PIVOT! PIVOT!

Hey everyone! Sorry I didn't email on my first P-Day, there was so much stuff to take care of, and I was just so busy, I was lucky to even email the mission president, but I'll sum it all up in this email!

This past week and a half has been such a whirlwind. The work is taxing but still fun at the same time. Lugging the bags and leaving the MTC was a little sad and missing home a little and other things made it a little hard inside, but that sadness left when I realized what I was leaving to go do I had to leave at 3:50 in the morning so that was fun...... not. Before my companion was out of sight I shouted: "HURRAH FOR ISRAEL!!" at 3:50 in the morning. At the airport checking in I sotra... forgot my boarding pass. It was ok though because I got it a little while later. When I was on the plane taking off, time seemed to stand still. As we were taking off I thought to myself: "Wow, I'm going into the mission field. I have always wondered what it would feel like on the departing flight, but man, I've never been more anxious in my life." Before we left the MTC, my teacher brother Woodbrey shared the last 15 minutes of an MTC talk with us by elder Holland called "Feed my Sheep". Basically elder Holland shared the story of the apostles after Christ died. They didn't know what to do, so Peter suggested that they return to fishing, and they did. They eventually met the resurrected Savior on the shore of Galilee, and He asked Peter three times: "Peter, do you love me?" And three times, Peter said yes. And Jesus then said to him basically: "If you really love me, then feed my sheep! I have asked you before to leave your nets, I'm asking you again, and I'm not gonna ask you a third time! When I asked you to be an apostle, to be a missionary, it was forever!" I love that talk and listen to that portion every single day. When I was taking off, I thought: "Peter, you can't go back." So I'm not gonna go back until my two year portion of the work is done. When we landed and got our bags, we met President Ames, who is the best mission president hands down, and we went to      Liberty Jail. It was a nice spiritual experience before we got to the mission home. They went over the rules for hours and I about fell asleep. I met my companion Elder Montoya the next day and bruh he is so awesome, he has made such a good trainer! His name is Elder Montoya, prepare to be baptized. He also used to watch The Office before we laugh so we always talk about that

To sum up last week, I got right into the work. It was pretty exhausting with biking walking driving and approaching strangers. From it all, we put two people on date for baptisms!! I'm so so happy because our area hasn't had baptism in two years. Margaret had to have her date pushed up because we are trying to get her to stop drinking tea, and she is weening herself off of it. Like last week she was drinking five cups a day but now she's drinking two. The next one is Henser and he only speaks Spanish.  Luckily my companion speaks Spanish as well haha. He lost his phone so now we have no way to contact him, but he usually shows up at church. P day 1 was pretty fun, I got some ingredients to make spaghetti and eggs and I made breakfast and dinner for my companion, it was pretty fun. We played volleyball for hours hahaha and today for p day we played basketball and I found out I suck at it.

We had exchanges, and I went With Elder Murdock. We had like three service projects we did. First we helped a family in the other ward, the Holleys, move in. That was actually pretty fun! We were loading things up the stairs, and as I was helping the guys bring a mattress up the stairs I shouted "PIVOT! PIVOT!" (Those who have watched Friends will understand the reference). probably not the wisest idea because we laughed so hard we almost dropped the mattress. Next we helped an older woman reposition a garden gate, and then we got someone's mail (they were physically unable) and swept their porch.

When we went shopping, we bought this watermelon and we were gonna eat it, but then we took it to Elder Mortensen and Elder Murdock's apartment and did something else with it. Elder Montoya bought a Bang energy drink, and we decided to mis the drink with the watermelon. We figured that if we turned the drink upside down and set it on the red part of the watermelon that we cut out, we would sort of infuse the drink with the watermelon and then it would be lemon flavored. Long story short what it ended up being was a hole in the watermelon filled with this energy drink, kind of like how ocean water gathers in a hole you dug in the sand. Mortensen and Murdock didn't want it and so we just had this watermelon in our fridge the whole week, and my companion would just eat from it like a bowl with a spoon throughout the week and when he finally finished the thing yesterday he scooped everything out and made a hat.

I finally got to see fireflies! For those of you who don't know why I'm saying this, it's because I used to live in Indiana, and we'd get those all the time,  but for the last ten years I've been living in Nevada, so I haven't seen them in so long, so it was nostalgic for me. 

You run into all kinds of people on the street, Oh gosh. Just yesterday we stopped a guy and asked how he was doing, and he asked of we were part of the cast of the Book of Mormon SMH. then when we said we weren't he said that we were hot enough to be in the cast and so we looked at each other when he said some other stuff and... needless to say he wasn't going to be a member anytime soon so we quickly bid him a nice day. 

Still in Overland Park, Kansas! We met some amazing families, and I am starting to get to know everyone's names haha, we met this awesome family the Moons, and they're so awesome! Bruh there was a fly in the house and the kids started screaming, it was such a fun dinner. We met a lot of other families too, and I'm getting used to doing lessons-- sorry, SHARING MESSAGES little by little.  We went to a family who made this amazing dinner, it was like ham and melted cheese inside a crepe and it was tipped with a homemade sauce, it was absolutely fire. I'm gonna send the recipe for the sauce to my mom I want them to try it. 

There is another awesome family, the Toblers, their oldest son Duke was baptized on Saturday!! It was amazing to watch it it was one of the most spiritual moments on my mission,  and I smiled the while time.

Well that was my last week and a half! Good job if you've read up to here. sending prayers your guys' way!