Christmas

December 28, 2015

Dear Family,

Where did the year go?

For Family Home Evening we went with a couple families in the branch Christmas caroling to less active members. There were some great moments and it just shows that we care and are thinking of them.

The members here are awesome, I know I have said that before but it's true. Many of them got us Christmas presents, chocolate, socks, ornaments. Our investigators Jennifer and James got us ugly Christmas sweaters, haha.

Christmas morning we went and opened up our presents with Bernice, our mission "grandma" and spent the morning there. Then I got to skype all you's of course, which was the best part of the day, and then we had dinner at Jennifer and James house. Pretty relaxing Christmas. I love the gifts, thank you! (I have so much candy now, haha) We had a green Christmas and now that it's over the snow just won't stop, we are being buried right now. Time to break out the shovels.

So I was pretty nervous about transfer letters because I am not quite ready to leave Montague yet, but good news, I am staying, and so is Elder Kleinkopf. Even better news, we are having a baby. We are going to be in a trio and his name is Elder Smith, so original. Don't know anything about him because he is coming from the MTC so we get to be parents (train him). But we are not sure how long he will be staying because he was called to a different mission but has been reassigned here until he gets his visa.

We hope to see great things this next transfer.
Love You, Happy New Year!
Love, Elder Ray

Senior Couple in Summerside! The Brewsters.

A while back  Bernice mentioned that she would like a picture of Christ
with children in her house, so we had one printed and put it in a frame, she loved it!

This is Elder Kleinkopf's reaction to Bernice opening the gift we made her.

Christmas Zone Conference

December 21, 2015

Dear Family,

This past week has been crazy....crazy awesome.

On Monday night we traveled to Amherst in Nova Scotia right before a snow storm hit, so that way we could get off the island and be there for the Christmas zone conference that was on Tuesday.

The zone conference was great, it started off with a devotional and a few talks from missionaries, but at the same time we were getting flu shots, haha it was very interesting. After that we had lunch and just got to hang out and enjoy each others company, something we don't get to do much. Then we had a talent show where you could choose to do something and I was a part of a few things actually. I did a back flip competition with sister Craeger and Elder Warner (yes I can do back flips on the ground now). Then I also sang with Elder Gibb and Elder Kleinkopf a parody that we all edited/wrote called Tractin' in A Winter Wonderland, all about our mission and the work, very funny. And the final part of the conference was a white elephant gift exchange, which can get pretty crazy with sixty people. I ended up with a little model of a Star Wars X-Wing (don't even talk about star wars right now). It was really fun and well needed for quite a few missionaries.

Afterwards there was almost a foot of snow and the storm continued so we had to spend another night in Amherst, where there were seven Elders total, and the power went out...

On Saturday we helped out by serving and cleaning up at a Curling/Lions club that was hosting a dinner for a work party, and we talked to almost a hundred people.

Our investigator David, who I have been teaching for four months so far, finally came to church for the first time, and he stayed all three hours!
It was the Christmas program and I think we sang every Christmas hymn in the book, no joke. The third hour we watched the Christmas Devotional. And after we had a linger longer (a potluck). It has been a great week, can't wait to see you on Christmas!

Love, Elder Ray

Christmas Zone Conference!

Merry Christmas!!

Christmas Turkey

December 14, 2015

Dear Family,

When it's ten degrees Celsius and you think it's warm outside.

We had a lot of lessons set up and ready to go this past week but unfortunately most of them fell through. What can you do?

On Wednesday we went over to President Dourte's house and slayed one of his turkey's for the branch Christmas dinner we had on Friday. I helped with the carrying and the plucking but couldn't handle the cleaning out the insides, so Elder Kleinkopf did that part. Instead I took pictures and videos of it haha. It was so gross. By the time we were done and weighed it, it was thirty-five pounds, it was so heavy. And just think about watching this process and then eating it a couple days later. For me it is a good mission story and experience.

Speaking of the Branch Christmas dinner there were like twice the amount of people there than there is at church. There were quite a few less actives and even non-members that were there to talk to and get them comfortable with the church and the people. It was a very enjoyable evening with food, caroling, and laughs, and a big fat turkey.

Didn't have any snow this past week but there is supposed to be a storm coming in tomorrow, other than  that stacking wood and shoveling for days.
Since Montague has been knocked so many times we are still trying to come up with new ideas to get the community involved. We have an Addiction Recovery Program that we do and are going to start publicizing it. People might like it considering Montague is the drug capital of PEI.

Love you all more than Gingy loves his gumdrop buttons!

Love Elder Ray

p.s. we saw a black fox, it was really cool.

...Turkey

Just turkeying around.

Le Tour De Faith

December 7, 2015

Dear Family,

On Tuesday we had dinner with brother Shumate and we had like the best tasting salad I have ever eaten. Anyways, he told us one of his first missionary stories that he had where he went to the MTC for almost four months and was trying to learn Spanish but was having a hard time with it. All the other missionaries seemed to be picking it up pretty quick. In his group at a small foreign airport, they tried to take one of the American passports from one of the Elders, but "Elder Shumate" made them give it back and was speaking their language with ease and could understand them. But for some reason no one else in his group knew what they were saying. He said, "Come on guys we have been studying Spanish for months now." Another Elder said, "That wasn't Spanish, they speak Portugese here." What?! Gift of tongues I tell you, he didn't know any Portugese. I just thought it was a really cool story.

This week, because of Le Tour de Faith, we did a crazy amount of tracting and talked to as many people as we could in this little town of Bethlehem...I mean Montague. There was a challenge in the mission for every day of the week, Monday was how many investigators and less actives you have at a FHE, but unfortunately we didn't hold one that night. Tuesday was how many baptismal invites, where we invited to people but nothing yet. Wednesday was most creative way of finding people to teach. I can't even remember what Thursday's was. Friday's was how many books of Mormon passed out and we made it to five. And Saturday was how many invites to church. Overall, between the Elders and the Sisters, the sisters won, but this week has definitely shown what everyone is capable of.

We were knocking one night and this family from India answered, and all four of them came to the door. We tried talking to them but they couldn't understand us, I think all they got out of it was when we said servants of God. They just stared at us in confusion. It was actually kind of funny but pretty awkward all at the same time.

Sunday we had our Joyful Sounds Choir Performances which took up a big chunk of the day after church. We had one performance up in the town of Souris (pretty much pronounced like sorry) and then in the evening at the Hillcrest United church. It was so fun and had quite a few people there. Everyone in Montague knows who the missionaries are now, we talked to many of the people there.

P.S. It's really cold, and the people here say that this is nothing yet... I'm going to die.

Love You!!

Love, Elder Ray

Joyful Sounds Christmas Concert.

Just got these pictures, it was back with Elder Shambrook.
The Dourtes have been raising these for months and we are
going to eat one this Friday for the Branch Christmas dinner.