Sunny California

Hello everyone, this week in sunny California, it has been that, exactly.  The weather is already hot, and feels like summer already, no bueno.

Monday we had our normal P-day, before coming home to have a lesson with Pandian and Mr. Singh, who live in our complex.  They're both such great guys.  These Indian people are so humble and down to earth, and are so accepting of help to learn not only English, but the Gospel of Jesus Christ as well.  If anything, planting the seed for now is nice.  We had dinner with a member of the Stake Presidency, and talked with him about his calling and such.  Had some great steak too!  Eventually we had our normal meeting with the district leaders and sister training leaders, and it went well.

Tuesday was kicked off with weekly planning, as usual.  We had a lesson planned with Mary Anne, who is the one Elder Clark and I knocked into on exchanges that one time, before we were ever companions, but she said she was behind with some stuff, and needed some weeding done.  So we did some weed'n'teach, if you will.  She is so ready for baptism, and I am so not ready for the sun.  I already got sunburned.  We had to go help the sister training leaders move some stuff around, then it was time for knockout.  No time for lunch.  I feel like that's the only addition to being a zone leader, no lunch.  I had a stale hot dog bun for the road before knocking some doors.  Talked to some interesting people, that's for sure.  A member gave us some money for dinner since we had no plans. We went to Buffalo Wild Wings, but the wait was too long, so we went to Chick fil A.  Lets just say we got two 30 nugget platters, and it was awesome.  We had a lesson with Tabitha, and she too is ready for baptism.  She got some anti stuff from her sister and wanted to know more, simply to prove her sister wrong!  She's so prepared!

Wednesday we had some studies to prepare for a meeting.  The meeting was MLC, or mission leadership counsel, where all the zone leaders, sister training leaders, assistants, and President and Sister Henrie gather, and train, and counsel.  We had to make out way up to Santa Clarita by 12, and the meeting started at 1.  It ended around 6, and we got home around 7,  It was a long day, and I can't remember what we did after.  I do remember, however, since Elder Clark and I have been naming every semi on the road, we decided to take the truck route on the way to Santa Clarita...never again...

Thursday we had to put together a training that we were giving that day.  It was a zone meeting, rather than just district meeting.  It was a good couple of hours as well, and the lovely assistants showed up, so I got to see Elder Jensen and Elder Neilson again.  We had a good knockout before heading to dinner.  We had huge T-bone steaks that were the size of our plate.  The thing was, we didn't have much time to eat, because half an hour later, we had a meeting with the stake president and President Henrie.  We discussed the things we could do to better help the work in the Canoga Park Stake.  Afterwards, we went and visited some investigators that have seemed to drop off, and had no luck.

Friday we went and helped Mary Anne out again, first thing in the morning.  Did some more weed'n'teach.  When we finished there, we went to lunch with one of the members of our zone and just talked.  When the time came to knock, we hit a pretty good street.  The YSA sisters were knocking in our area as well, and found a couple of potential investigators for us, so we'll follow up with them here soon...again.  This family that is in the Tongan ward in LA, but live in our boundaries (if they attended the English ward) took us out to eat, and we got to choose.  You betcha, we chose McDonalds!  Sure was good!

Saturday we didn't have hardly anything on our schedule, so when we left our apartment, we just went and knocked first thing in the morning. and boy are people more receptive and kind then.  No new investigators, but some pretty cool potentials came from it.  When we finished the street we were on, we were walking back up to our car, and saw some other missionaries from another church, haha, and they were double dipping all the people...sorry, not sorry! haha We talked to one of them, and traded them for a Restoration pamphlet.  We eventually came home and had lunch, which consisted of ice cream and Pepsi.  We wend and did some park proselyting, and watched some kids film some movie for school, but they weren't interested in the Gospel.  However, they did know some kids from the last ward I served in, and said that those youth had talked with them about the church in the past, which was neat.  Youth can have a big impact!  We found some part member families , and the non member of one family invited us back and wants us over for dinner. another wants us to teach their daughter, so those are successful pools.  We were home for the last half hour or so, and were supposed to have another English class with our Indian friends, however neither have a phone to tell us they couldn't do it today.  So since we were at the apartment, we walked around to find someone. We ended up playing ball with some people at our complex and beating them twice, then introducing the Gospel to them.  They invited us back to play ball with them more often, so we'll do that if there is progression in the Gospel with them.

Sunday was good.  We asked the Sunday school teacher at the beginning of the week, if we could teach on something specific to meet the needs of our investigator who would be there, he got back to us and told us we could do it because he wouldn't be there.  So we quickly put something together, and then our investigator left after sacrament meeting, so no point in getting out of order in Sunday school, so we just winged the next lesson.  Then, of course, our investigator walked back in...oh well.  It went well and there was a good spirit.  After church we had ward coordination and discussed our teaching pool and such, and then hit the streets knocking.  We came home for dinner at the end, and day light savings hit us hard.  We fell asleep during dinner, which was much needed.  Then our appointment cancelled, and we were nearly out of gas, so we just walked around the huge mall, all the streets around it, and talked to everyone we could.  It was a good use of our time.

Today we're going to hit some sick scenic drive that at the top you can see the ocean, so that's on the agenda, as well as eating dinner with the Stake President.

I love you and miss you all!  Remember, because of the great Plan of Happiness, which is centered on the Atonement of Jesus Christ, we can be forgiven of every little mistake we've made, but more importantly, know that someone else has already felt every bit of pain and can succor you in times of need.  Turn to our Savior in these times.  "Men are that they might have joy."  -that's the way to have joy.  Turn to Christ.

"If you're not happy in life, you're being selfish."  Gordon B. Hinckley

Elder Martin

"By and large, I have come to see that if we COMPLAIN about life, it is because we are thinking only of ourselves."  

President Gordon B. Hinckley