Letter from Tacoma #53: October 31, 2016

 Hey everyone!

Let me tell you how my week went:

Monday: Everything fell through for our plans this P-Day, so we basically dinked around town, played some card games, just fooling around until we needed to get back to work. Unfortunately, there seemed to be no one else to have FHE with, so we were kind of left to go walking about town in the dark... with no one around. It was pretty uneventful.

Tuesday: The weather was phenomenal. Completely sunny, very warm, perfect conditions to go street contacting. So, we did that until we ran to our next appointment, doing service for an older woman named Maves. She had us clean out her oven and her moldy fridge, and put up a new shower curtain. She was very grateful for that. And then we ate dinner, went knocking 5-7's, then ran to Addiction Recovery Program at the church. I love those meetings, because they're very enjoyable. The 12-step program is a great spiritual resource and I learn a lot from it about addictions. We've basically been attending these meetings every week since I got here, so that shows how fun it is to be in that environment.

Wednesday: District Meeting! That also happened to be the day the new Wendy's opened up in Aberdeen, and before now the closest one was another hour away in Olympia! SO OF COURSE WE WENT! The kitchen was full of employees for the opening day, and a bunch of corporate execs were there to greet us at the door. It's been so long since I had Wendy's, so I kind of splurged and got a BACONATOR combo. MMMM, so gooood!

District Meeting was about extending commitments and how we need to be straight-forward when committing investigators do follow the commandments. If we beat around the bush, it won't be as effective, but we still need to follow the spirit in how we address these commitments to each investigator. And if we're afraid of them declining the commitment, it's still better that we do, rather than never give them the chance at all.

We also met with Diane for dinner again. She made some way good spaghetti. During the meal we taught her the commandments, and how living them would open up blessings in her life. But not living the commandments also has a consequence, which is that we miss out on the blessings Heavenly Father wants to give us. We explained all the commandments, and she seemed to get them all, and she's already living most of them anyways, except for drinking tea. But she doesn't seem willing to give that up yet, because she hasn't gotten a confirmation about the Book of Mormon yet. So, we're praying for her.

Thursday: After Weekly Planning, we ran to an appointment we had with a lady we met through knocking on Tuesday. When we met her Tuesday, she said she was glad to see us and told us sorry about how her husband shooed us away last time... which I don't even recall... but then she told us to come back Thursday. So we did. Her name is Catherine, and a long long time ago she had a close friend who was mormon, but Catherine just never asked all of her questions that she was curious about, because back then she didn't understand a lot of what we believe.

So this lesson we had was super great, because she was just asking all the right questions, and just from answering her questions, we taught all the points of the first three lessons in an hour. How's that for record time? And better yet, she understood everything! We also left her with a Book of Mormon, as well as a pamphlet about the Restoration of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, just in case she wanted remind herself about what we talked about. Although, due to scheduling conflicts, we won't be able to see her until the second week of November, mostly because our schedule this week will be pretty hectic. So here's to hoping she reads some of the book before we come by again.

Friday: We did service at the Senior Center again this week. But while we were serving lunch, there was this lady who came in, completely angry at Elder MacQueen and me. We have no idea what she was mad about, she was just ranting and shouting about... something. I think I heard her threaten to close the 'Mormon Church'. It's times like those that you just have to sigh and realize that she was smoking weed, so she wasn't in her right mind. As calmly as possible, we served her some lunch to-go and bid her a good day. Eventually she left, and everyone else in the Senior Center just started giving us these surprised looks. A few of them were like, "Wow, these missions you guys go on must really teach you how to be calm around people like that."

I felt pretty good that I've learned how to be more patient with people out here. I know a year ago I probably would've been shouting back at that lady. That experience was pretty neat.

And after lunch, my shoes have been worn all the way through to the sole (I blame the sand), so the thrift store at the Senior Center let me come in and take a pair of shoes for free

Saturday: We spent the day finding, street contacting and knocking. But during the afternoon we helped Rosa move her stuff out of storage and back to her home. It got done sooner than we thought it would. So the rest of the day was pretty open.

We got this in the mail, tho.

​It's a Blue Apron box. It's this program that sends you a box monthly, full of ingredients and different recipes to try out. Elder MacQueen's family sent him a free trial box, so that's what we used to make dinner that night. We made...

Cabbage/chicken Pizza!

​All the ingredients are fresh, the pizza dough came pre-made, and it was pretty simple to follow the recipe.

​It came out pretty good. Tasted good when we added BBQ sauce, but tasted alright without it. Plus the apartment smelled like pizza for almost a day and a half... which would have been alright if it hadn't been Fast Sunday the day after.

Sunday: It was just a full day of singing. We had fast and testimony meeting, singing hymns, and then another hymn in combined third-hour. And then the member who signed up to feed us just told us to get it at the choir potluck after church, but there was choir practice before they would start eating. So, we sang in choir practice, too. It was fun, and it made me miss singing in choir back home.

Immediately after we had there, we had to run to Elma, because we were having a fireside put on by the missionaries. We were singing as a missionary choir, so there was an hour and a half more of practice, and then the actual performance. I love these kinds of Firesides! They're so fun and I get so pumped!

With all that singing yesterday, I'm surprised I didn't wake up to find my voice gone this morning.

Also, some senior missionaries came from the mission office to the fireside, and they brought the mail with them! YES! I got my package!!! Thanks for the shirt and socks, those were really needed.... Though I'm not sure when we'll get around to making the red velvet cake. A member just gave us a couple more boxes of brownie mix to make too, so we'll need to pace our sweets right now. Thank You!

So that's how my week went.

Good job on your games, Brandon! Keep it going to the championship! ... But that blonde hair, tho... I'm not sure how much I like it myself. At least it'll grow out by the time I see you in person again.

Also, congratulations to Daniel and Melodi. Their new girl looks cute!

Wow Mom, I didn't realize you were mostly irish! That would explain my need for Mt. Dew though. "Haha, I drink all I want. I'm Irish, so it's okay."

Happy Halloween, everyone!

Last Halloween on the mission!!!! WOOT!

I love you all!

Thanks for reading!

-Elder R. Austin Moe

Wa-Tac Missionary