Arrived in Washington! January 2015

Nate arrived in Tacoma, Washington on January 6, 2015. He seems to be doing really well, enjoying the people, likes the area and his companion!! This is my favorite part from an email he sent home, "Oh and I had my first experience with a gun this week to! We knock doors everyday from 5-7 and on pdays it is 6-7 and we knocked this one door and he came with a pistol and said that we were close to getting hurt... we left pretty quickly, we think he might have been drunk...(he had two doors on his house) Sorry I don't have any more time to email about all the miracles here! Love you guys tons!" 

Just what every mom wants to hear!!! :)

Here's a little bit from Nate's last few letters (and a few pictures below):

February 2, 2015

"...never take all that you have learned in the gospel for granted, because I have found that no matter how much you think you know, you really don't know a lot. Also, Preach my Gospel is not just a tool for missionaries. It is a tool for members as well. It really helps you to understand gospel principles. I think it would be good for scripture study and it might be more enjoyable for the girls as well. Then you could practice teaching each other what you have learned as simply as you can. I think that is one of the hardest challenges, is to teach things simply. My companion is really good at it and is helping me out with that. He teaches in a way that is just so simple and easy to understand and the Spirit is there. We do role plays and it helps me to realize that I need to work on teaching just about everything. I am improving which is good but I'm nowhere near perfect."

"Yesterday was the Super Bowl and the mission was on lockdown. We went to the church with the English zone in our area and played a football type games with Scripture and Church questions. It was good. The Seahawks and the Patriots played. People here really like the Seahawks. They would have been really mad if we knocked during the game so that is why we went to the church for 3 hours and then home to study and watch the restoration video." 

January 26, 2015

"Ahorita, todo es muy fantastico. My companero es super. Tambien tememos mucho comida, los miembros en la rama nos dan mucho comida. Hermana Nana nos da Spaghetti que puede alimentar ciento personas. Elder Hernandez come un plato, pero hay ciento platos..."

"The best part about the area is that we get fed a lot, Elder Hernandez says that this is the area that you will get fed the most at. I don't think I need anything, and my anxiety is doing well and I am pretty healthy. I have gained some weight, I am about 204-206 every day, I haven't dropped below 200 since I have been in the field. :) I try to workout or do stretches in the morning. It is good having a constant companion, it doesn't really bother me. Yes, I know you love me:) I love you to! I  haven't received the letters from Mexico yet, maybe you have to call them and give them a forwarding address... Also our investigator right now is interesting. I didn't get to baptize him, we still havn't taught him all the lessons...but we are working on it. I say investigator singular because the used to be investigator is now baptized! I got to confirm her a member yesterday, in Spanish! It was really cool:) I only messed up on one word which was bendecimos, but that's okay, they still understood and it wasn't part of the ordinance that had to be perfect. It was super cool to because after she shook my hand and I could tell that it meant a lot to her. Her name is Nancy McCleod.

Also there are people from different parts of Mexico or other countries that speak differently, Elder Hernandez is from the norte and the other people from the norte also speak super crystal clear and annunciate their words properly. Also I met this guy who is a member from Columbia and he pronounces his words clearly as well. You don't know how important and how much easier it is to communicate if you annunciate correctly until you are learning a language! The people who talk clearly are a lot easier to understand. I am no where near fluent but my Spanish is going along well, and God is helping me a ton!"

January 20, 2015

"Yes I eat a ton of food! I was definitely the culprit for why all the milk and cereal disappeared. I could drink about 3 gallons a week.... I bought two for last week and finished them and even drank some of my companions milk, he doesn't use as much milk as I do. I also ate about 1.5 bags of cereal. DON'T WORRY:) The members here have us taken care of! they give us dinner about 5 times a week or more, even though there is only about 30ish active members in the branch the relief society passes around a list every week. I think we get fed a lot because a lot of the members are converts and really like the missionaries:) We had breakfast at a members house yesterday and lunch today at a members house. The Hispanics expect you to eat a lot! More than I can eat! Somehow Elder Hernandez can handle it!"

January 12, 2015

"Okay so traveling was insane we barely caught our flight both times... The Mexico airport is super unorganized and we had to stand in 2 lines in order to check our bags... after we went through the first they said that we were in the wrong line and had to go to the other:) that's okay God blessed us and we got taken out of the middle of the line and went to priority:)) And we made it to our flight. We got our bags checked. We were traveling in a group of 3 Elders, Eld. Burke, Elder Ahlert and I. When we got to the Dallas we found out that Elder Ahlert's bags got checked to Toronto.... I think he ended up getting them a day or two after he got to the mission, must have been horrible to only have one pair of underware... Also I forgot to mention but our flight in Mexico couldn't take off for an hour because the fog was so bad. so that got a little worried. It was way cool though because when we got to Dallas they had our boarding passes ready and everything and gave us the orange things so we could go through the lines faster. But it still took a while to get through the Airport because Elder Ahlert had to figure out what was going on with his bags. Then we caught the train over to our terminal and barely made it on the plane, there was only two people who got on after us I believe. It was crazy but that is how we made it to Tacoma."

We are teaching two super solid investigators right now. The first one is Hector, he speaks like a cheetah! It is super hard to understand him, but Elder Hernandez does. There was only one day when he spoke a lot slower and it was a lot easier to understand him, I know that I will be able to understand him in the future though. He was a little concerned about the baptism, he was worried that we would give him the washing machine treatment in the baptismal font, Elder Hernandez and I thought that was really funny! We went through with him how baptism works and did 2 practices, he felt a lot better after that! He said he wants me to baptize him! It will be way awesome, he is on date to be baptized this Saturday! He is way cool and has definitely found a blessing from reading his Scriptures every day. He says that he has a lot easier of a time going to sleep when he reads.

"Also another one of investigators is Nancy. She speaks at a human pace which is really good for me, it is a lot easier to understand her. We are planning to baptize her on Sunday or in 2 Saturdays from now. I have never met anyone who is so ready to accept the gospel! other than Sister Todaro(Miss Carmelina)! Every time that we talk about a commandment and then ask her is she will keep it she says yes!" 

Nate and his companion, Elder Hernandez at a Zone Conference (A Zone Conference is a meeting for missionaries to practice their teaching skills, get to know the other missionaries and enjoy some good food)

Nate with several other missionaries in his zone. (A zone is made up of a bunch of missionaries who are serving in a specific area.  Nate's currently serving in the Olympia-Lacey area)