Week 13

Chandler had his first baptism!  He was very excited and he sent some pictures.  He is happy that he is no longer a "greenie" and can now be the senior companion.  I can't believe it's been three months already!  Time certainly flies.

Mom,

That's awesome! The poem was inspired!! Haha! I did get your package a
couple of weeks ago and I forgot to mention that last time, but I did get
it and I enjoyed those pop tarts and cereal bars very much! We had our
first baptism. That was really awesome! The dad is less active and the
mom is not a member. All the kids have been or will be baptized and
we're working to activate the dad again because if he goes back then
his wife will be baptized right then. So we are working with them to
get her baptized and him back to church! We have found
tons of potential investigators, but they're all out of our area so we
just keep handing off these golden people to other missionaries. Haha!
It kinda sucks, but hey, we're still finding people. We had a lesson
with this investigator that lives behind us named Brad and his
daughter Stephanie. We showed them the Mormon Message "Mountains to
Climb" and he is about to have a surgery and they're scared and after
we showed that video the spirit was sooooo strong and they both just
started crying. It was a pretty neat experience. I took over the area
twice this week on exchanges, which was neat. That means I was the
boss!! Haha! I enjoy being in charge way too much! This is the last
P-Day of the transfer, predictions are Elder Taito is leaving and I'm
staying and becoming District Leader. So I'll let you know next week
how close our predictions were. For the Christmas care package I would like a spiral
bound hymn and children's songbooks and as many CDs as you can afford.

My favorite scripture is.... Drumroll please!! Moroni 9:25 it's a great one!

We'll be looking for you in conference!! Love you all! Good luck in Idaho!!! Over and
out talk to you guys next week!!!

Love,
Elder Colton :)

Week 12

My sweet son made me laugh and cry with his email this week.  I can't believe how much he is changing on his mission.  He's maturing and learning to appreciate the little things in life.

Mom,

Its crazy! I'm going to miss that home. But! I'll go back and see it and meet the new people that live there. Heck if they ain't LDS I'll convert them! Haha!  We haven't had transfers yet. That is in two weeks, but that transfer will mark three months and the end of my training! Super excited to stop training! I'm just ready to be a missionary that isn't a greenie. Haha! 

So my story for this week, we're working with this Less-active member (I won't name names) but he has had a rough go in this life. His wife died and he learned like a month ago she was going behind his back and all that stuff. So he got in a relationship with this "girl" on some dating website in England and she scammed him out of every dime he has... He wasn't rich to begin with, but now he is going to lose everything. Well so we talked with him a bit and he said he gets down on himself and makes stupid choices because he doesn't thank God for what he has already. He has a home, a car, an a computer. But that isn't enough. He needs a girlfriend and a bigger home and acceptance and just worldly things. He told us all this and by then it was time to go so we left and we were walking back to the apartment and I looked up to the stars (It was like 9:30 :P) and just said thank you for everything I already have. After that I felt like I needed to write this and show it to him. I haven't shown it to him yet because we just haven't met with him this week, but I felt like this was directly inspired for him. Anyways here it is. 

I open my eyes, it's the start of a new day. 

I pull on some pants and I get on my way. 

I brush my teeth and I get in the shower. 

I go downstairs, work starts in an hour. 

I shove breakfast down my throat and put on my shoes, 

I pull on my coat, it's the working mans blues. 

I do this everyday, you could say I'm pro. 

But really I'm not I just go with the flow. 

But therein lies the problem I go with the flow, 

taking no time to look and explore where I go. 

I wake up in the morning to my alarms ring. 

And I think it's too early to think of anything. 

I should go to my window and look outside. 

I should look out and thank God I'm alive. 

For he's the reason I opened my eyes. 

He's the reason we have those gorgeous blue skies. 

And most times we lack to thank God for our lives because
we're too busy working and swallowed by pride. 

If we would look up and look at the stars 

we might come to realize what we really are. 

We're children of God, the one, the most high. 

The one we can thank for our precious lives. 

If we would slow down and take more time, 

to smell the roses, and to make this climb. 

We would know who we are 

and we would reach for the stars 

striving to live to our fullest potential and live
with God in his home, the Celestial. 

That's my little poem. And, being a guitarist and being raised by an avid music lover I put guitar chords to it and made a song out of it. Haha! But it sounds just as good in the form of a poem and I feel as if this will make an impact in his life to change and thank God for his circumstances he's in instead of trying to be more than he can be. That's my story and the highlight of my week. Hope everyone is safe. I miss all of you!!! And love you guys tons!!! Tell the ward I miss them. 

Love, 

Elder Colton

Week 11

This was another quiet week for Chandler.  His email was a short one, but here you go:

Mom,

Let's see my week was actually a very uneventful week. We will have this kid Carson Gorze over for a 3 day mini mission so that will be really neat to have him over with us. We have a baptism in two weeks. We got two people to commit to baptism last week so we're just looking for a date for them. We found a Nerf gun in our apartment and we were dorking around with that all morning yesterday it was way too much fun. Haha! Our church starts at 1pm so we wake up, finish studies, and then hangout till 1 o Clock so yeah we get bored and start doing stupid stuff with in this case a Nerf gun! Haha! Other than that we've just been teaching and all that missionary stuff! I love you too! 

Love, 

Elder Colton :)

Week 10

Chandler sent this picture with his email this week.  I just love seeing his handsome face!  He also sent me two pictures of the new socks he bought, but I figured it would be best to spare you all the sight of his hairy legs!

Mom,

There's all sorts of crazies here it's nuts! Yeah Elder Taito and I are still together. He's most likely leaving next transfer so I'll get to take over the area which will be fun, and I might even be district leader next transfer depending on how everything plays out so yeah that should be cool. We have Sister Haggemann she's awesome she feeds us whenever if ever we need it and her husband leaves the football games on so when we stop by we get our tender mercy and watch a little football. Haha! Alright, so my crazy story for this week is, I gave a blessing to this girl who couldn't talk she was starting to get some like bulge in her vocal chords and she was going to need surgery and all that stuff. So anyway, we gave her a blessing and by that Sunday she could talk again! It was so neat! I was pumped! I just wanted to go and give everyone blessings. Haha! It was nice it was a huge faith booster for us. We are meeting with a guy we tracted into, his name is Larry. He is very smart in everything! He's very promising on our second meeting he asked for the Doctrine and Covenants!? That's crazy! Nobody does that so hopefully we can have him on date soon. We now have four people on date for baptism! That's so great! Two of them we got last night! So we're starting to have a lot of success here all of our goals are in the green which means we're reaching our goals which means we're working hard because we're setting tough goals. So that's really neat those are the highlights of my week minus the obvious stuff like we tract a lot and walk in the heat a lot and all that sucky stuff! Haha! But the good outweighs the bad so it's not bad out here at all it's a lot of fun! Things are going well here I'm healthy I'm happy and I'm eating so that's good! Haha have a good week y'all! Love ya guys! 

Love, 

Elder Colton :) 

Week 9

Other than the fact that Chandler met Jesus, his week was pretty quiet :)

Mom,

Not much is going on. We have a baptism this month and next month so that's really sweet!! We had a crazy guy tell us he was Jesus and that he smoked meth with angels on a regular basis and then he continued to say how he saw God aka his literal dad because he's Jesus and then he took our Mormon.org card and said he'd come by our apartment and have like some personal Jesus time with us. I just busted up! It was rude I know but I couldn't believe it! I was just waiting for the lighting to strike him! This guy seriously thought he was Jesus and yeah I just started laughing so hard. Oh yeah he said he was perfect. Yeah he said he's never sinned. And he said he has a degree higher than a doctorate in the fields of math, science, physics, and theology. He claimed also he was the smartest man in the world because he's Jesus. Haha crazy guy! Oh we've been doing a ton of tracting! :P Oh boy it sucks! Haha! My companion loves it but it's so ineffective I've been trying to come up with other ideas that would have more success because we knock for an hour or two and not a person expresses interest so yeah that just drives me nuts! Haha! Well anyway that's it for me. Have a good week guys! I love you all!!!! 

Love, 

Elder Colton :) 

Week 8

It sounds like Chandler had a pretty fun experience this week.  I'm not sure his mission president would approve, but he has always had his own way of doing things ;)

Mom,

I went on exchanges with Elder Russell and we decided we would do something different, something somebody hasn't done. So we grabbed our guitars and decided we would go guitar finding. We said a prayer and asked that we will put forth the effort and in return we want to see miracles happen. And no sooner after we said amen than people start honking and waving at us and we started walking up and down the main drag playing music and after about 5 minutes these ladies stopped us and started talking to us. They asked us who we were representing and we told them the LDS church and this lady named Angie started asking tons of awesome questions! And we had all the answers! It was so neat! She is like golden! She told us to come back the next day and teach her because she wants to change and she wants to be sealed to her husband and live with him forever! The only downside is that I was on exchanges in someone else's area so I won't get to teach her, but I will get to hopefully hear how things are going with her. So we left her and about 30 seconds later some guys come out of this restaurant we walked by and they said hey it's karaoke night and we want to hear some music. And we were kind of skeptical at first then we decided like hey we prayed for people to come to us and they are so we went in. Haha! Elder Russell wasn't comfortable playing and singing so he sat with the crowd and I got up and I announced myself and and that we were LDS missionaries and then I performed my solo piece Book of Mormon stories to set the tone then I sang Book of Mormon Stories and that actually drew a lot of smiles. They thought that was great and then they asked if I knew anything else and I said yes and sang House of the Rising Sun and Sweet Home Alabama for them and they were all clapping and excited and we handed out all of our mormon.org cards and they said we were the coolest missionaries they've ever seen in their lives and that they'd check out the website and get some questions answered. So we planted a whole lot of seeds in there. So then we left that place and as we were walking back to the apartment 2 more people stopped and talked to is and told us they appreciated us and what we do and all that stuff. Then we got back to he apartment and we got a call from the temple saying that somebody from the restaurant found my iPad that I had lost and he knew we were LDS so he drove to the temple and asked one of the people coming out to take it to the guy inside and have him call us and tell us he has my iPad and that he would be by the restaurant and we could come grab it. On our way walking there we ran into a Jewish guy who wanted to bash and Elder Russell really likes bashing so he was just going at it and I was just standing there quiet and I was just getting super bugged with what my companion and the guy were saying to each other so I just stepped up and yelled time out! This is stupid! And I just said we're not changing our faith your not changing yours I respect that I love you, God loves you God bless have a good night and bye bye and I grabbed Elder Russell and we went and got my iPad and went home for the night. So yeah that was my awesome miracle filled night it was a great experience! There's my weekend highlight! Haha! It was great! I performed for people like I sang and stuff aren't you proud!? I used my talents!!! Haha! Anyway, I'm having a blast I'm really enjoying my self and having a lot of fun. Time is flying! One transfer down already! (Which by the way I'm in Central Point for another transfer they say I'll probably be here six months!) I hope things are great back home! I hope you're not too worried about me. I imagine you can't be with the house and stuff. Haha! I think about you all everyday too!! I love you!!!! 

Love, 

Elder Colton :) 

Week 7

Nothing terribly exciting happened this week, but I've copied his email just for those who want to read it.

Mom,

Sorry we had our P-day canceled yesterday for a zone conference we had a seventy come and speak to us it was really great! The weeks do fly by transfers are this week I'll probably stay here. It's predicted I'll be here for six months so yeah I'll start getting comfortable here in Central Point. haha!  

Things are going. The work here is tough. People are just set in their ways or have already been "saved!" Haha! But we have a few investigators and some progressing investigators we have one set baptismal date that just fell into our laps and we have someone that we're trying to set on date but I think I told you about him. So the work is moving. I write in my journal every chance I have time I'm trying my best to write in it often. We have all kinds of cool spiritual moments when tracting and teaching. It's really neat. I wish I had like unlimited time to email you all these stories but we have so many missionaries waiting to email you get like 15 minutes and then you trade off the computer so I'll start recording my stories over the week so I can just copy and paste them in the email really fast! 

I love you too!!! I can't believe how fast it goes I'll be home before I know it!! 

See ya in two years!! 

Love, 

Elder Colton :)

Week 6

Nothing major to report this week.  Chandler and his companion worked on the church's pear farm.  They had to help harvest all of the pears.  Here are some pictures he sent:

Week 5

This was Chandler's response to me asking him if anything crazy had happened to him yet.  Keep in mind, when asking that question I meant for him to tell me about the crazy cat lady in the ward, or the fact that someone fed him under cooked chicken.  The story he sent was not what I was expecting!  Haha!

Mom, 

Yeah a crazy thing happened on Friday, We went on exchanges this Friday. I went with Elder Shelley from Utah.  We ran into some crazy people at one house. We OYMed a guy on the street that was standing in a drive way.  OYM means open your mouth and talk about the gospel. We introduced ourselves and told him we were missionaries from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. I asked him if he had ever talked to missionaries before. He said no but that he didn't see any reason to because he didn't believe in Christ. I asked him why not. He said he didn't really see the purpose to believe in Christ. So we started teaching about the Plan of Salvation. He got really interested and told us to come and stand in the shade because it was hot. We talked to him a little longer and he asked us if we needed some water and Elder Shelley wanted some so the guy we were talking to ran in side to get some for him. While we were under the car port waiting for him we were looking around. There was a lady inside that was drawing some skulls on the wall inside. While we were still waiting this lady got in her car drove off and came back with a little take out box with green leafs sticking out of it. Then this other guy pulled into the driveway going super fast, them reversed like two feet and then layed on his horn. He gets out of the car and starts yelling the most random things and throws his keys as hard as he can at the wall. Then he starts yelling at us wondering why we were standing in his drive way. The lady that was drawing skulls came out and told him we were waiting for Mal the guy that we started to talk to that was inside. So he picked up his keys and ran inside and slammed the door. Then he came back outside and I was trying to tell him that we were sorry that we could move and he could move his car under the car port. He told me to back up because he to drain something on his arm. It was really nasty.  He had stitches from his wrist to his elbow and about three inches in the middle it was split open and there was this big bulge that looked like infected muscle. He started screaming again and popped the thing on his arm and blood went squirting out and almost got all over me. He than ran into the back yard and was throwing things around. So we wrote our phone number in the back of a Plan of Salvation Pamphlet and left it on a chair for Mal. We didn't know if Mal was ever going to come back out and we didn't want to have to deal with the crazy guy any more. It was pretty nuts! Haha 

Other than that it's pretty chill the dinners are really fun. I've played a lot of piano. Haha just working hard and all that stuff it's really fun hard work.

Love, 

Elder Colton :)

Week 4

Chandler didn't really have anything new to report this week.  He was just getting settled in his new apartment and getting used to living on his own.  He and a few other missionaries took their p-day to go to the California coast.  Here are a few pictures he sent:

Week 3

This week when I emailed Chandler I had a ton of questions!  Like, how much money do you get?  Do you eat with the members every day?  Do you have a car or do you ride your bike?  Where is your companion from?

I've never served a mission before and I just didn't know how everything worked so I was being an annoying mom and making sure that he was at least eating!  Haha!  In my defense, I didn't remind him to brush his teeth so that means I'm cutting the cord at least a little bit ;)

Dear Mom, 

Elder Taito is from American Samoa, but he's lived in Oklahoma most his life so yeah he is really cool! He's super chill and fun and, yeah, we get a lot of work done its awesome! 

They gave us a debit card with like 130.00 dollars a month and we have dinner every night for the rest of the transfer so we eat with the members a ton! We have our own apartment and its nasty. We walked in and Elder Taito just knelt down and just started dedicating the place. It was funny! Haha! Yeah, I got my bike; however, we hardly use the stupid thing. Its an all bike area we're in, but we walk most places and usually end up getting picked up by a member. There are a lot of members here! Its actually a lot like Tooele here its crazy! But there is still a lot of work to be done. 

My week... Let's see... 

*Tracting, we got doors slammed on us. Haha! We were told we're way off base and need to catch up with the world. Haha! 

*We came across a few people to teach so we have some lessons here in the next week.

*Busy, Busy, Busy! 

*We got i - Pads 

*You can send me my guitar if you take it to Guitar Center they can box it and send it to me so that was really cool! I can only play it at night after daily planning for 30 minutes and on P-Days

I'll keep working hard! You guys keep hanging in there! Love Ya'll!

Love, 

Elder Colton :) 

Week 2

Here is what Chandler has to say about week 2 in the MTC....

Dear Mom, 

I have survived 2 weeks! It is flipping hard and my district is one of the strongest and best here in the MTC; however, some other districts have been losing missionaries like crazy! We got some new Elders and Sisters in our zone and one of the Sisters went home the day she got here. It's crazy! I mean, it's hard and stuff but it's not impossible! 

I've been having a blast! Half my district leaves tomorrow and I'm going to miss them so much. They're like brothers to me. We have so much fun! Perhaps too much fun, but seriously, we totally clicked the day we met and we've been having so much fun this whole time! Today some awesome Elders leave to Australia at 2:00 AM so we got to stay up with them until they left and say bye so we all got to sleep until 10 this morning. That was way awesome! It was some much needed sleep... Haha I don't know if you know this but I just learned my companion here is the cousin of a friend I had in school! That's crazy ain't it!? Such a small world. I sent you guys a short little letter on the 10th so hopefully you guys get that soon the mail service here is slow as cold tar so it seems like it takes forever to get to you guys! Oh! My companion and I were teaching a progressing investigator and she totally has been reading the Book of Mormon and praying about it and she prayed for us at the end of our last discussion on the 10th we were so happy! If we had one more day we would have had a baptism date set. Hopefully the next set of missionaries are able to get through to her like we did. 

I miss ya guys! Can't wait to see you in 2 years! Love ya!!!!! 

Love, 

Elder Colton :) 

Week 1

This was by far the worst week for me!  I can honestly say that I have never cried harder than I did the night we took Chandler to the MTC.  But, Chandler's first email home made me feel a lot better and when he asked me for more money, I knew that even though he was grown up, he would always need me!  Haha!

I will post Chandler's emails home, but I will sometimes edit them so that there is punctuation (yes, he is a high school graduate....).

Dear Family,  

The MTC is crazy! Its so freaking hard and we're always busy doing something. Yesterday we had an hour of downtime and me and two other Elders fell asleep on the floor of our classroom. It was the best nap ever! I'm having a lot of fun and I've made tons of friends! I have the best district in the MTC and we have way too much fun together. Its too bad like four of them are going to Washington so we won't get to see them for a long time. My new companion is lots of fun and we get together pretty well. I'm not used to this whole have someone glued to your side thing yet. It sometimes is annoying, but he's a great guy and I have fun with him. We have the opportunity to sit in 10 hours of class a day. That's just so much fun! Haha not ;) I'm teaching an investigator today at 7:15 that's going to be fun and go good I hope. I don't know if you got my letter but I need you to send like $80 everything here is expensive and I've had to buy a few things and so I'm down to quarters I blew through the sixty like it crazy. I forgot my razor I had to buy detergent I had to buy a clip for my badge so I can wear it on my T-Shirt I had to get highlighters for a class so I could mark my stuff and I had to get  stamps and envelopes AND paper. It was way expensive for that shopping trip haha :P  Oh! we had a devotional last night and it was amazing! Look up Josh Wright tonight he's an amazing LDS pianist who came and played for us last night it was the best devotional ever. I wish i could play piano like him.  It's tough here but a lot of fun and I'm learning lots! I'm taking as many pictures as I can but boy I have hardly any time so I only have a few. Thanks guys I miss you lots but I'll see you all in two years! Love ya guys! 

Love, 

Elder Colton :)

My first post (I seriously can't believe I just started a blog)

Well, I never thought I would see the day that I would start a blog!  Ever!!  But, with Chandler being out on his mission people are always asking me how he's doing and I think this will be the best way to include the whole family in his mission experience.  I will update this blog weekly when Chandler sends me emails so that you can read about his adventures.