White Washed!

Dear Family,

 

   These last couple of days have been really busy and crazy.  Monday afternoon I got a call from the assistants and I was called to be a trainer and a district leader.  Yesterday I found out where I was going. I am in the May Valley ward. May Valley ward is in the Bellevue South zone.  Since I am training, my companion and I were "white washed" into the area, which means we are both new there.  The reason we were white washed is because it has been a sister missionary area.  So that may or may not be the reason I smell like "luscious embrace"....i didnt bring any soap or shampoo with me. 

   May Valley is a car area and we are living with members.  They are very nice.  We are still trying to figure everything out. Like how to get to place to place and where the church is and basically everything.  Yesterday I went to transfers and picked up my new car then went to the mission home in mercer island.  There the trainers found out who their comanions were going to be.  Before we left, President Larking talked to both us.  I guess the bishop in May Valley really wants the area to be one of the higher baptizing area's in the mission.  So the ward is receiving a lot of attention from the stake.  There is a lot of work to be done.  Last years goal for the year was 6 convert baptisms.  To put that in perspective the Federal Way Ward goal (my first area) for november and december was 15.  But there are some really good things happening.  I am excited to be here.  We met with the Bishop last night and he is really good and wants to be involved in missionary work.  We are meeting with the Ward Mission Leader tonight.  The sister missionaries told me he is great, when we talked briefly  at transfers. 

  That is what is happening to this point.  I was surprised again to be transferred since my old companion has been in that ward for almost 8 months straight.  Seems like everytime I dont think I am going to get transferred I do.  It is exciting to be in this new area with a brand new missionary.  His name is Elder Peterson and he is from Draper, Utah.  He is excited to be out.  I can tell these last few days has been a little overwhelming.  But I can relate to that.  The first few days there is so much thrown at you at once.  He is doing great though. 

  Christmas was good as well.  Definitely different, but it wasn't too bad.  Being able to talk to you guys was great.  Dinner was very good and we played a couple of games after dinner that night since we were allowed to have a two hour christmas dinner. 

  Being a district leader is a little nerve wracking.  The zone leaders and sister missionaries are the two comanionships in my district.  It will be a new challenge, but it will be good.  

  Winter weather is back.  It seems like the rain is trying to catch up and get up to the months average these past few days.  It's been pretty gray.  Well we got to go get shopping done so we can start proslyeting.  I hope everything is going good.  Talk to you soon.  I love you!

 

        Elder Clark

Transfer Day!

We received a short email from Tim Long (the family Brayden stays with) giving us a heads up that transfers came in Sunday night and Brayden will be moving to a new area but not much more.   Waiting to hopefully hear from Brayden later today or tomorrow.  

Elder Clark & Elder Tingey on transfers 12/27/2011

Merry Christmas!

We had our Christmas call with Brayden on Sunday night.  We were able to talk for about an hour and thanks to his tech savvy Bishop we were able to video chat using iPads and FaceTime.   We thoroughly enjoyed the short time we had to ask him many questions and hear about his activities and experiences.    We all think he looked great and sounded so good.   Due to his illness last week he missed being able to attend a temple session with his Zone.


Transfer calls were coming out that night so our weekly email won't come until Tuesday. 

Short and sick...

Dear Family,

 This week was pretty good.  We are going to the temple this afternoon, which is why we are emailing and shopping today.  We have a baptism scheduled for this saturday.  Her interview is tonight, so we will be busy getting ready for that this week.  Last week we also had a really good lesson with Susan, who is Elvia Flores sister who is now living with them.

  Christmas day is still a little unknown.  We have church in the morning and we are suppose to do the call during the least productive hours of the day.  So I am guessing I will be calling sometime in the afternoon. Probably around 1 or 2.  So thats exciting.  This week will go by pretty fast, we will be pretty busy.  Well I am sorry its so short. I am just really not feeling to well right now.  Hopefully I can make it through the temple.  I will try to write a letter sometime today.  I love you!

 

  Elder Clark

Dear Family,

 

  This week was pretty good.  The weather is staying pretty nice.  Still a little cold when we go tracking from 5-7 but not rainy so thats good.  We had our mission christmas party on thursday. It was pretty fun, we had dinner and watched a movie.  It was a late night though, we didnt get back to our house till 10:15.  Also on Monday, we got interviewed for a movie that new missionaries that are coming to Seattle see.  That is why Elder Bunton was back in the Seattle area, he was making the video with a couple more elders that went home when he did.  Hopefully I will get to see the video when it is completed. 

  Our ward Christmas party was also last week. It was alright we were only there the last hour or so. The nativity play was pretty good.  I'm sure not as good as yours since Wes was playing Joseph. 

  This Sunday was a really good day for us.  The night before we were going over to someone that we have been trying to visit ever since I got to Jovita Creek and we have had no luck. But Saturday night we went over and Chris, who is the persons grandson answered the door.  And we have talked with him before.  So we asked how he was going and he said good then he asked if we could get him a ride to church tomorrow.  We said yes and we had a quick lesson with him as well.  That was really cool that he wanted to go to church without us even asking.  So we had our ward mission leader pick him up and he is going to start going to the young mens activities.  We are meeting with him again Saturday and hopefully we can put him on date for baptism.  At church we also had one of the people we have on date for Jan. 14th for the first time. He liked it.  Also, Mike Crump, one of our recent converts blessed the sacrament and Andrea Flores another recent convert got a calling.  So that was pretty cool to see . 

  This last week we dropped some of our investigators because they weren't progressing and wouldnt read from the book of mormon. Thats about all that is happening teaching wise right now.  I cant believe Christmas is only two weeks away.  Have you guys got the tree up and everything? Sister Long has the middle floor pretty well decorated and lit up.  And about the chocolate lollipops. If me and my companion take a picture could mom make like a cd or something that said merry christmas on it?  We'll probably take a picture today and have Bro. long email it.  When do the kids get out of school? Has it snowed there yet?  Here it is pretty frosty in the morning.  I am grateful for Kerrigans and Livia's prayers. We get to call on Christmas, next week I will let you know what time and everything.  Have a good week.  I love you.

 

  Elder Clark

Hi!

  Well it is starting to get a little cold.  In the lower 30's in the morning and at night then higher 30's during the day.  But we haven't had any precipitation for the past several days.  I guess that makes it colder because the clouds hold the heat in opposed to when there is no clouds the heat escapes.  I thought that was pretty cool to learn. 

  But this week was great.  We found some new investigators.  And we put two people on date; one for december 24th, and the other for January 14th.  The guy for jan. 14th actually lives in the Long's neighborhood, he is renting a house.  His whole dads side of the family is Mormon. And he went to church as a kid a couple of times but all he remembers is the sacrament.  So we had a good lesson with him on friday.  The young women who is on date for december 24th is part of a part member family.  And she has been coming to church the past several weeks and participating in young womens. We think she is pretty solid for her date.  This sunday because of the big nativity event we went to church at a different building and ward.  We went to the Redondo ward.  It was cool to see some of the marshalese people that we use to bumb into when I was in federal way at church.  I also learned that Libby and Bobby who we worked with my first transfer are planning to get married and baptised.  I still remember when I asked her if she wanted to get baptised the first time I met with her and she kind of looked at me like I was dumb, because both Elder Bunton and Elder Park knew of her situation of not being married and they forgot to fill me in on that.  But that was some really good news I got Sunday. 

  While were on the subject of Elder Bunton. I actually saw him twice this past week.  It was a little surprising and weird.  We were hosting at the nativity event and I saw the Cahans who are part of the Federal Way ward and I hadnt seen them in a while so I said hi.  And sister Cahan told me to look at the door and that she had brought a surprise and sure enough elder Bunton walks in. Its pretty weird to see one of your companions not as a missionary.  It was good to see him and talk with him for a few minutes. 

   That is really sad about Ashton.  I had the opportunity to work with him when I helped out with the basketball camps.  He was in my group one year, I think his eighth grade year.  He was always smiling.  I also knew his sister as well. 

   That is good that West won, sounds pretty exciting! ! I think we are going to play basketball today.  We were planning on playing last week, but I took a three hour nap. Oops. But I am pretty refreshed today so I want to play.  Oh and Brother Long let me know that the singer I was thinking of was Jewel.  He is kind of OCD so he cant stop until he can remember the person or get the answer.  Its kind of funny sometimes.  His birthday is actually today.  Everything is going good, the days are long but the weeks fly by somehow.  Dont worry about the CD's right now.  Drew sent me like 15, which my companion and I are very thankful.  But even though I am on my mission things haven't changed, he sent the package to "Elder Brayden Judy Esmeralda Clark," that got some laughs.  I have helped set up more lights this christmas than I have my whole life.  So far we have helped three people (one of them being the Longs) set up Christmas lights.  It was pretty fun. I hope everyone has a good week! I love you!

 

Elder Clark

 

p.s. yes to the lollipops