Not too much happened this week. It was still a pretty good week though. We didn't teach a ton of lessons, but we made some good things happen. We started off the week with dinner at our branch president's house. He wanted to make us dinner because Elder Van Mondfrans and I both had birthdays the week before. It was a solid dinner of pork and rice and he shared some scripture about how getting older entails getting wiser and how we need to keep progressing in the Gospel. I don't know. I didn't really get where he was going with it. It was kind of him though.
We had more of teaching English class splits on Tuesday. I stayed to teach with Julio and the other two went out with he branch president. We were hoping to get three members to come so that we could each be accomplishing something. Hopefully we'll be able to pull that off this
week.
We had a lot of appointments fall through this week. It meant lots of looking up people and lots of trying to set up appointments for next week. We met a few new people. All very nice people, but nobody is particularly interested. We'll keep trying with them though. Nobody really of note to mention.
There were three big service events for the week. First one was on Friday evening, a member in our branch was moving. We got some people together and headed over to help her out. She had a ton of stuff and lived in a basement, which made for some tricky maneuvering with some
things. But we managed to get everything into the truck. Elder Van Mondfrans and I had to leave before unloading because we had a lesson. But we left Elder Morrell with Julio and he helped finish the move while we taught. The lesson went alright. His name is Jose Molina. He's not a member, but his wife is. Very nice people. He is always willing to listen and talk, but he's not a huge fan of the Book of Mormon. He loves the Bible so much that he isn't particularly interested in trying a new book. But he still comes to church every week and he recently started reading the Book of Mormon with his wife. We'll see how it goes.
The next day was our big car wash. I guess the branch did one a few years ago and wanted to try it again. We set it up from 9 to 12 and had a big barbecue afterward. We did a bunch of advertising with flyers and posters in Patchogue. They didn't bring anybody in though.
Our biggest draw was our advertising team on the side of the road. We had three sister missionaries and a bunch of kids from the branch out holding signs to get people to come. I went out and ran moral support to keep everybody excited and cheering. It was a lot of fun. We
managed to bring in 8 cars from the street. Not bad for two hours of advertising. We didn't really get anybody interested in coming to church from it, but it was a fun event and we met some very nice people. The barbecue afterwards was way good too.
Right after the barbecue, we headed over to help another woman with a move. She was a friend of a woman in the branch and needed some help. So we all went over. There were lots of things and not very much room in the rental truck. We did some mad Tetris work and managed to get a lot of it in. We still had to make a second trip though. We had to leave, but some other missionaries were able to come and finish up for us. We left to go visit an investigator that the sisters are working with. Her name is Beatrice and she has a 6 year old daughter named Brenda. Brenda apparently came down with a really bad sore throat and was in lots of pain and very scared. So we went over to give her a blessing and to help calm her down a bit. I first met Brenda back in December, so she and I are homies. She was very scared about it all, so we stayed and I chatted with her for a while to help keep her mind off of it. They were planning to take her to the hospital, but ended up taking her to a clinic the next morning. She's doing alright now. She's a tough little girl.
Church wasn't too eventful yesterday. The big event of the day was that Taylor got the priesthood. We've been trying to make that happen for a while, so it was nice to finally have it take place. Taylor asked me to do it so it could be in English. Presidente Mejia apparently had other ideas though. He decided that he would do the blessing and I would translate it into English as he went. That was interesting. It would have been fine, but he would say so much at a time that I would forget parts of it as I went. It all worked out though. Taylor felt good about it, so that's all that matters.
This is our last week with Elder Van Mondfrans. We might have some more moves coming up this week that we're excited to help with. It's definitely going to be an adventure.
Love, Elder Erickson
week.
We had a lot of appointments fall through this week. It meant lots of looking up people and lots of trying to set up appointments for next week. We met a few new people. All very nice people, but nobody is particularly interested. We'll keep trying with them though. Nobody really of note to mention.
There were three big service events for the week. First one was on Friday evening, a member in our branch was moving. We got some people together and headed over to help her out. She had a ton of stuff and lived in a basement, which made for some tricky maneuvering with some
things. But we managed to get everything into the truck. Elder Van Mondfrans and I had to leave before unloading because we had a lesson. But we left Elder Morrell with Julio and he helped finish the move while we taught. The lesson went alright. His name is Jose Molina. He's not a member, but his wife is. Very nice people. He is always willing to listen and talk, but he's not a huge fan of the Book of Mormon. He loves the Bible so much that he isn't particularly interested in trying a new book. But he still comes to church every week and he recently started reading the Book of Mormon with his wife. We'll see how it goes.
The next day was our big car wash. I guess the branch did one a few years ago and wanted to try it again. We set it up from 9 to 12 and had a big barbecue afterward. We did a bunch of advertising with flyers and posters in Patchogue. They didn't bring anybody in though.
Our biggest draw was our advertising team on the side of the road. We had three sister missionaries and a bunch of kids from the branch out holding signs to get people to come. I went out and ran moral support to keep everybody excited and cheering. It was a lot of fun. We
managed to bring in 8 cars from the street. Not bad for two hours of advertising. We didn't really get anybody interested in coming to church from it, but it was a fun event and we met some very nice people. The barbecue afterwards was way good too.
Right after the barbecue, we headed over to help another woman with a move. She was a friend of a woman in the branch and needed some help. So we all went over. There were lots of things and not very much room in the rental truck. We did some mad Tetris work and managed to get a lot of it in. We still had to make a second trip though. We had to leave, but some other missionaries were able to come and finish up for us. We left to go visit an investigator that the sisters are working with. Her name is Beatrice and she has a 6 year old daughter named Brenda. Brenda apparently came down with a really bad sore throat and was in lots of pain and very scared. So we went over to give her a blessing and to help calm her down a bit. I first met Brenda back in December, so she and I are homies. She was very scared about it all, so we stayed and I chatted with her for a while to help keep her mind off of it. They were planning to take her to the hospital, but ended up taking her to a clinic the next morning. She's doing alright now. She's a tough little girl.
Church wasn't too eventful yesterday. The big event of the day was that Taylor got the priesthood. We've been trying to make that happen for a while, so it was nice to finally have it take place. Taylor asked me to do it so it could be in English. Presidente Mejia apparently had other ideas though. He decided that he would do the blessing and I would translate it into English as he went. That was interesting. It would have been fine, but he would say so much at a time that I would forget parts of it as I went. It all worked out though. Taylor felt good about it, so that's all that matters.
This is our last week with Elder Van Mondfrans. We might have some more moves coming up this week that we're excited to help with. It's definitely going to be an adventure.
Love, Elder Erickson
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