Here Comes The Sun!

My fellow Americans,

    This week was the bomb! Yesterday I felt the warmest weather in
almost 6 months. It was 22 degrees outside! That's 70 F! Needless to
say we spent our Pday outdoors playing ultimate frisbee it was
wondrous. Maybe if I say my prayers every night it'll happen again.
    This week we had 2 count them TWO discussions! Haha it was
glorious. We've been teaching a girl named Jamie and she's solid. Her
friend's in our ward and she's been coming with him for probably
around 3 months now. As long as I've been in the area, at least. She
was scared off by the previous missionaries, but since Elder Fifita
and I are too cool for school, she accepted our invitation to take the
discussions. Haha just kidding we're the two biggest goobers in the
mission, but we've been working for a long time try and make her feel
comfortable with us and help her realized we're normal people
underneath the suits. So we taught her the first lesson last week and
the second lesson yesterday. It went really well and she accepted the
invitation to be baptized! So that's sweet. We left the date to them
though so they'll get back to us soon. We also met with Scott, the
other member referral. He's in his early 20's and has two kids. He
really wants to change his life but he's afraid to start because he
knows it'll be a big process. So we've been teaching him and trying to
help him have the confidence in himself to change. Good stuff! We've
been really blessed the past couple of weeks it's been awesome. Summer
is a good time to be a missionary!
    Elder Fifita is almost better! I don't care if I jinx it I give
up haha. It's awesome though. transfers are next week and I can
honestly say I'll be sad if he gets transferred. It's taken quite
awhile to get used to each other but right now it's the best it's
been. I've really grown to love him and he's taught me a ton. Who
knows though! It's not unheard of for someone to stay in an area for 5
transfers and serve with the same companion for 3. So he could stay,
we'll see!
    We did a lot of service this week! One of the less-active members
in our ward works out on a farm, and so we went out twice this week to
help him. The first day we dug post holes put up a fence for the
horses. It was hard work! They were super basic fences, but it took
forever to put up the wiring around it. It was fun though it was good
to get outside. The second day we helped him chop wood. He always has
a ton of wood in front of his house and it honestly looks like it came
right out of the forest. We asked him where he got it and he said
"wherever." Haha we have our suspicions. Anyways so he chopped it all
up with a chainsaw and Elder Fifita split it all. I've never seen
someone split wood like him. The man's a power house it was crazy! He
did it a lot back home I guess. Afterwards we had a fire and roasted
marshmallows it was sweet! I miss camping.
    That's too bad that President Dalton's getting released. But he's
been in there since before I was born I'm sure! Interviews with him
were always amazing. Maybe he'll go to Nursery like President
Duncombe! :)
    Well that's pretty much all I've got for this week. Have
yourselves a good week! But don't have too much fun without me.

Love you guys,

Elder Read

PS tell Grandma Read I've gotten the two letters she's written. I'm
sending my reply off tomorrow. She's the best!

More Snow!

Hello Mother Read!

    This week was a nifty little experience! But I'll get to that
later. It sounds like you guys had an eventful week! Sorry to hear
Calista isn't a pageant queen, but from the sound of it I don't think
she's too devastated! Mom that's sweet that you got to see all of your
siblings! Yeah send me that picture of all of you! I'm glad you guys
had fun though.

    Winter did indeed return to the Great White North. I'm soooo done
with snow! I'm ready to come back to Oregon and drown in the rain. At
least it goes away after awhile and doesn't linger like a sore back!
Actually the snow melted again by mid week and then it started to
rain! :) I was dancing like wild man I loved it! I miss the rain it
reminded me of home. Elder Fifita......is sick again! Hahaha I knew if
I said something I'd jinx it! We aren't sure what he has but it's
taken off it's jacket and set up a cabin. Haha I'm convinced I'll
never see him healthy. Transfers are in two weeks (May 2) and chances
are I'll get someone else. Oh well, he's handled it pretty well all
things considered. I would still be in bed if it was me. He's always
hacking up his lung and he sounds like a chain smoker! Hopefully he'll
get better soon. But I won't get too excited :)

    Hey Mom thanks for the package I got it yesterday! Hahaha those
clothes are all small though. But I'm determined to fit back into
them! :) Good thing all my suit pants are expandable waists haha. When
I was with Elder Merrell he hit his original weight and he gained 30
pounds in 6 months hahaha. So there's hope my friends! I have yet to
pass 20. We literally get fed every time we stop by a member's house.
I'm ready to start pulling my "I can't I'm diabetic" card. But I hate
that, so we'll see. Moral of the story: Go somewhere where you eat
tree bark.

    So we taught two discussions this week. It was awesome it's been
too long. One we taught on Sunday, and it was a referral from a member
we got last week. The guy really enjoyed it and the spirit was strong.
After the lesson he asked us when we could meet again so we're gonna
meet again on Sunday. The other one was another member referral. She's
been coming to church for a couple of months and she was taught the
first discussion awhile back but was scared off for whatever reason.
We've been talking to her and trying to build her trust for a long
time though, and he lesson went really well. We feel like she's
comfortable with us and she understands we're normal people haha.
We're meeting with her next week too. The less-active family that came
to church last week skipped out this week! So we're gonna stop by
today and find out why. It was a good week though. Keep our
investigators in your prayers!

    That's all I've got this week. Not too much to report on, but in
other news I've been working on the same Sudoku puzzle every night for
the past 3 days. It's a doozy I can't figure it out! Anywho, have a
good week and be smart!


Love you guys,

Elder Steven

It's April 10th!

Creative title I know. I'm running out of clever things to say!

    This is getting ridiculous. I just deleted the email AGAIN! So
here goes my attempt to remember what I typed haha.

    Mom you were released!? That's super crazy I feel like you were
just put in the Young Womens! The Nursery is sweet though, I hope you
know how much the girls loved you in Young Womens though. I heard it
from them more times than you'd believe! Man I love the sacrament
meetings when everything changes! Branden Driver's the man I'm not
surprised he's in the Bishopric. What happened to Bro. Worsley and
Anderson?
 
Easter was sweet! The Bergers, the less-active part-member family
we've been working with since I got here came to church for the first
time in years! It was awesome to see them. We've been stressing that
we won't baptize her son until they've become active again, and it's
starting to seem like they're sincere in there desire to come back. It
was great. One of the members in our ward had a friend that we're
gonna teach next Monday too, so we're excited. It's cool the see the
work slowly start to pick up.
 
Easter dinner was at the Simmon's it was awesome. I love ham no
matter how many times I've eaten it! Afterwards we stopped by a
less-active family and they fed us cake. The past 3 times we've gone
over there they've been in the middle of some celebration and are
eating cake. It's getting ridiculous haha.
 
Elder Fifita is starting to get better! If all goes well we'll be
at full-strength this week. I'm starting to get superstitious though
haha. Every time I talk about him getting better he gets worse. So as
far as you're all concerned he's been in the hospital for 3 days and
isn't expected to recover haha.
 
The weather here is beautiful! It's almost 15 C outside and I'm
in short sleeves! Warm weather makes me trunky though. All I think
about is hiking back home and playing basketball after work! But
proselyting is a million times better in warm weather so that's good!
 
We went on exchanges with the zone leaders this week. I was with
Elder Morely, he's an awesome guy and he's my age! So of course we
acted accordingly. He taught me how to rip phone books in half, so at
the end of the day we spent the rest of the night ripping phone book
after phone book apart! The other zone leader taught Elder Fifita the
same thing so when we got back together we did the same thing! Kids
these days.
 
So yeah! It's been a good week. Thanks for sending all of the
stuff mom! I haven't gotten it yet but I'm sure it'll come soon. Have
fun in Utah, I love roadtrips I wish I could go too! Do work family!

Love you guys,

Elder Read

Weekly Report from Canada

Hello family of mine,

    This week was pretty solid. Tuesday night a member called and
asked us to come over and help them paint their house, so we went over
Wednesday morning, and worked from 10am until 3pm. It was brutal, I
strongly dislike painting haha. But we did it anyway, and I got paint
pretty much everywhere except the walls. Little did I know that primer
can come off in the wash, though, so some of my darks have little
white spots on them. When will I learn! Elder Fifita was given the job
of sanding the walls, and they didn't give him a mask or anything, and
he was still borderline sick. So after he was finished he got all
congested and it set his cold off again. He's starting to lose his
voice and he's even worse now than he was 6 weeks ago. So we went to
the doctor on Thursday night and they told him he has Bronchitis and
gave him a bunch of prescriptions. Hopefully they work haha he's a
little ornery when he's sick :) I still have yet to see a healthy
Elder Fifita!

    General Conference was awesome! Sunday Morning session was sweet.
I liked Elder Hallstrom's talk on how there's a difference between the
Gospel and the Church, and President Eyring's talk on Adversity. We
watched 4/5 sessions at the church, and then a member invited us over
for lunch Sunday afternoon so wewatched the Sunday Afternoon session
over tehre. Conference is the best, and it always comes right when I
need it too. I also liked President Uchtdorf's talk where he quoted
the bumper sticker "Don't judge me because I sin differently than you
do" hahaha everyone's quoting that! "Stop it" is another commonly
quoted phrase too :)

    It snowed again on Sunday, but then it melted by dinner. The
weather's getting warmer and warmer. We're now usually sitting at
about 12 C. I love the warm weather, it's glorious. Yeah Dad you
better believe we took those jackets off! We just wear a coat over our
shirt and ties :)

    So I went to put on my slacks the other day and they are a little
tight :) Mannnnnn! This week they made us relinquish our gym key
because we're too loud in the morning. Which makes no sense because I
ride the dinky little exercise bike in there and Fifita sleeps on the
workout bench haha. Oh well, we still have the exercise bike that we
found in the city :)

    We're hoping to start teaching a less active family in our ward
this week. Their son is 12 and told his mom he wants to start coming
to church and get baptized. So we went over last week and set up a
time to teach him the discussions. Missionaries have tried in the past
though, and nothing really happened. So we're hoping for a different
outcome this time around! Members here are awesome and are still
working with their friends. Hopefully when Summer rolls around things
will be going well.

    Alright that's all I've got today, not too much to report this
week. Have yourselves a good week and I'll talk to you next week!

Love you guys,

Elder Read