Teaching in Toronto

Hello everyone! Last p-day was pretty eventful. In my weekly report I talked about how difficult tracting is and how little success I've seen from doing it. Well...just a couple of hours after writing that email we went tracting and found 2 potential investigators. I'd like to explain a little bit how it happened. We were driving and Elder Fabiano went to a street that felt good and pulled off to the side. We sat there for a few minutes to do some paper work, planning, and phone calls. It was a very warm evening and the sun was right in our faces, just beaming into the car. The AC in our car is really poor for some reason so it became uncomfortably hot real quick. The whole time I was thinking to myself why my companion doesn't drive down the street to a shady spot so we don't die in the car. Although I really wanted to say let's go to another spot, I never said anything. After about 20 minutes we finished what we had to do and got out of the boiling h...

I neglected to let you know that my p-day was today not yesterday because of a holiday yesterday. Sorry for the worry! Happy 150th birthday to Canada! I want my American friends to know that I do love 'Murica but I am proud to be a Canadian. Even if I become a dual citizen or end up living in the states most of my life, I will always identify myself as a Canadian.  Tonight we get to join in on the July 4th celebration with our American friends. Let me explain. Sault Ste. Marie borders NE Michigan. I uploaded a picture of the "International Bridge" a couple of weeks ago and that is the bridge between Canada and the States. The bridge goes over a river that separates the two nations; the river is the location for July 1st (Canada day) and July 4th celebratory FIREWORKS. We get the best of both celebrations. We enjoyed the fireworks and Saturday and are going to watch the July 4th fireworks tonight from our 4th floor condo a couple of KM's away (we can't ...

Enjoy the long email :) Last week I cut a suspenseful story short. I will keep the suspense going a little longer while I explain some other events of this past little while. Zone conference was held in Brampton (part of the Greater Toronto Area) on Wednesday. We drove down to Brampton  with another set of Elders the day before because it's an 8 hour journey. Ontario has some beautiful landscapes. I miss the Rocky Mountains in the west but I love the lush forests and abundance of fresh water here. I took half-decent pictures while driving to give an idea. Road trips are awesome. It's nice to take a break from proselyting and enjoy a long drive (and occasionally get pumped up from listening to Motab, Elder Holland, etc.). At Zone Conference we watched a video of Elder Ballard talking about his experience as the Toronto Mission President many years ago. He shared the secret which increased the mission wide baptism rate from aprox. 18/month to 60/month over a short pe...

Greetings everybody!  Happy Father's Day yesterday to my dad, my brothers and others! Keep up the good work in the home. I don't know what it's like to be a father yet, but I imagine there is more to it than meets the eye. Thank you dad for everything you do for me and our family every single day. The way you have lived your life as a father has taught me more about true fatherhood than anything else. I am blessed to be your son. Life is fun in Sault Ste. Marie. We had a very interesting experience on Wednesday. We received a phone call from an unknown number at about  6:30  in the evening while we were out and about. He sounded like a middle aged man, he said he sought out our number because he had some questions for us. He then asked, "What is your church's stance on gay marriage and abortion?" I paused for a second. I had an initial thought to try to answer him over the phone, but instead I said something like this: "We'd love to answer ...

I love my second area so far! In this email, I will often refer to the city of Sault Ste. Marie (Sue-saint-marie) as the "Soo". Firstly, my companion is named Elder Fabiano (foh-bi-ah-no), he's from West Jordan Utah and he's awesome. Nothing but great companions so far! He's been out about 10 months. His great Grandpa was Italian so that's where he gets the name, you couldn't tell by looking at his pasty white skin and red hair haha. It was a pretty long drive from Woodstock to the Soo: 2 hours NE to our exchange point (a little North of Toronto) and then 8 hours North to the Soo. As we drove into Sault Ste. Marie I got a strange feeling. It felt familiar, it felt like I was coming home to some degree. These feelings are not to be confused with home sickness haha. I guess this place just reminds me of Alberta. The mix of deciduous and coniferous trees, the wide roads, the friendly people. It's a very pleasant city, I'm looking forwar...

Hello everybody! It is transfers week! Sadly, I will be leaving the wonderful land of Woodstock  (after 3 transfers) and moving on to the next stage of my mission. Fun fact: My brother Jordan served in the Toronto West Mission from 2010-2012. One of the areas he served in is Sault St. Marie, Ontario (pronounced Sue-Saint-Marie). Guess what? I am being transferred to Sault St. Marie! I am pretty excited to follow in my brothers footsteps! I've heard my companion is a really cool guy as well, so I get another awesome companion. I will always hold a special place in my heart for Woodstock. It's been a great place to be trained and gain great friendships. My current companion Elder Kohl is staying and will do a fine job continuing the work. We saw some finding miracles this week! Thank you for your prayers. We received a member referral family of 4 this week who are potential investigators. This family has been dealt many difficult...

Greetings! ConGRADulations to my brother Kyle for graduating High School...with better grades than me (not hard to do). You looked pretty sweet in your grad tux. Enjoy your last summer before life gets real haha. Happy Birthday to my nephew Ezra tomorrow! I'm not sure how he is already 7, crazy. The work is still trudging along in Woodstock. I don't have anything that amazing to report on from this week; it's not realistic to expect an amazing week every week. We don't have any progressing investigators anymore. We just have to keep pushing forward and hope for a brighter day. I do believe that we are going to have a better week this week; I'm going to do my part to make it a great week! One highlight of the week was our ward conference on Sunday. I sang in the ward choir: we sang a song called "one by one" the lyrics were written by Elder Bednar. It's a very nice song I recommend checking it out. The Stake theme for this year is: show...

​​Hello! Yesterday was not our p-day because of Victoria Day. We missionaries do the opposite of everybody else: the Sabbath is definitely not a day of rest and holidays are go days!  My week started off pretty sweet. For p-day Elder Kohl and I went to the golfing range and also played on the chipping and putting green. We shared a $14 bucket of balls and played for close to 3 hours so it was absolutely worth it! I'm still good at golf :) We also helped out the members a lot this week. We have mowed and done weed whacking for a couple senior members, helped a sister pack stuff before she moves, cleaned out gutters, painted a bedroom, and de-cluttered a back yard. What would the ward do with out us?! Some might think that's too much service, I think I would rather be doing that than tracting haha.  We've been primarily working with the members to find people to teach. This way of finding basically looks like the following:...

Happy Mother's Day! It was so great talking to my amazing family yesterday. I love you all so much! I wish all the best to my brother Nathan who's reporting to the Provo MTC this Wednesday and then going to the Paris, France mission 6 weeks later! I hope you have fun at the MTC! We had a good week here in Woodstock. We found 2 new investigators while tracting on Saturday which is sweet. We found them only after having the door closed on our face about 20 times in a row. While we were going door to door with no success, I had a feeling that despite the many negative responses we were getting there would be at least one very interested person on the street and that's exactly what happened. This experience reminded me that often times we have to push through a large amount of opposition before God helps us and blesses us. A quote from one of my favorite movies just popped into my head: "The night is darkest just before the dawn." I believ...

Hello everyone, I'm pumped for my brother Nathan who's reporting to the Provo MTC in a week and a half! Paris is not going to be able to handle so much force and power! I'm so excited to chat with my family on Mother's day! I will see you at  4:00 MDT ! We had another great week here in Woodstock. The gentleman who walked into sacrament meeting last Sunday came to church again this week. He had to leave right after the meeting so we didn't get a chance to teach him again but he said he is reading the Book of Mormon and loving it! We are looking forward to seeing him progress! We enjoyed a regional broadcast on Sunday: includes the North Eastern part of North America. Elder Oaks presided and he gave a powerful talk. He laid down the law pretty much, it was awesome. My testimony that he is an apostle of the Lord was strengthened. Every time I hear the leaders of the church give talks the spirit confirms to me that every thing they say is...