23 May 2016

Elder Green the Greenie and Elder Yule the Trainer

Alright, so my new companion. Straight out of the MTC. When you're brand new you're called a greenie or you're green, of course you know that. His name is Elder Green.... Yup Elder Green!  Green the greenie. He seems nice! I've only been with him for 4 and a half days so far. He's a skinny little guy. He's from Ogden. MTC  And he's pretty green. In the greenie sense. Which is good. He's all gung-ho about working.   And of course I'm certainly not an expert on how to work, but I've had good companions who have taught me a little bit on how to do our work. It's definitely weird being the senior companion and training him. I'm just going off of kind of my basic knowledge I guess. President Marston said he was going to get me a book or a paper or something called "You Know Enough", so hopefully he does that pretty soon, haha. I'd also like to tell you how incredible president Marston is. When I was in the mission office picking up Elder Green we had a little meeting with the trainers. There were about 6 of us. When we finished that meeting and we were walking out and president walked up next to me and kind of gave me a little shoulder push and said "Elder Yule, how are you!?" With a big old smile on his face. I said I was doing great! I told him I was pretty nervous, but I was excited. Then he said "I have all the confidence in the world in you Elder Yule. There more things in store for you, but you have to train before you do those things." He is an incredible man
who has so much love inside him. 

Email sent to me from Elder Yule's companion

Hey Marianne! It's Elder Phelps.

I just wanted to send you an email to tell you how amazing your son is, and how much I loved being companions with him! It was some of the best 13 weeks of my life. We had so much fun and worked so hard. We have the same sense of humor and we were always laughing. We had many great spiritual experiences together.  I just want you to know how thankful I am that I was companions with your son. I was begging President Marston to leave us together. I hope we can serve together again. I was so happy that instead of just leaving him on Tuesday, he was able to come down to Roseville with me and we could drop him off at his greenie meeting on Wednesday. He will be an awesome trainer! I'm so excited for him. I miss him and everything and everyone else in Chico very dearly.
Your son is awesome. He is a great missionary. He changed my mission and helped me improve so much! I will always be grateful for him and for you for raising him. 
Thank you so much, Mama Yule!

Elder Phelps

16 May 2016

Transfers were this week! Elder Phelps is leaving which makes me very sad. We really hit it off he and I. We have honestly become great friends! When I was with Elder Bates president told me that you weren't called to be companions to be best friends, you were called to be companions to spread the gospel. Elder Phelps is going down to Roseville to be a zone leader. President calls you on the phone when you are called to be a zone leader or a trainer. So we get the call and Phelps answers and president tells him
to put it on speaker phone.  He calls Elder Phelps to be a zone leader and then he says ............... "and Elder Yule, I'd like to call you to be a trainer. Will you accept this assignment?" I'm going to train a new guy! I'm really quite scared. I'm kind of honored that president trusts me with a greenie. I don't know how to do this though. I hardly know how to be a missionary myself! How am I going to show a new guy how to do it? So that's probably the biggest update.

9 May 2016

I asked Calum what the start of his days are usually like...

Let's see.. So I start my day waking up at 6:30.  Elder Phelps has a Jillian Michaels dvd from another missionary, and we work out for 30 minutes.  It is awesome! Haha! Then Phelps usually showers then I shower. Then we eat breakfast. I usually just have a bowl of cereal. Golden Graham's to be specific. Or some chips and guac. Then personal studies then companion studies. I have gotten better at my scriptures but I'm still not very good. The iPad is very handy.  I can just search the little phrase I'm thinking of.  But I wish I could just know where I was going to find the scripture. And lessons, really we just wing it. I mean we don't memorize a whole discussion.  We memorize the principles of the lesson but then just wing it.  Which I think works pretty well. I study the little cards that Cousin Jay gave me.  Those are so helpful!  Like he put a ton of effort into those on his mission. They have scripture references and everything. Still no news on Phelps leaving or staying. Everyone wants him to stay. We have even been praying for him to stay. 

I miss the calm presence of a mother! I especially thought about that yesterday. And I miss my whole family. I
always do. I love you guys. I will do a big long email next week. I love you mum.

18 April 2016

This week was great! Jessika and Maxx were baptized! Jessika's father in law baptized them and Elder Phelps confirmed her and I confirmed Maxx. It was incredible. One thing I have found is that when I give a blessing the way I feel the spirit is, when my eyes are closed I get dizzy.... At least I'm pretty sure it's the spirit. Yeah I think it
is. But it was an awesome day. We had some awesome lessons and some weird ones. For some reason this week we met a lot of weird people. They would just walk up to us and talk to us. 

4 April 2016

This week was alright. Missionary work wise it was awesome!  Emotionally it was a bit weird. I was very homesick a few times. I don't know why. Seeing how big Riley has been getting and thinking that I can't give him a hug and a kiss when he gets up in the morning has really been getting to me. I've just missed home. But on the other hand I hit my 6 month mark this week! We taught some really great lessons and our investigators watched conference and all sorts of stuff. The work, like last week, is going great in Chico! Transfers are this week. Elder Phelps and I are staying in Chico, which is great because we work very well together. From conference this week the thing that
hit me most is that I need to follow Christ more to be a better leader. In the priesthood session a guy talked about how to be a better leader.  He said the key to being a better leader is to be a better follower. Christ was the best leader of all and He followed perfectly Heavenly Fathers plan. In my patriarchal blessing it says people will look up to me as I am modest in my behaviors. While I've been out here I've been talking a lot with other missionaries, making a bunch of silly jokes and running around or whatever.  Not that I am acting inappropriately, but I'm going to try to be more modest and follow the Savior even more, so that others will
look up to me.  Not that I'm in a leadership position, but I still think it's a good thing to do.

14 March 2016

Elder Phelps is really close with a family in Rocklin and they took us down and we did an endowment session.
It was so cool!!

My week was crazy!  We had zone conference, which was cool.  It rained non stop!  First we biked through a 6 inch puddle. Then through a little stream that went up to my calf.  Then we went on a little path under a bridge that was flooded.... It was literally up to my waist! I couldn't tell if I was being disobedient by swimming!  We didn't know it would be that deep.. We just kind of went and then half way through my entire butt was in a river.... Yeah it was crazy. We were already soaked from the rain so it didn't do much, but it was a bit scary and a bit fun, haha! We have this great new investigator who referred herself on Mormon.org, so she is really into it. She has been through a lot of sad stuff recently. So she loves the incredible message of the restored gospel and how Heavenly Father loves us. She is great. She even asked how she would go about getting baptized. Elder Phelps said "well first you talk to the missionaries." And she said "check." It's sweet, haha!  She is super excited and we are excited for her.

It was a good week but I hope this one is a little bit better and more dry. My shoes are fine. I might try to find a cheap pair of black dress shoes to wear in the rain because after wearing them in the rain they are soaked for days.

I miss you mum and I love you. I'm proud of you as well for being such a good principal. I bet your job is harder than mine. I get to tell people stuff they want to hear, and you don't always get to do that. Love you mum.