Oct. 25, 2010

NEW ADDRESS:
Elder Conner Allred
61 Shawmut Ave. #2
Central Falls, Rhode Island
02863


I totally forgot to tell you last week that I'll be training and that I was moving. Oh well. Anyway, my greenie is great! Elder Phillips is from Las Vegas and he's a great kid. His spanish is really pretty good and it's been a good first week! The elders that were in Central Falls left 5 weeks ago because one of them went home early, so we walked into a dead area -- but, now we have 6 investigators (4 thanks to the providence elders) and a half a page of contacts, so we've been working hard. Elder Phillips and I click really well. It's so great. He's a lot like Mickey Dailey haha. So we have a lot of fun together. He's not into cars, but his attitude is very much alike -- very ironic and inteligently humorous.

It was hard to leave Bridgeport -- I loved it there and I miss the people a lot. The people are mostly dominican or Guatemalan here, they all tell me I talk like a Mexican haha. They all speak in Vos, which is weird. It's like more informal than Tu form and it only changes present indicitive and present subjunctive, so it's really easy to learn and use. It's just weird to me though. We had a great little party with the people in Bridgeport and it really made me feel great. I'm going to miss the people there, they were so great. :( But, life moves on. I'll see them again, one day!

Our house is a huge dump, it's disgusting. I fount a garrapata (tick) crawling on my shirt the other day after I got up from praying. So I called Sister Pehrson to see if we should spray, she said no for now, we'll see if I just brought him inside or what happened. But I murdered him with a knife. Our utinsil drawer had only 8 cucarachas in it! I hate our house. It's really nasty. The area is a lot more ghetto as well. Our first night we didn't get home until 8 p.m. but I still took Elder Phillips out to scare him haha. We walked outside and some dominican kids yelled out "Los Mormones!!" So I yelled back "?!Que Onda!?" They definitely didn't realize we spoke spanish. We shared a little bit about Christ with them, one of them is an inactive kid. We said a prayer with them and then after that we went home and planned.

Well, I can't really think of much more at this point. We are having fun moving in and getting everything rolling! I feel honored that President Pehrson trusts me not only to train, but to basically open an area!! Que Chido!


Los Amo
-Elder Allred

Pictures: Saul and us
Stephanie Perez and Me (Inactive Member)
Elder Phillips and Me
p.s. I got the book!

10-12-10

Hi all,

Library was closed on Monday so we're finally getting our e-mails done! This week has been kind of slow but it's been a good week all in all. To be honest, I can't really remember what really went on -- my brain just kind of mixes things up all into one big ball and I can't discern between yesterday and 6 months ago.

We did have some luck with an old investigator named Brenda last week. She thought we were J.Ws the first few months the missionaries were meeting with her. Finally I asked her to compare her bible with mine and she found... they're the same! So then she said "Well, then what's this book?" So everything actually went really great with her! She seemed a lot less confused! But, tragedy struck. This morning during studies we got a phone call from her husband -- he says he doesn't want us to come over anymore to meet with her. So that kind of bums us out, but hopefully his heart will be softened. We just told him "if you need anything, give us a call."

We are teaching a part member family from Paraguay. Very interesting accent, too. TrabajaR. They have really american R's. The husband was pretty heard hearted up until now, for some reason he wants to meet with us. So we're happy about that. Last night we taught the restoration and we told him about the apostles having the same authority as Jesus Christ, he thought it was blasphemy and questioned me on it. It was such basic knowledge (so I thought) I didn't even know where to look to answer him! Finally I looked at Acts... DUH, acts of the apostles. And read him a few of the miracles done at the hand of Filipe. He is opening more and more, he just needs to have scriptures to back up what we say for him to believe. Which is fine with me, I feel comfortable answering questions with scriptures. I feel like I don't get the chance to do it enough, actually. People will usually just believe our testimonies, so it's fun to use a little spiritual knowledge. He asked last night though, "Why should I have to read alone? I will just listen to my wife read, we're going to be together forever aren't we? So we'll just read together." Those are the kinds of questions he asks. I was kind of stumped, I thought "Yeah, good point." I can't really explain to him the difference in studying alone and with someone. Personally, I like to study alone -- but I didn't have a good reason to give him to study alone, other than I like it! haha.

Elsi's daughter, Camila was in the hospital the other day! We gave her a blessing though and then we prayed that night asking that she would be healed by morning. She left the hospital at 12 the next day! Talk about a cool miracle, huh?

A woman in our ward named Amelia (Mexican) lives with her daughter, son and son in law. Her daughter is 7 months pregnant with her first child and has been married less than a year. They were sealed in the temple. Well, her husband decided he doesn't like whatever he's got so he skipped off to Mexico without any warning and just abandoned his wife/baby. So that has been kind of hard for her. She's 23 and is about to have a child! She feels pretty vulnerable. So we're having them over tonight with the Sanchez' to try to get a good friendship going. And, to have a little time away from sitting at their house in the dark. They need time away!

We're going to see if we can track down the ladies from Spain. The family they were living with have no idea what happened. They just took off randomly one day. The mom wants to stay past her Visa and from what the other family said she's a little insane. She is basically the boss of her daughter and wants to marry her daughter off to an American to get papers. So we're going to see if we can catch them near her highschool today. Hopefully we can, they definitely need some help in that family!

Transfers are coming up next week and I'm hoping I don't take off.

We moved apartments by the way. Same address, just apt. 111 now.

I love you and I am praying for you.
-Elder Conner Allred

Oct. 4, 2010

Mom

Thanks for the words. It's still hard but I'll keep moving on.

Conference went well, the brethren seemed to talk a lot about 1Timothy chapter 4 which is a great chapter. We had a few members show up and I thought my companion was going to have an aneurysm. He kept asking me "So, people don't go?" (Saturday morning) I said "No, honestly, people just throw it on TV and pay a little attention or are out working, especially the Hispanics." "But, why? Do they not care? Do they not understand?" haha. I was just thinking -- RELAX! They have lives haha. The Lord understands. We went to dinner with a member family on Saturday night and he about started to chew out the wife because she had been home all day and hadn't watched any of conference. I just kind of shook my head. She then started speaking English (that's when you know they're a little frustrated) and said "Elder, when you have children, you'll understand." Andale!. He means well haha. He's a recent convert of 3 years so I think he deserves a break haha. It's just really funny! To me, at least!

I really liked the talk about not looking back -- that was a great talk for me I think. I have a hard time not looking back. There were a lot of great messages about this and what I think I saw from this conference is that the world is being attacked, especially the saints, and we need to raise our children in such a way to be prepared to battle these attacks.

I have made an extensive study guide for how to read Spanish. We have an investigator who can't read. She is 30 something years old and has children etc. But she can't read! So I have split up each letter and we begin on Tuesday with lessons. I have a page on syllables and vowels and then 2 letters per page. I have written up some homework she can do that goes along with the lessons we teach as well. I'm excited to help someone learn to read! How cool!!

I can't think of much else that has happened this week. The Library has new computers, finally! I love you, I hope all is well at home. Happy Birthday!!!

Hopefully things go well this week. I love you.
-Elder Conner Allred