Elder Ben

WHAT?!?!? E.T.'ed????? Yep that's right I was just emergency transferred out of the area that I was born into and have stayed for the past 4 and a half months! It was Thanksgiving night when I got the call at around 10:15 p.m. and was told that I would be moving out at 9 in the morning the next day. Not much time to pack or get things in order before I was off....I didn't even get to say goodbye to anyone in the branch.

So right now I am in Renton, but still in a trio (just two different Elders then the last trio). So turns out that last transfer (two weeks ago) President Larkin had put the two Spanish Elders that couldn't drive together in an area. Well that doesn't go over to well because the areas that the Spanish missionaries have are just huge and there was no way that they could bike the whole thing. I am with Elder Wilkins (haha yep my trainer) and Elder Haro. It is really crazy to be in a new are and new branch. Just when I had everything figured out with roads and branch members and all they switch it up and I am back to square one with not knowing anything. Should be great though.

So in the first two days of being here I have made some crazy connections with Manti.   First off, I live in the house of an older member couple, and the lady asked me where I was from. Turns out that her niece is the wife of Fred ( Fred that owns "Freds sports grill" on main...his last name isn't coming to mind).   Really crazy, but she says that they love going to Manti and visiting. Second, I met an Elder in my new zone (Elder Allred) that is from Redmond and wrestled in High School.  Turns out that he is friends with Kip Denton and Tanner Denton and that would have put him I'm my weight class....maybe I wrestled him.  He also knows the Carters because Sargent Carter is the one that recruited him into military service.  Maybe this coming week I will meet other people that have connections to Manti somehow.

So I'm not sure if the Brothers were able to make it to church this past week, because I wasn't there. Hopefully, because they seemed to be interested in coming

McKay hit it right on when he said you don't have to worry about going hungry on Thanksgiving.  I had multiple Thanksgiving meals the night before I left Seattle.  And then when I got to Renton they had a Thanksgiving meal for the branch.   I think I have had more Thanksgiving than at any other time in my life.  It is a bit different than the normal American dinner though  had Mexican beans, macaroni salad, and deer soup at one appointment so not what any of you ate I am sure.  The other one was pretty normal with mashed potatoes, turkey, and dressing.   I took several pictures at both of the appointments (Jaclyn will be happy)

On Saturday night we had the branch Thanksgiving here in Renton.  Turns out that the branch mission leader wanted to do a skit with the missionaries (Elders and Hermanas  we quickly in one hour put together a 10 minute skit and performed it.   It surprisingly went well and was really funny. So now I can say that I performed in Spanish!  I think one of the members may have recorded it so it is just a matter of tracking it down so everyone can watch it. hahah

So Friday on I have just been trying to get used to things in the new area.  There is a lot of people to meet and a lot of roads to memorize.  Just trying to memorize the members and investigators and get things organized

With Love,

Elder Howell

Elder McKay

Hola Madre!

This week has been very positive for our work here. Little miracles are happening all over the place. We've been working our tails into the ground and I think the Lord is finally letting us see the upcoming harvest (crossing fingers). We finished this week with 5 people on baptismal dates and 3 people at church.

One of my favorite little things that happened this week was similar to what happened with the Albanian woman from a couple weeks ago. This weekend, we tracted into this couple that had just moved here from Haiti. They had seen missionaries walking around in Haiti before, but never talked with them, so they were very open. Unfortunately, English wasn't their primary language, so we asked what language we should order from the mission office and they said either French or Haitian Creole. Wonder of wonders - we got back to the apartment that night and we have a single copy of the BofM in French among all the English and Spanish copies. This weekend, we finally connected with a less active/part member family that we've been trying to meet for a while. It turns out she's from the Philippines with the native language of Tagalog. Once again, back at the apartment, we found a single copy of the BofM in Tagalog! This is nuts! Lol, all we really have are English or Spanish books, but for some reason in the past two weeks we have just happened to find people who need them in Albanian, French, and Tagalog and we have had every single one of those already at the apartment! Random... Thank you, God! The only other languages we have left are a Russian and a Hindi copy, so I'm expecting minor miracles with those two as well. :)

Well, Thanksgiving was rather odd. We ate a lot, met a lot of people, etc, but otherwise it wasn't quite the same without playing football/frisbee with the Howell clan. Christmas will probably be just as weird.

Lovies!

Elder M.

Elder McKay

Mom,

You're right; there is no need to worry about us going hungry on Thanksgiving. I think we're up to 5 or 6 different appointments on that day with members already. Urgh....I'll have to keep myself to a single green bean at once place, maybe a roll at another appointment, a salad at another, and then a piece of pie or something so that it all turns out to be a well rounded meal instead of physically exploding. =P

Unfortunately, the gal who smunched my companion ended up avoiding us once we tried to setup an appointment. Lol, she did try to get a date with Elder Fuller though, so he had to explain our restrictions and tell her what we as missionaries are all about. Oh well, there are elect and prepared people in this pond of tens of thousands that he and I have stewardship over -- now we just need to rely on God to help us cross paths with them.

I've learned a great truth: 1) the Spirit speaks better than I do. 2) the scriptures are written by inspiration of the Holy Spirit. 3) reading selections of the scriptures with people is giving them those words from the Spirit which is equivalent to teaching with the Spirit. Or at least, that's what I've determined after this week. We've been able to see several miracles and set 3 people on baptismal dates after simply listening to them and then reading selections of the Book of Mormon with them that felt right. What do you know - it works!

I saw an alligator for the first time since coming to Florida in April! It probably took so long since I've been in the city the whole time, but we spotted one in a swampy creek that we were biking over. He was only about three feet long, but it was still pretty cool. I dunno, it's just very different here. Instead of the usual deer on the side of the road, we have squished armadillos and dead possums everywhere with the occasional raccoon and turtle thrown in. Swamp Life.

It's hard to believe that Jesse Richardson is home, Preston Coburn is getting married, and Peter Olsen is over the hump. I still remember back when those kids were all in middle school! Gah! I'm old....

I'll close with these choice words that you can give to the family: Happy Thanksgiving, Ya'll!

Your Southern Son,
"Elda Mac"

Elder Ben

Happy Thanksgiving!!!

Well this week has been a little bit slower just because we have been transitioning with my two new companions. Elder Wagner has served in this branch before and all I had to really do is take over all the planning for our investigators until he caught on to who we were teaching. It is a blast in a trio though. It basically seems like time flies by faster with having 2 companions, lessons, tracting and everything in between just seem to be a lot more fun. Not that we are looking for the fun aspect, but it is true. We have transitioned to doing a little bit more tracting. Elder Wilkins was a less active members guy, while Elder Wagner is a tracting and finding new investigators guy. Both are fine with me, just a different style of work. It has already paid off though. We found several investigators this last week that we are starting to teach.

Not to much that really stood out to me this week. A lot of getting my companions introduced to the investigators and starting to work for there.

Mom, it is so true. A lot of people when they see us think that we work for the government and are a little scarred/suspicious of what we are doing. It doesn't help that it starts to get dark at 4 in the afternoon so half of the proselyting time we are in the dark with dark clothes on....not very conducive to have people open their doors to you.

Last night I had this thought to visit two people that Elder Wilkins and I had been teaching before. They are brothers and after about the 3rd visit with them Elder Wilkins and I dropped them because it seemed like they only wanted to learn about the church because they were interested in what a mormon was more then the actually investigation of the truthfulness. Thinking that is was going to be a disaster and wondering if I was making a bad choice going to their house, we went and had a lesson with them. And it actually turned out REALLY well. Surprised me, but they asked a lot of good questions about the Book of Mormon and said that they wanted to come to church on Sunday. Big change to anything that we had seen before.

Well I have to go. Happy thanksgiving to all.

Elder Benjamin Howell

Elder Ben

Family and Friends,

What Manti won the football championship! This is just crazy! I think Manti sports have been moving up. Way to go.

Nice to hear that Daniel had a pretty good support group to watch him run. It sounds like his team still did pretty good even if they didn't go to nationals

Has it already been a year since Teyah was born? I guess that would make since because it is November.....that means that Peter Olsen has been on his mission for a year also....time is just flying by.

Well today was transfer day so that is why I'm emailing a day later. Turns out that I go from my first companion for over 4 months to getting my 2nd and 3rd companion all in on day! That's right I'm in a trio. Every single companionship of Spanish elders was switched up this transfer (not that that is a lot only 4 companionship's) but this is the first move that we have made since I have been out here. Elders were even taken out of one area and had Hermanas white washed into it, just a huge mix up. We have 9 Spanish elders, so last transfer one guy was with an English elder, turns out this time President wanted to try having a trio instead. I am still in the same area that I have been. one of my new companions was here in this area right before I came out so he already knows the area and most of the members. My companions are now Elder Wagner from Salt Lake City, and Elder Henderson from Ogden. I have only been with them for about 2 hours so don't know to much else about them. My zone has been in the past like what McKay's is now, with not many people leaving. Today I think about half of them left though so we will be seeing a lot of new missionaries.

We had a Spanish Conference last week that was pretty great. Every other transfer everyone in the Spanish program gets together for training and then we have a lunch after. Since there are only about 24 of us it is easy to organize and get together. Elder Wilkins went all out for the lunch and bought over 6 pounds of carne asada, everyone seemed to love it though and he wants to continue it as a tradition

This week we had to take both of our on dates off date. One of them is moving out of our area, but still staying in the mission. The other one has to get married before her baptism (and wants to get married), but it just wasn't going to happen in the next couple of weeks. We plan to continue to work with her for a baptismal date later on

Last week was great weather! We were seeing about a week of temperatures in the 60's then last Saturday we had a cold snap and I think winter is finally upon us. I am finally just having to bring out my coat for the winter

Well I have to go

Elder Howell

Elder McKay

This week has been interesting....

So last Monday was probably the most wild one ever. Four of us elders went fishing in the St. John's river behind an investigator's house. We missed the prime time, but decided to stick around anyway. The other elders were using poles, but I wasn't actually in the mood for fishing or catching anything, so I just decided just to learn how to toss this net that is used for catching bait shrimp. On my second cast, I caught a small fish, and by the end of the evening, I was getting good enough with it, that I had caught three decent size sea trout while none of the other elders had caught anything. Hahaha! Take that! The vegetarian guy who hasn't fished in 12 years is the only one who catches any fish! Elder Day ended up chopping up one of my fish for bait and caught a very large blue crab with it. He was reeling it in and was pretty surprised, "I think I caught something, but it's not fighting very much......What on earth is that?!" Lol, the crab wouldn't let go though, so he reeled it in and put it in a bucket to give to someone who could use it.

Now that daylight savings time is over, it gets dark really early here and we have to flick on our bike lights every evening. That same night after we were done with P-day, we were biking on a sidewalk down near the end of our area and were making good time. This car came to pull out of a gas station that we were passing and then stopped before pulling out onto the road, so I figured it had seen me and continued through. Two seconds later I hear a screech and then a loud crunch. Turns out, the gal had not been paying much attention and smunched Elder Fuller pretty good, but thankfully didn't actually run him over. His bike and her car were both pretty messed up though. Lol, you have to know Elder Fuller, but this was so like him - he pulled himself up on her hood and gave her the thumbs up while she was still freaking out behind the wheel. Turns out she's a college student about our age, and had some interest that she'd just hit two ministers, and we may end up teaching her in the near future. I figure God works in mysterious ways to bring people into our path. =)

Hmmm, ah yes, this inactive member was piddling around in his shop when we dropped by to see him and he was in the middle of creating a collection of handmade wood/gold pens. He saw our pens (my 20 cent Bic variety) and said, "You boys need new pens" and gave us both these very glassy pens made of gold and dark wood. I must admit, it looks a lot better than a black and white plastic one. :) It writes about the same though.

On the serious side of things, we are still praying for miracles and doing all we can to find new people. We did see one occur with an Albanian family. We met them while leaving the apartment of a part member and had a really positive interaction. We got back home and told our roommate about it and wonder of wonders, he just happened to have a single, hardcover copy of the Book of Mormon in Albanian at home. We were able to place that with them this past weekend and are have high hopes with them.

Well, the computer is going to oust me off in 35 seconds, so I'd better send this. I love you all!

Elder M.

Elder McKay

Good Morning, Family!

I agree with Benj, the mission is absolutely the best way to ensure that you are never bored! Not only do we have all sorts of exciting, scary, spiritual, and funny experiences, but just about every day has a fair supply of awkward moments! I've never had someone in the house almost die on me during a lesson though, so I think my younger brother has topped me....for now. =)

So guess what - miracles do happen! The day after Elder Fuller got the call to be a trainer this next transfer, I asked God if He knew what He was doing, and told Him I'd really like to keep this companion for a while, if it was ok with Him. Wonder of wonders, that very evening President Barry called up Elder Fuller in the middle of a dinner with a member and told him to scrap that. Some elder here was going home for some emergency, and the new elder will be shuffled in with someone else. Tadaa! Needless to say, I was fairly happy. Transfer calls came around again Saturday night and oddly enough, almost our entire zone is staying - one sister is going home and one being transferred out - but I have heard of a zone being that poorly represented at a transfer.

Well, I have a confession to make. That goal of 4x4 that I told you about last week is extremely lofty and there is no chance we can do it without some serious miracles occurring and a lot of help from the members. I have so far had 2 baptisms and 3 reactivations during my entire stay in this work and so expecting twice that in the next two months is pretty bold and right now we don't really have any investigators to put behind that goal. However, we presented it in ward council yesterday and got the elders quorum, high priests, relief society, and bishop on board with it and they threw out a bunch of ideas and names for us to follow up on. We also have 3 member families that have friends that they want us to start teaching in their homes in the next week or two, so we're praying hard for some Spiritual Power to sweep these people into the gospel.

I look forward to seeing those pictures from Benji's Halloween getup; make sure those get forwarded to me! =D Our ward had a massive chili cook off, bonfire, and trunk or treat that people came out of the woodwork to attend. I don't think I knew half the people there, but it was a lot of fun and we got a couple of investigators to attend as well. We've been eating various chili's for the past week though since the members always pawn their extra food off on us. I don't think I've eaten this well on a regular basis since I left home 5 years ago.... Hopefully you won't need to send me larger pants for Christmas or anything. =P

Your stories surrounding the Sawtelle wedding were quite amusing. I can't believe Mike split his pants out twice! Lol, who does that? But it sounds like a marvelous occasion all around and a wonderful vacation for the Howell crew. I'll catch those Facebook videos someday.

This week has been cold; at least, relatively speaking. We started wearing jackets for the first time on Wednesday night. The thermometer says it is still 55-60 degrees, but it feels a lot cooler than that. I'm not sure if it's just the humidity factor or if I've just adjusted to living in a sweltering sauna through the summer, but I'm going to have to find some gloves or something soon.

Well, wish me luck as we work into this next week - we're gonna need it!

Love,

Elder M.

Elder Benjamin

Hello Family!

Well sounds like this last week was pretty packed with a bunch of family things going on in Phoenix. Everything sounds like it was great at the wedding (minus the splitting out of the pants) and everyone had a great time. Weather sounds amazing in comparison to Manti's 15 degrees. It makes it even more exciting to have had Corey get his mission call the same week. Tell him congrats for me.

Ummm.....ya I haven't even given much thought to Christmas but I guess it is just around the corner. The arrangements that you have right now sound good and I should be able to participate (maybe I will send a bottle of some great Mexican hot sauce that I found :) jk)

This week wasn't transfer week, but that is coming up next week. We should find out this Sunday if we are getting transferred. The zone that I am in right now will be shaken up a little bit because we have 3 district leaders leaving and then both zone leaders leave next transfer. I am thinking that I will most likely be moved, but you never know because I was thinking the same thing last transfer.

The baby incident actually turned out to be a blessing in disguise. After that episode that we had they are all about learning the gospel. The father is already a member but is dedicated to returning to church and just a couple of days ago we put the mother on date (for baptism) for the 26th of November. God works in mysterious ways to get people to listen.

Not to much to report this week. We are working with several individuals and a couple that are really close to accepting baptismal dates, but there is just little stuff that we have to overcome with them. I have a feeling that in the next 2 months of so there could be 4 baptisms.

Working with the kid that is being adopted by a family in the branch has been great. He knows little to nothing about anything gospel related so we have taken baby steps from who God is to who Jesucristo is to the basics of a prayer. We made some flashcards for him so that he can go through pictures of gospel related people and things and get familiar with them. The great thing is he is catching on and loves to go to church....even after 3 hours he asks to go back to the church.

Well got to run
Thank you for everything

Elder B