14 January 2013

this past week we went down to vegas twice. once on tuesday, for zone meeting and to go up to the mission office. and then again on friday for interviews with President Black. everytime we go down to vegas its at least an hour driving each way. on tuesday it was almost 2 hours each way because we had to go all the way up to the mission office. so we always carpool with the other elders who live in pahrump and we turn it into a party.

wednesday was filled with building a bunk bed and knocking on doors. nothing super out of the ordinary. we did meet an interesting man who wanted to tell us what we believe. we didnt handle the situation very well. arguing never works. which i knew. just forgot for a moment lol. so we talked to him for about half an hour in front of his house. basically it has a waste of a half an hour and nothing was accomplished. but i wont do it again, at least not for awhile lol.

on friday, before my interview with the mission president, we found out that my members that we live with will be going to arizona for a job for who knows how long. so we'll probably have to leave and move in somewhere else. im not sure what will happen, but they leave thursday lol, so im sure we'll figure out something soon.

also big news this week. randy quit smoking! although, we called us this morning and said he took 3 puffs. but he made it 4 days without any. and hes aiming to be baptized in 2 weeks. so he still can do it! i just hope hes not too disheartened. we'll talk to him later and see how hes doing.

other than that, not too much going down. transfers are next monday, i dont think anything out here in pahrump is gonna change. we'll see.

oh, and we saw 4 coyotes this morning, that was pretty cool! also cool, our water pipes froze last night so we had to go to the other elders place to shower.

i hope everyone at home is doing well! love and miss all of you!

-elder donovan

7 January 2013

another good week out here in pahrump! started the week by going to death valley. basically, we drove an hour plus to go see more desert lol. but it was a cool desert. . not very pretty, but interesting. and the weather was perfect for hiking. we went on a 4 mile hike up and down a bunch of sand dunes. another 2 miles to see a natural bridge, and then another short walk out to the badwater salt flats (lowest elevation in the hemisphere). all very cool!

the rest of our week was full of planning for lessons only to have the people cancel. we saw a lot of randy. helped him move, again. this time he lives right across the street from the church building, so thats better for all of us involved.

on thursday, another elder and i went up to vegas for an all-day leadership meeting. it was a long, slightly awkward drive, but once we made it to the meeting it was fun because all my buddies were there. they all said that the mission office has been much quieter since i havent been there lol. good times causing trouble in the mission office :) maybe thats why they sent me all the way out here.

the rest of the week was filled by doing service for the old ladies in the ward and knocking on doors. nothing too exciting there.

we'll see what the next couple of weeks bring. life is still good out here! currently i am working on running my first marathon, so i'll make sure to keep you informed on how that goes.

have a wonderful week! be good.

love,
elder donovan :)

31 December 2012

hopefully everyones christmas was great! mine was. i got to talk to my family awhile, including Bradford and Carrie, and Grandma and Grandpa, and lots of cousins, which was great!!!!!! the rest of christmas was spent by playing cards with randy (one of the people we are teaching) and then just relaxing at the other elders place. it was a good stress free day.
but it kind of messed up the week. it seems like everyone in pahrump was too busy to meet with us this week. but this coming week should be better.
tomorrow is also another "non-proselyting" day (which means we arent suppose to go out and work) (i guess to help us avoid people with new year hangovers, or something, i dont know) so i'm going to Death Valley! not sure how im getting there yet, but im gonna make it happen.

i found out today (unofficially) that my are is going to split this transfer giving me (probably) a new companion, only one ward to cover, and 6 elders total in pahrump. if it actually happens it'll be pretty cool. who knows though. the last elder who was out here told me that President Black told him thats what will happen. we'll see lol.

i hope that everyone got what they wanted for christmas! i did :)

have a wonderful week :)

love,
elder donovan :)

24 December 2012

I'm probably having the most fun I've had on my mission. its super fun to be out here working! life is good :)

Merry Christmas!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

17 December 2012

pahrump is awesome! maybe just because its not vegas, but so far im really liking it!  its small, just 3 stop lights. we live about with members who are about 5 miles away from the nearest stop light. it has rained for the past few days, and many roads are unpaved out here so we have had lots of opportunity to use the four-wheel-drive on our truck :) we teach a guy who lives in an RV and we are going to start to teach another this week, after he gets out of jail. the mountains have been covered with snow all week. people out here have all sorts of animals. pigs, horses, cows. there is even a guy who walks around town with a goat!

my companion is named Elder Corcoran. hes from Missouri and has been a missionary for 2 months now. hes half samoan and huge, so everyone one is always asking us for help moving. we did 4 in the last week!

this week we went around to everyone we could meet and offered them a christmas message. not many accepted, but it has been a good way to spend time.

our two wards seem really great. mostly nice old people. some of them are "snowbirds" from colder, more northern places.

we're going to go to Death Valley soon on a p-day, since its in our area. im excited for that!

all is great here! MERRY CHRISTMAS!

-elder donovan

10 December 2012

sorry to everyone who emailed me, i dont have time to respond to them today but i will next week!

im getting transferred to Pahrump! its west of vegas. there are only 4 elders out there. i will be the district leader over them, so no longer am i in charge of babysitting 18 missionaries. just 3 :)

i'll have more info next week. and more time.

ok, more next week! got to run.

elder donovan

4 December 2012

i reached two milestones in my mission this week :)

1. (im not sure if i told you this one yet or not) i was able to go back to my first area and see the Woods family. Brother Wood has been baptized for about 9 months now and has been progressing so well that it was time for him to become an Elder in the priesthood.  it was wonderful to see him and be able to talk with him about how his life and his marriage are so much better than they were before he was baptized. they are doing so well and it was great to see. i miss those people!

2. (im STILL debating telling you this story, but it was a big part of my week)(if you are pregnant or have a history of heart problems (or are my mother) please do not read this lol) i wa knocking on doors this week with a couple of other missionaries. as we usually do, we were taking turns every other door. it came time for a new missionary to make a contact at the next door. he was nervous to begin with, but you should have seen how nervous he was when a man threw open the door pointing a hand gun at us! (no joke) i think we all kind of stood there with shocked looks on our faces (our usual door approaches do not work in this situation lol) he stood there for probably 10-15 seconds as this man swore at us. he then slammed the door and we left the street very quickly! the ironic thing was that just a few dors before we talked to a nice man that told us we would probably have some luck because this was a "very nice peaceful street". not quite. we wanted to go back and warn him about his crazy neighbor lol. but dont worry! this was the first and probably last time this will happen. my area is a very nice part of town.


in other news, the girl in the samoan ward that we thought was ready to have us teach her is in fact not ready. since everyone in that ward is related we get different stories from all her aunts.

transfers are a week from today, so i will get a new companion then and we will no longer be in a trio. that will be very nice. trios are inefficient.

thats all ive got this week. hopefully all is well with everyone! 22 days till christmas :)

love,
elder donovan