A New Start!

On Tuesday, May 27, 2014 1:35 PM, Blaine Bushman <blaineb@myldsmail.net> wrote:
 

Hey everyone!

 

I hope you have all had a great week. Thank you so much for all of the pictures. I loved them. The kids look amazing, I loved seeing Nana and Grandpa, and Mr. G looks really good. I'm glad that honors night turned out so good and everything ran smoothly. I'm sad that I wasn't able to be there for Mr. G's last concert. The program is going to really miss him as well as all of his students. You told me about the Utah story while we skyped. That's awesome that you were able to give him that. It sounds like you guys really had a blast going to Dallas and Kenzie's recital and track meet. Congrats on doing so good Kenzie! Tell Canyon to write me. That's so cool that President Vore is now the Temple President. He is such and amazing man. I'm so glad that Nana and Grandpa and dad could take the kids to the temple. That is such an amazing experience that none of them will forget.

 

Well this week was pretty good. I already love my new companion, Elder Tui'one! He is such a cool, happy, guy that is just a blast to be around. And on top of that we live with Elder Carbonneau and his comp Elder Sweeney. We have the best apartment in the mission!!! Haha And I am actually driving a truck which makes life even better! So Tuesday the only thing that I have to share really was I had my first District Meeting as the District Leader. I am over the Zone Leader's and Elder Carbonneau and Elder Sweeney. So thankfully I don't have too much to worry about. The ZL's and I are focused on finding while Carbonneau is finishing baptizing most of the investigators they have. The meeting went very well actually and afterwards I could really tell that it was led completely by the Spirit. There were things that came up that I hadn't planned for that were exactly what the district needed at that time which was super cool. So Meeting Number 1=success! So like I mentioned my area is completely 100 % in finding mode right now. We have no investigators to work with right now. I have come to find out that with my companionship we are having to repair issues that past missionaries have made so we have a lot of work to do. The work is similar to my last area in Corona. The only difference is here, my area is even bigger and it's all spread out. It'll be interesting to see how things work out. But we have a lot of potential and former investigators that we can work with and this week we should be picking up 3 or 4 so I'm super excited! We are going to have a lot of success together. We are trying to start waking up earlier than normal to go play ball at the church so we will see how that pans out. I really need to get back into shape and lose a lot more weight. Thursday I had a District Leader Meeting in RIverside during which the AP's and President Smart trained us on how to be good DL's. It was a really good meeting and I gained a lot from it. I also got to see a bunch of my MTC buddies there which was really fun. That day after I got back we went and contacted a refferal named R who seemed to be pretty legit. And then that night he called us and left a voicemail about how he didn't want us to come back cuz he had "researched and doesn't need a prophet" so that was kind of a bummer. But we are going to go back anyways sometime this week to try and help him understand a little better. Friday we got money for dinner and so we went out and brought food home and had an intense study session which was really fun and I learned a lot of things from it. Saturday I did my first interview for baptism. Boy is that a lot of pressure! S is a 9 year old boy whom Carbonneau has been teaching and after the interview I was blown away with how smart and ready he is. Long story short...S was baptized Sunday evening and is now a huge blessing for his family. Sunday was a crazy day. So crazy I don't have time to really even start. We ended the night at a farewell Tongan party for a kid in our ward that is (on the plane right now) giong to Chicago Illinois for his mission. Great food. That's all I have to say. No wonder I'm fat. Poly's are always feeding us. But I love it! Yesterday as it was Memorial day meant we didn't get the chance to email which is why I am doing it now. But we had a great day scorching my feet in the rough sand volleyball pit and then just hanging out playing monopoly and Lord of the Rings Risk! It was a good day. We had dinner with the Pierre's (their son is the one leaving for the mission) and it was super wierd because I could feel and recognize the feeling in the house of the aknowledgement of everyone that their lives were all about to change.

 

Other than that this week was full of us just hitting the pavement and trying to find people to teach. And during our breaks there were some intense games of Risk, monopoly, nerf wars, and one moment in which a carrot cake was being thrown between Carbonneau and Tui'one as they fought to shower first! Hahah That was so much fun. Don't worry mom. The mess got cleaned up. Overall it was a pretty good week. I hope you all have a great time this week and stay safe. Pray that we can find people to teach. We need the help. I love you. Can't wait to hear from you again. Until next week...

 

Love,

Elder Bushman