Howdy,

That video was great. Jack has such tiny little legs and he is so long. How is the middle of his body even supported?

(Click here for the video of Jack)

That's crazy that the temperature is so low there. We actually had some cooler weather but it was still pretty warm. Everyone is saying that it probably be a cold winter because we had a pretty mild summer.

Jordache's baptism was pretty great. We actually tracted into Jordache. Its pretty cool because the day we found Jordache we also got 25 contacts (25 daily contacts is one of the mission goals and its kind of difficult out here). So it just goes to show that when you really stretch and are diligent to the standards good things will come about! His friend Anthony baptized him and the other priest was one of the witnesses. It was pretty cool for all of them. Jordache is kind of goofy, when he got in the baptism font he smiled and waved at everyone. I was actually thinking that him and Christian would probably get along quite well - same sense of humor. His confirmation blessing was really neat too...We have kind of talked to Jordache about serving mission and he's rather hesitant about the idea. Well, in the blessing Brother Jarnagin very specifically said that he would serve a mission and also, that his decision share the gospel would be key to helping his family accept the gospel. Pretty neat! I attached a picture, I don't know why they aren't smiling....they were all pretty happy.

On Wednesday we got to watch "Meet the Mormons" and it was so good! I think it will be super great for the world. I want everyone to see it. Its a documentary but its not boring. The church has some serious talent in filmmaking. We're actually not suppose to use it in our proselyting but we are encouraged to encourage members to see it and to tell there nonmember friends to see it. I think it comes out in October.

We had hit a rough patch these past couple of weeks in terms of work being kind of slow but I think it is almost over.  We have a few really promising potential investigators. We have talked to one of the ladies, Nettie, we do volunteering with about different gospel topics but we had a good talk about the Book of Mormon a couple weeks ago. She told us that her husband would probably love the Book of Mormon so we gave her a copy for each of them. Well, last week she rescheduled the appointment we had with her but when we were volunteering she said that her husband has already started to read the Book of Mormon and he loves it! Apparently he said that its been answering some of his questions about the Bible. Hopefully we can get an appointment with them this week!

We also got a headquarters referral but the apartment number wasn't on the text so we ended up calling her. Her name is McKenzie and she is also excited to meet with us. We just talked to her on the phone but she wants to watch conference.

So things are looking up :)

Unfortunately President basically told me that I was getting transferred in 3 weeks :( 

I was pretty bummed on Saturday because the Wi-Fi (they're working on getting cable) at the church kept cutting in and out during the women's conference so I probably only saw about 30 minutes of it...I'm feeling pretty spiritually deprived! Its sounds like most of the branch will actually watch conference at the building. We may end up going to member houses that are watching in their home to avoid technical difficulties :)

Well, I love you!

Have a gooood week!

-Sister Davis

Howdy family,

It has been a pretty goooood week. That's nice of the bishop to send me a gps. I did get the teddy bear package....the ward does send me a lot of stuff so I settled on sending thank you cards every couple of months. There are missionaries in this mission that live with members but I'm not sure how many. This is the first area that sister Carling hasn't lived with a member. I think its a good idea, the missionaries I've talked to seem to like it for the most part.

I feel like we're teaching the whole world how to to family history. We've had a couple appointments this week where we taught less-actives and members how to do family history. We had a pretty cool experience with one sister in the ward. After we shared a message about inviting friends to do family history this Sister said that she needs to figure out how to use familysearch.org first. We had some extra time so we helped her log on and get started. She told us about how she had been having dreams about family history work and people just kept randomly bringing it up in her life. When she finally got on the site (it took awhile to set up) there were several close relatives who still needed work done. The spirit of Elijah was pretty strong, I think her family was in the room with us, it was awesome. It was a good experience for that sister to see why she had been having the prompting to get started on her tree.

Its actually kind of funny that we're teaching family history so much because neither of us really know what we're doing. Just enough to help someone get started.

We had tacos with Tricia one of our investigators this week. She's the best but she doesn't want to be baptized until her husband joins as well and he doesn't even like to be in the house when we're there. I don't even know what he looks like. So we're kind of stuck. She's been investigating for quite awhile and has even given up coffee.  We think family history may help. Its kind of our answer to everything these days.

Jordache is a funny kid. We asked him what it is about the church that is motivating him to keep coming and be baptized. He said that whenever he's gone to churches before he would always fall asleep (even though they were less than 3 hours)  and he would wonder why something that should be so important was putting him to sleep. Well, when he came to the LDS church he stayed awake the whole time and was actually interested in what was going on, not just that but he agreed with/liked what was being taught. He also said that he is at a point where it was "now or never" in terms of baptism, so Heavenly Father has good timing.

Thanks for sending me a bag! Mine just becomes sadder every day.

Every single one of my companions so far writes about twice as much as I do in there weekly letters home. I think most of them go day by day and tell there family everything they did. That just seems like a lot.

It was a pretty rainy weekend! I like rain but it sure throws a loop in our plans.

Yeah, I can't believe I've been out for a year almost. Sure doesn't feel like it! 

Thanks for all your love and support :)    (that sounds like something on a thank you card)

I love you!

Thanks for the article! I'm not really suppose to use websites that aren't authorized by the church but maybe since its ran by an LDS group its okay? Not sure about that one. President Mortensen is starting to do Mission President Firesides once a month at different stakes in the mission. They're meant to bring in lots of nonmembers or less-actives. Basically its mostly a musical program put on by missionaries but there's also testimonies given by recent converts. So maybe that coach would be a good person to have speak! That would definitely bring in a lot of non-members.

I'm doing well. Its been a fairly decent week. Definitely one of those weeks where you feel like nothing happened but somehow you were still busy the whole time. We're really trying to find new investigators. I don't know why but its been really hard lately. It hasn't been this difficult in awhile. Its all good. I have faith.

We've been working a lot with family history. We're helping a couple less-actives get started on there's and we've also been helping Priscilla get her's going. Its been pretty cool because Priscilla hardly had any information on her dad and grandparents. We were able to find her dad's information and we found her grand-parents and great grand parents and her mom's side. Its exciting! She is really looking forward to going to the temple but unfortunately it is closed this month. Our mission president is also really pushing family history. He wants us to start teaching it after we teach the Plan of Salvation.

Jordache is still doing excellent. The two other priests in the branch are really good friends with him now. The youth sunday school teacher always tells us that Jordache answers a good portion of the questions asked in class.

We've been doing a lot of service lately. Its nice because we can do service during the hours that are hard for catching people at home. Service is another thing that Pres. Mortensen is encouraging us to do more of...its pretty neat. He wants each companionship to do ~10 hours of service a week. For all the missionaries out in the country this is very good news. Its not an official change that has been made but its in the near future. Part of the perks of being a sister training leader is getting to hear the future plans for the mission.

Nobody really knows when we're getting ipads. All we know is that it is before the end of the year. I'm not sure how paying for it works either...Pres. hasn't said anything about becoming an online proselyting mission. Honestly I'm not sure if this mission is quite ready for that... but President thinks we may start doing online stuff next year. 

I'm sad to hear about grandpa and aunt Lois. I'm happy to hear that Grandpa is probably going to be just fine. I'll keep him in my prayers.

Did I tell you that sometimes we help in primary? Usually with the sunbeams. If there's a lot in the class, then they usually ask us to sit in with the teacher to help keep things from going out of control. Or sometimes we end up actually teaching a class if the teacher isn't at church. 

I love you!

I hope you all have a goooood week.

-Sister Davis

Also, my bag is kind of a sad sight. Its sort of falling apart. Do you have any good missionary bags that you aren't using?

Howdy,

I'm emailing at the church building today. We're lucky.

I didn't know about the flooding in College Station, its seems that weather there is worse than it is here...Its mostly just hot here. People say that it stays hot in September and then sort of starts to cool down. 

Its been a pretty wild week. I went down to Houston on Tuesday for MLC so Sister Carling did a little exchange with the other STL's companion in College Station. MLC took a really long time. We had to leave at 6:30 am and we didn't get back until about 6:30 pm. MLC is always a good time :) its like a mini-zone conference. 

When Sister Carling and I got back to Brenham we were only there for about an hour before we did a real exchange with the Caldwell sisters. So our week didn't really start until Thursday and by that time we were real tired of driving.

We had to go back to College Station on friday for Zone meeting. It was a pretty good meeting...its harder to tell how things are going when you planned the meeting. Its been a pretty humbling experience to be in a leadership position because you really understand, as King Benjamin puts it "your own nothingness". I've realized the best way to help the zone is to just follow the spirit with everything you plan and teach. Its not so much that I'm helping anyone, but that the Lord through me is helping the zone and that is neat.

Jordache is just soaking everything up. He is a pretty cool kid. We asked him if he's ever thought about serving a mission and he has! He's not sure how his Dad would handle that but his dad is cool with him getting baptized so who knows...

Everyone in the branch loves him.

Tomorrow is transfers but Sister Carling and I are staying. Yay! Pretty much everyone else in the zone is changing.

Here's the funny quote of the week. Sister Carling and I were about to go into a member house for dinner so we said a prayer in the car before we went. I guess I was tired because I said in all seriousness "we grateful that the Knox's are kind enough to eat us..(Sister Carling - also tired- starts laughing)...I mean feed us."

Its just been a fun week.... :)

I love you! Hope you're enjoying your labor day.

-Sister Davis