Elder Shields in Carlsbad, CA

Hey! Had a very busy week this week. We had trainer follow up on Tuesday, and we had a mission wide talent show on Friday. Both of which ended at 4 in Vista so we had to drive in traffic for like 2 hours to get home both times, it was pretty awful! But the talent show was way fun!! I got to meet a lot of people and see a lot of random talents, one Elder got really good at saying words backwards so we would give him words and phrases and he would tell us them backwards, super random, but cool. I got to accompany two singers which was a lot of fun!! I also had to accompany someone on Thursday night so I got to play the piano a lot this week which is awesome since I don't get to play nearly as much as I used too. And I missed it way more than I thought I would.  Completed Christmas Countdown We did a lot of service for the neighbors of one of the members in our ward (the Phippens), we helped them move, and Sister Phippen sent a whole bunch of pics I'm pretty sure so that ...

Hello everyone how are you!?!?!? So this week we were not able to meet with Richard and his family, it is unfortunate but they really aren't as interested as we had originally thought. We will continue to stop by and serve them the best we can and teach them when available.   We did have a solid lesson with Shaelee again this week, her mom sat in with us during the lesson. She expressed some of her concerns with the church, one of them being why the Prophet and the Apostles and the Seventy are treated like celebrities. She thinks that we should all be equal (which we are). We were able to resolve most of her concerns, but there is still a long way to go to get that family active again and getting Shaelee baptized.   This week was zone conference! And while zone conference goes on our cars get inspected by other missionaries, so when the Escondido zone conference was going on on Tuesday, me and Elder Snyder got to go and help inspect the cars. It was pretty borin...

Hey what is up everybody!! This week was pretty good! We spent a lot of time this week inviting people to the Nativity that happened over this weekend. We went around to a lot of less actives, former investigators and part member families with cookies and an invitation to the Nativity. The cookies was an idea from one of the members in the ward (sister Bradshaw) and she provided us with cookie dough as well which was super clutch. And people were a lot more friendly to us when we had cookies in our hand hahah.  Also got into a super bad Bible bash this week, it was just with some guy who was doing some work out in the front lawn. It just started out us asking him if he needed help with anything, and 45 minutes later the guy was reciting all these scriptures on the trinity while I told him to explain Acts 7:55-56 if the trinity was true. I was so mad from bashing that I just turned to Elder Snyder and said we were leaving and left without saying anything else to the guy. It w...

Hello everyone!! This week was really good! Me and Elder Snyder have been getting along really well!! He has started to be a little more talkative now that he isn't a total deer in the headlights like he was when he first got off the plane haha.   We got to go to the temple this week!! That was so much fun I had the best time ever! I have really started to appreciate the temple since I've been out here because we go so few times. I don't think I took full advantage of just how nice we have have it in Utah to have 5 temples within 40 min of my house. I should've been going way more often!! But as much as I have missed going to the temple, I know that it is not my main purpose as a missionary. I am here to do the work of the living, not the work of the dead (someone told me that so don't quote me on it haha).   Unfortunately, we really haven't gotten anywhere with any of our investigators this week, had a lot of cancellations. But we have started working with ...

So this is my first week with a new trainee. I went and picked him up on Tuesday night. His name is Elder Snyder and he is from Ogden Utah. He's a pretty cool guy! He's a little shy tho and a little apprehensive to talk to people but I'm gonna get him broken out of his shell in no time! A lot changed in the zone, I got a new district leader and a new zone leader, two areas got whitewashed and there was like five other people getting transferred out. It's gonna be a lot of fun getting to know all the new missionaries!  We got to teach Shaelee this week, we taught her at the Jamchis house, it was pretty sweet. We really need to talk to the parents tho to find out where they are at on letting her be baptized and all that good stuff.  Bridgette's kid is having surgery this week so we won't be able to meet with her, but plz keep her in your prayers, we definitely are and we are doing whatever we can to help her during this hard time!! Thanksgiving was so fun!...

So transfers are this week I am staying in French Valley, and I got a call on Friday and I found out that I will be training! I have to go down to Vista tomorrow night to pick up my greenie, I will send pics and stuff for that next week!  Got to go to Mormon Battalion this week which was super fun! They do a little tour and we got to learn all the history of the Mormon Battalion and then we did a little devotional in one of the rooms in the buildings, it was super cool to see how big of a role the Mormons played in the history of the country!  For Zone Conference unfortunately L Whitney Clayton got reassigned at the last second, so we got Elder Taniela B Wakolo and his wife. It was super good tho! I learned a ton about some of the patterns that are used in our church and we talked a lot about the Gospel of Jesus Christ, The Atonement of Jesus Christ and about the saving ordinances in our church and why they are necessary, it was sweet.  No good news from Bridget and...

Definitely felt the prayers this week, because we had a super solid lesson with Bridget on Tuesday! It was good to finally get into contact with her again. Since it had been so long since we met with her we just read the Book of Mormon with her. She had some concerns about why bad things happen to good people, which is always a really tough subject, she was especially fired up about it because of all the shootings in Texas and Vegas and other places. We shared the scripture Alma 60:13 with her and she immediately expressed that she felt a lot better about it! Matt Bradshaw was at the lesson with us. Since he is a RM and doesn't have a job yet and isn't going to school, all he wants to do is go out and work with us, he even went tracting with us on Thursday. I enjoyed it a lot.  Went on two exchanges this week, one with Elder Taylor, who is the same mission age as me, and one with Elder Phillips, who is going home in 8 days. It was a really good experience to go out with Elder...

Hello, so all day P day was straight up so baller!!! Got a sweet deal on bowling cuz we went in the middle of the day and there was like 30 of us so we got a group deal, and then we got to just go to the church building eat Hawaiian food that was catered to us because of a member in the Murrieta stake, and play ping pong and basketball and just to whatever. I only watched some of the Saratov Approach, because I was much more interested in playing around the world or dynamite haha.  So we taught Shaelee again and she said that if it is okay with her parents that she would want to be baptized!! but the mom isn't too thrilled about it she was pretty cold to us after that and she cancelled our appointment with them for this upcoming week, so from now on when working with them we just need to take it very slow, but it's good to know that that is something that Shaelee wants for sure.  We have an appointment with Bridget on Tuesday, and plzzz pray that it doesn't fall through...

So gonna be honest, this week was pretty rough. We weren't able to get in contact with Bridget again, the guy Richard we talked to last week hasn't responded to anything either. And tho we had a really solid lesson with Shaelee and her fam, she ended up not coming to church, again. It is really hard when I know that what we have to share will make these people happier, but they just won't listen or act on what we say when we ask them to do something! ugh oh well.  There was some fun things that happened tho. I went on exchanges with Elder Draper, who is my District leader and that was a lot of fun! He serves in a biking area so I got to take my bike over there and use it for the first time on my mission! It was so freaking tiring! I was like dead by the end of the day, but it was really nice just to have a change of pace, and I got to see just how easy we have it over in French Valley with a car haha.  We also had the Harvest Festival (fancy way to say Halloween party) ...

First off, my P day next week will be on Tuesday because we are going to do an all day P day on Halloween, which I'm stoked for it's gonna be so fun!  Pretty solid week, we were finally able to start teaching Shaelee, and her family is super chill even tho they are really less active they are super open to everything. Hope that this will lead us to be able to rekindle what got them baptized in the first place.  Sister Bradshaw got in contact with Bridget and she will be coming to the Harvest Festival on Tuesday which will be an awesome way to get her better fellowshipped into the ward!! that being said, the Harvest Festival is on Tuesday and we normally teach her on Tuesday, so we most likely won't do a lesson with her this week, and she is out of town next week! so that will make it like a full month that we haven't taught her! UGHUGH. oh well, hopefully the Harvest Festival will be a good experience for her.  Had a cool experience! Me and Elder Mann were just ou...

Hello Everyone!  Transfers were this last week and I'm chillin' another 6 weeks with Elder Mann in French Valley! Our zone leader Elder Eddins just got made an AP so that was pretty cool! Our district is staying the same other than that. Our zone got huge tho, we got some visa waiters and the Spanish branch has two sets of missionaries now. I'll send a pic of the new zone.  Bummer this week Bridget cancelled on us and didn't show up to church :( We are worried about her. But we won't lose hope! She is ready for the gospel and we aren't going to give up on her! One of the sisters in the ward (Sister Bradshaw) offered to go over and see how she was doing today and just make sure everything was okay with her. Hoping she gets in contact with her.  Good news with Shaelee tho!! The Bishop got in contact with her mom and she is okay with us coming over and teaching her! We are trying to find a time to go over and meet the fam and start teaching.  Me and Elder M...

Hey, Hey Hey, I forgot to tell you guys about general conference last weekend!! It was honestly such a spiritual experience for me! I got so much more out of it than I usually do because this time I was actively listening and taking notes for every session and it was so worth it! We watched most of the sessions and the stake center, but we did watch the priesthood session at a members house, the Stefls are their names. And it was cool because they just had their youngest son leave on a mission so this would have been the first time the dad had watched general conference without his son in a while so it was cool that we were able to be there with him.  We were able to meet with Bridget again finally and we had a really good lesson, we talked with her about faith and talked about Alma 32 with her then she asked for some scriptures we could share with her on resisting temptations she has and we shared Moses 1:13 with her, and it helped her a lot!  We haven't been able to g...

Hi Sandi! We had your awesome son over for dinner tonight.  He loved the carnitas and guacamole.  We're thankful he's in our ward and he's doing an amazing job! Whitney and Ben Garcia Elder Mann and Elder Shields

We got introduced to a guy named George Mijares this week. He was born a member of the church but he hasn't gone in a long time. He's had a really rough life, like two jail sentences, he's been shot several times, been homeless for a while, he has a pretty crazy life story. But he has recently been making strides to try and come back to church. We have been able to go over and visit him a few times, he lives out of Motel 6 just a bit outside our area. And I got the opportunity of giving him a blessing! It was a pretty touching experience, I was so glad that I was able to use the priesthood that I have to bless someone else's life.  So Elder Mann got sick on Tuesday so that was literally the worst thing ever!!! He was in bed all day just sleeping, so I just got to chill in the apartment all day! I read a ton of scriptures and watched like an hour and a half of the District (which is so boring), and luckily I had my rubix cubes so I did that to pass the time a little b...

Hey guys another week down in Temecula!  So first off we had another lesson with Bridget! Went super well and she is definitely starting to see tender mercies in her life since she has started to meet with us! She shared a cool experience with us about how lots of her resentment she has had for a lot of people has just gone away, we were able tell her that that is the spirit and it can bring comfort and guide her in her life. She is not ready for baptism because of a few family matters that need to be resolved beforehand, but we are trying to get her on date so she has something to work for.  We weren't able to teach Shaelee this week because her parents didn't let her, didn't seem like a good sign, but then she and her mom came to church on Sunday! That is the first time anyone in her fam has been to church in like a year, pretty awesome!  Been doing a lot of service out here. So far I've helped two people move, helped a lady paint her house, helped the Bradshaw...