Summerfield!

Elders Huff and Murray

So Summerfield is a little suburb of Greensboro in the Northwest area of NC. It's kinda a more rich area than Concord and there are also a lot of apartment complexes. Work is pretty slow here, but I'll have to see if I can help speed it up. Well, this week has been super crazy and weird. 

So Monday morning (I have a hard time believing that that was only a week ago) we got transfer calls. That morning all I did was pack  Then we went shopping, I of course didn't buy anything, then for the last time the district Elders went to Taco Bell together. *sad face*. We then went to the church, played volley pong for the last time, shot off a few emails, then went to our dinner appointment. We had Papa John's pizza with the Dicksons and they were super surprised that I was taking off. We then went and saw Homer, and said goodbye to him. I'll miss Homer a lot and I sure love him to death. Then, we went to the Brown's and read the scriptures with them. I gave Nicole the Book of Mormon that my awesome family wrote their testimonies in and she and Ben were super happy about it. Thanks for that Book of Mormon, I wish I had a million of those, hint hint. *winky face* We then went home, signed each other's ties, and I signed the Concord Cheetah, Charles. 

The next morning, we got up, studied, then went to the Kannapolis building. Elder Nelson got his new companion, Elder Norconk, then we said a quick goodbye and he took off. *sad face* I'll miss Elder Nelson a lot... Elder Washburn then got his new companion and took off after saying goodbye. Elder Christensen and I then played horse together with some dude until Brother Wooten from the Summerfield ward came and picked me up. Then I left the area I loved so much. *sad face* We then drove the hour or so long drive up to Greensboro and Brother Wooten and I chatted it up. It was weird not being with another missionary. We went to his favorite burger spot for lunch and then he dropped me off at my new apartment. I then met Elder Murray, who is pretty cool and pretty hyper at times like me. I am now in a very similar position as my first area. I am companions to a relatively new district leader. Both Elder Nelson and now Elder Murray have only been here one transfer and they don't know the area very well at all. It's weird how similar the circumstances in the ward and missionary work are in both my arrivals in my areas (hopefully that made sense). We are on a trishare car thingy again like Concord. We have the car two weeks and then we don't for a week. I was fortunate enough to come to Summerfield on bike week. Then it stormed. 

We got an email Thursday morning that said that a storm was coming and we shouldn't drive or ride our bicycles during the storm. So Friday the storm came, and honestly, it really wasn't that bad. The way the people here were and still are freaking out about it I thought it would be a little more fierce, but we maybe got a foot of snow...*confused face*. Don't get me wrong, it sure was an inconvenience. We had to walk everywhere this week and my legs are so sore. On Friday we walked a total of about 10 miles and were walking for about 4 hours. We went to an appointment and had to walk 1 ½ hours to get there and the same amount of time back. It was crazy. Everything shut down and it was like a ghost town. I was bored along the walk so I took some videos. They are kinda

dumb, but just keep in mind, I had been walking for so long I had to try and make things exciting. We walked all day Saturday and Sunday too. I am pretty beat. I can't wait to get the car today and for the

snow to melt. It barely can be called snow either. It is mostly ice that just accumulated and looks like snow. Now I know what it means when Utah says it has the greatest snow on earth. So the snow was fun for a while, but now I am sick of it. There are still a lot of people that haven't even left their houses since Friday. We have helped a lot of people get unstuck from the snow as well. What a Utah boy and Rexburg boy know how to do is getting out of the snow. People here freak out when they get stuck. They just floor the gas and burn all the rubber off the tires. The only reason that this storm is so

dangerous is because the people in NC freak out whenever they see snow. We were at a member's house on Wednesday and there were a few little flurries going on outside, nothing big at all. It wasn't

sticking to anything, and the member kept looking out the window and saying things like, "Oh, my goodness, I wonder if the plows are out yet." And, "I could call someone to give you guys a ride, I don't want y'all to be snowed in." It did start to pick up on the way home on or bikes, but it really was nothing big at all. Church was even cancelled! *surprised face* So President authorized us to have the sacrament in our apartments. 

We have only had one dinner appointment this whole week, so hopefully this next week will be better and I'll be able to meet more members. I maybe know five people in the ward right now. We had a missionary general broadcast on Wednesday and that was very good. Elder Anderson, Elder Oaks, Elder Clayton, Elder Bednar, and some other people spoke about the fundamentals of missionary work. They had a lot of good insights and practices we can implement. 

Now I am officially not being trained and I am eligible to be a trainer now, though I doubt I will be one anytime soon. I don't really want to be one anyways.  

I did not get Marieta's package before I left Concord...I probably won't get it for a couple months. It'll show up at Concord, then they'll wait until they go to the mission office, then they might remember to take it, then I'll have to wait till we go to the office, and hopefully I'll remember it and pick it up. Tell Marieta thank you for me anyways. It's awesome that they're thinking of me. 

Well, I love y'all, hope everything's going well. Go Panthers!

Homer & Elder Huff say goodbye

Elder Huff with Homer's cat, Puff . . .
HUFF and PUFF

Everyone had to get their bread for the storm. Everything was in full stock, except for milk and bread.

Transferred!!

What the heck!!! So we got transfer calls this morning and I'm taking off to Summerfield, while Elder Nelson is staying! What the waka! I'm not really happy about being transferred but it'll all be okay. I am going to Summerfield, up by Greensboro. I am going to be companions with Elder Murray, who is (not surprising), the district leader in the district. I think I'm destined to be the district monkey for the rest of the mission (district leader's companion). Oh well, everything will be okay I guess. I'm just not that happy that they were late for transfer call and did it Monday morning instead of Saturday night, so I wasn't able to say good bye to the members in the ward. 😰 But I'll be able to say goodbye to some good friends though. Oh well. We had a pretty good week anyways. We started the week off with an exchange. I went to Kannapolis with Elder Washburn and we had a pretty good time. Wednesday we had what I though was a pretty good  correlation meeting. Sorry I didn't write a longer email this week but I am busy saying goodbye to people. Love y'all. I'll send my new address next Monday.

Elder Lane

Farewell Lunch -- Elders Huff, Christensen, Washburn & Nelson

Three Months of Greatness

Elders Huff & Nelson

So just this last Thursday marked my three month mark in the mission. It really isn't that long but it feels like an eternity. Everyone always says that the mission goes by so quick, and I've noticed that only the people that have come home from their mission say that. I'm not saying that I don't like my mission and that it hasn't been a great experience, I'm just saying these past three months seem like a year. I've learned so much and gained so much (including a bit of weight, but don't worry, this week I've started to lose some weight, I'm working on it #lotsofbananasandcuties). 

This week was pretty good. I can't really remember much, but that's probably the result of working so hard. Tuesday we set a baptismal date with a lady named Anette, and on Wednesday, Elder Moutz and I (we were on exchanges) set a baptismal date with Fabian and Joanna. We have no problem setting baptismal dates with people, but we can never seem to get them baptized! Since I've been in Concord, we have probably set about fifteen baptismal dates and guess how many of those have actually been baptized...You guessed right, zero, none, nada, zip, zilch! It's kinda driving me a little nuts. What are we doing wrong? We just got to keep working and maybe one day we'll figure it out. 

I had an awesome exchange with Elder Moutz this week and even though I am continuously feeling like I'm being judged by a zone leader, we had a lot of fun. The zone leaders came to our district meeting and we exchanged afterwards. Friday Brother Larson, who just got back from a mission in the Dakotas with his wife, took us to go see some people and afterwards we were driving back to our apartment when we suddenly heard a loud BANG! Someone in a school bus that had just drove by threw a full water bottle and it hit the windshield of the car. Brother Larson (who has been bishop, stake president, patriarch, and has served three missions) swore, flipped the car around and chased the bus down and went in and yelled at the kids in it. It was a pretty serious situation, but I have to admit, Elder Nelson and I had a pretty good laugh afterwards. High schoolers are just dumb . . . sometimes I forget I was one less than a year ago. 

Saturday was service day. We got up and went and helped a family move because there was so much black mold that had taken over the house. We had a lot of fun there and afterwards Brother Espinal took us to Harris Teeter for some delicious sub sandwiches. When we got home, we biked to Brother Watson's (our ward mission leader) new drivers Ed office, WatsOnWheels, and helped him paint it. We brought an investigator named Price. He's a very interesting fellow who's basically homeless (we seem to get a lot of those) and has lost almost everything. He's pretty notorious throughout Concord as a protester and trespasser so whenever we mention him in the ward people warn us of him. As if we didn't already know. He's calmed down in his old age and he really isn't a bad dude. He is super humble and loves the message we share. I just wish that when we would bring him to church that people would actually talk to him. They just assume he's crazy and won't even talk to him. All the people that have been able to have a conversation with him admit he's really not a bad guy, but everyone else judges him and even us for bringing him to church. It kinda makes me a little sick. We have a great ward and I dearly love everyone in it, but I wish some people were just a little more missionary minded. We're working on it. But anyway, we brought Price to help us paint (he's painted all his life and he's really good at it) and he helped us out a lot. We were all pretty amazed at how fast and efficiently he was able to do it. We had to leave to get to an appointment, but Price decided to stay and he helped them finish up the whole job. We were impressed. Here he is, basically owning nothing, spending half the day doing service for someone he doesn't even know very well. He has come a long way since we have started to teach him and I see a good life ahead for him. His political views might be a little different than other people, and he had a pretty rough past, but he can start again if he chooses to accept Christ.  This gospel is amazing and truly the best way to go. I've seen it bless so many lives and I see it more and more each day. I keep thinking to myself. How can this not be Christ's true church? How could this church's fruit not show that it is a good tree? I never realized how much I needed to increase my faith until I came out here. So many things go wrong out here it's hard for me to stay positive and strengthen my faith, but I just need to keep looking at the great things that I have seen. Missionary work is tough but it is well worth it. 

Yesterday was pretty good too. We had a pretty good church and we got to meet a new family in the ward and had a good pot roast dinner. We went to the Browns and little Jonathan brought me up to date on the whole playoff picture and how the Packers are making it to divisionals. Well hope everything's going well at home and wherever your adventures take you. Love y'all. Talk to y'all next week. 

Shady District

Happy New Year!

This week was pretty good, and pretty busy...and weird. So we started off this week with looking for former investigators on Tuesday. There were two on a single street so we decided to check them out. It turns out they were both dead...kinda creepy. They both died pretty recently, too.

Wednesday was okay, I went on exchanges with Elder Christensen in Kannapolis. It was super rainy that day and we had to get rides because of course it was bike week for them. While we were waiting for a ride we went out and played a little in the rain.

Thursday we went down to Charlotte for a zone conference which went from 9:00 to 4:00. So long. By the time we got home and ate dinner, we couldn't go out anymore, because Charlotte people go crazy on New Year's. We had to stay inside starting at six. We live in a retirement community and we could still hear people yelling outside and getting drunk. We planned and then played Apples to Apples with the district over Skype, which kinda worked out. We then finished the night by watching the Testaments.

The next morning we went to zone meeting! Two long meetings right in a row! Eesh! While driving down to Charlotte, we saw so many cars off the side of the road. A lot of them had crashed into something. We probably saw 15 cars like that. People really party it up in Charlotte I guess. We had a good zone meeting and we had a fun district lunch afterwards. Pretty good week.

We had a mission wide fast yesterday, and while we were fasting I guess I got sick so that stunk. I was feeling lousy and I was hungry, but I made it! Still feeling some effects today, but I'll get better. This week hasn't been too effective, because we had so many meetings and everybody was busy. We haven't really been able to talk to many people like Paul and the clan.

Yesterday, though was a mess as well. We had fast and testimony meeting and a crazy lady got up at the beginning and talked about her life story and her Christmas break and how she liked it and didn't as well, yadayadayada. She was up there for 20 FLIPPIN' MINUTES!!!!! During her testimony, all of our investigators stood up and left! Including the Concord sisters' investigators. Only Nicole stayed. Good ol' reliable Nicole. Yikes. It was a mess. The bishop had to go up and tell her to stop. Oh well.

It's gotten a little colder here now, and I get to wear all my sweaters now so I am excited. To tell ya the truth, I was getting a little sick of all the warm weather. Well, everything is going well in Concord and we are meeting a lot of interesting people. Hope everything's going well back at home. Love ya!

The District

I found a Green Bay fan!

Moving on

This week was a pretty busy but great week. Last Monday started with Elder Nelson getting his stomach scoped with a camera down his throat to figure out what is wrong with him. No results came back. Bittersweet because it's good he doesn't have an ulcer or something nasty, but now we don't know what to do to treat it...oh well. I guess he'll just have to keep on keeping on. He's pretty good at managing it so it's not too big of a deal. 

Tuesday we went to a mission Christmas party/long meeting. Elder Nelson had a good time catching up with old friends while I just ate good food all alone...no, I got to say hi to some old MTC friends; Elder Buffaloe, Sister Beal, and Sister Valentine. We had a good time and I got the package my parents sent to the mission home. I had such a great Christmas! I got so many fun packages and letters from so many people it made me soooooo happy! Thank you so much!! It's not very easy being away from home for Christmas but things like that just make it so much easier. 

Christmas Day we had a brunch at the Dickson's (who have four HUGE dogs!), where Elder Nelson called his huge family. They got us a lot of little gifts and a NC T-shirt. So nice! We then visited Homer and then the Mooneys. We then visited the Dickinsons and we got to try out the Swagway that Clair got for Christmas, it was not very easy, and very wobbly. 

They offered us raw oysters but we declined because I remember how much my dad hated them on his mission, and I wasn't very hungry anyways. We then spent the rest of the night with the Eskelson's. We had a lot of fun chatting and eating and playing Mexican train dominos. I got to Skype my family which is the best! I got some good gifts for Christmas too. I got some sweaters and I wish I could wear them, but it is so blasted warm down here! Whoever heard of 70 degree temperatures the entire week of Christmas! It's throwing me off. Don't get me wrong, it's been nice, but I am really looking forward to some chillier weather and maybe to actually use the furnace in January. 

Carolina lost yesterday...pretty sad, but I can't believe the Falcons were the ones to break their winning streak. Weird. I can see Drew reading this email and laughing because he loves the Falcons and I would always tell him the Falcons aren't the best. 😅 Miss ya Elder Merrill! 

Well anyway, in other news...we got our car stuck in a ditch twice this week, well let me rephrase that, Elder Nelson got our car stuck in the ditch twice this week. That's what happens when there is a rule that to reverse the passenger has to get out of the car and back the driver up. We try some crazy U-turns. I'll show y'all some pictures. Hey, we got out of both of them though without any car damage! Not bad, not bad at all. I might have gotten a little muddy though from one of them. 

Well, we've had a really good, warm, Christmas week and we are looking forward to the new year. I love y'all! Thanks so much for everything you do for me! Peace out! ☮✌🏻

P.S. Oh, I forgot, The day after Christmas the district set off sky lanterns and then
went caroling to an old folks home. It was pretty fun.

Christmas

It was fun to talk to Elder Huff for Christmas.  We also got to 'meet' his companion.  Logan sounds great and seems very happy.  He is eating well (has gained 15 pounds), and teaching many.  We love him.

Good tidings to you!

Hey y'all! How's everything doing this wonderful Christmas season? Everything is going splendidly here in the thriving metropolis of Concord. This week was really was really fun and this upcoming week is going to be good too, I can just tell. Bike week started this Wednesday, and of course, it conveniently got chilly. Not super cold, but uncomfortably chilly. Elder Nelson was kinda freaking out about how cold it was, the lowest it ever got was the upper twenties, and that was when we were in bed sleeping. The coldest it got when we were out was the low 40's so it wasn't that bad. Elder Nelson is a St. George boy so he's weak when it comes to the cold. But everything's fine, as soon as we get the car back (of course), it's supposed to get back into the seventies for Christmas Eve and Day and for a week so we're excited. 

This week was pretty exciting, we got four 16 year olds on date. I don't know how solid they are but they seem pretty pumped. A month ago we went looking for a former investigator, and the person that answered the door was a kid named Caleb (not the former). We talked to him and he seemed accepting so we set a return appointment, but we were never able to get in contact with him for a while. We decided to just stop by and we met Paul, who also seemed excited for our message and set a return appointment for us. We went to the appointment and Paul and Caleb were there. So was Paul's sister, Alice. We taught all three of them and set another return appointment. When we showed up to that, Paul had decided to bring another friend along, Noah, and we had an amazing lesson with them and then we set baptismal dates with all four of them. I think Paul is the most excited and we really hope at least he will get baptized. It's pretty exciting. 

The Kannapolis Elders had a baptism on Saturday that we were able to attend with two investigators, Tay and Ella. We were super happy that they were there. We've always been able to get in contact and have lessons with Tay, but Ella is a different story. We haven't been able to talk to her in over a month. We brought Tay with Brother Halvorsen, and when we got there, we found Ella there! I guess she and Angie (the one that got baptized) are good friends and Angie picked Ella up. So we were super happy. We also got the whole family (Homer{Recent Convert}, Ella{Homer's wife}, Tay{Ella's son}, and Pie{Ella's granddaughter}) to church! And they really liked it! The
baptism went pretty well. Elder Nelson and I aren't very good witnesses. So when Elder Christensen was baptizing Angie, her foot popped out of the water. The water was so cold that right after Angie came up, she ran up the stairs into the bathroom. Elder Nelson didn't see the foot come out, but I did, but I guess I wasn't fast or loud enough at telling everybody that Angie's foot came out of the water, so we had to get Angie back in the cold water and do it again. But, after, Ella said, "It better not be that cold when I get baptized." Which got us excited. Afterwards we went out with Brother Halvorsen and he took us out to Pizza Hut, which was really good for Tay, because he doesn't get out much because he's wheelchair bound for awhile. We really appreciate the people that do so much for us in this ward, though yesterday at church they made things a little difficult. 

So a couple Saturdays ago, we met this guy named Pryce, who is a really skilled painter. He had just lost everything when his trailer with all of his belongings caught on fire. He didn't have it insured so he was left with only the clothes on his back. He seemed like a super nice, humble guy, so we invited him to church and he said he would love to come. Well, I guess that was a bad idea, because when we picked him up the member who was driving, who is a super nice older guy, told us that guy is crazy and we shouldn't have invited him to church. So the ride to church was super awkward. We then got to church and during the course of the three hours I had five ward members come up to us and say stuff like, "You brought THAT guy!?!" or, "You know that guy's like a time bomb just waiting to go off." So basically all through church I was stressing about if he was going to blow up or something, but he was pretty calm. Oh well. We had a guy sing O Holy Night, but I don't think he did as well as Chris Roper. 😏 

Well, anyways, how about those Panthers? 14-0 now. Pretty exciting. Well, I'm glad to hear that Star Wars didn't disappoint. There is a lot of hype round here about it. I can't wait to see it when I get home. 

Well, as I am writing this we are waiting in the waiting room of a digestive health center. Elder Nelson is going to get a camera down his throat. He's been having some stomach problems and he hasn't been able to eat much lately so we are excited to figure out how to fix it. 

I haven't really played the piano much yet in the field. I played a lot in the MTC, but there are a lot of people in the mission that can, so I haven't really had the need to. I play occasionally in district
meeting, but that's about it. 

I'll be singing tomorrow. We're going to go caroling tomorrow night with some members of the ward and the Concord sisters. Well, I love y'all and hope everything is going well. Talk to ya later!