Week #52 - Paper Clips and Rolls

Hey Everyone!
CONGRATS TO JONNY! Way to go, Broseph! You're so grown up now...by the time I get home you'll probably be a father of three or four kids. That's crazy to think about. When's the wedding? Next July? Late next July? I'm pretty sure that's when it was going to be. I already talked to Erin and she said she probably won't stick with this if it has to be any sooner than next July. I want to see more pictures and I also want to have her fill out the survey from a few weeks ago and send it to me so I can see if she's funny or interesting at all. You my boy, Jonny. You my boy. Congatulations again, pants. That is absofruitly awesome.

It was a pretty awesome week this week- I got to attend good ol' Jim P.'s baptism in Benicia and see a lot of cool families again. The song went really well and Jim was way excited at the service. He cried and gave me about fifty hugs. His wife did as well (they're in their seventies...hehe). Anyway, it was awesome and I was pretty happy I got to go. We had interviews with President Bunker this week. I'm still way impressed. He's very easy to talk to and it was awesome to chat with him for a while. It made me realize even more how much I'm enjoying my time out here. At the end he said "Well, Elder Balagna, are you a happy missionary?" and it felt pretty good to honestly tell him absolutely I am. I guess I never really take the time to think about how much I love life out here. After the interview, Elder Norton and I got to meet with him at the same time and discuss the zone and he basically asked us what we wanted to do next transfer. There's a new area opening in this zone that he said he might "transplant" both of us to where the ward is in need of help. We said we wanted to go there ...and it'd be kinda cool to see what we can get going. But, it's the farthest we could possibly be away from the zone...so it might make it tough to be there as zone leaders. We'll see what happens- we find out Sunday!
Anyway- life is still good and the gospel's true!
Have a good week and thanks for everything!
Elder B

Week #51 - Catnip & Playdough

HI!
It's been quite the week. Lots of pretty amazing things are happening in the Santa Rosa Zone. This is definitely a totally different mission than when I first came out- I can't believe how much it's changed over the last year. President Bunker has played a huge role in getting everyone refocused on where our minds need to be and where our efforts should be put forth. In the past two weeks we had four baptisms in our zone, we have two more this Saturday, and seven scheduled for August 1st. Life's been awesome!

Last week we had zone conference which was definitely the best one I've ever been to. President gave and amazing talk/discussion about being Abinadis in the mission and pretty well threw down when it came to being obedient and working hard. Very inspiring. I reread the account of Abinadi about four times after his talk and I couldn't believe I never noticed how incredible those chapters were (Mosiah 12 through...17? Wherever he says his final words before they kill him). I was asked to sing an arrangement that Elder Chaichana and I put together of I Need Thee Every Hour and it went really well, so altogether it was quite the conference.

This Saturday I get to go to Jim P.'s baptism in Benicia so I'm way excited about that. He asked me to sing for it so hopefully I can work up something delightful. I was pretty pumped to hear he's finally going to do it. I had set a date with him while I was there for July 11 but he kept putting it off because his son in South Carolina was trying to work out a time to fly out and do it and couldn't. So, ol' Jim decided he's going get baptized regardless because he's ready. Thattakid.

I just finished listening to a series of eight lectures that Truman G. Madsen gave on Joseph Smith and everything about him from his birth to his death. He goes all the way through and bears a WAY powerful testimony at the end. Needless to say, I'm still firm in my testimony that Joseph Smith was a true prophet. No one can tear that one down. Sidenote- one thing he mentioned was that in the dead sea scrolls they recently found a huge portion that talks about a second "messiah" (messiah just means annointed one) after Christ that would be a descendant of Joseph. This messiah it referred to was also given the title of being a "restorer" and there were all these prophesies talking about how he'll bring back the truth and stuff. I guess that sort of thing is why I'm impatient with people who tell me flat out that Joseph Smith was a conman.

Anyway, life's amazing in California. The gospel's true and it always will be. Have a good week!
Elder B

Week #50 - Alex's Answers

1. WERE YOU NAMED AFTER ANYONE? Well, my middle name was actually taken from Blake Hickey. My first name was a last-minute backup once Mom finally agreed that Skeletor was way too common of a name in the late eighties.
2. WHEN WAS THE LAST TIME YOU CRIED? I'm kinda surprised I'm the only one to mention the passing of Michael Jackson here.
3. DO YOU LIKE YOUR HANDWRITING? Actually I love my handwriting. It's adorable. I'd be confident in saying that's one of the top 100 reasons of me being the favorite child.
4. WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE LUNCH MEAT? All I've ever gotten at Starbucks was hot chocolate or cider. I know that doesn't really apply but it's making it really difficult to decide on my answer.
5. DO YOU HAVE KIDS? I own a baby goat, if that's what you're asking. Just kidding it's against mission policy. However, the other day I watched a goat get milked and it was nasty. Now I have no idea what to tell people what I'm going to do after my mission because goat milking is definitely out.
6. IF YOU WERE ANOTHER PERSON WOULD YOU BE FRIENDS WITH YOU? Absolutely. I'd always tell me how cool it was that I could grow facial hair so fast and then I'd go get owned in racquetball against myself. I wouldn't feel like a loser though because I'd know every second with me was worth it.
7. DO YOU USE SARCASM A LOT? Your mom does
8. DO YOU STILL HAVE YOUR TONSILS? Ugh why does everyone ask me that?
9. WOULD YOU BUNGEE JUMP? I would if I had Jonny there to protect me
10. WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE CEREAL? I'll tell you what ISN'T my favorite. Plain Cheerios. There's no taste. I don't give a hoot if they're good for your heart. That's why I support Medtronic and all they do for the world. I'm surprised plain Cheerios stuck around after Medtronic started up.
11. DO YOU UNTIE YOUR SHOES WHEN YOU TAKE THEM OFF? Was this survey written in the 1200s? This is why we have shoe horns. I don't have that kind of time.
12. DO YOU THINK YOU ARE STRONG? Maybe this will answer your question: I've been using perfect pushups for about six months now.
13. WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE ICE CREAM? Black Walnut (just kidding I don't eat ice cream that makes me vomit)
14. WHAT IS THE FIRST THING YOU NOTICE ABOUT PEOPLE? Their tonsils.
15. RED OR PINK? Pink unless I'm dressed as Superman. Which is quite often. I guess red.
16. WHAT IS THE LEAST FAVORITE THING ABOUT YOURSELF? The fact that I never have anything to improve. At least I don't steal my answers from despair.com. Count it!
17. WHO DO YOU MISS THE MOST? Sadie
18. DO YOU WANT EVERYONE TO SEND THIS BACK TO YOU? I hope nobody sends this back to me.
19. WHAT COLOR SHOES ARE YOU WEARING? Black
20. WHAT WAS THE LAST THING YOU ATE? A pretzel.
21. WHAT ARE YOU LISTENING TO RIGHT NOW? The future
22. IF YOU WHERE A CRAYON, WHAT COLOR WOULD YOU BE? Goldenrod or Macaroni and Cheese. Forest Green and Jungle green were the worst colors ever (sidenote).
23. FAVORITE SMELLS The smell of fear. Fear that no one will think my own ingenuity is clever enough. Fear that drives me to steal my answers from despair.com AND Family Guy. Just kidding I really like the smell of burnt popcorn.
24. WHO WAS THE LAST PERSON YOU TALKED TO ON THE PHONE? Elder Kartchner.
25. DO YOU LIKE THE PERSON WHO SENT THIS TO YOU? I don't have anything against them at this point.
26. FAVORITE SPORTS TO WATCH? Basketball. It's a slam dunk.
27. HAIR COLOR? Dark Brown. If anyone thinks it's black you may want to have your eyes checked.
28. EYE COLOR? I have a patch of brown in my eye, so I guess my eye color is mutant.
29. DO YOU WEAR CONTACTS? I pick up contacts.
30. FAVORITE FOODS? Turkey Roll. hehehe and a ton of other stuff.
31. SCARY MOVIES OR HAPPY ENDINGS? I want to watch a movie that has NO ending.
32. LAST MOVIE YOU WATCHED? Mallcop. It was pretty funny.
33. WHAT COLOR SHIRT ARE YOU WEARING? White. Something new.
34. SUMMER OR WINTER? There are no seasons in California.
35. HUGS OR KISSES? Well I don't know what either of those are so whatever
36. FAVORITE DESSERT? Dry, bland chocolate cake with no mild or any topping
37. MOST LIKELY TO RESPOND? I hate this question for that anything in the entire universe.
38. LEAST LIKELY TO RESPOND? Probably Tyler. He's never typed an email to me.
39. WHAT BOOK ARE YOU READING NOW? The mission library and the standard works. And Harry Potter. Just joshin.
40. WHAT IS ON YOUR MOUSE PAD? Danger
41. WHAT DID YOU WATCH ON TV LAST NIGHT? Fear
42. FAVORITE SOUND? Jonny's laugh. It's so cute.
43. ROLLING STONES OR BEATLES? Rolleatles, mostly because it was really clever of me to combine the two possible options.
44. WHAT IS THE FARTHEST YOU HAVE BEEN FROM HOME? Probably Wyoming

45. DO YOU HAVE A SPECIAL TALENT?
I'm really good at life
46. WHERE WERE YOU BORN?
Under There
47. WHOSE ANSWERS ARE YOU LOOKING FORWARD TO GETTING BACK?
Katie's

Welp, I've got about seven minutes left of online time. Sorry everyone. I had a really fun time filling out this survey though. Life is awesome in California- we picked up a golden investigator this week. We were visiting a contact and then she called us over and said she wanted a church. She's been to ours before and loved it- we taught her three times this week and gave her a church tour. Way solid. Things are great though- we got five new investigators last week (very unusual) and we were able to teach a lot.

The gospel's still true!

Love,Elder B

Week #49 - Fire Doesn't Work

Hey Everyone!

This week was awesome. Our new mission president is AMAZING. We're all very excited to work with him. He has some very innovative ideas that I'm pretty pumped about. Basically he's awesome. Anyway, I'm really excited. I'm on the downhill of the ol' mission. It feels pretty weird. It was kind of a bitter-sweet day on the 2nd. Mostly good though, because now I know the things I really want to accomplish and work on with the final year out here. I know the things I want to change about myself and how I can change them, so I think by the time I get home I should be just about perfect. I think you all have a lot to look forward to.

We picked up some new people to teach this last week that seem really solid. We have a lot of work to do in the area so we'll be kept busy this transfer. We taught a guy named Donald yesterday that we met a few weeks ago. It was an interesting experience. He's in his late twenties and has obviously done a lot of hard drugs. He lives in a pretty gross apartment. But, when we tracted into him, he basically said that he really wanted us to come back and talk about God and the Bible. Yesterday, we taught him all about prayer and about Christ and he told us that he prayed every day but he wanted to feel closer to God. We talked about how to feel the Spirit and how to pray and stuff...it was actually very cool. He wanted us to come back Tuesday and teach him more. He obviously needs a lot of help in his life in general- so I'm pretty excited to see where things go with him.

Anyway- things are great in Santa Rosa. Life remains swell and the gospel's still true. Happy Fourth and have a good week!

Elder B