Changing our P-Day This Week Only

As secretary to the President, I thnk Hunter sent this to all missionaries' families in his mission

 Hello families,

                I am writing you to let you know that because of General Conference this Saturday we will be changing our P-Day THIS WEEK ONLY to Monday, April 2^nd. So, we will not be on our emails this Saturday which is why I am writing this email so that you WONDERFUL mothers do not call the mission wondering why we are missing! Thank you very much!

Hola familias,

                Les escribo para informarles que este Sábado, debido a la Conferencia General no tendremos día de preparación hasta el Lunes 2 de Abril. Será así por solo esta semana. Significa que no estaremos leyendo ni escribiendo correos hasta el Lunes. Así que no hay razón (específicamente nuestras MARAVILLOSAS Mamás) a pensar que nos perdimos y que nadie sabe dónde estamos. Muchas gracias!

We love you all! Take care.

Les amamos a todos! Cuídense.

SNAKE RIVER, FLY FISHING!!

Dear Family,

This week was  good and also a little difficult.

We share an area with the AP's (the assistants to the President) which means that we have like double the work force. The problem is that we have stopped going on splits with each other which hinders our ability to get to know each others investigators.

                They left for conferences and just kind of gave us all of their appointments. It is good that we have a lot of work to do but when we have 2 appointments at the exact same hour 3 times in a row it is a little frustrating especially when we have never been to the house or met the person before.

                We survived but it was a little rocky.

                We are progressing in the area though! We have had 4 investigators attend church every Sunday for the past 5 Sundays. The problem is that they aren’t all the same investigators. We are trying to work on that!

                One of the biggest problems here is that every Sunday this huge market just appears out of no where and it is all a little cheaper and has anything you could possibly need. It is only open on Sundays as well. A lot of people tell us that they have to go shopping on Sunday because of this stupid tradition. I hate it.

                J and S still need to get married but they don’t have the money quite yet. They won't let us do any sort of fundraiser either which is stupid but I am not going to argue with him.

                D has a baptismal date and so do her 2 children. She is a single mom who has 3 kids in total and has big desires to change. She went to church last week and I believe she will go again this week. We are going to see her tonight so we will see.

                L Family is great. They are a new family that has told us they are going to church and told us to come by and get them to go which means I will drag them out of bed if I have to.

                C Family is one of my favorites because F is sooo funny and because they just had a baby and she is very adorable. They also said they will be going to church and we are going to verify It tonight. They also expressed their desires to be baptized.

                Funny story this week: Elder Sarnowski and I were walking to the store one morning and this guy stops us as we are going in and just shouts ¨How is the business doing?!¨

Elder Sarnowski had spoken with him before so without thinking he just changed it around and said ¨Hows YOUR business doing?¨

The man responded ¨Terrible!!! No money! No chance!¨

This is all in English by the way.

Then he says ¨Where are you from? America! No wait one of you is British!¨ And then he pointed at me. I just laughed and said, ¨Nope I am American.¨

Then he shouted, ¨OK! You are from…New York..no no no…Idaho!¨

Surprised, I responded ¨Yes actually I am from Idaho.¨ Then without hesitation he shouts at the top of his lungs, ¨SNAKE RIVER, FLY FISHING!!¨Making the whipping motion you use with a fly rod.

I almost lost It there because it was just so random. He continued to say other weird things and then at the end he just said ¨PRAY TO YOUR GOD!¨ To which Elder Sarnowski replied ¨Pray to yours!¨ And then he walked away. We have been quoting this encounter all week.

I will act all this out on a recording for you next week!

It sounds like Grandma is doing okay with everything. I know she might not accept a lot of help but it is good to be ready to offer it anyways!

That is about it for this week! Love you guys! Stay strong!

Con amor,

Elder Reese

I Remeber in the MTC

Hola a todos!

This week was  a good  week but also a little stressful!

We had transfers so that means that my life got a little stressful and busy.

As missionaries we are always finding new investigators but the most important thing is finding investigators that progress. In Preach my Gospel it talks about finding the chosen (encontrando los elegidos). So we always find new people to teach but sometimes we very quickly stop teaching them when they don’t read or they never want to go to church.

As for Jorge and Sonia. They are progressing very well. They have received all of the lessons now and all they need is to get married and get baptized so that they can start their year countdown to the temple. They are going to choose their marriage date this Thursday so we will know their baptism date that same day!

I love Chik Fil A breakfast. (We got a new Chik Fil A in Nampa and we went to breakfast last week) They have those little chicken nuggets on those sweet rolls. Those are my favorite!

It is good that Courtney and Summer could visit! In my brain Austin and Summer are like big kids now and not children. It is kind of strange.

I am glad you guys are staying in contact with Tanner (Hunter's best friend). I regret the small amount of effort I put into being a missionary with him but he is a good kid and I love him to death!

I am so glad I didn’t have to do all that work with the bathrooms! It is kind of weird though how I miss doing jobs like that sometimes. Like digging or doing manual labor. It is really good.

I have really been praying hard for Grandma and Grandpa. I haven’t really told anybody about it because I don’t want to make a big deal about it if it is going to pass quickly.

Also, I may not like someone too much either but if you give me a powdered doughnut I will be your friend forever too (Bill had to bribe my 7 month old granddaughter to come to him with a doughnut). I am also super excited to meet all of the new additions to the Reese family as well considering everyone decided to participate in the process.

That is a pretty gross story Dad (Bill had a colonoscopy last week and told Hunter all about it). I remember in the MTC all the gringos couldn’t poop or they pooped too much. It was funny to talk with the new missionaries because I had forgotten about that until they started talking about all the time they spent in the bathroom.

There was an Elder in the MTC with me that didn’t poop for 13 days. He literally tried everything and nothing worked. We would always walk by and pat his stomach because it was in like a permanent flex mode and it was hilarious.

I will be sending voice recordings still I just had to figure out how I was going to work out the schedule. I have one that I will send to you guys.

Mom never bought me a battery powered car. (I found a battery powered car for one of my grandsons) He should feel lucky.

Also, Oahu is the best island to go to according to Elder Sarnowski and he gave me lots of good ideas.

Anyways, that is my report for the week! I love you all!

Con amor,

Elder Reese

God Has My Back

Hey guys,

So my week was pretty good. I got a new companion. His name is Elder Villon and he is from Guayaquil Ecuador. He is a really cool guy. He is 19 and has about 7 1/2 months in the mission and spent all of that time in the same area. 

Elder Eldredge is still here because he is training Elder Villon how to do his job but only for this week. Elder Eldredge will be done and out of the offices on Monday. I have really enjoyed my time with him and love him to death but I am super excited for him to get back out there and take care of business. 

I am almost ready for transfers. I was starting to finish things up and then I got the itineraries I was waiting on and had to stop everything. The good news is there are only four finishing the mission and that means God had my back on this one. I will have everything ready on time though. 

President Nelson is an amazing prophet. Elder Sarnowski had an uncle that worked closely with him and he said that everyday before lunch him and President Nelson would race up the stairwell in their building up to the roof and President Nelson would usually win. They did that until a few months ago until his uncle died.

I was talking with Elder Sarnowski because he lived in Hawaii for like 2 years and he said he is going to give us the pros and cons of every island and things to do on every island so that we can see our options. So next week I will tell you. 

As for Hayley (Hunter's Cousin), I had no idea she was pregnant again. I thought she had just had her first kid. Probably because she has. But at least it is the size of a healthy colt! 

I will be praying for Grandma. We have always been pretty blessed as Reese's with things like this so lets not lose our faith now. Make sure that someone is always helping her with anything. It sounds like everything will turn out okay though. 

As a missionary we always teach the Plan of Salvation. One of the biggest parts of it is our life here on Earth. We are here to be tried and it is our time to prepare ourselves to meet God. (Alma 34:32) Basically bad things are meant to happen. It is unavoidable. What we can control is how we react. Never harden your heart as the Nephites did. Just push forward with a steadfastness in Christ and the blessings and help will come. 

I hope you have fun traveling. It is probably going to suck but the fishing part will be fun. I don't really have time to go fishing. 

I am kinda mad they waited so long to put a Chik-fil-a closer to our house. I wouldda spent a lot more money there had it been there while I was home. 

J and S have not yet gotten married but they are doing all the things theyneed to do to get married and it is a huge process. My guess is they will be married and baptized before the end of March. 

I will send you guys some pictures! Love you I will write more next week! 

Con amor,

Elder Reese

If I Get Much Fatter

Hey guys! 

I am indeed getting ready for transfers! It has not been to bad yet which worries me! I have had no trouble with the missionaries that are finishing the mission or that are coming to my mission. The problem is people going on the mission from our mission. 

I am also in charge of helping people from districts that are going on a mission actually get on their plane. So I have to schedule their setting apart with President and make sure they get to the airport and help them at the desk. 

The problem is they don't have their itineraries yet and they leave in a week and I am going to have to schedule their setting apart right before they happen and it could change everything. But other than that I am good. 

So right now we have J and S that are progressing and are almost married! And then after we get their marriage date we can give them their baptismal date. I actually have to tell you a crazy story about J as well. They are an awesome family and we love them to death!! 

Also, that little girl we gave a blessing to...long story short she woke up the next day hungry and ready to play! I will explain that in more detail as well! 

The C family has now accepted the invitation to be baptized and they are some of my most favorite people ever! F is one of the funniest guys you could ever meet. Just picture Scott Legg telling a story in his hick slang term English and switch to gangster broken Spanish. I love it. 

They also just had a baby like a week ago and she is the most precious thing ever. She is healthy and has a full head of hair. We also gave her a blessing because she has been making this noise that scared F. We made sure he thought it was a problem and he said yes so we did it. 

I had no Idea that Rylie (Hunter's cousin) was engaged. That blows my mind. And that he came all the way from Georgia. I wouldn't go to Georgia with my fiance! Maybe not even my wife. Have you heard the way Tyson talks now? Ain't no one want that! 

The wind is always blowing in Idaho. It is part of life. It just means your mountains are better than everyone elses. Well I will be happy to go to Hawaii! If I get much fatter though we might have to cut out beach time! 

Courtney and Lance have not told me what they are having but I will wait until maybe she tells me that way she can't get mad at whoever tells me! I will patiently wait. 

It turns out that yes I have been here for over a year now. I don't quite know how I feel about it but I swear I left home like last week. Time is precious folks! 

That is my report for this week! Love you all! 

Con amor,