and have a great week!

Elder Tonini

email: May 20, 2013

Ready for my week? Here we go!

Monday was a good PDay; I played some basketball and then I went home and lifted in the garage. I did legs and I got up pretty high. My power-cleans got up to 225 pounds and my squat was 315 pounds. I was I was doing reps as well so it was a pretty good day. We got our OYMs (Open Your Mouths) and went to our appointments for the night. We got into a part-member family (PMF) and got to teach them. Hopefully we can pick up the husband and the kids as new investigators here in the next few weeks. Our lesson with Nikki on Tuesday went well and we picked her up as a new investigator. We had our usual DDM meeting and then went to Dairy Queen to get our lunch. A member of the stake owns it so we get to eat there for free! Luckily, we only eat there once a week so it is all good. We went and gave someone a blessing we found tracting but she TOTALLY rejected our blessing and didn't feel "anything" so we left. We had dinner with our bishop and we stopped by to see another PMF and tried to get in to teach him. It is a son-in-law to the N*****'s and he is a sweet guy but it going to take some time with him. Our ward mission process (WMP) lesson with the B***'s went well too. We had our less-active lesson with Aaron and that went well. He is a super cool guy and he has been through a lot. I am not a HUGE fan of less active work but I will do some and we are starting to see some fruits of our labors.

We rode our bikes to our lesson with Juan and Courtney to save some miles. After our lesson with them, I was ridding no handed when I heard this huge metal pop. I had no idea what it was so I just kept ridding. Come to find out, I ended up popping a spoke. Wonderful. So we took the bikes to Russ D**** in the ward, he runs a custom bike shop, and get the bike checked. He couldn't fix the spoke so I am going to another shop. That wasn't even the best part of the day either. The ZL's gave us a referral to meet up with a young guy at the Sonic in our area. So we went to Sonic (YES THERE IS A SONIC IN MY AREA!) and met with him. While we were sitting there, this guy came up to us and wanted to talk after he got his sandwich. When he sat down, he asked my comp to open up to Isaiah 7 and then to Matthew 1. My first thoughts were "oh crap, get ready to bash" and sure enough the guy just bashed hard on us. It seriously lasted like 20 minutes then he left to his car. Before he drove off, he yelled a few things to us. Five minutes later, he comes back up to us to apologize that we said all the stuff and then kept bashing! I was BEYOND PISSED. I only said a few sentences to him because I would've lost my temper and he wouldn't listen to us. His points were stupid and his arguments we not even valid. Oh man, it pissed me off. I had to go home to cool down.

Our dinner was with the ward clerk that I got to know better and then off to a bishopric meeting to go over the ward list. We got a list of 50 names to go see. Better get crackin' on it.

Thursday was kind of a slow day, all we did was weekly plan and tract basically. Our dinner was with the M****'s and then we had another WMP lesson with the C****. They are an interesting couple but they were fun to teach. We did though meet with another PMF and picked up the husband as a new investigator. He was taken the lessons quite a bit but hopefully he will come around.

Friday was pretty much the same as every day. We tracted and made visits. We did though, meet with one of our investigators and had a good lesson on baptism. We then got to go do some service for a family in our ward. He is moving to another ward but he needed the big guns to come help move so he called us. We went to Sonic afterwards and then called it good for a night.

Sam A***** in one of the other wards took us to Applebees for breakfast which was a fundraiser for the local high school cheerleader squad. It was a good breakfast and then we came back home and did our studies. We made more visits and then went to dinner with the San Jacinto Elders because we didn't have a dinner. It was super fun, I loved it. The family was super chill so it was fun. Our lesson with the G***** family was super fun. We tried the whole boiled egg and rubbing alcohol lesson and it blew up on us but it was still fun. We took our team-up to visit another PMF and taught the husband and the son. We want to meet the wife but we think there is something sketchy going on there so it will be interesting to see what happens.

Sunday was super fun because I got to go back to MoVal for a baptism! Church went well and we had an interesting guy come to church. When we saw Hawkins, he told him to lift up his shirt, in the foyer, and check out this "dog bite" he had. He wasn't dressed in his Sunday best and he kept going crazy. He got up over 20 times and he was crazy! So Eric S***** escorted him out and the guy told him that he is the French President and that the FBI are stalking his house. I thought he was on meth because of his pick marks on his body but apparently he was skitzo that didn't take his meds. We taught our golden investigator and he told us he wants to be baptized! Ohhhh yeah. I then left to go back to MoVal and that was awesome. I love the Samoan ward! I also got to see Anita so that was good. I met the Sisters and apparently one of them was new to the area and had heard a lot about me and she wanted to meet me. Ohhh boy. But it was good to see Coleman and McClain. I seriously miss that ward! I love all the wards I have served in.

Other than that, things are going well. I am working as hard as I can and working the hardest. I know that this is the Lords work and I love it! I am so grateful for the Atonement of Jesus Christ! Thank you for all your thoughts and prayers. I have the best family ever! Love yall :)

Elder Tonini

P.S. Look up a Fiest family in Minot! I am serving with their son!

email: May 6, 2013

Subject: Onward to Hemet!

As you have heard, I am going to Hemet to serve there for the next little while. Anita called me to tell me that she had talked to Mom and it just made me chuckle. Yes, she buys me all sorts of stuff and it drives me insane because I feel like I'll offend her if I say no. She replaced the old weight bench that I had with my weight set. I am not exactly sure how I will get that home but if we want a weight set at the house, I have one! Sounds like the move is coming up quickly! Can you make sure to take a lot of pictures and mail them to me so I can have them? One great thing is that I can think about home and not get trunkie. If y’all could do that, that would be wonderful! Ready for my week? Leggo :)

Monday we taught a less-active girl that we tracted into a while back. We are so close in getting her to come back to church. Plus, her dad's family aren’t members so that would be awesome to get them into church! They are Hispanic so the Spanish-speaking missionaries will take care of them but still, that would be ideal. We ate dinner with the H****'s and we sang happy birthday to Elder Coleman even though it wasn't his birthday. The kids think that anytime Mom makes a cake, it is someone's birthday so it turned out to be Coleman's birthday that night :). I got really close with their four-year-old son and I brought my Rubix's cube to show him. He carried that thing around all night and was really upset when his dad made him give it back to me. I had the thought to give it to him because it meant a lot more to him than me so I did. He gave me a big hug before I left. The cube is replaceable but that hug wasn't so it all paid off.

We taught LQ again on Tuesday and that lesson went well. We talked about baptism and what made the true form of baptism true. It really made me realize how grateful I am to be enlightened with the truth. She is having a hard time with some issues that we found out about later this week. I then had the craziest food experience. Have you ever heard of balut? It is a Pilipino dish that is basically a ten-day old fertilized duck egg. I ate it and boy was it gross! I got it on video so beware whenever that comes home! We stopped by Lisa and her family and had a quick lesson with them. We found out that their 19 year-old daughter is expecting her SECOND child now. Holy crap! She's not married either so that was kind of upsetting. Our lesson with a hopeful part-member family went well. They are a Samoan family that has been having some issues so we started teaching them in hopes to help them feel the Spirit again. It was a good way to end the night.

I went on exchanges with Elder Moss and we had a pretty good day. We had a lot of appointments fall through so we started to go through the unbaptized members list to try and find some part-member families. We gave a blessing to these four African-American young people in their garage and that went well. It is amazing how addictive gaming can be. Some of the kids were playing Minecraft and they told us that they could play it for four days straight. NOT COOL! Huge waste of time. We then stopped by to see Ken and have dinner with him. I love that man so much, it was super hard to say goodbye.

We had our last true ZLC on Thursday and it was always an interesting experience. I don't like the bureaucracy of the Church sometimes. The Church is true but the people aren't. We then had the most interesting lesson with LQ. We decided to teach her about repentance and that did NOT go down well. We found out her real concern: she hasn't forgiven the person that murdered her nephew over 10 years ago. She can't let go of it and she has a pure hatred for that person. So needless to say, the lesson didn't go as well as we would have hoped for but we aren't going to give up on her. The A**** family took us out to eat at Five Guys for the last time that night as well. I love that family dearly as well.

We had our usual meeting with Anita on Friday and she kept asking me if I was going or staying. I didn't have any gut feelings yet so i couldn't tell her yes or no. Our ZDM went super well, we did a really cool activity. We blindfolded the entire zone and led them into the chapel with the lights off and music playing. I then played DJ and played the clip from Finding Faith in Christ when Christ goes through the Atonement for us. I dubbed it back to some dramatic music and read from a talk about the Savior. We then had them take the blind folds off and we talked a little bit more about what the Savior did for us and how we can apply that into our missionary and personal lives. I thought it went super well. Of course, I got emotional but I have accepted the fact that I am that way. We saw Gracia again and had dinner with Anita as BJ's Brewhouse. It was super good, my last supper with sweet Anita.

Saturday was kind of a botched day with our appointments falling through again. We did though get to see another part-member family and teach them. They didn't come to church but we had a good lesson with them. Transfer calls came and I am leaving to go to Hemet in the Diamon Valley Ward. At first, I felt like I got demoted but then I slept on it and those feelings went away. It will be good for me to be a "regular" missionary. Plus it sounds like that area is dead so I will have my work cut out for me. I called Anita and she just cried and cried. I felt so bad for her... But I am needed in Hemet.

Sunday was super hard for me because I had to get up and say goodbye. That was so hard to get up and bear my testimony. I was a blubbering mess... But I got through it. I waited until the end so Jeffrey and Blake could hear it. I had so many people come up to me with tears in their eyes and give me a huge hug. This ward really felt like home. We then made visits all day and also got to see Weylen (a super famous horse trainer) start the process of breaking a Mustang. There was a film crew filming it and it will be on the air sometime later this year. They are following a couple horse trainers across the country and I got to see firsthand how it works. It was super awesome! Dinner with the R*****'s was super fun, we watched their little girl slide down the stairs in a cardboard box into her mattress. Super hilarious! I said goodbye to Ken, the Baugh's and a few other families. Brother Baugh gave me a "father's" blessing before I left so that was much needed. It was so hard to leave... I loved the people I served with and they will always have a piece of my heart.

Well, that was my week and my last chapter in Moreno Valley. I loved serving here and I am truly going to miss it. I love you y’all so much and miss the kids a ton. Love y’all and can't wait to talk to you on Mother's Day!

Elder Tonini