Tuesday, February 22, 2011

Decorating for Christmas

Sounds like a busy and fun week. Bummer that Kellie didn't go to state - but you are only as strong as your weakest member. Sounds like Quinton is having fun. There is a boy here that is exactly like him. To a tee. It is garrett roque (the brother of the girl that he texted or whatever). Pretty funny. Well it's still in the 70's so it's perfect temperature out here. I enjoy it a lot, but I will never live in Arizona permanently. Tell Conner Happy Birthday! Turning 14 is a big move - that means dances - get to show all the moves you have practiced for months. Sounds like he had a fun birthday.

No! I am not going to wear a mis match suit - that is just ridiculous. But I know that I had at least 3 suits (with matching pants) when I was at BYU that I brought home. Now I know one of them is a light brown which doesn't work. But I'm pretty sure that I had 2 dark ones with matching pants - granted that was one year ago so not sure where they are at now. But let me know if you cannot find them and then I will go buy another one.
You cannot send packages directly to me - just to the mission office and they will be here before Christmas - Sister Beck will make sure of it. Bro. Eagar has 2 sisters (live in Mesa and Kingsman) - and they both have families - so they all came over for Thanksgiving. But he has never married or had kids.

Alberto did get baptized. He asked me to do it, so I got to change into my all whites - which is so cool. I wish I could wear all white all the time. It was a 30 minute service which was amazing. The quickest one I've been apart of. Talks were short and perfect (they should really just be testimonies and not sermons). He was baptized, some short remarks by the BIshop and then out. Font drained and cleaned up in under an hour.

Well, you know if Elders are saying there is no time limit on phone calls on Christmas then it is probably a mission rule they have or they are just crazies. In the white handbook it says to have short conversations. And then our mission president has told us to take 45min-1hr max. The wards here are nice. I'm learning a lot from my new companion. We follow the same dinner policy in Anthem were we can only eat if there is a teaching opportunity (investigator, LA, etc.) So we only get fed by members maybe once a week if that. But Bro. Eagar takes us out to lunch about 2 times a week and cooks us breakfast on Saturdays and makes big batches of things for him and then just puts it in the fridge and tells us to have at it. So it rocks living with him.

I will check on a dentist here after the holidays. We have our next transfer on Dec 28, so we'll see how that plays out and then I'll get in somewhere. I have your JOY decorations in our room. We actually put up Bro. Eagar's Christmas tree and decorated it this last Friday. It was fun. It looks really good. I'll take some pictures when I get the camera. And if you haven't sent my package yet - throw in some things from the blog so I can see what it is like if you still do that.

So my week:

6 Dec 2010 - Today we had a fun district activity - played ultimate frisbee. Fun being with friends and talking. I enjoy it. Went to Maria'a and played some pool and then she fed us dinner. Crock-Pots are good. Had another lesson with Alberto - making daily contact with him and Maria. We are going to move his baptism again forward to Thursday.

7 Dec 2010 - Went on exchanges with Elder Duke. So I got to his area at night and so we began planning for the day tomorrow and I asked him what their daily contacting record was and he said it was 20. And their weekly record is like high 30's. So I told him we would get 50 contacts and he laughed a bit and told him you gotta be confident and you'll get them. It would have been 2.5 times their daily record. So the next morning we set out and we worked like dogs - I drove him into the ground - but he can take it. We made it to 5pm and we had 21 contacts. So we had barely broken the daily record. So we went out again and destroyed it and ended the day with 51 contacts. Made 30 contacts from 5-8pm. So we were blessed to reach our goal.

8 December 2010 - Had a district meeting. We got there early and interviewed 4 Elders who are just struggling. (One companionship had 1 contact all last week and the other companionship had 5). So we met with them and it was decent. We stayed for half of that district meeting and then went to Elder Bird's meeting. Had lesson with the Toledo's - a Navajo family. Have 8 yr old, Brooke, who is awesome. Then went to Alberto and met with him and set out the program. He asked if I would baptize him which is awesome. Had dinner with the Clough's - a Recent Convert family. He's a really good cook and made fried chicken with mashed potatoes - great.

9 Dec. 2010 - Planned a lot today. Bro. Eagar took us to Bajios - really good. We started to put up the Christmas tree. Had Alberto's baptism. It was great. Love being in all white. After that, I went up to Anthem - Pete drove us up. Good to catch up with him (feels like I just left Anthem, but it has been a good month about now). Had to interview 3 sister missionaries over the phone which was fun i guess. So on exchange with Elder Bird now.

10 Dec 2010 - Elder Bird and I talked about a lot of things - effective district meetings, baptism interviews, how to work with sisters, ward members. Contacted a lot today. Got 51. I love contacting - fun stuff. Swung by the Cray's - an investigator family Elder Bird and I tracted into. They bought me a Christmas present. A yellow dress shirt and tie. We had the Gavilan Peak Ward Christmas Party that night too which was wierd going to since I served there. Got to see the Alvarez family which was cool. The Bishop even asked me to give the closing prayer. Came back to my area.

11 Dec 2010 - Went and met with Mark Ediger today. I need to baptize him. One of the few that I have taught and not gotten into the water. He's a tough one. I'll get him soon. Finished decorating Bro. Eagar's tree which was fun. Looks really good. He said it has been many many years since it's been decorated up this much. Put some garland around the house too. We planned for our zone meeting next Wednesday. It is looking like it will be real good. Visited with Alberto - they fed us some dinner too. He's leaving for Mexico tomorrow for about 3 weeks. Great man who will do great things. Bro. Eagar took us out to Subway for lunch too.

12 Dec 2010 - We had our last Ward Council training today. And Elder Hall is sick and has halfway lost his voice, so he stayed with our ward on splits with our WML and I went with President Morris (in mission presidency who does trainings with us). So we trained a YSA ward council today which was a little different but fun. So President Morris and I were talking before it about our attack plan and things and he said that he wanted to hit this ward straight on and not beat around the bush. (So for the trainings, President Morris talks for about 20 min and then turns it over to Elder Hall and I for another 20 min). So he got up and was pretty straight forward, He doesn't mince words which is fun. Then I got up and went on for about 20 min and got to drill them a bit too. I think they are fun. Then we went to watch a child of record baptism with Maria. Her baptism in on Dec 18th and she has a fear of water. Then we had a couple appointments. Went over to the Roques and they fed us some pancakes and sausage. Shared a quick thought. Came home. Was on the phone for like an hour and a half taking numbers from District Leaders. Lot of concerns going on now, but also a lot of great things happening. Pushing really hard to break the zone baptism record which is 17 in one month which occured in 2005. So it has been like over 5 years since we've baptized that much. Gotta fix that - so we are pushing everyone hard.

Life is great. Living the dream. Will probably check e-mail around 4 again.

Love,

Elder Perkins

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