Week 52

Happy Hump Day!!!!  I can't believe that it has been one year already.  Here is the week in review....

August 10

Happy Birthday Ethan! Today was a pretty lame P-day as Elder Anderson volunteered us to take Elder Stott and Elder Lui to go tie shopping and then we sat at their house for a long time. We finally went to the church to play some three way volleyball. We made some visits to end the night.

August 11

Today was pretty good. We had lessons with Jessica and a less active member with a 9 year old daughter cancel on us. We had dinner dropped off and we weren't able to teach Maylia, a recent convert, because we couldn't get a male to come with us. We made some visits the rest of the night and we have exchanges with the Assistants so I am with Elder Canny in their area!!!

August 12

Today was a blast! We had a service opportunity in the morning that their whole Zone went to. We cleaned up a bunch of garbage on two houses in the ghetto! We went and visited one of their Ward Missionaries and shared a message. Dinner was really good, I don't remember the family's name. We taught their investigator Ben. Our lesson with Curtis cancelled. Had a really good day with Elder Canny!

August 13 - HUMP DAY!!!!

Pretty good day today! No packages yet but I'm sure they will be arriving soon. We had weekly planning which went well. We had a lesson with Trisha who is going through some hard times after being laid off from her job. We went to 5 Guys with the Twiggs, which was really good!

We had splits where I visited some potential investigators and talked to an inactive member who wants to come back and have his girlfriend take the lessons which was really cool.  They are not in our ward unfortunately, but I was still really excited! Then we went to Macdon's for an ice cream cone!

August 14

Today was really good. I got my hump day package from Mattie which was really surprising haha! We had District Meeting which went really well and we were able to see how the other Missionaries have done with the social media and I was very impressed that they took what I had talked about and ran with it which made me really happy! We went with Hermana Johnson and Sister Barton to a lesson with one of their investigators who is YSA age who they are going to try and hand off to us. The lesson went really well. We had dinner with the Bryson's which was good! We made visits the rest of the night and set up an appointment with Desirae.

August 15

Today was pretty good. We went over to Brother Cleverly's to help him out with some odds and ends and he taught us a little about sprinklers! We had a lesson with a new investigator from the family ward, Alice who was raised RLDS but she is interested in meeting with us.  The lesson went well and should be interesting to teach her. We had dinner with the Rotches and then had a lesson with Makaila Chalia and made a couple visits before taking Elder Nicholson and Elder Cross out for celebratory Cold Stone for finding a new solid investigator!

August 16

Today was pretty good. We had two investigators that we weren't expecting that came to church. We taught a guy named Randy between Church and for dinner before we ate with the Donnor's. We then went with Brother Donnor to our lessons with the Rayborns and Desirae . We put Desirae on baptismal date for the 26th of September. We then went and I did a baptismal interview which went well. Then we went and picked up Elder Nicholson and Cross to come over.

Well that is my week....Hope all is well with everyone.

Love you all,
Elder Ashby

Here is a rap that Elder Ashby wrote about his last area in Prescott Valley

Week 51

Greetings all!!!

August 3
Today was a pretty good P-day. Elder Anderson got his haircut today. We went to the Stake Center to play basketball and volleyball which was really fun! We made visits the whole night.

August 4

Today was pretty good. Finally finished the book, Jesus the Christ!!! We had MLC (Mission Leadership Conference) for a big chunk of the day and I really enjoyed it for the most part!

We got back and had dinner with the Carpenters. We then taught Trisha, which went ok. We made a few visits to end the night.

August 5

Today was an average day. We took Elder Weeks his bike that we picked up from the Mission Office yesterday. We taught Jessica the first lesson who has a boyfriend on a mission, she will be moving up to Flagstaff in a couple weeks. We took Elder Stott and Lois to the bike shop so they could get one of their tires fixed. We had dinner with Sister Simon and the other Elders because our appointment couldn't feed us tonight. We had coordination meeting and then taught a recent convert, Juan, about the priesthood.

August 6

Today was pretty uneventful missionary wise. After Studies I wrote a little rap. We went to lunch at a Mexican restaurant because Elder Lois got his visa and will be taking off to New Guinea on Monday, so we went with Stott, Lois, Cross, and Nicholson. We went to the Church with Elder Nicholson and Cross, so Elder Cross could practice his musical number with Hermana Johnson. Then we had to go to the Mission Office to pick up Elder Lois packages. We did our weekly planning and then Brother Marcott took us to a Chinese buffet for dinner. Our appointment with some members didn't show up so we made visits and then went to Sister Simon's house to rap with Elder Cross and Nicholson which was so much fun!!!

August 7

Today was busy, but good! We had lunch with Nicholson and Cross as usual. Then we had Zone Meeting, which went really well but longer than we expected so we had to cancel on Trisha. We had dinner with the Squires. Then we got a call from Brother Lychlyter asking if I could give a talk on Sunday because someone told him they couldn't speak, so we did some things on Facebook then I wrote my talk.

August 8

Today was a really fun day! We had to drive to the Mission Home to pick up more packages for Elder Lui, who leaves for New Guinea on Monday! His family sent him a dang kitchen full of junk food it was ridiculous! We had to figure out all the recent converts information today for Stake Coordination tomorrow which was not so fun! We had dinner dropped off by Sister Johnson. We then went and picked up a guitar to borrow from the Jacksons which made me so happy!!!! We had a lesson with a recent convert, Makaila, which went really well. Then I finally got to meet our family ward's Ward Mission Leader because they were out of town and he tuned the guitar for me!!!

August 9

Today was pretty good. We had an early morning due to Stake Coordination but it went well and I got President Hettinger on board with all the Facebook things! Church was good we had Ashli come and a investigator that moved into our ward named Jacque Short. It was another long day. The Jacksons dropped off dinner then we went and made visits the rest of the night.

Hope you all have a great week!

Love you all,
Elder Ashby

Family's from Prescott Valley...

Platt's

O'Conner's

Kriwer's

Reed's

Brower's

Jeffery's

North Phoenix Zone

Week 50

Greetings from the Phoenix North Area

As a Zone Leader my companion and I are over 2 different Wards, Cactus View (family) Ward and the North Phoenix Young Single Adult Ward.

July 28
P-day wasn't very eventful but fortunately my email was working well so emailing went really well. I got a call from President Griffin about being a Zone Leader, but unfortunately it was in a different Zone which wasn't what any of us expected. I am still really excited for the upcoming transfer.

July 29

Today was a blast! Transfers went well and was so much fun to see everyone like Oliphant, Ockey, Earl, Melsen, everybody! The meeting was very long because we had Mission Conference right after the transfers. Our meeting went from having a leadership meeting at 9am and the Mission Conference ending at 4pm. My new companion is Elder Anderson, he seems pretty cool! We got back to Phoenix North in the Cactus View (Family ward) and the Phoenix North YSA ward. We had coordination with the YSA Ward which went really well then we taught Ashley one of the YSA potential investigators, which was an interesting lesson, but I think we will be able to help her as we continue to meet with her.

Pretty good day.

July 30

Today was really good. We went and trained the two new District Leaders on their duties. We had lunch with Elder Cross and Nicholson.

We did our weekly planning. We had dinner with the Cooks from the family ward which was really good. We made visits the rest of the night which, included talking to a drunk lady who was the sister of a less active member, but she might sit in on a lesson when we set one up with the Sister so we will see where that goes.

July 31

Today was pretty good! We had lunch with Elder Nicholson and Cross again, which is apparently a fairly common occurrence. We went to the other districts District Meeting for a little bit before heading to our District Meeting which went well! We had some YSA members, Charlie and Nick, take us to Panda Express for dinner.  They were a cool couple. We taught one of our investigators, Christa, which was ok.  She didn't really pay attention because of her young daughterc but it was still a good lesson.

Tomorrow we are meeting with a referral from one of our members who seems to be absolutely golden and solid!!!

August 1

Today was pretty good! When we were leaving lunch with the other Elders we had stolen back Elder Anderson's Nesquick and Elder Nicholson saw it, so he came running out after us and we started to drive away so he jumped in the back of our truck bed, haha! We made some visits in the afternoon and then went to Taco Bell with the other Elders. We had a short lesson with our investigator, Deserae, which went pretty well. Then we taught our referral, Trisha, who was either really tired or is just kinda crazy, but she is a golden investigator and was asking when she can be baptized but we are going to wait till the next lesson to set a date with her. Pretty good day though.

August 2

Today was pretty good. Going to two Wards was kinda tough with all the meetings, haha. Church was good though. Trisha came and seemed to like it! After church we had dinner with the Donnor's who are pretty cool.

We made some visits the rest of the night then picked up Elder Nicholson and Cross to sleep over as tomorrow is P-day!

I hope all is well with everyone! 

Love you all,
Elder Ashby

I found some Pirate booty!!!  Arrrggghhhh....

Elder Anderson is really tall.  He reminds me of my buddy from High School, Max.  Elder Anderson is from Canada!