Week 79

It’s been a good week! Last pday was mediocre; it was raining again so we stayed inside. Thursday was good, we did some weekly planning, called a hand full of people to try and get in contact with to invite them to church and set appointments for the week. It was a bit of a struggle getting in contact with people. We’ve realized before we can go out and do a lot of finding in this area, we need to do some work with our area book as it is. It’s full of people that we don’t teach and neither of us has met. So our goal is to do a lot of contact attempts to get in touch with these people we have in our records and find those who are really interested. We don’t want to continue adding to the mess of people we have. Sometime in the afternoon we went to the church and met with the other elders, Elder Clark and Elder Matson for a split. I went to their area with Elder Matson and Elder Patterson stayed in our area with Elder Clark. We didn’t seem to have to much success with the appointments we had set, they fell through and we attempted to get in contact with some investigators in his area through Facebook and phone and a couple responded but we weren’t able to meet with them that night. Later in the night Elder Matson had challenged me, for I can’t remember what reason, to do 300 push-ups for 30 days. (I know I know, your thinking what the heck is this kid up to? This isn’t gospel related... I know, but it’s what happened okay, bear with me... the miracles will come and the experiences worth sharing are coming) It was about 9pm at the time so I had an hour and a half to knock out 300 push-ups... I thought pshh, that’s too easy... but I proved to myself how out of shape I am... but I did it, I succeeded and before 10:30 I did 300.

Around noon on Friday we unsplit. When we met back up with the Elders we went to Panda for lunch. The other Elders had a great day in their area, they were able to meet with a member we hadn’t been able to visit very much, but they went over and were able to do some service for him. It was great! Slowly but surely making positive progress with him.

We had planned to go back and help Brother Cano with his home. We were on our way and realized we were going the opposite direction. So by the time we had realized it we were too far out of the way, we gave him a call and apologized... he said he was about done for the day anyway and we could come by another time.

This week was a bit slow... unfortunately we aren’t teaching IK anymore... he just isn’t making progress and showing real intent. Other personal reasons have showed that it won’t be good to make time each week to meet with him. He’s a nice kid, just a little confused.

Crazy Story for the week...

GHOSTS live with us. So since I got to this apartment, roughly 3 weeks ago, weird things have happened and noises have been heard. We’ve been making the joke that we have a ghost in our apartment because stuff falls of the counters when they are completely stable where they are, we have a pan that was securely set in our dish rack and all of a sudden at the end of the day we were on the couch talking and we heard this loud (pan hitting the tile) sound. So we got up to see what happened and the pan is on the floor and has a pretty nice bend now. Earlier in my first week here, I can’t remember what happened but other stuff on the counters had made their way to the ground also.

HERE is my crazy story:

So I’m lying in bed, it’s some time after 10:30pm. We have been in bed for a little while now. Elder Patterson is really quick to fall asleep every night while I on the other hand take at least half an hour if I’m lucky to fall asleep each night. So I hear Elder Patterson’s heavy breathing and know he’s sleeping... JUST as I’m on the very peak of falling asleep a very distinct movement was felt from under my bed. Honestly it felt like some one kicked me and it completely woke me up so I (blind as a bat) grab my glasses and look under my bed to catch the little elf that kicked me... but no elf was there. Convinced that he was now hiding, I checked under Elder Patterson’s bed, no elf, and Patterson is sleeping. So I tell myself it must have been a stuck spring in my mattress that decided to spring at that moment. Well again I’m back to the peak of falling asleep and a sock gets thrown at me! For the 2nd time I’m wide awake. This time it’s after 11pm, Patterson is sleeping like a baby and I flip out wondering WHO threw a sock at me hard enough to wake me up. Well it wasn’t Patterson because he woke up the second I shook him, after jumping out of bed, flipping the lights on, and going over to his bedside. He quickly woke and with squinted eyes from the lights being on he, confused as can be, slowly reaches for the sock in my hand and unfolds it from the ball it was rolled into (before it was thrown at me) and says “is that my sock? Bro what are you doing??...” His head falls back to his pillow and back to sleep he went... again, I checked under both our beds, you know... just to make sure the boogieman wasn’t around. Completely disturbed and awake I flip the lights out shut the door to our room and lay back in bed. Finally I’m back to a point where sleep has found me, when all of a sudden my arm gets pulled toward the crack between my bed and the wall, instantly I’m awake again, for the 3rd time... I’m loosing my mind at this point. Something is in my room and wants to play games. Patterson is still sleeping... it’s about 12am and I’m upset I’m not going to get any sleep tonight. Well I again laid my head down and went to sleep... not sure what the time was but for a fourth time I’m awoken by a loud noise it sounded like a hydro flask was thrown at the floor. Well, Patterson has a metal bottle on his windowsill but when I looked it stayed standing on the windowsill with nothing on the ground in our room… tired, confused, upset, I rolled over and on to my knees and voiced to my Heavenly Father my frustration… I’m just trying to sleep and something isn’t letting me. Whatever it is, may it leave, and bless this apartment that it may be a place where we can take safety from the world, a home for the Spirit, and a place of love and peace this I pray for, in the name of Jesus Christ, amen. And back to sleep I went and didn’t wake up till 6:30am.

When we both woke up I told Patterson what had happened and if he even remembers me waking him up. He had no idea anything was happening and didn’t remember me waking him up or taking his sock from my hand.

Next week will be a great week!

Patience. Love. Faith
Much love,

Elder Newbold