Hey Peeps!

Thanks for the birthday package and such! you must have forgot to send me a GPS. cause that will really come in handy down here.... haha if there isn't really a way to send it you can just put money on my account so I can buy one here... ;) I'm glad matthew is enjoying soccer, oh yeah, and tell him for the Millionth time i'm not in cleveland hahaha! :p

Ammon. here's the thing, I work out when I can and that's not very much. we have been so busy i wake up and i'm to tired to work out so I lay on the floor haha! but I do what I can, and we have two baptisms coming up within the next month!! we have transfers on october 13th so I could leave but probably not because you spend two or three transfers in an area.

things are good. We are teaching this Lady Jill. She is going to be baptized in two weeks. she has had a shady past with drugs, alchohol and stealing. Jill was fired from her job this last weekend from stealing and that wwas what she really needed to be honest. with her job there was no way that we could get her to come to church but now she said she is going to be to church no matter what! but anyways. she has also had the gospel in her life for thirty years and is just now accepting it at age 50. she feels so bad for being a nitpicker and not accepting to anything ever but now she is so happy and you can see the light in her face. we meet with her every day to talk and teach. she told us that her end goal is to get sealed to her parents in the temple! so yes she is pretty much golden. She has made leaps and bounds in the last week, let alone the last couple months!

Oh yes, mother. I'm sending scott and grandpa the reciept from the Chiro with their letters so you can give it to dad. I'm fine, my bed just sucks and it was time for an adjustment. That chiro sucked too. Joe is way better than him. so if i have to go again while i'm here i'm going to try to find another one that is better.

Oh yeah, Speaking of the Harlans. I forgot to tell you guys that I saw Briana at the Temple with her man my last week in the MTC. I didn't say anything though cause I just thought I should stay quiet haha. oh yes. Tell Hailey that so far she has lied. She said she would write me! haha oh just kidding. you can if you want though. Isn't Camielle coming home soon? or is it another 6 months? I can't remember.

Anywho. I'm stoked, we have a family of four we are going to try to start teaching and also we are going to start with rick's nine year old step daughter and we found a new guy tracting so we are going to see if we can teach him also. Things are starting to slowly pick up here in this area, but it's still going to take some time to get it where we really want to be to be honest, and when we get there we are probably still going to want to improve. I'm not going to lie haha! but yes. things are going very well

No mother. I'm not homesick. I told you that nonsense wouldn't happen with me. once I get homesick things go bad and that's just not going to happen. I'm sorry. haha. You need to call JR and matt or something because they should have their papers in and getting their calls soon so be on them for me!

Um, So I think Adam loves me more than Jennifer. I just though I would throw that in there somewhere too. um, let's see... nothing else that's coming to mind. I'm glad that the yard is getting done. Like I said... It better be done so we can have a huge party when i come home! haha ;P love you

Love you and you.

Michael!

Way to go dad! you're going to be ripped when I get home!!! haha I can't believe the plow broke! that sucks!! man. I'm on a trek. I haven't rode mine yet but i have while on exchanges. and there are some you can pray for. Jill Robinson. Brian Sutton. and pray for the kosch family and norm to be accepting to the gospel so we can teach them.

Love you.

Lovers,

Quit Using Dearelder okay? I swear I told you that you could e-mail back now that I'm no longer in the MTC haha ;p as you know from past e-mails, the johnson farm was very cool. and mom, you were wrong, It wasn't because of the holiday you didn't get an e-mail, it was because we were up in Hiram all day long doing stuff so we didn't have the opportunity to e-mail. nice try! hahaha :P I can't believe Jordyn is learning to write! give her a big ole' kiss for me haha I'm so happy that she is enjoying soccer and what not. that's so cool haha

This last week was crazy, we had over ten hours of tracting and we taught around 11 lessons, this week on the other hand isn't going to be as good because we only have four days that we can prosalyte (however it's spelled) in our area because of meetings and exchanges, so we'll see what happens haha. I'm so stoked for you guys to actually get tree's in the front yard! it's progress haha. that's good, maybe it will be done when I get home. I mean it better be because if not... well lets just not go there haha. I can't believe you got talked in to being the room mother! ah hahahaha that's so funny!

I'm glad to hear that Joel has moved out, hopefully that will be good for him and he will be able to improve and such, that's great. and Jayme! way to go girl! that's mad props, next time make him go up there! haha ;P (now, now, don't get mad, I'm only playing. you know I love you!)

Now Ammon, I'm glad you are reading your scriptures, just remember as you read you need to understand what is going on or your study is in vain... Just saying. ha That's more than what I did. I didn't start really reading till the end of my Jr. year for a couple of months and then all of my senior year. It's definitely worth it so keep at it man, you know what's up! ha

can you see me becoming weirder in my e-mails? be honest!!! I sure hope I'm not! I plan on coming home with the same type of personality I had when I left, Maybe even better, but not weirder haha! that would be a total downer. no joke.

So they had me talk in church on sunday. it was the first time I didn't write it down word for word, so I was a little nervous, but luckily for me the branch only had 30-40 people there so I did good and I spoke for 20 Minutes... where did that come from? haha

Anyways. Mission life, well we are thinking about dropping rick, or only going to see him once a week or less because he isn't progressing and he doesn't really seem like he want's to. Elder Hernandez was cool with what I said to him. He kind of just lets me say what I need to say because he isn't the greatest at being bold. Somtimes I have to take control of the lesson too because he gets distracted with the kids really easily and can go off on tangents. oh man, speaking of this. we went to talk to this guy who is investigating that we haven't talked to since before i got here and we brought a member who talked to him for and hour and a half before we could say a single word! it was horrid! I had to tell the member i was going to cut him off and ask the investigator if he still wants to be baptized and we found out that he had be anti'd because some how he found out about the mountain meadows massacre, I mean really? how do you find out about that unless you are really digging or someone gives you anti material.

Oh yeah, Adam, I forgot to tell you in your e-mail, you have mad props with all that work. and make sure you do it good because when I get home I'm planning on doing the whole year mixed with work thing too. so be good at it so i can come get advice from you! haha it's definitely worth all of it.

So my birthday is this saturday right? I would sure hope that you wouldn't forget, because that would be freaking lame. so along with all of the other things you are sending me... (:P) if you could send me a GPS cause we have a hard time finding places sometimes.... I would be eternally grateful (greatful? man I can't spell) and also two long sleeved shirts. one of them we got was a 17 with 32-33 instead of 34-35. so yeah. that would be awesome. so I love you, don't forget how much I love you, every single one of you! ;) So if anyone else is interested in sending something, cause I know it's your hearts desire. My adress is:

1810 Winston Dr.

St. Marys, OH 45885

So don't forget how much I love all of you, hahaha but yeah. I think this is it. so have a good week, I know I will.

Love Michael!

Bad Momma, Bad Momma!!

Ouch.... This sucks!

no e-mail waiting for me. It's not the knife in the heart that hurts, it's the turning of the blade...

ha okay just kidding. a little, that's some offensive stuff!

Anyways, this last week was a pretty busy one, we ended up teaching about 12 lessons or so in Five days, that's pretty good for this area I must say. Usually there isn't that many. also i have a feeling that i might be gaining some weight because we have eaten at a members house like every night, sometimes lunch too.

I don't really know what else to say i guess cause i didn't have an e-mail waiting for me... :'( I go serve the Lord and I get forgotten... haha :P

I guess a good thing though is that we finally got an appointment with one of the investigators that we haven't been able to make contact with for the last three weeks, so we just need to go see if he is still intrested and teach him a couple more things and then he can be baptized. so maybe that would count as my first? we'll see how much we still have to visit with him and teach him.

So how is everything? Is ammon having a fun time with football? Hopefully his game this last weekend went well. what about the yard? more tree's, curbing, sprinklers, or maybe even grass? well... maybe I'm getting a little ahead of myself.... haha Anyone new move into the hood? I would ask if anyone asked for my address so they could write me, but who am I kidding? ha no distractions here! just really just serving the Lord!

So this one investigator, Rick. He has a smoking habit. pretty frustrating with that cause he was smoking a lot less than normal but now he has digressed. Also, he is living with his baby momma and they have three kids together. before I came they had committed them to get married but when I asked last time he just had another excuse. It's really frustrating to put up with it. we had told him that we were going to call or drop by his house every night to check on him to see how he is doing and so when I talked to him last night I was very up front with him. I just told him that he can't just sit back and wait for some miracle and that he is going to have to do things for God to help him overcome his addiction and that he needs to really try and not be so lazy. I was pretty blunt but I felt I needed to. I don't think there is really any other way to get to him. I really don't know. It's just excuse after excuse.

Enough of my ranting about hardships. How are Jenn and Adam? I haven't heard from them at all, if you wanted you could tell them to E-mail me or something? How are Jayme and Cassidy? is that still touchy? and yes, I know he is in ceder. Do you know if Scott took offense when I told him not to send me articles about spanish fork football? I hope not because i didn't mean any.

Is Matthew liking the new school and all? I hope so. Are the kids still going to the LaMonts to work out? or just Ammon? that will be good for him, Hopefully he isn't too much bigger than me when I get home haha. Have you heard about anyone else that I went to school with getting their mission calls? I know there is a lot of questions here, Kind of like Alma 5 but without the soul searching/eternal salvation questions haha. but there isn't really much to work with cause well it was an empty inbox so i'm just winging it that is all!

It's already been a month, that's weird to think. we'll see if time speeds up after the first transfer, that's what i have beed told so maybe it will happen, I just need to stay diligent and doing my best.

Oh yeah, are you still sending this E-mail to people? who are they? I'm just kind of curious, that's all. but yeah. Untill you write me back. ;) (this time you have a full week, so we'll see what happens haha :P)

Love Michael!!

In my defense, I didn't write an e-mail because Michael told me not to so that he could use all of his computer time writing to us!! I sent a snail mail letter to him last week, he just hasn't gotten it yet, and I'm sending another one today, so there!!

Letter 9/9/10

Dear people of the real world,

Did Grandpa put Elder Michael Stone? That way they can forward it to me, and I'm not sure if J.R. has my address out here, probably not, so if you could send it to him too like through a text that would be way cool! haha well yeah kirtland is pretty dang neat. The mall isn't actually here in St. Mary's it's about 40 minutes away in a town called Lima but its pronounced lime-a. weird I know. we have a car to drive so I'm yet to ride a bike, and I'm okay with that haha. Elder Hernandez is a good guy, and we get along pretty well and he teaches me quite a bit. He is weird in ways and all but what missionaries aren't? haha He is from small town kind of by lake elsinore. He has one year left so we will be companions for possibly two more transfers after this one.

On monday we went to the John Johnson farm in Hiram for a "zoned out" this was a 3 zone p-day where we had a tour of the johnson home. I didn't know that that was the place where Joseph was dragged out of the bed and tarred and feathered, it was so so oh i can't think of a good word to put here but i will just say weird, to stand and be in the same exact places that those horrible things happened and places where he recieved reveleation straight from Christ and other olden day prophets.

After that we just got to do some activities and play games with everyone else. It was very fun. (It was so great to play football! haha but my legs are still sore 3 days later! ;) ) after that was over, we headed home, but elder hernandez had to stay in cleveland becuase he is the district leader and there was a leadership training meeting. So i went on exchanges in a town called fremont. haha oh man that was an experience. monday night when I got there we went to visit these two older people who have a mental capacity of an 18 year old or so and the wife made me a yamaka! it was out of control haha but wow. this lady is crazy and she makes all the missionaries that she has over yamaka's like how Jesus did back in the bible and stuff when he was a kid I guess. Just about everyone in the whole mission know's about these two ha.

I finally found someone to fix my pants too so I'm excited to finally have pants that are long enough! yeah buddy! the members here though are pretty good for the most part, but there is only about 40-50 of them and the church building is like a normal one like we go to but cut into a third with no pews or fixed seats on the stand. the stand is only six inches up, the podium is on wheels, the sacrament table is just a normal table and the wooden walls on the stand can be taken off. oh yeah, lets not forget that there isn't a piano or a organ? it's just a really nice keyboard instead.

There isn't really that much else to say except that I'm meeting some really good guys and maybe I will send you their name or something when they go home so you can look them up on facebook for me cause some of these guys are really great and I would like to stay in touch with them. especially the ones who are almost done haha! Anyways, besides this you can give other people my e-mail and/or address so we can chat and such. Don't forget me, God never forgets you ;P

I Love you all, don't have too much fun with out me.

Love, Michael! ;)

Surprise e-mail!!

What a week! A letter, a phone call, and now an e-mail!! Wow, I'm glad Michael is doing well, and I pray he continues to be excited and work hard.

What's up my homies?! I'm just chilin here in Ohio. ha my first area is Called St. Mary's which is the farthest away from the mission home you could possibly get. This area covers about 12 towns and we live in the town of St. Marys. It's definitely a new experience! my Trainers name is Elder Hernandez, he is from so. cal.
Now that I'm here in Ohio it isn't really that much faster to do dear elder or just normally write so it isn't that big of a deal whatever you may use. also you can e-mail if you would like but since we use the computers in a library we are timed for a half hour and sometimes we have more time to use if there isn't anyone waiting so we'll see what happens I guess.
Kirtland is a really nice area, and the Temple is so different than what i thought it was going to be, and then we went to the newell k. whitney store where joseph translated and the school of the prophets was. It's really interesting to think that I have walked and been in the same places as Joseph smith ( but not down here in st. marys because it is like a 4 hour drive away! ha)
the apartment is, well, a missionary appartment haha it's only elder hernandez and i in there. the next set of missionaries are 40 minutes away and after that it is another 40 minutes to more missionaries. so we are definitely far away from everyone else.
oh yeah! I had my first experience flying too. but that wasn't bad, i mean it's only a plane ;) it sounds like all is well back at home from when i called on tuesday. but anyway if you are going to send me something it need to be like this
Elder Michael Stone
1810 winston dr.
St. Marys, OH 45885
If you do it like that then i will get it! ha so just make that known and that would be great, I'm here for the the next 6 weeks. also if you send a package to the mission home they can only forward it to me if you send it through usps. not ups, fedex or whatever. also if you do send it to the mission home it needs to be Elder Michael Stone. not just elder stone.
I'm still not fully adjusted to this eastern time zone thing. But i was a never good sleeper to start with so you know me, always to sneak in naps right? ;P just kidding.
I know this E-mail is really out of order and stuff, and it's not our P-day (cause that's monday) but i just don't really know where to go yet. we have three real investigators and two with dates from the last transfer, also we are meeting with some recent converts and a couple less actives. I haven't met them yet so when i do and when i get to know them i will tell you.
Monday we have a 'Zoned out' where we are going to the Johnson farm in kirtland, hopefully that will be good, we just get to drive for a million hours thats all ha ;) the culture here is already pretty dang different, there is so much diversity haha, and i haven't even seen much! the neighborhoods are old and stuff like you would see on tv and movies. and water towers all over, it's so flat!!! the humidity is nice though when it isn't too hot, it's cooler today and yesterday than when we first got here. that day was so dang hot! ah haha. anyways life is good, hopefully it doesn't drag on, and guess what?! i'm in a driving area ha lucky me! most area's are actually driving from what it seemed at the transfer meeting yesterday, but eventually my luck will run out and i will be on a bike before i know it! (knock on wood!) ha I hope I can Stay busy, The other missionaries told me that if i stay busy things will be a lot better so i'm going to try to do that. Last week Elder Hernandez said they did about 13-14 hours of tracting and the mission goal is only 7 so i'm hoping that we will be able to find people who are ready to be taught and that we will be able to teach them so we can do a great job.
Love you all.
Elder Michael Stone
p.s. Missionaries love packages! (and if you're not family, letters also ha)