Fallon Week 3 (Mission Week 72)

Hey guys I don't have much time so I'll just send my weekly recap. Here's it goes!

Monday

It was just a regular pday nothing special. Just played some board and card games with the district and dod other regular pday things.

Tuesday

In the morning Elder Takemori and I had a zoom meeting for the Facebook committee. We were chose to be the graphic creators and responders of the Fallon zone. After the meeting we had a great district council and I gave a training on proselyting. We started exchanges with Tonopah after district council and we all went to service for Suzi. We drive fence posts into the ground for her garden. After that we took our personal study hour and then we had dinner. After that we went to print off some flyers for our music devotional on Sunday. After we got done doing that we went to mutual and helped the young men build tables for a service project. We headed back home and that night we started putting together the workout machine that we took from another elders apartment because they werent using it. It was so complicated but somehow the Tonopah elders managed to get it together haha. 

Wednesday

We were still on exchanges with Tonopah so we were able to do alot of work in the area with 2 sets of elder. We had a lesson with Allan and did some proselyting. We then went to the Huntzingers to pick up some cookies because she wanted to make us some when we were over last night to print out the flyers. We had service at the Life center where we wiped up the tables and cleaned up the cafeteria after the senior citizens finished lunch. We ended exchanges with Tonopah and then went out to pass out the flyer for a while. That night we went to the Sheckler ward mutual because the young men leaders want the youth to be around the elders and they asked us to come to mutual because they only have sisters so thats awesome! After that we went to the church with the sister and set up the gym with tables and chairs for an activity the next day.

Thursday

We had service planned in the morning that the ZLs asked us to do but we went and knocked on the door no one answered. We asked them to call them and they said they had just texted saying it wouldn't work today. There went our entire morning so we called around and asked to help anyone so we managed to find a lady in the ward who needing help harvesting her pears so we went and did that instead! After that we conducted our weekly planning session and then had some stuff planned but the 2nd ward elders needed help because their bike tire blew out so we went to help them. After that we went to dinner and then we went to help with a move in the ward.

Friday

We had another lesson with Allan that sent well and then after it we passed out more flyers around the neighborhood. We had lunch and then a maintenance guy came and fixed our sink so we had to stay here for a little bit while he was here. After that we went to the church and spent some time prepping posts for the Facebook page. We are going to go each Friday and scheduled 3 posts a week. Please go follow the Fallon Fernley Come unto Christ page if you want to see our "amazing creations" haha. After that we did some proselyting and then had dinner. After dinner we had basketball! We started exchanges with the 2nd ward elders that night.

Saturday

It was actually such a fun day. The entire zone was together in the morning because we were doing our rehearsal for the music devotional we were putting on. Meanwhile President and Sister Saxton were there doing interviews and were attended our stake conference so we had the whole gang in town. We had lunch with the Horns after and Brother Horn is into disc golf so I was able to talk to him about that. Heres another fun part of the day. Fallon has an annual festival and fair and guess what it is centered around. Canteloupe!!! It was  Cantaloupe Festival weekend so that where EVERYONE in town was at. Everything there is Canteloupe flavored or the topic of discussion. We went and volunteered and it was so much fun. Elder Connell and I scanned tickets for people coming in and then Elder Takemori and Burton played security at the back gate haha. It was so much fun. We even found someone to teach but they live in Yerington so we will send them over the the elders there. We went to dinner and then came back to help more. Usually we dont do this amount of service in one day but it ws by far the best use of our time because there would be no one in town. When we came back from dinner they put us in the ticket booth and we were the first faces people saw when they came. It was a constant flow of people and we sold entry tickets to everyone. We even saw someone get arrested right in front of the gate haha. It wasnt a calm arrest either 4 cops threw him to the ground and were yelling at him so that was interesting. Once curfew came around we snagged some Cantaloupe ice cream and then headed home. It was definitely the funnest day Ive had in a while

Sunday

It was also a really good day. We had stake conference and it was a spiritual feast. We had a general authority Elder John W Lewis and his wife in attendance as well as President and Sister Saxton and a member of the temple presidency. Its not often you get this at a stake conference so I was really content. The whole meeting was amazing. I sang on the stake choir so I was up on the stand behind these great priesthood leaders. The end of Elder Lewis' address was about the rising generation and the gathering of Israel. He had all the youth stand up and the final moments of his address was about how they are the Hope of Israel. It turned out perfect because the closing song of the conference was the youth singing the EFY medley and oh my goodness there was not a single dry eye in the stake center. The EFY medley has such a big spot in my heart and I cry every time I hear it sung in person and this time was no different. It was so powerful.  When the song ended the stake patriarch got up to say the prayer and he couldnt even say it for a couple of seconds because he was choked up. It was awesome. After the meeting Elder Lewis wanted to meet with the President and Sister Saxton, the missionaries, and recent converts of the stake for a couple of minutes. This was so cool as well because we had just had Elder Alonso tour the mission and now I was getting another special chance that not many people have to meet with a general authority. That 2 general authorities in one transfer!! After everything concluded we did our studies and then went to the Cantaloupe festival and helped take some banners down because it was over. After that we had dinner and then we went to the music devotional. I was really worried no one was gonna be there and that we would sound terrible due to hiw practice went but it actually went really well. I cant wait to go to Lovelock in 2 weeks and do it again. That concluded my awesome weekend.

Lesson Reviews

Allan 

We had a good lesson with him. He hadn't read the pamphlet yet so we went over the first half of it with him. He had some good questions. He also said it was cool to think that Adam and Eve partaking of the fruit was part of the plan. We invited him to pray about the things we taught and read the second half of the pamphlet.

Allan 2.0

We had a great lesson on the second half of the Plan of Salvation! We read from the pamphlet and discussed what we learned as we went along. He had some great questions about Resurrection and the Spirit World as we went. We discussed how the Plan is out of the love our Father in Heaven has for us and that God is our literal Heavenly Father. We testified that once we make this connection everything else about the Plan comes together because God wants to give us all that He has. He asked for a chapter to read so we invited him to read Mosiah 3 and we will discuss it on Wednesday!

That's it for this week! I love yall!

Have a great week

Elder Proctor

Fallon Week 2 (Mission Week 71)

Hey guys! I hope yall had a great week. These weeks are going by so fast. It feels like I'm writing an email every couple of days now haha. I'm still surprised at the fact that I haven't missed a week yet. Some emails have definitely come later than usual but I have 71 weeks out of 71! 33 more emails left. I will go 104 out of 104!!! Anyways here's how my week went.

Monday
I had a fun pday. The elders from Fernley came to Fallon and we played basketball. Anytime I play ball it's always a fun time haha. In the evening we helped the 2nd Ward elders fix their bikes (which used to be ours haha). That took up a good chunk of the evening. The Tonopah elders spent the night so they didn't have to drive the 3 hours home and then come back in the morning.

Tuesday
We had our first district council of the transfer. We have a HUGE district. People kept showing up and it's by far the biggest district I've ever been apart of and maybe ever. We had 18 people there. It's more of a district conference haha. We had a great time and it's was a fun meeting. After district council we started exchanges with the Hawthorne elders and I went with Elder Wadsworth. He is such a funny goofy guy and it's so fun. We went out proselyting for the afternoon and had some good contacts. After dinner we headed over to mutual but they were just watching a youth music broadcast so we went into the foyer to make some calls. A good amount of people answered and we have one referal that we contacted and she said she'd be out of town for a week but to call her next Thursday! When mutual was over we talked with the youth for a little bit and I played one of the Anderson kids 1on1 and he's actually really good at basketball. I can't wait to keep playing him this transfer haha. That night was very interesting because Elder Wadsworth took some pre-workout at 9:30pm because Elder Takemori gave it to him and he was going crazy for about an hour or so

Wednesday
We had a day full of service which was awesome. In the morning we went over to the Boyd's and helped them empty out a TON of sandbags and level out their yard. After that Sister Boyd prepared a great lunch for us! I love it whenever we get fed after service. After that we headed over to the next service project. This time it was with almost all of the Fallon missionaries. It was like a group service project and we cleared an entire property of weeds. Keep in mind these aren't Texas weeds that grow in the Garden but gigantic Nevada desert weeds haha. It was pretty fun doing it with the district and they fed us pizza afterwards as well. The place was really close to the Naval Station so the whole time we saw fighter jets flying over us and that was SUPER cool. We ended exchanges a d then after dinner we had a great lesson with Allan. After the lesson we had volleyball night.

Thursday
The morning was spent contacting people in area book and meeting more of the members in the Carson River Ward. We conducted our weekly planning session and then took some time to clean the apartment after having 3 days of continuous sleepovers. We joined the ward in helping load the moving truck for Sister Christen. I was designated as the one to play Tetris with all the boxes and I think I I a good job haha. After that we went to dinner and then did some Facebook finding to end the night.

Friday
In the morning we went back over to Sister Christen and helped her sweep all the walkways of her house and the garage. That took a little bit more time than we had expected but it turned out well. After that we went over to the Taylor building to check if the basketball hoops were down because we had our first basketball night that evening. Good for us both hoops were down so we didn't need to worry about getting the key to lower them. That afternoon we spent a majority of the time contacting people in area book and meeting members. While we did this we tried to find people around. Dinner was pretty fun because after we ate Brother Christensen asked if we wanted to go on a Side by Side ride and check out Lattin Farms (which is where he works) and we said yes. He took us over there and we fed the goats and checked out the corn maze. We had basketball night and it turned out well. The first night in a new area is always scary and nerve-wracking because I don't know who will show up but luckily enough we had 15 people show up!!! Success!!

Saturday
We went on exchanges with the Spanish elders today. I went with Elder Anderson. In the morning we went over to Sister Christen and helped the ward finish packing the moving truck. After that we went out to eat and that was a fun experience. After that Elder Anderson and I went out and did some classic tracting in this one neighborhood in out area. We were out there for 3 1/2 hours. We contacted a lady in area book and when we walked up I saw a plaque that said "Proctor" so that was cool to relate that I was Elder Proctor. Turns out the husband is Elder Proctor as well for the local Seventh Day Adventist church! We had a good connection and we will be seeing them every so often. One funny thing is that we were pretty thirsty and we were both saying how awesome it is when people offer us water but no one had yet so we walked up to a random door and said this "Good Afternoon we are Representatives of Jesus Christ. We have been walking around and are thirsty. Would you be willing to give a servant of the Lord some water?" They gave us water!!!! Never have I done this before but it was fun to do and I was glad we did it. What was even funnier is literally RIGHT after that we had 4 people offer us water and we were carrying around 8 bottles of water when we really didn't need it but earlier we had none when we actually were thirsty. Anyways those 3 hours were a fun experience. We had dinner with the Hanks and then after we needed to go drop by Elder Andersons apartment but we were distracted talking and laughing about some stuff that happened at dinner that we realized we were halfway to the next town over. We turned around and had a good laugh from that. That night we had flag football. The sunset was amazing and everyone in the groupchat was talking about it.

Sunday
We had a great day at church! Allan was able to make it and the ward did a great job introducing themselves and helping him feel welcomed. After church we had stake choir practice for stake conference next week. I suck at singing but it's still fun haha. After all our meeting we had a Bible Study with Granny B. The Lotts came too and it went well. She is pretty adamant that she won't convert but all we can do is invite and love. After the lesson we had a great dinner with the Huntzingers. Sister Huntzinger made some awesome Fillipino food and she's gonna make curry next time per my request. I can't wait haha. We did some more contacting and then we headed home for the night.

Lesson Reviews

Allan                                                               

We had a great lesson with Allan. We talked a lot about baptism and what that means for him. He said he would be open to baptism but wants to learn more about it first. We asked if he wanted to go over the lessons and he said yes. We gave him a Plan of Salvation pamphlet and are going to go over it with him next time. He has some great potential!

Granny B                                                            

We read from John 21 and discussed what we learned from it. Barbara has great faith in Jesus Christ and holds true to her faith. She told us a couple of stories of when she recognized the Lord's hand in her life. She did say a couple of times that she is not going to convert and she is completely fine where she is at. She probably won't progress at all for the time being but she does love to study the Bible.

That's it from this week! I'm starting to feel at home here and we're already about to be halfway through the transfer! Hopefull I don't get moved after one transfer like I did in Dayton haha. I hoping I'm here for at least 2 preferably 3 transfers. Who knows this could be my 2nd to last area. Crazy right?!

I love yall so much! Have a great week!

Elder Proctor

Fallon Week 1 (Mission Week 70)

 Hey everyone!! 

I hope all of yall had a great week. I know I did. A week full of missionary work, zone conference, and cool experiences makes for a great week. We had Elder Alonso of the Seventy come through the mission and that was awesome. Read what happens on Friday for a cool story about him and I. I'm adjusting to Fallon pretty well. The area is by far the smallest area I've ever covered but that's OK. Having so many missionaries in one small town is pretty fun because we see them nearly every day. Anyways here's how my week went. 

Monday

It was my first pday in Fallon and it was pretty fun. In the morning the zone leaders, sisters, and us went fishing. We didn't catch anything but we did catch some really small baby catfish and 2 frogs. We put them in a bottle and took them home haha. All the missionaries in Fallon gathered at the church and we had a pickleball tournament and played basketball. In the evening we went out and contacted a couple of people.

Tuesday

We did not have district council because of Zone Conference being this week. Instead we biked over to someone to help them move in. Something funny is that we had just helped some members move out of the same house and it was members moving in. We got lunch at Azteca with some of the district and then we had to take 2nd wards car and they took our bikes. Sad day. My dream of being in a biking area lasted 4 days. Elder Takemori has some medical stuff the makes it hard to ride a bike so President Saxton switched it. Oh well. After we did that we went out and continued to contact our teaching pool and see who is actually progressing vs people who the missionaries just stop by. Sad to say but not many people are progressing. 

Wednesday

We participated in the first day of Zone Conference via Zoom from 9am to 10:30am. It was good. Elder Alonso of the Seventy was there so I'll tell you more about him when I reach Friday when I went in person. After the Zoom we went out and contacted some people in our area book. After lunch we made the lonely drive to Austin, NV to start exchanges with the Tonopah elders. Highway 50 is dubbed "The Loneliest Road in America" and it definetly is. It is one of the major highways in Nevada because it's the only way to go through the middle of the state but there was NO ONE on it. This is because there is NOTHING in this part of Nevada. It took us 3 hours to do the switch and by the time I got back to Fallon with Elder Arneson it was time for dinner. After dinner we talked with some people and then went to our volleyball night.

Thursday

We had Day 2 of Zone Conference and we joined via Zoom again. Elder Alonso gave an incredible training on having the Savior be the focus of everything. Escpecially invitations. Usually missionaries will say something along the lines of "We invite you to read Chapter 27 of 3Nephi and know it will benefit you" but when doing a Savior invitation Elder Alonso stressed that we find a verse of the Saviors words and have the Savior invite them. So instead you would read a verse about studying God's words then say,"As we just read in this verse Jesus Christ wants you to read 3 Nephi 27. He invites you to experience the blessings of studying His word." I don't know about you but that packs a lot more power than it just coming from me. Also it makes you understand what we are actually doing as missionaries being the messengers of Jesus Christ. Whenever people don't follow invitations it's not ours that they deny. It is literally Jesus Christ that they don't keep a commitment with. Anyways I learned alot. After the Zoom we had service with a lady and some of the missionaries in the district came to. That was pretty fun. After that we had lunch and then ended exchanges. We conducted our weekly planning session and then went to dinner. We had a lesson with Allen and we used the Savior Invitation technique and it worked much better. After the lesson we drove over to Reno to spend the night with Elder Kennedy and Thompson because we had Zone Conference in person early in the morning.

Friday

We got to be at Zone Conference in person which was amazing. Elder Alonso continued to give awesome trainings and President Saxton also gave a really good training. The best part about today was lunch. We started Zone Conference at 8am so by noon it was over. We put our stuff down at a table and then went through the line and I was right next to Elder Alonso in the line and then I saw him sit down at a table by himself. I wasn't gonna miss this chance so I grabbed my stuff and Elder Takemori and I sat with him for lunch. The people at the table was President Saxton, Elder Alonso, a senior couple, and us. I am so glad that we made the choice to switch tables. At first it was pretty awkward because we were really talking and it was President Saxton and the senior couple doing most of the talking but it transitioned into Elder Alonso talking specifically to Elder Takemori and I about missionary work and all of his life experiences and conversion story. It was really cool to be able to get an extra hour of Elder Alonso while all the other missionaries were just hanging out with each other. At one point the missionaries were throwing rice crispy treats to each other and were being a little loud because they were seeing who could eat one the fastest and Elder Alonso used this to teach me about the Spirit. We were talking about receiving promptings and he said "The Spirit is constantly trying to talk to you 24/7 but sometimes we get distracted. As you saw just a couple minutes ago your friends over there were throwing the rice crispies around and they were distracted. The Spirit cannot speak to them right now. They are too distracted. Now what they were doing isn't a bad thing but I am saying that they are distracted so they cannot recieve promptings at that moment. On the other hand the two of you (Takemori and I) are not distracted and we are discussing the Gospel so you are more apt to recieve promptings because you are not distracted." That was really cool to see him use this to teach us about the Spirit and it was really a compliment from a General Authority to me. I had also studied his general conference talks and I liked one in particular alot. It is "Love One Another as He Has Loved Us." I was able to talk to him about his address and gain some more information to the story he shared and the general buildup to giving a general conference talk. Elder Alonso and I actually ended up continuing to talk even while everyone was cleaning up. It was a really cool experience and it's cool to know that I was able to connect with him more than any other missionary there that day just because I has the desire to sit with him. He was actually heading the Quincy Stake conference the next day so I told him that I served there for 6 months and to tell Brother Walmer I said hi haha. Well after Zone Conference we drove home and got back to normal missionary work. 

Saturday

The Bebouts drove to Fallon in the morning to give me my package that I sent to their house because I didn't think I'd leave Dayton so quickly. It was nice to see them. The rest of the day was filled with contacting people. Some went well some did not. We stayed busy all day though so that's good. We had dinner and then we had our first flag football night. It went really well because we have a youth in our ward who is the QB at the high school so he invited a lot of his friends. He even said afterwards that he could tell that everyone enjoyed it and it was alot more fun than everyone thought it was gonna be so they are going to invite more people to come. That's always a good thing whenever you create an environment that people want to come to.

Sunday

I had a cool experience that I'd like to share. Bishop asked Elder Takemori and I to give a short introduction and testimony at the beginning of sacrament meeting and I didn't prepare anything at all because it was supposed to be really short and I knew that I could just wing it haha. My plan was to think of a scripture, share it, bear testimony on it, then close and sit down. While the sacrament was being passed I was thinking on what I would talk about and the thought to bear testimony on the Atonement of Jesus Christ and repentance came to mind so that's what I rolled with. I introduced myself and then read Alma 7: 11-13 and bore testimony and my experience with the Atonement of Jesus Christ, repentance, and the grace of God and then sat down. Elder Takemori followed suit and bore a simple testimony of the Atonement of Jesus Christ and then the 1st speaker who was given a topic got up. This is where the cool part is. She gets up and says the topic that she was giving to speak about which was The Atonement of Jesus Christ and His Grace!!!! I instantly felt the Spirit right then and it was so cool to know that I had no topic or anything but through the Spirit I bore testimony on what the sacrament meeting talks were focused on. Elder Takemori leaned over and whispered "I guess someone is in tune with the Spirit." This was pretty cool because I had just talked with Elder Alonso of the Spirit and stuff so it was cool to see it in action. Anyways the rest of the day went well. We met the Johnsons family while we were out and they have an unbaptized youth so hopefully we can have a good relationship with them so she has the desire to be baptized. They are and awesome family. We made some more contacts in the evening and then that concluded our day!

Lesson Reviews

Allen

We had a great lesson with Allen. We discussed his previous meetings with missionaries and then read from 3 Nephi 27 to teach the Gospel of Jesus Christ. We discussed baptism and he said that he has never been baptized but is at a time in his life where things have slowed down enough to where that could be a possibility. We testified that the Savior is joyful when we follow His Gospel and Jesus Christ is inviting him to follow him and the way we do this is by being baptized. We invited him to read 3 Nephi 11 before our next appointment on Wednesday. We also invited him to come to church!

Thats it for this past week! This next week is full of exchanges and trying to get more people to teach. Thanks for the continued prayers and thoughts coming my way. I love yall!

Have a great week

Elder Proctor

Dayton Week 6 (Mission Week 69)

Hey guys!

It's me again coming out with another weekly email. I hope you are all doing well. This past week was crazy with transfers. I knew that getting a new mission president would bring some change but oh man the changes won't stop haha. Sadly after only one transfer in Dayton I have been moved to the Carson River Ward in Fallon. It's really wierd being transfered after one because in all my other areas I have been there for at least 3 transfers. I'm no longer gonna be playing in the Carson church league so Alpine better get someone good or else their gonna lose by 50 now lol. Everyone in the league is probably gonna be wondering where I went haha.

This was President Saxtons first transfer that he was the head of and oh man it went extremely unexpected. I did some math (transfertology I like to call it) and 86% of the mission was transfered. 86%!! Only 12 out of 86 companionships stayed together and there was close to 20-25 areas whitewashed (including where I'm going). On top of that the most unexpected people were put into leadership positions. The mission was going crazy. 17 people went home (including my trainer, Elder Rhoades) and they were literally the heart and soul of the mission amd were the most well known missionaries and had a major impact on the mission because they were all in leadership positions. Seeing them go home hurt lowkey. Time for a new generation to rise up. I'm officially an oldie in the mission which is crazy. Anyways here how my week went

Monday

We had a great last pday of the transfer. President Saxton wanted everyone to send an apartment tour into the mission chat so everyone could see if it was clean or not.. Elder Horner and I went above and beyond the requirements and spent the morning making our video. I'll send a link so you can watch it.. We also had a zone activity and we played basketball for a while. During the evening we had an incredible dinner. We usually don't have dinners on Pday but because of the change we had the Highins for dinner. Sister Higgins loves doing themed dinners and I've heard other missionaries talking about the time they dressed up as mermaids for a mermaid themed dinner so I was pretty hesitant to be excited for it and didn't know what to expect. Holy smokes was it fun though. She asked us what our favorite Disney movies were so we said Cars and Tangled so we had a themed dinner on that. Everything was themed out and even the food had labels on them. My favorite was the refried beans labeled as "Pascal Poop." We played so many themed games and won prizes and it was so much fun. The Ross family was there too and the entrie evening was surprisingly enjoyable.

Tuesday

We had a great day. It started out with district council in the morning. After district council we went to In n Out for lunch but when we get there we get a call from Elder Rice (our DL) and it turns out that someone hit them in the roundabout and wanted us to bring them food. Whats crazy is we were right in front of them and we somehow didn't see them get hit by a car. They are OK though haha. When we got back to Dayton we went to the food pantry but they didn't really need any of out help so they sent us away. We went out and proselyted by Six Mile Canyon road and we actually had some good contacts. We were out there for about 3 hours and it was really productive. After that we went to the Bible Study with Irma and discussed Psalms 19 with her study group. We had dinner with the Harkers and then we ran into Melanie at the grocery store. It was like the 4th time running into her in public so that was cool.

Wednesday

Holy moly Wednesday was crazy. Just the day prior I was telling Elder Horner that it was nice to have a break every 2 to 3 transfers where I don't have to worry about transfer news all that much because this is my first transfer here in Dayton so it's most likely I stay. Well that changed when we got a call from President Saxton at 10am asking to speak to Elder Horner in private. He let Horner know that he would be training but didn't tell him if he's leaving or staying in Dayton and said he'll leave that part of the info to be known when transfer news comes. At this point I'm freaking out because it's now a VERY big problem that I'm leaving Dayton after 1 transfer. It was hard to stay focused on the rest of the days activities because of this. We helped a lady weed her whole yard and it was quite nasty because all the weeds were COVERED with little flies and gnats so it made us squirm. Eventually we got it done and then went to the Bebouts for lunch. We had a lesson fall through with Maddie but it turned out well because it made it to where we were able to help someone move. After the move we had dinner with the Soderborgs which was great. We went out and said half goodbyes to some investigators and then went to the Winwards for haircuts and we recieved our transfer news while we were there. This is where I received the news that I was being transfered to Fallon after only being in Dayton for 6 weeks. I'll wrote a separate paragraph about my feelings on the transfer.

Thursday

My last day in Dayton :( We played basketball in the morning and the members that play were surprised that I was leaving so soon. Ot was really fun being able to play ball every morning at the church but oh well. That morning we played soccer with Zoe and the Gardners. They invited a lot of people but sadly none of them made it. It was still fun and Zoe and Kendra are getting ready to go on missions! I spent some of the day packing and then we're headed to the Bebouts so I could say bye to them. This goodbye sucked because they are literally the grandparents of the missionaries in Dayton and are so welcoming. Brother Bebout is also a very recent convert so that adds to the joy we have for them. I was pretty bummed that I was onky able to be around them for 6 weeks but that's better than none at all. We went around and said bye to more people and then we went to a community volleyball night the High School team put on. That was really fun. There were a good chunk of members there and youth and it wasn't very nice to have to think that I'd be leaving them all the next day. We had to leave early so we could go to the Jongsmas for dinner. At first I was pretty upset that we had to leave but after the time at the Jongmas I was happy that we went. They have a 3 year old and he is so funny. 

Friday

Bye Dayton!!! :( It was really wierd leaving an area so soon because I have been in all my areas for at least 3 transfers so I wasn't used to leaving so soon. There were so many potential relationships I could've had but because of the limited time I had I wasnt able to build them as I know I would've if I had been there longer. No more Carson church league basketball for me :( Alpine is gonna need a miracle now haha. We left early in the morning to get to the Neil Road building to load the transfer van. I arrived in Fernley where I would be staying in a temporary trio with Elder Tanner and Metzger until Elder Takemori came in from Elko that evening. We did some contacting but most of the day was spent helping someone move. They had a TON of stuff. The best part of the day was that Elder Holy was with us. Elder Holy is awesome haha. The transfer van came into Fernley in the evening and thats where I met Elder Takemori and then we caught a ride with the Zone leaders to Fallon because we are on BIKES!!! I had no clue and I was sooooo excited to find out that we were on bikes!!

Saturday

My first day in Fallon was really wierd because we had no area book. Whitewashed with no area book is not easy haha. The transfer was so big that it overwhelmed the church servers and left all the missionaries who got transferred without area book. Luckily the Elder who was in the Carson River ward last transfer is still in Fallon so I just signed into his area book so we had some people to contact. We helped someone move out of their house and we met some of the ward members there. During the afternoon we biked to all of our top progressing people in the area and introduced ourselves. Not all of them answered but it was a good start. My bike tire blew up randomly after we knocked a door when I picked it up. We had to get the 2nd Ward elders to come get us. I guess that's what a biking area has to offer haha. After we figured out the bike situation we biked to dinner with the Irving's. After the dinner we hit a couple more houses and then headed over the the sisters apartments and everyone in Fallon pulled up and we all introduced ourselves and got to know each other. While we were socializing a random 25-30 year old ady came out of the apartment next to the sisters and started to socialize with us. She and I started talking about horror movies because we both like them and later on she asked me to scoot over so she could sit down and I thought nothing of it because there was PLENTY of room for another person but she scooted all up into me and immediately all the Elders started laughing and my eyes got real big. I accidentally rizzed her up too much and now I was stuck. Luckily we were getting ready to leave anyway so I was able to use that as an excuse to get away from her haha.

Sunday

Church doesn't start until 11:30 here so we had a good amount of time in the morning for studies and preparing for the day. Our church building is a bit weird and the chapel has some interesting rock work. I've never seen one like it before. Regardless it was a good first meeting. After church we rode our bikes far out in our area and continued to introduce ourselves to people. We originally didn't have a dinner but someone invited us over and that was awesome. We played spikeball with their youth and it was so fun. We even got a flag football night set up and I'm super excited about it! We finished off the night biking home and checking up on some of the other missionaries in Fallon.

Lesson Reviews

Ken

He and his son were outside and we talked with them for a few minutes. We got to know what the missionaries before talked to them about. We discussed the Plan of Salvation because his son said something along the lines of "he doesn't want to believe that someone goes to hell right when they die" and we testified that God has a plan for everyone and he takes this into account. We asked if they would read a PoS pamphlet and they said they don't read. We asked for a time to come back and Ken said whenever the garage is open he is home

A crazy thing about transfers is that my new district had 16 missionaries in it. Usually districts only have 6-8. We are the Fallon megadistrict. I'm about to go on sooooo many exchanges this transfer because my companion is the district leader. I guess this is a learning experience because I really don't like exchanges haha. I am looking forward to being really close to alot of missionaries proximity wise.

That's all from this week. I'm looking forward to seeing what Fallon has to offer. Thanks for all the prayers and I know that my Savior, Jesus Christ, loves and love all of you!!

Have a great week!

Elder Proctor

Dayton Week 5 (Mission Week 68)

Hey everyone! Sorry this is going out so late. The email has been ready to send since Monday night but my Gmail account storage reached its limit so when I tried to send the email it got deleted. I spent all day trying to clear storage so the email would go through. I finally got it to work so here it is haha. I hope everyone had a great week because I know I did. I've got a week and a half to report on so here it goes.

Thursday 7/20

For pday we went out and tried a new disc golf course at James Lee Park in Carson City. After we did that some of the elders in the zone got together and played wiffleball. That was pretty fun. Unfortunately for us we didn't put sunscreen on so 5 hours in the blazing Nevada sun had us pretty sunburned. It was still fun though

Friday 7/21

We woke up with bad sunburns..... not gonna lie it hurt so bad haha. My neck was on fire a it didn't help that I have to wear a collared shirt. It was hard to stay focused on the work but regardless we had a pretty good day. We started off the morning by proselyting and contacting some people in this one neighborhood. We then went to the Bebouts and helped paint their hallway. We had a lesson with David and then contacted some more people. We had a great dinner with Brother Rickabaugh and Sister Johnson and then we went over to Teddy and Juans place to meet them. Teddy was a grey dot that was marked as not interested and earlier that day we knocked Teddy's door a couple of times but no one answered. Just before dinner we get a text from Teddy saying his mom told him that we knocked and knocked and knocked and knocked and knocked (her words exactly) so he said that we could come by this evening. We did it it was a good time.

Saturday 7/22

Early in the morning we helped Brother Callan and his son, Duff, with a project in their backyard. Duff is going to plant some grass in the backyard so we helped clear and move dirt so they can do this. It was actually pretty fun and they bought donuts and chocolate milk to share while we were there. Brother Callan was asked several times throughout the 2 hours if we were ready for donuts so I think he was pretty excited for them as well haha. After lunch we went out walking and contacted a bunch of people. It was super hot too. Also we still had our sunburns so it was not very pleasant but we still worked. We went up to Virginia City as well and contacted some people there and walked the boardwalk. No Jeremy Renner this time. Darn it. We had dinner and then we went over to Melanie and had a short lesson with her. We then had a lesson with David. For some reason that night our small apartment complex was lively and everyone was outside. We played basketball with the people playing and also some kickball. It was pretty fun. I managed to get some numbers so we can invite them to play ball at the church.

Sunday 7/23

We had a great time at church. Melanie was not able to make it so that means she broke our pinky promise... That afternoon we spent a lot of time proselyting and contacting some people who have had previous contact with the missionaries. After dinner we did some more of what I previously mentioned and while we were doing that we got bashed by a guy named Jeff. He started out pretty nice but by the end he said that we were wrong and will be punished for it. He said that he could baptize us in his backyard. Their were many things that he said that we could combat easily but it would be no use so we tried out best to mosey our way out of that conversation as fast as we could. After that we headed to the Bebouts to go over Come Follow Me with them and play some cards!

Monday 7/24

Oh boy it was a rough day. I'll send a screenshot of our areabook but we literally had 20-25 missed contacts and we didn't have a single contact that happened. They were all knock no answer, call no answer during weekly planning, or someone telling us the person we are looking for is not interested or has moved. Some days are like that and it's a good reminder that sometimes you'll have a day that no one answers the door haha. We were working all day but all we say was red. Zero progress lol. We had a great dinner with the Greenlees and then we went over to Duffs again to help with the yard project. We finished shovel out the dirt and then Brother Callan made milkshakes for us after our hard work. That made up for the day we had just had.

Tuesday 7/25

We had district council and during it we had a mission wide Zoom meeting and talked about the Facebook roll out. The NRM is getting Facebook back to use as a missionary tool. President Dunn took it away a year ago but now President Saxton wants it as "another line in the water." I'm excited for it because that's how I get all the community events going so I'm looking forward to doing that. After district council we helped the Bebouts with their house project and then went out and contacted some people by the golf course. We had a great dinner with the Rands and we joined in with them to watch a nephew open a mission call on Zoom. Their nephew is going to the Micronesia Guam mission speaking Tagolog. I am glad I am here in the US haha. After dinner we headed up to Virginia City and contacted people up there. We had a nice visit with the Lindseys and it turns out Brother Lindseys ancestry stems from Gilmer Texas so that was cool to talk about with him. 

Wednesday 7/26

It was a pretty chill day. We volunteered at the food pantry for the first time but they had a lot of volunteers that day so we didnt really do anything. We are gonna start going on Tuesdays when the truck comes in so we are more useful. We also helped the Bebouts again with their house because they want to get it done before their family comes in town for a week. After that we had dinner and then for youth activities we played ultimate Frisbee and soccer. Some of the youth brought their friends so that was awesome!!!! 

Thursday 7/27

We had an awesome pday up in Tahoe. We went up there in the morning and we played a really nice disc golf course and I was so excited. It has 27 holes and it's designed pretty well. I had a blast. Elder Gardner was there too and he makes mission vlogs so we will be in one of his vlogs! After we disc golfed we went to IHOP with Elder Harris and Whetten. That was fun too. We explored the shops some and then we headed back down to Dayton. South Lake Tahoe is a pretty cool place and I can't wait to actually be able to go in the lake when I visit after the mission. 

Friday 7/28

We had Friday morning announcements and this is when President Saxton announced that we will be going back to Monday pdays. Thursday pday lasted a good 5 weeks haha. I actually already kinda knew that it was gonna happen as well because at zone conference I was talking to President Saxton one on one and he we were talking about Thursday pday and he was saying things like "huh that's kinda wierd isn't it" and "I think Mondays are better." Because of this it didn't really surprise me when he undid President Dunns last change. The rest of the morning we went out and hit some dots in this one neighborhood. Someone invited us in a gave us cinnamon rolls! That was great. Also while we were there we saw the dump truck carrying all the material for Duffs lawn so that was cool to stumble upon. We have been helping him with this project to just by happenstance we saw it. We told him we will come later in the night to helo get started moving the material to the backyard. During the afternoon we had a lesson with Shawn and then proselyted near his house. We had a great dinner with the Tumanavoas and we played basketball at their house too. That was really fun. After dinner we went to Duffs and helped shovel the dirt into wheelbarrows and haul it to the backyard. This has been a fun project because the Callans are great people. After that we drove down to Carson for our church league game and to start exchanges. I had 25 points and we finally won haha. 

Saturday 7/29

I was on exchanges with Elder Bradshaw. We started the morning by helping the Bebouts out with their lawn and moving some furniture. After that we went to the Allisons and celebrated their sons 5th birthday. We went to the dollar store and got him a couple of small things as a gift. After that we contacted some people and we had a lesson fall through with Maddie. Her mom said they were all sick so that makes the 6th lesson in a row to fall through....... we drove back to Carson for another church league game. I scored 56 points this game and it was a nail biter game. What was cool was the guy that guarded me played college basketball and after the game we talked a little bit about missionary work and the church so that's cool. The remainder of the night was spent in Elder Bradshaws area. We had YSA sports night and that was fun. 

Sunday 7/30

We had church and one of the YSA in out ward is heading off to Germany for her mission so she gave her farewell talk. A couple of her friends were there so we introduced ourselves and we are gonna try to get a soccer night going because they all play soccer. Hopefully that works out well. During the afternoon we did some work in Moundhouse. Mostly everyone we talked to wasn't interested or didn't answer but we did have one good contact. We knocked the Whitneys door and it turns out that Brother Whitney and his wife have made it a goal to come back to church but haven't gotten around to it yet so it was a really good thing we stopped by and he was grateful for it. That was cool. We had a great dinner with the Kimballs and they were so excited to have the missionaries over so it was nice to be appreciated haha. You could sense he sweet spirit in their home and it was so nice to be with them. After that we headed over to the Smiths because due to a communication error on our ward mission leaders part we had 2 dinners from people who really wanted us over haha. I'll never deny double dinner days. The Smiths are AWESOME and we talked about basketball, sports, and roller coasters the whole time. Their whole family loves amusement parks and especially Six Flags so I got a little trunky talking to them about it haha.

Lesson Reviews

David Martin

We chatted about how he has been doing and he shared a bunch of personal experiences that he has had. We connected it to the plan of salvation. It was mostly a how to begin teaching to see where he was at. He is mostly concerned for his wife right now so he won't be going anywhere soon. He said to visit often but just make sure we call before.

Teddy and Juan

This was pretty stinking awesome! We taught a partial restoration and answered a lot of their questions on church stances. They are totally down to meet again. We also are gonna meet up to play disc golf with Teddy. I was able to put some connecting into play with my knowledge on disc golf. Good and solid way to end the night. We invited them to church and they'd be down to come.

Melanie

We chatted with her for a few minutes and she said that she was really glad that we stopped by or else her night would've went another way. We talked about church and how it will bless her life. We discussed what happens at church so she knows what to expect. She talked about how a lot of her family have ties to the church as well. She pinky promised that she would be at church tomorrow.

David Walter

We discussed David's current progress and what we need to do going forward. His mom had a fall and that has been hard on him and he is really busy so he hasn't been reading the scriptures. We told him that until he does that then nothing will change. He said that he's not fully focused on being baptized and is focused on other things. We said that in order to be baptized you need to be "All In" and we can work on being 1% better each day. We talked about the Word of Wisdom and the promised blessing associated with it. He will need to give up coffee. We testified of God's love for him and his family. We will continue to meet with him but baptism is a long term goal now instead of being soon.

Shawn

We talked to him ONCE AGAIN about how the Book of Mormon and the Bible go hand in hand. For some reason he cannot grasp the fact that they go together and don't replace one another even though we've taught it multiple times. He agrees that the Book of Mormon is true but he struggles with understanding that it doesn't replace the Bible. He loves the Gospel and his faith in Jesus Christ is strong but it is difficult to talk about anything else because he is stuck on what was previously mentioned above.

That's it from this week! Thankfully I was able to report on some lessons again unlike last email. There's still a ton of work to be done here in Dayton so I'm happy about that. This week is the last week of the transfer so I'll have transfer news next email. Thanks for the continued support and love coming my way!

I love yall! Have a great week!

Elder Proctor