May 1, 2017
So, yeah, this week was pretty dang busy... like every week ever. But it was super good, and it all ended with the baptism of "C"! She is, like my favorite person ever and I am super happy I could work with her to get her baptized!
Other than the baptism, we had zone conference this week and we learned a ton about loving our investigators. There were also some rule changes so that we can now do family history for a few hours each week and we can go to the temple with our recent converts for their first time going through to do baptisms... so we are getting all excited to go with "C" and her husband this coming week (hopefully)! Super good week full of learning and what not... so that's always good :)
here are some super cute pics too [See slideshow above]
1) "C" got baptized this week it was flipping awesome
2) traditional pre baptism mirror selfies...
[Addendum]
This week is pretty well decribed in my other email, but yeah... my zone is doing super awesome. We have a ton of greenies being trained and they are like the best Greenies I have ever seen... so that is always good.
Elder Hansen is super awesome. We get along really really well. He is from Idaho and is basically a big goober so naturally we get along well haha. He has been a zone leader for a while and is a Creole missionary so it is awesome to be able to learn from him and all his experience and wisdom :)
It kind of depends on the week on how much finding and teaching we can do but this last week was definitely really busy so we would start working our area around 4 every day. This is super hard on us, because we really want to work our area, but we can't haha. It's all worth it when we are helping the other missionaries, and we know the Lord blesses us and makes up for the time we cant spend in our area. I love being a zone leader though. It is super fun. We see and help a ton more missionaries than I have in the past, which is so fulfilling. That's probably one of my favorite things to do as a missionary...help the other missionaries become more like Christ. If there is one thing that I have learned about helping people on my mission, it is that if you make anyone more like Christ they will be excellent at whatever it is they are trying to do. It's awesome how that always works out... so that is what we are focusing on this transfer: making our missionaries amazing desciples of Jesus Christ.
Good to hear colin is killing it back home and its good to hear from you :)
Love, Elder Foster
May 8, 2017 [Email before our Mother's Day skype]
Hey!
So I can give you a full update in 6 days when I see you on how the week went and such, but yeah overall this week was good. I flipping love this ward! It's super fun and really missionary minded. Actually tonight we are going to have a missionary activity... so that is going to be good for the ward.
This week was lots of work. We had MLC again, so the mission leadership all got together. We have changed a bunch of stuff in the mission the last little bit here, so we can do family history for a few hours a week now and the Zone Leaders dont give a Zone Training every transfer any more. We just give a shorter training at District Trainings whenever we feel like they need one. So that changed our schedule around quite a bit, which has been interesting...but yeah,a I will give you all the details and what not when I talk to you guys.
Have an awesome week.
Elder Foster
May 15, 2017 [Day after Mother's Day Skype]
So you just talked with me but I sent some pictures your way.
This week though was pretty good. Hard to find people this week, but when we are finding, people are sticking a lot longer than they were last transfer. I love my companion, Elder Hansen, and all is going well over here in Hollywood/Hollyhood/Hollyweird... those are all the names we have given this area haha. One because it is hood and two, because the ward is full of probably the weirdest people on the planet. But it all works together to make it the best ward ever haha. Not sure how that works, but it does.
Hope you all had a relaxing mothers day and all is going well back home. Send me some pictures sometime. I wanna see what all you guys are doing :)
Love, Elder Foster
May 23, 2017
Yet again another transfer has come and gone and I am going to be staying in Hollywood for a third transfer. I am super excited about staying. Elder Hansen is dropping to be a District Leader in the Coral Springs zone.
My new companion is Elder Briggs, who is another one from Idaho. We predicted to each other a few transfers ago that we would be serving with one another sometime in the near future and we were right haha. So I am super excited for him to be coming to Hollywood. We are around the same age on the mission [been out about the same amount of time] so I think that is going to be really cool working things out in the zone.
As for this week, not too much has happened other than we have been clearing out a ton of names from our ward list. This is a very transient area and a ton of people move in and get baptized and move out and never move records, so we are in the process of clearing the ward list so that future missionaries and the ward can stay focused on people who are actually here. So we have been doing a ton of that lately, in addition to our knocking and what not.
"C" and "W" are still doing super amazing. He comes out teaching with, and she is just super solid. I will send pictures with them next week. We are going to see them tonight at our correlation meeting.
Picture: I am going to miss this man. We thought we would take a final sombrero pic.
Love, Elder Foster
May 30, 2017
So yeah... this week was transfers and everything was super crazy! We have spent a very large amount of time putting together stuff for the zone for this transfer. We are giving a training tomorrow and Thursday, and have MLC (Mission Leadership Council) on Friday. Then we are having ZLC (Zone Leadership Council) on Saturday, (where we are planning on giving a training also) and then we are planning comp studies for the zone for the first half of the transfer. Everything just hit us all at once and we are super busy 24/7 right now. It's crazy and fun and we are super excited to finally get into the actual trainings and such instead of planning all the time haha. It's taxing just sitting in our room using so much brain power.
It is indeed getting really hot again, and it's starting to rain on the daily now, so summer must be here. It got into the 100s one of the days this week but other than that it has been mid 90s with about 70% humidity... so yeah summer is back. I am just super glad that I am not in a bike area right now haha.
It's super fun to stay with the zone this transfer. I feel super close to everyone now and I feel like I am in the best position to be able to help them all the best way possible to become the best missionaries they can.
Elder Briggs is my companion and he is from Idaho and is a farm boy through and through. It has been super fun being with him so far. We work super well together which is always a bonus. I will let you all know more about him as I get to know him better.
Love,
Elder Foster
So, yeah, this week was pretty dang busy... like every week ever. But it was super good, and it all ended with the baptism of "C"! She is, like my favorite person ever and I am super happy I could work with her to get her baptized!
Other than the baptism, we had zone conference this week and we learned a ton about loving our investigators. There were also some rule changes so that we can now do family history for a few hours each week and we can go to the temple with our recent converts for their first time going through to do baptisms... so we are getting all excited to go with "C" and her husband this coming week (hopefully)! Super good week full of learning and what not... so that's always good :)
here are some super cute pics too [See slideshow above]
1) "C" got baptized this week it was flipping awesome
2) traditional pre baptism mirror selfies...
[Addendum]
This week is pretty well decribed in my other email, but yeah... my zone is doing super awesome. We have a ton of greenies being trained and they are like the best Greenies I have ever seen... so that is always good.
Elder Hansen is super awesome. We get along really really well. He is from Idaho and is basically a big goober so naturally we get along well haha. He has been a zone leader for a while and is a Creole missionary so it is awesome to be able to learn from him and all his experience and wisdom :)
It kind of depends on the week on how much finding and teaching we can do but this last week was definitely really busy so we would start working our area around 4 every day. This is super hard on us, because we really want to work our area, but we can't haha. It's all worth it when we are helping the other missionaries, and we know the Lord blesses us and makes up for the time we cant spend in our area. I love being a zone leader though. It is super fun. We see and help a ton more missionaries than I have in the past, which is so fulfilling. That's probably one of my favorite things to do as a missionary...help the other missionaries become more like Christ. If there is one thing that I have learned about helping people on my mission, it is that if you make anyone more like Christ they will be excellent at whatever it is they are trying to do. It's awesome how that always works out... so that is what we are focusing on this transfer: making our missionaries amazing desciples of Jesus Christ.
Good to hear colin is killing it back home and its good to hear from you :)
Love, Elder Foster
May 8, 2017 [Email before our Mother's Day skype]
Hey!
So I can give you a full update in 6 days when I see you on how the week went and such, but yeah overall this week was good. I flipping love this ward! It's super fun and really missionary minded. Actually tonight we are going to have a missionary activity... so that is going to be good for the ward.
This week was lots of work. We had MLC again, so the mission leadership all got together. We have changed a bunch of stuff in the mission the last little bit here, so we can do family history for a few hours a week now and the Zone Leaders dont give a Zone Training every transfer any more. We just give a shorter training at District Trainings whenever we feel like they need one. So that changed our schedule around quite a bit, which has been interesting...but yeah,a I will give you all the details and what not when I talk to you guys.
Have an awesome week.
Elder Foster
May 15, 2017 [Day after Mother's Day Skype]
So you just talked with me but I sent some pictures your way.
This week though was pretty good. Hard to find people this week, but when we are finding, people are sticking a lot longer than they were last transfer. I love my companion, Elder Hansen, and all is going well over here in Hollywood/Hollyhood/Hollyweird... those are all the names we have given this area haha. One because it is hood and two, because the ward is full of probably the weirdest people on the planet. But it all works together to make it the best ward ever haha. Not sure how that works, but it does.
Hope you all had a relaxing mothers day and all is going well back home. Send me some pictures sometime. I wanna see what all you guys are doing :)
Love, Elder Foster
May 23, 2017
Yet again another transfer has come and gone and I am going to be staying in Hollywood for a third transfer. I am super excited about staying. Elder Hansen is dropping to be a District Leader in the Coral Springs zone.
My new companion is Elder Briggs, who is another one from Idaho. We predicted to each other a few transfers ago that we would be serving with one another sometime in the near future and we were right haha. So I am super excited for him to be coming to Hollywood. We are around the same age on the mission [been out about the same amount of time] so I think that is going to be really cool working things out in the zone.
As for this week, not too much has happened other than we have been clearing out a ton of names from our ward list. This is a very transient area and a ton of people move in and get baptized and move out and never move records, so we are in the process of clearing the ward list so that future missionaries and the ward can stay focused on people who are actually here. So we have been doing a ton of that lately, in addition to our knocking and what not.
"C" and "W" are still doing super amazing. He comes out teaching with, and she is just super solid. I will send pictures with them next week. We are going to see them tonight at our correlation meeting.
Picture: I am going to miss this man. We thought we would take a final sombrero pic.
Love, Elder Foster
May 30, 2017
So yeah... this week was transfers and everything was super crazy! We have spent a very large amount of time putting together stuff for the zone for this transfer. We are giving a training tomorrow and Thursday, and have MLC (Mission Leadership Council) on Friday. Then we are having ZLC (Zone Leadership Council) on Saturday, (where we are planning on giving a training also) and then we are planning comp studies for the zone for the first half of the transfer. Everything just hit us all at once and we are super busy 24/7 right now. It's crazy and fun and we are super excited to finally get into the actual trainings and such instead of planning all the time haha. It's taxing just sitting in our room using so much brain power.
It is indeed getting really hot again, and it's starting to rain on the daily now, so summer must be here. It got into the 100s one of the days this week but other than that it has been mid 90s with about 70% humidity... so yeah summer is back. I am just super glad that I am not in a bike area right now haha.
It's super fun to stay with the zone this transfer. I feel super close to everyone now and I feel like I am in the best position to be able to help them all the best way possible to become the best missionaries they can.
Elder Briggs is my companion and he is from Idaho and is a farm boy through and through. It has been super fun being with him so far. We work super well together which is always a bonus. I will let you all know more about him as I get to know him better.
Love,
Elder Foster