Monday, November 21, 2011

Letter home 112111

well it is nice to here from you grandma siiro, im glad that you were able to get a lap top thats pretty cool. i hope your doing well and i cant wait to get home and see your new teeth haha, love you lots.
we had a good week, a lot of stuff happened and i hope i can remember it all cause i forgot to write it down. i guess ill just start from last monday and also ill tell you more about elder rasmussen he is soo funny hehe hes awesome, hes still brand new kinda, im his second companion. he is from preston idaho and he went to preston high school so that is cool cause thats where napoleon dynamite was filmed and also isnt that where sister thurston is from? we had dinner with the mcdonalds on monday night and brother mcdonald was talking about his job and how he works in construction, and so i told him how i worked for jon peterson and did stuff and he said "i know jon peterson" and i was like whatttt!? hes from chicago and went to byu, that jon peterson? yep we had some classes together and im friends with him on facebook so ill ask him if its the right jon peterson, but i haven't heard back from him yet so maybe you could ask jon hahaha that would be sooo crazy. Then later on in the week we were tracting in lake carolina which is like aviano but like 5 times bigger and lake carolina is no soliciting but since we arent soliciting its ok but the security people drove up to us and said you cant solicit and we were like we arent, we are prosalyting its different and we have a license to do it but then she was like no in lake carolina soliciting is anything door to door even just handing out flyers, and i told her that the church even came out to the police department and talked to them and won, but its ok cause we still go back and tract. Then we were in a different neighborhood and met a guy who is a mason and we talked about how joseph smith was a mason and also got into some pretty deep doctrine talk haha and he was cool with it he brought it up and agreed with us and we started talking about the stars and the universe and all that haha it was crazy ive never talked about that stuff with someone tracting before. Then on saturday we went to a lesson with a 28 year old lady named lakyra who is our best investigator and we taught her the plan of salvation and she told us about how her mom just got diagnosed with breast cancer and so it was awesome cause we covered so many topics and related it all back to the plan of salvation and she had lots of questions that we answered and everything made sense and she loved it all, the lesson was like an hour and a half long, she couldnt come to church though but thats ok. also later in the day we stopped by a lead named erica wineglass and invited her to church cause she said she wanted to come last week but was sick. then at church we walked into the chapel and she is sitting there with one of our members and they have already become like good friends and there daughters are the same age so it was like perfect cause we didn't have to do anything she just actually came to church. we haven't been able to get someone to church in forever, so i was soo happy. we went on exchanges with elder law and elder linford this week from 6-9 on saturday and then they are coming all day on Wednesday so gonna be sweet. we have thanksgiving lunch at 3 with a single lady from the ward who is having her family in town so she invited us to go over cause we couldn't normally go over and plus she lives super far away, ive never really met her before but it should be good, then we might go over to a cool family in our ward the reays for dinner at like 5:30 hahaha so i might feel a little bloated that night. and we are playing in the turkey bowl on saturday, they arent doing it on thursday cause nobody will be here so its all good and the other elders in our district are gonna play with us too cause their ward isnt doing one. we tried running on saturday morning but it was soo cold it was like 29 degrees and the field in front of the trailor was frosted over but elder rasmussens longs couldnt take the cold so we had to walk back. ya its been really cold and then today its like warm and humid haha the last 2 days have been humid and rainy.
bummer about ASU ahhhhhh!! are they still gonna play in the championship game? coyotes sound like they are rockin like always.
alli you sound like you did great in your concert wish i could have been there to hear you play:)
That's sooo cool to see mike robison and all that how he has just come back and how the members just rallied around him and made him welcome and offered to help him thats why i love desert ridge ward and thats what i want to try and help each ward i serve in out here be like.
haha i cant wait to see what coy looks like hahaha man that went by fast i seems like he just left
dont send a tree cause i dont have anywhere to put it or store it in the trailor so thats alright im good without one, if you want to send paper decoration that would be ok haha, yes i have heard back from mariah but not from jordan, kassie or even gaby for like a month haha, but i got a letter from courtney larsen who is a friend from the singles ward so that's cool
we dont have a target around here only walmart
im good on a blanket for now i just put on sweats during the night
i drive the car all the time now since im senior companion 
i have been able to take more pictures so ill send the memory card soon also has cool pics that you could use for the xmas card
i got a cd player in the apartment and every apartment should have one so im good, i don't need eclipse anymore i got a copy of it.
AWWW i miss teagen soooooo much haha man, the weather today is a little warmer and its nice though i have noticed its felt a lot like az for this time of year
i cant believe that temple poster thing is almost half way full haha
well i love you guys i am doing great and have a great week continue praying, i will send the envelope with stuff in it today and answers to anymore questions in it also
love Elder Harper

Monday, November 14, 2011

Letter home 111411

November 14, 2011


So we had transfers this week and elder mcpheters got transferred to Martinez in Augusta, Georgia he is a district leader there haha he will do awesome. At transfers i saw lots of guys, elder Williams from the mtc he is now a zone leader in west columbia after only 7 months he trained and now he is a zone leader, haha that’s crazy. I also saw elder winger, he’s is training now in Summerville.  Well as you have probably been wondering my new companion is Elder Michael Rasmussen he is fresh out of his training stage so he has only been out for 3 months, so im his second companion and he is a cool guy haha he’s funny but he is also a little shy and doesn’t talk a lot, but he’s is cool we get along great no problems at all. I’m going to learn a lot from him and I am going to teach him all that I know how to do and be patient with him since he has only been out for 3 months, but I am going to try to help him be less shy and better at talking to people cause that’s the hardest thing, if you are comfortable with talking to people then everything gets better and easier.  Elder law is still my zone leader we are going on exchanges tomorrow and Wednesday, we didn’t find a lot of people this week but we did have one funny experience, elder Rasmussen and i did a lot of knocking and Saturday morning we knocked into a Jehovah’s witness and he was like telling us that the book of mormon isn’t inspired word of god and all that stuff and he was like i wont talk to you about the book of mormon but i will about the bible so we were like ok sounds good. his Jehovah’s witness new world translation changed so much from the king james, says completely different things, and he read a verse that says "all scripture is inspired of god" and then says that the book of mormon isn’t inspired of god, so were like, ok what ever but he offered to give us pamphlets. We have had lots of trouble getting in contact with our investigators, either they don’t answer the phone or return our calls or they are never home so it sooo hard to follow up and teach people a second time.

We got word from the mission about christmas packages, family and friends if they are going to send christmas packages to send them by December 1st, i cant believe it almost Christmas, hahaha time flys by so fast.

Also elder rasmussen has one of the special issue book of mormon ensigns and i was wondering if you guys could order one for me

Mom,you can send mixed berry jam that would be cool, I haven’t had that one yet, i haven’t gotten your envelope with the feathers yet so i will look out for that. me and elder mcpheters made the green chili roast stuff it was really good, but he took the crock pot with him cause he bought it so we don’t have it anymore :( oh well i can still cook other things.

Things that I might need for Christmas, ughhh well I don’t know yet ill have to make a list of some things

Dad i read a little bit of the book this week i haven’t had a lot of time at night but i will definitely read more this week.

Yah, grant I heard that the skyrim game came out it seems pretty sweet, we have a kid in our ward who is really into those games and call of duty haha, so he always tells us, i cant wait to play it when i get back, so you are varsity now? did the coach tell you that you got moved up? Why don’t you want to do pinnacle baseball? how are the cardinals and ASU doing?

I love you guys a lot and keep praying for me I love this work it’s so awesome and I when I study every morning the spirit testifies to me all the time that this is the true church of Jesus Christ

Love Elder Harper





Monday, November 7, 2011

Letter home 11711


well we found out about transfers and elder McPheters is leaving me after being together for 3 months, it feels like we haven’t been together long enough cause we felt we were going to be together another transfer at least.

So that’s the sad news, but hopefully i get a good companion and not like last time when i went from awesome companion to not so awesome companion. we had an awesome week. so last Monday we went to see a lead named derrick and he was home and let us in he is black but his wife is white and they have 3 kids that are mixed so we taught them the restoration and they loved it and the wife had a lot of questions on tithing because other churches tithing is used for paying the pastor. They asked if we had different races of people at our church and we said yes, we aren’t segregated and she was so happy to hear those things and they are so ready, so today we are going to teach them about the plan of salvation.

This week also elder law came on exchanges with me for all of Tuesday and we talked about boiling springs and he told me that he found out that Paula cash hasnt been going to our church for a while. the Andersons who bishop Timmermen knows are her home teachers so i hope that she comes back to church soon, but elder law also said that she had dinner at our ward mission leader in boling springs house recently and that went well so i really hope everything turns out ok. i wrote Wanda Scruggs a letter today cause elder law told me she started a Book of Mormon class at church so that was awesome to hear , she is so awesome and she will never sway away from the truth. i hope i get to go through the temple with her next may

I got your package and i love it, we are going to buy a roast today and put it in the crock pot with the green salsa for the last crock pot meal that elder McPheters and i will have because the crock pot is his and hes taking it with him :(

But the book is cool dad i am going to start reading it tonight after we come in while McPheters packs his stuff. and thanks for the fish oil. oh also elder law just got a new cd from Nashville tribute called work its about missionary work so maybe you could send that to me for a Christmas present, wooow its almost Christmas! haha that is so crazy, then all of a sudden its going to be my year mark in like 5 months i think, haha i dont know i lost count.

so i just looked at the pictures, haha my room is super pictured out woooow hahaha. cool so you guys got the cordons table now in our back yard, that looks good in that spot.
cool pics of the chase field stuff i would have loved to have done that. how long has elder Dennison been in the ward, why do the elders that come to az look so much older? i feel like the ones in my mission look sooo young. mom you shouldn’t stay up so long you need to go to bed earlier than 12:00

so that girl that we set on date for baptism we havent been able to get a hold of her we even went by for our appointment and she wasnt home so we are not sure what to do with her yet

well i hope you have a great day and week love you all :)

love elder harper

Letter home 103111


whatss upp

this week i have to say has been really frustrating, we haven’t been able to get a hold of the brown family at all we met with Sean the dad on like Monday and he said to come by yesterday on Sunday but he wasn’t home and that is the 3rd appointment he has not been there for. we try calling him but he doesn’t answer and his voicemail box is full and he never answers our texts. down in the south and i don’t know if its just down here or not but people are too nice to say no, or don’t come back or i don’t want to listen and so when you talk to them or teach them its cool the first time but once they realize that you will keep coming back until they tell us no then they wont even open the door or answer the phone or anything even when we knock and we know that they hear us they wont answer and they never tell us that they don’t want to meet with us anymore, or they schedule a day for us to come back and they purposely avoid us that just kills me especially when you drive a long way and use lots of miles or change your schedule to go see them. and that is all that has happened to us this whole time here in Blythewood, even with the coolest most solid investigators, they just in the blink of an eye disappear off the planet. this area is the hardest area in the mission its the least baptizing and has been for like 4 years. Last week i think i told you about how the stake here has a new stake mission plan and it is awesome we announced it to the ward yesterday and it really didn’t go the way we thought it would go, there was like nobody at church so like nobody heard about it the presentation that our first counselor put together was not great, and we even passed around a sheet for the members to sign up for us to come by and do the thing with them and out of maybe 30 people 6 signed up, haha we just were like what the heck. do they want to baptize anyone in this ward? one cool bright spot to this week was that we taught a girl who is in her 20's and she accepted to be baptized on November 26, right now she is the only person we have on date for November and we really hope she stays and gets baptized.

ya we get transfer calls this Saturday, but we really are thinking that me and elder mcpheters stay together everyone in our district thinks so and elder law and linford our zone leaders think so too, plus it would be best if we were together at least one more transfer.  we have so much fun together haha sometimes we will just have times when we will get in a air freshener fight in the trailer or one time he took my bed apart and took all the covers an off and so i did the same to his bed haha we just have so much fun together and try to make every minute fun even when we might be having the worst, most frustrating day ever, ive learned a lot in my studies like today i was reading in alma about Ammon and king Limoni and then i just looked at the footnotes and learned about the godhead in john 20:16 its a cool scripture and proves the trinity wrong.   

man that stinks that grant lost his last game of the year but did he get to play a lot? i love that story of our mascot punching the brophy one, that is someting that i would totally do if i was there. grant what ever you do in the spring whether its track or baseball make sure you continue to work hard and put your full effort into it just like in football, you made so much progress and you thrived in the spotlight that can be a constant as you work hard in practice every day. thats sweet that halo4 comes out right after i get home, i cant wait to hang out with you a lot for the 2 years before you leave on your mission and alli also.

well i love you guys so much pray for me and elder mcpheters to be together longer and that we will have success

love elder kelly harper