Christmas/Skyping

Dear Family,

I had a wonderful Christmas week and pretty much got most stuff in while skyping. It was sure good to SEE everyone and to hear that everything is about the same, except the fact that Nanna Bear is getting older! Holy cow!! Other than Brianna, the others looked about the same.

So for Christmas Eve, we went over to a home and had Cornish gamehen? I have no clue how to spell that and I just straight sounded it out, but it's just a little chicken, I had some rice and artichokes, which were my first time having those and it was different but pretty good. We had this little candle burning at the top of our plates so it was like a fancy dinner with them. The husband had his sisters family come over and they invited one of their friends from my last ward, so it was really good seeing them again.

For Christmas we went over to another families home and spent most of our time there. They are a crazy, loud family. They had some of their kids over so there were like 15 people there. We had soup and lots of cookies and ice cream. We are going to try to teach one of their daughters who is like mid 20's. She moved back in with them for a few months so we'll try and teach her. She is pretty crazy and super funny, she's different than most of her family, she's kinda red-neck. Her and her sister do this syrup challenge every Christmas, so we joined in! We had to see who could drink the little bottle of syrup the fastest and the winner would get to go first in Candy-Land. I took 3rd, my comp lost and we sure felt that syrup after. It was fun!

S had her baptism interview and she passed!! So we should be having a baptism this coming Saturday! It's going to be so awesome! She is super solid and is ready. We found out she's only 20 years old! Kinda weird seeing someone our age married and in the military and expecting! 

We have interviews with our mission president, president Weston on Wednesday and for New Year's we will most likely be going over to our bishop's place and chill there with S and D, so that will be fun!!

It's also snowing!! Finally getting some snow after Christmas!! Well, I hope I wasn't too weird Skyping, I figured I was a bit so hopefully it wasn't too bad. Well, have a good week everyone!! 

Take Care!!

Love, Elder Searle

Elder Searle and Sister Weston at Christmas Zone Conference

Christmas Week

Dear Family,

I can't believe Christmas is only 3 days away and there is still no snow here, what the heck?! It's been raining a lot but not cold enough for snow, so looks like we won't be getting any for Christmas...oh well.  We have been enjoying our life in our new apartment, it's still really nice because we won't be buying any food for a while, still haven't made a dent in all the food the sisters left here. We've been getting a lot of food from members that went home for Christmas, so we were given 3 gallons of milk and like everything that was sitting out on a counter, like bread, chips etc. So even if we did make a dent in the food, all of this food given to us has filled it back up.

We had our Christmas Zone Conference and it went well. We all had to get a white elephant that was under $5 so I found some Spam playing cards, they had a recipe on the back of each card of something you could make with Spam and had pictures of Spam on every card, so kind of funny. The white elephant I received were some Andes mints and some pens....not really a white elephant gift but I sure did enjoy the mints! :)

We met a really interesting guy last week, he's an older guy and he has hundreds of G.I. Joes!! He's also in a Renaissance group so he make his own chain mail and has like 20 different daggers, swords, axes and mallets etc. Kinda scary and creepy, he lives in a basement that is made for short people, so I have to duck my head the whole time. He's into horror movies and scary masks but he is a cool guy. We have seen him twice, we did get him to start reading the Book of Mormon again so that's good!

We went to the temple on Friday, so makes for a great week! The temple is always the best place to go and we had a great time. After wards, a member payed for us to go somewhere to eat so we went to Time-Out Chicken and we were the only white people there. Then some other Elders showed up so we had 12 white men in suits ordering chicken, they sure have some good chicken!

We had our Christmas program at church and the choir did a pretty good job. We had a much better turn out then all of our practices so that made it a lot better!

For Christmas, I have no idea when I will Skype, we were invited to a home on Christmas Eve and hopefully by then I'll know our plans. I was also invited to a home for Christmas, so I'll Skype from there. It will probably be the craziest, funniest Christmas I've ever had....they have kids in town and are just out of control and so funny! I'm really looking for to that.

Merry Christmas Everyone!!!!

Remember the reason for the season!!

Love, Elder Searle

new home/new car

Dear Family,

So I'm going to make this email short and to the point seeing that we have to hurry. So we got a new apartment because of more missionaries going home than coming out. So we moved into the Fairview sisters apartment and our old one is getting closed. We are in the nicest and most expensive apartment in the mission. That even came from Sister Coleman who is over the housing for the mission. They have a lease with this apartment till February, so I will most likely be moving again in a few months. The nice thing is that the sisters left EVERYTHING there!! Our fridge is just so full and so much food and candy everywhere! We have so much, our new place is also 7 miles south of our area so...drum roll... we got a car full time!! Know what's better....I'M DRIVING!! and to make it even better....we got a Chevy Cruise, the funnest car to drive in the mission.

My companion, Elder Jacobson can't drive because they won't let you drive your last transfer, so he is chillin while riding shot gun. He isn't the district leader for his last transfer and we got a car full time and the nicest apartment, he says it's like his retirement home since he leaves for home in January!! We celebrated the night we moved in our new place with some sparking cider. :)

So our investigator wasn't baptized on Saturday because she said she prayed and wants to go to church a few more times, like all 3 hours. We moved her baptism back to Jan. 3rd, we aren't worried about her at all, she is super solid. We did go to the sister's baptism on Saturday and it was cool.

Also found a super solid 15 year old Hispanic kid, he keeps texting us for more things to read in the Book of Mormon so that's awesome!! We will teach him sometime this week.

My new address is-

14222 Constitution Circle #22
Bellevue, Nebraska 68123

 We also had a family sign up to feed us on Christmas, not sure what time yet, but we'll get that figured out.

That's about my week, lots of packing and cleaning out our old apartment and moving in. Also, sorry to the people that have emailed me and I haven't gotten back, emails are starting to pile up and I don't have time to email everyone. Grrr!!

Love you all!!
Elder Searle

Christmas Party

Dear Family,


We had our ward party Christmas party on Saturday and it went pretty well. My comp Elder Jacobson played the guitar and sang and all of us missionaries sang and we did meh. I had a 16 yr old come up and ask me "singing isn't your strong point is it?" Well.....NO IT ISN'T!! But I'm trying, so tell the choir back home that I still can't sing. We had our investigator there that should be getting baptized this Saturday!!! So that will be awesome!!We also went around with our ward mission leader and he was talking about the expensive old school razors and about expensive shaving kits. He sold Elder Jacobson on it, but I'm like nope! Not spending all that money even if it will last me my whole life.


On Wednesday we went on exchanges with the Papillion Elders and they changed the rule so both of them came to our area, so we blitzed our area. It worked out well for us because we got to both go looking for new people, but it also took 2 days of work so later that week we didn't have anyone else to try because we tried them already! So I was with Elder Jenkins and we had a good time, we taught our soon to be baptized investigator the word of wisdom and keeping the Sabbath day holy and we did a pretty good job.


On Thursday, on our way to take the other elders home, we used some of our lunch hour and went to the Cheese Haus and looked at expensive cheeses and got to sample some things. It's a tiny cottage log house building, we tried some cheeses, sausages and also some frog balls and they were all pretty good.


So this week will be a little different, one of the Papillion Elders got his Visa and it going to Brazil, so Elder Jenkins will be spending the next 3 1/2 days with us until transfers on Friday. Elder Jacobson and I will most likely be staying together, but we are getting a new apartment. So we might be moving into our new one on Friday, so don't send anything this week or else I might not get it! :O


That's about it, nothing too crazy. It has been warmish here to and it is so weird for December! I even mowed a yard the other day, mostly for the leaves, but still. I thought only grandpa would mow in December, but I guess others do to! :P


Love you all!
Elder Searle

Thanksgiving Day pics

Food Coma

Dear Family,

Thanksgiving...oh man...did I wobble after that! So we had 4 Thanksgiving meals that we went to. Our first meal was with a Grandma and her two friends. We had lunch with them and we went early to help with the food. We had a good time and we tried really hard not eat too much, we had small servings and when we went back for seconds, we tried to be good and then the pies came out! I ate way too much! Then we went to another home and had a crazy time there, they have 5 young sons with 2 of them being twins. Their dad was hilarious trying to discipline them.

Then we went to the guy that offered us the ride in the snow like a couple three weeks ago and we had a blast there. They had neighbors over and they know about the Mormons and everything we believe in and were super nice. After we ate we talked to them and we shared the "His is the Gift" video with them. Then the wife started to pack us up some food from her pantry. She was pulling out all sorts of food. We won't have to go shopping for quite a while now with all the food we got.

We finished up our night at a part member family's house and we got there a little late so they had already eaten, which was fine by us. We then had more pie!! So that was my Thanksgiving, got plenty of food and ate WAY too much, but it was worth it.

Sunday....man was it cold!! We were out trying to finish off our night and it was SOOOO cold! The wind was just a killer. I had more stuff on then my companion but we ended up running home so we could warm up faster and sooner. It was the first time that I was actually so cold that I ran home.

We also met a guy with the coolest name ever....John James Peoples III, every time we say his name we have to say ALL of it, coolest name ever!! :)

On Monday when visiting a family, they had a banana and gorilla costume, so that explains those pictures! :)

Since it's Thanksgiving Week I just want to say a few things that I am thankful for. I'm thankful for my awesome mom who makes sure that I know that she loves me and will do anything for me and for an awesome Papi who has taught me how to "make things work" and has helped me with life lessons. I'm thankful for my awesome brothers and sisters, even if T-Rav is cooler than me. I'm thankful for all their letters, especially Maya's awesome letters and all her emoticons. I'm thankful for my grandparents who have helped me out with buying new clothing and for teaching me to work hard and "not run with the weed-eater! I'm thankful for the love and kindness that everyone shows me and for all the emails and letters that I get. I'm thankful for this gospel and everything that it can bring to us and for the chance I have to be on a mission.

I hope you all had an awesome Thanksgiving!!

Love you all!!

Elder Searle

Thanksgiving Week

What's up family and friends!! We had zone training this week and Elder Jacobson had a musical number at it, so we spent a few hours for a few days at the church so he could practice singing and playing the piano. So I just walked around the whole church, they were re-doing the gym floors so I couldn't shoot around or anything. I also went on exchanges with the zone leaders and I went up to Gretna with Elder Clark who is our new ZL and we had a pretty fun time.

We saw some awesome people up in an area called Ashland and we saw some people that I knew from seeing them before. We had a good talk with both.

Yesterday (Sunday) was by far the busiest Sunday I have had. We just had one thing after another. We had church and then we helped a member go to Plattsmouth and pick up a snow blower that someone just gave him, so we drove with him, then had to hurry back for ward correlation, then went to choir practice, then had to hurry over for a dinner appointment (which was super good, we ate like Kings!) and then our night was over. It sure made the day go by super fast.

So for Thanksgiving so far, we have a lunch and 2 dinners set up with a possible 3rd dinner, we are going to be plump for sure!! :) One of our dinners is with a part member house so that's going to be super cool.

Love you all!!

Elder Searle

Year Mark/Mission Tour

Dear Family,

Good ole' winter has finally decided to hit us and it's not being very nice to us. Right now it's 11 degrees with a high of 17 and a low of 4, but you have to add the humidity and wind chill and it's pushing 0 right now. We are staying warm, right now we're emailing at the computers at our apartment complex and I'm wearing shorts and Elder Jacobson is wearing shorts and flip-flops. The office lady made fun of us, she said "where are your coats! It's freezing outside!" Our apartment and the office are pretty close so we were only outside a minute.

Monday our P-day we went shopping and found some killer deals. I got a new tie at JC Penny's for $4, I couldn't pass that up! Then we went to Goodwill and I found a pair of shoes that fit me and they are BROWN!! I've been looking for a pair of brown shoes and finally found some and they aren't bad. Then my Mr Mac stuff showed up and it was like Christmas in November!!! To top the day off, we ate at a families home and they made Cafe Rio Salad and it was sooooooo good!!!

On Thursday...my year mark!! I spent the whole day in Lincoln with Elder Brent H. Nielson of the 70. It went really well and I learned a lot! He had us print off 3 talks to prepare us for it. 2 of the talks were by Elder Bednar and the other talk was by this Elder....I didn't even realize it was his talk until he said "ok, now if you'll pull out my talk we will talk about it" and I was like..."OH, now it all makes sense." lol

He talked mostly about the Atonement and how it's not just for the bad to become good but for the good  to become better. He said most of us don't realize that the Atonement is for all of us, not just for those that do those "common sins" like smoking, drinking etc. but for everyone. Everyone can become better and improve.

Afterwards, we drove all the way back and had dinner with the Bishop's family who are awesome!!

On Friday, we had a pretty cool experience, we were walking in the snow down a busy road and we had been walking for a while so we had snow building up on our shoulders and backpacks. This random dude pulled up and asked if we wanted a ride, so we jumped in and found out he isn't a member. He is Lutheran and had 2 exchange students with him. He asked us we wanted to go get some coffee or hot chocolate before he dropped us off. We both thought...YES!! Teach this man about the Word of Wisdom!  So we were like, "we don't drink coffee but we would have some hot chocolate". He said "oh dangit!! I messed that one up and forgot you Mormons don't drink the good stuff!" We laughed and he bought us some hot chocolate. He then asked if we had a place to go for Thanksgiving and he invited to come eat with him that day. How crazy is that?! Some random dude that we don't know inviting us. He lives in base housing in our area and so we totally can. Super Cool Day!!

Saturday and Sunday we had Stake Conference. Somewhere in the week, we texted a less active and asked if we could come over, he said we could and they had a little band. They had a singer, 2 people on guitar a bass player and a crappy drummer.

I hope I talked about everything I wanted too, took me like the whole hour to write this email, either I'm slow at typing or I actually wrote a good email for once!

Have a good week everyone!! Love y'all!!

Elder Searle

 new shoes!! These are the same shoes, just one pair a little more worn

 on my wall at the apartment

 My companion, Elder Jacobson

All the ties I've accumulated!

Almost a year!!

Dear Family,

This week has been pretty good, going to try to make this quick because I got a ton of emails this week. So some sweet things happened this week, we found a new investigator and he is 18. He's a really cool kid and we found him skateboarding outside of our place. We taught him twice, set him for baptism and then had to turn him over to the Cottonwood Elders because he doesn't live in our area. It kinda sucks but hey...we're all on the same team!

We also got a referral from church HQ about a part member family that lives in base housing and they are super golden! They are both linguist, he speaks Russian and she reads Chinese. They both came to church, which was awesome! Remember there hasn't been an investigator for like 4-5 months now, so not only was it good for us, but also good to show the ward we are trying.

We had a crazy conversation with a guy, he knew stuff about Joseph Smith and Moroni and then went on about how they saw the blue light and that he talks to aliens and how 3 of them came down and talked to him. We had a good laugh!

Guess who's in the ward choir again!! Yep! ME!!!  Why do I have to get companions that sing really well!! LOL I kid, it was pretty fun and we got some treats after for practicing, so that's good.

It is starting to get cold here!!

Thanks to everyone that emailed me this week....I think it's the most emails I've received since being out, so thank you!! Have a good week everyone! Love ya!!

Love, Elder Searle

Halloween/Transfer Week

Dear Family,

Transfers were last week and I'm still here in Bellevue 2nd, but I got a new companion, Elder Jacobson. He's from Springfield Utah and is pretty chill and funny, we get a long well. He was a zone leader up in North Platte and he came down here and is the district leader. He came out with Elder Quayle so they will both go home in January. We didn't get a whole lot done with Elder Quayle saying his good-byes and me getting my new companion.

We had dinner with a family and we taught them, they are a fun, crazy family with 5 little kids. It was fun. After we went to the departing testimony meeting for the missionaries who were leaving and it was pretty cool. There were a ton of people there!!

Wednesday and Thursday were just us going around and saying goodbye to people, Elder Quayle started packing and everything. Our zone leader, Elder Sadler stayed with us for 2 nights and we had a blast with him. I went with the Papillion Elders since my companion wouldn't be coming until 5pm that night. We got home at 6:30pm and since it was Halloween, we weren't suppose to be on the streets past 6pm, so we had pizza with the Papillion Elders, not the most fun Halloween, but it will do. :)

That is pretty much my week, nothing too exciting or anything. One thing we did find out...we have to wear our suits all the time now, not sure how we feel about that.

Hope everyone had a fun and safe Halloween!!

Love, Elder Searle

Transfer Week

Dear Family,

This week was pretty dang fun. For P-day we had another zone activity and we went to the mission office and we played dodge ball and played chubby bunny which was super funny! We did a few rounds of it and it was funny, I wish I had my camera with me, but I didn't. We just kept going around and having everyone put a marshmallow in their mouth, it's pretty funny when you get like 6 marshmallows in there, you can't chew or anything, just smash them in your mouth! :)

We had our appointment with the Pastor and it went really well. We ended up teaching him the whole Plan of Salvation, he didn't believe in it, but we taught it. We drew pictures to go along with it. :)

Wednesday we did service for a family and then helped them with the trim around their 3 kids closets, it was pretty fun and took most of the day.

Thursday we had a district meeting, then I went to Cottonwood on exchanges and we were in South Omaha in the hood and some kids were playing basketball and talking smack to us saying that us white men can't shoot, so we played basketball with them for a bit and it was pretty fun! The oldest was 15 and the youngest was 12 and they all thought they were little Lebron's or something.

Friday we did some service and then had our ward Halloween Party, we went for a ride in a pretty legit teal Jeep. It was fun!!

Saturday was our normal service at a family's home. We helped them lay brick again and almost got it done. We went at 9am and had waffles and then we had dinner, we were there that long. One more Saturday and I think we'll have it done.The little kids they have are awesome, they love to shake our hands and they have this sweet looking Trike that we got to ride around.

After our visit with the Pastor on Tuesday, he invited us to his church on Sunday...so we went. It was Reformation Sunday so there was a guy dressed as Martin Luther and his wife. The Pastor must have told them we were coming because they were right on us when we walked in. I now know how people feel when they come to our church for the first time. The Pastor came out and hugged us and talked a bit to us, we're either really good friends now or he thinks he converted us. :)  It was neat to see how they do things though.

Transfers are on Halloween so we'll see if anything changes with me,

Love you guys!!

Love Elder Searle

Meet the Mormons/Monster Truck

Dear Family,

This week wasn't quite as adventurous as my past weeks. We were finally able to go see Meet the Mormon's, it was really strange to be in a movie theater, as a missionary. It was good. We went with our ward mission leader and a non member. The non member said he always gets popcorn at the movies and that he is so far in debt, but he got some anyway.lol  He only ate half of it and then gave me the rest, so I had some popcorn while we watched the movie!

We only have one investigator right now and that's the pastor at the Lutheran Church, but nothing is really going to change there, we don't think. But this week, we were knocking on doors in this neighborhood and saw this dude getting out of his car and he looked like a normal college student in his 20's. So we started talking to him and after a little bit he said "oh you guys know I'm the pastor for the Southern Baptist Church?" He had like 20 different Bible's and he had our Book of Mormon. Then his wife pulled up and out comes 3 little girls and a baby....the dude was 30 years old but totally looked our age, but with a nice beard. We talked to him for over an hour and he said he would call us sometime this week and we can go talk to him again. I don't know why we keep running into pastors. :)

We finally made our dinner appointment that night, good thing that family is way chill. He said he'd feed us, but only if we help him with a project. He had to make a video with us for his job and had to ask some questions as if we were just walking into a Dr's office. (I think he's going to be a pharmacist)  It was pretty funny because he kept messing up and had to keep re-doing it over and over again.

We had dinner with another family this week and it was really good and we had a fun time. Then we went to another member's house because he wanted to show us his new truck. It's a 2012 F250 with like a 5 inch lift! It was mean, I have never sat that high in a truck before. The member just got a new job and needed a new big truck for work. It was so nice and had a nice roar to it. :)

We went fishing this week with some other elders and that's pretty much my week. This week is our Ward Halloween Party so that will be pretty fun and today we are going to the mission office and then playing some volleyball and dodgeball with the zone. :)

Love you all!!

Love Elder Searle

Watching Meet the Mormons!!

Be the Type of Missionary.......

Dear Family,

We had a zone conference and the goal that all the missionaries came up with was "Be the type of missionary your mom thinks you are." Isn't that awesome!!

Last Monday was pretty sweet, we went to the zoo and I got video of a gorilla trying to attack us. We all got peed on from the bats and the Bellevue 1st Elders got pooped on. lol

Tuesday we helped a guy set up a new bed for his 5 year old son and we helped clean up his place. He then took us to dinner at Sam's Club and we had those really cheap hot dogs, they were pretty good! We then went shopping with him and his 5 year old. His little boy wanted to walk with us missionaries and he was being so goofy, it totally looked like we were kidnapping him, but we were just trying to get him off the floor. We talked to a guy that was selling phones and his name was Ken S, I was like "that's my Papi!"

Wednesday we met with the Pastor at the Thanksgiving Lutheran Church, it's right next to our apartment. He is a pretty good guy and he didn't bash us at all. Everyone in the office was really nice to us. We talked to him for about 40 min. He gave us each a yellow Bible and told us to prayerfully read it....we gave him a Book of Mormon and told him to prayerfully read it. :) We are gearing up to go back in 2 weeks.

Saturday we did service all day, we dug dirt all day long. We helped move dirt at one house, then went to another member's house to move dirt and then we went and put up a retaining wall that was 20 feet long at another house. It took a while and it's a good thing we had 6 elders helping us at that house.

Then we had dinner in the projects, it was kinda gross. There were cockroaches in all the sinks and nasty crawly things everywhere. My companion said that was probably the nicest house there.

That was pretty much my week, we are going to the store today for P-day and we were going to go to a pumpkin patch, but it's been raining all night and still raining today.

QUESTIONS

Best food you've had there??  White Chili Enchiladas and I did have 3 steak dinners in a row one week.

How is the missionary work going in your area?  Super Slow! This area hasn't had an investigator for 5 transfers, so that equals 7 months. I wouldn't be surprised if this area gets closed down soon. Just really hard and the ward isn't doing very well either.

What has changed the most about you?  I'm starting to become cool! lol   A lot of stuff has changed about me, like when I come home, I want to do things that will help me in my life and not waste it. I'm starting to get better at talking and I can actually carry on a conversation now.  :)

Can you believe next one month you'd have been out a year?!  It's so crazy to think that, it is going by so fast! There is still so much that I need to improve on and I don't have that much time. I still don't consider myself a great teacher yet, but hopefully I'm improving on that.

Will your mission get to use iPads soon?  President Weston mentioned we might start using them in February, first starting with Facebook. I do hope I get to use one on my mission.

I do want to bear my testimony....I have a testimony in the Holy Ghost and that has grown the most. I went through a time where I was trying to teach and do things without having the Spirit with me and you can really tell a difference. Nothing really happens if you don't have the Spirit with you.

I have a testimony of the Book of Mormon, I have read the Book of Mormon more than I ever have out here. President Weston challenged us to read it as a mission and to finish it in 3 months. So if we read 5 pages every day, we'll finish it in 3 months. Right now I'm ahead of schedule. We are to mark every word that says God, Jesus Christ, Atonement, Repentance and we are to circle the word Heart. It has been so cool because every page talks about Jesus Christ and how the Book of Mormon really is another testament of Jesus Christ.

I also have a testimony of the Pioneers now. I have learned a lot more about them since being here at the Winter Quarter's Temple and The Trail Center. All the films I've been able to see about the Pioneers have been great. All I know is that a mission is hard, I can't imagine what the pioneer's went through.

I also have a testimony of our Prophet, after watching General Conference, it was really neat to listen to and get insight from President Monson. I feel like a couple of the talks were just for me and that was really neat.

I know that this church is true and that Joseph Smith really did see and do the things that he did. I know the Book of Mormon is another testament of Jesus Christ and that you really can draw nearer to Him by reading it. In the name of Jesus Christ Amen

Love you all!!

Love Elder Searle

 Biggest hill I've seen so far here! lol

Meet the Mormons!!

Dear Family,

Guess what we can watch this week!!! Meet the Mormons....in the THEATER!!! Yep, you heard right, we are going to find a day and find someone that we can take with us and go see it. We will be going all out, seeing how we can actually go to a theater and not even feel guilty about being there. I'm going to buy myself a big ol' thing of popcorn and a nice drink to sip during it. It's going to be so fun!

General Conference was pretty great! For Saturday's sessions, we watched it just at our church. There wasn't anyone there when we got there, but 3 more people came to the church to watch it. Who knew other people come to the church to watch conference other than the missionaries. :)  I made it through all the sessions....even without a conference packet! :P

In between sessions, we went to Chick Fil A and had lunch, and we walked right past a sister in my last ward. She waved at me and I got to see her little girl that is 2. I went to place my order and some lady was already paying for the 4 of us to eat.  Then another person came up and offered to buy our food and I told them somebody already did, but thanks for offering.  Pretty neat we had 2 offers to buy our food. Priesthood session was sweet, we went with the Bellevue 1st Elders.

Sunday's session was pretty legit. A family invited us over and we had brunch with them before it started, it was super good! Another family we know were there too so we were able to talk to both families. During the break in conference, this family dumps out all their storage water and fills them back up. They do this every October conference because it's a good time to remind them. So we spent the whole break bringing up these giant water jugs and then taking them back downstairs. We watched the last session with them and then had dinner with them. 

On Wednesday we had interviews with our mission president, he wants us to be perfect and I'm clearly far from it. lol

We are going to the zoo today, that is always fun!!

Thank Up!!

Love, Elder Searle

 Our home

 That super straight tree I talked about last letter

 To show you how much weight I have lost!

Going on an Adventure

Dear Family,

Had a pretty good week last week, I had a few adventures that were pretty fun and awesome. Fall weather here has been really strange.

On Monday we went to the mall so my companion could get his watch fixed...again.

Tuesday wasn't really too exciting, we mostly walked around and were told to go away multiple times. We finally just sat at a park for a bit and we took a picture of a tree because it was really straight. So that should tell you how the day went.

Wednesday is where our adventures start. We started out the day by having a Rubik's Cube race, which I totally got destroyed. We did it twice and the second time, my comp did it twice before I finished once, so I will need to practice on that. We went over to a sister's house, she's the lady who knitted me my hat and we go over every week and have lunch, we take our landlord with us and we're able to talk to both of them. After we walked around the neighborhood and decided to stop at a less active recent convert who has turned anti. It's not fun to be a part of and he wants to meet with us and the bishop about some concerns, but I know he'll just try to prove his point and not have an open heart so that meeting might not happen.

After that, we walked home to get a drink and Elder Quayle got his trunks in the mail, they are the papers he needs to fill out in order for the church to start working on his flight tickets for when he goes home soon. After he got those, he went a little crazy.

We left our place and started walking our normal path around the Lutheran Church and my companion was like "let's go talk to the Pastor!" I thought he was totally joking and I kept walking on the other side of the street...but he wasn't kidding. He opened the door and walked right in so I had to hurry. We asked if we could see the Pastor and the lady said he was in a class but to come back at 8. So we went back at 8 and all the classes were over and people were leaving. So we were just standing inside this church and everyone was looking at us and were really friendly with us. The Pastor came out and was really happy and full of energy and talked to us for a bit. He told us to come to his office sometime to set up an appointment. We haven't done that yet, but this whole story was a great story. We told it at district meeting and said that we are really trying to talk to everyone! lol

Thursday was our district meeting, our district is full of sisters now. There are 4 elders, including me and my companion and 7 sisters. All I can say is the room for district meetings smells dang good now. :)

After the district meeting I went on exchanges with Elder Wamsley in the Cottonwood area. We had a really good time. We met a guy who is a Sudan Warrior, when he was old enough to become a man...like 11-12 years old, he went through training to become a warrior and they cut 8 lines across his whole forehead.

On Friday we had a ward camp out that was pretty fun. We had a good time.

Hope you all enjoy my letter, it's a long one for me!! lol

Love you all!!

Elder Searle

Transfer Week

Dear Family,

Not much happened this week because of transfers. Elder Quayle and I are still together but our district got moved around. We spent one day saying goodbye to people, we also went to the departing testimony meeting which was really cool. We all wore our matching pink ties again and one of the sisters really liked the ties and she took a picture of us. We had to say goodbye to Elder Abad, he is going home to the Philippines.

On Monday we did a zone activity and we went to the park and played games like sand volleyball, soccer, basketball, Frisbee and kick ball. It was pretty fun and most of our zone was there so that was awesome. It was something different for us to do and it was fun!

On Friday we went to the Trail Center since they do firesides on Friday nights and for this one, they were watching Ephraim's Rescue, and this was like the only time we could watch a movie so we went. Most of the Elders were there so I got to meet up with some old friends and it was really fun.

On Saturday we were knocking and knocking on doors and we knocked on this one house that was a bit run down and a dude with an eye patch opened the door. He didn't want anything to do with us, but he looked just like a pirate. :)

Sunday was a good day, that night we got a ride home with a dude that just put a brand new engine in his Volkswagen because he blew up his last one after installing a brand new turbo charger and it blew his engine up.

This was really about it this week with transfers, I have been practicing the Rubik's cube and I keep getting better at it.

Hope all is going well with everyone, I am doing better. Getting along better with my companion and we are starting to have a good time together.....so that's always good!!

Love you guys!! Have a great week!!

Love Elder Searle

Chilly Week

Dear Family,

I actually had a really good and enjoyable week and a lot of good stuff went on. So to start it off, on Monday we went to the mall, again...we have gone to different malls like 3-4 P-days now. We found some cool skinny ties at American Eagle and my companion thought it would be a good idea if the 6 of us all had matching ties to wear to Zone Conference later in the week. Then he thought it would be a good idea that since 4 of us wear glasses, that all of us should wear glasses with our matching ties to Zone Training.

After our P-day is over, we've been going over to see a family that moved in when I got here. We bring our free Papa Murphy's pizza and they make a little food and we play games and visit with them.

Tuesday, I made myself a Purple Cow Shake...it made me really happy! :)

Wednesday, we went over to this older ladies house and she is always throwing a party with the older folks in her complex and they stitch hats and gloves and all that jazz that old ladies like to do. She gave me one of the hats that she made! It is really cool, it's blue and black and I took a selfie with me wearing it.

Thursday, I finally solved the Rubix's Cube!! My companion has been trying to teach me for 2 weeks and I gave up and quit like 6 times, but that day...I finally solved it. I was really excited. We had our Zone Training meeting this day and so us 6 South-Siders wore our matching ties and our glasses and we looked really classy. :_

Saturday was a full day of service, we spent 8 hours and laid a concrete pad and then laid bricks down by the sidewalk. They fed us both breakfast and lunch and would have fed us dinner, but we already had dinner plans.

Sunday I had to give a talk in sacrament...yep, even as a missionary I'm still scared to speak in sacrament. They had me as the youth speaker though, so that was good. The highlight of Sunday was being invited to a home and being able to see the Short's. It was awesome!! Nora saw us walking and she ran inside and yelled "Big Teddy Bear is here!" We talked to them for an hour before we had to go but it was really good to see them again. Then when we left, Nora gave me a big hug and that just made my week. :)

This week has been chilly, like I actually had to grab a jacket it was that cold...and it has rained a lot.

Hope all is well with you guys!!

Love Elder Searle

Week of Service

Dear Family,

This week has was full of service, like mowing, tilling, raking and putting up a retaining wall. The retaining wall was pretty cool because I have never done that before. A lot of the missionaries have been sick, the cold is going around, but so far I've been good.  On Wednesday, a set of Elders were suppose to train together but one of them was sick. I was asked to go sit with the sick Elder so that the other missionary could at least train. I sat at his place and since they live at a member's home, I got to play the pinball machine they have in their basement. :)

It's hard doing work out here on Saturday's because of the Nebraska football games. The work here is going really really slow, we do go see a lot of less actives and we do go read the Book of Mormon to Dean almost every day.

The computer is being really slow today, I'll have to try and come back later.

Love, Elder Searle