Happy Halloween

Well I will tell you what, when I was growing up and in my special years, I did not see eye to eye with my parents on a lot of things. But the older I get, the more I become like them for some reason. For example Dad hates Holidays especially Halloween, I too now hate Halloween. I think the whole idea is just dumb.haha Dad might be right about stuff once and a while!!

I will get to my week now I guess. It has been an interesting one to say the least. I love Loma Rica that po-dunk little town, but I don't really know how to do work here. There is not a town, no suburbs, as a result we can't really tract. Especially since most people out here are gun weilding pot farmers!! I don't think that they would like two men in black suits coming to knock on their door!! So I guess that is one of my frustrations here, is I don't really know how to work in an area like this.

Also like I said last week our Investigators and Less actives are dropping like flies!! But life is good, I really enjoy serving with Elder Whitney, and I really do love my mission. Well we have both been a little under the weather this week, so I don't have too much to say but I had a couple of stories I want to share.

First is that a recent convert of about 3 months named Melvin Jones died this week. I only met him once, and he was very frail just sitting in his bed when I did meet him. So Thursday morning we get a call from his care taker a member named Gail Scott, she was needing a friendly voice, because the hospice for Melvin had just told her he only had 2-48 hours left to live. Well we decided Thursday afternoon to go and see Melvin, when we got to the house he had already died, so we basically got volunteered to help take his body out to the Funeral home van. I imagined in my head something like the scene from Waking Ned Divine, and as you can guess I was ... Thrilled... to help out. Thankfully they had a stretcher to take him out on. Only on a mission haha. It was kind of funny though, when I said my last respects to him, I could not help but be a little envious of him, because I know he is in the rest of our Savior! What comfort that is to know that.

My second funny experience was just on Saturday night. Our ward had a Halloween party mixed with a Chili Cook Off. Well for my costume I decided that I was going to wear my Dress Lava Lava, and dress up like a missionary serving in Polynesia!! It was awesome and I had a good laugh just watching people's reactions to me wearing it. People asked me if I was supposed to be a sister missionary, and I was asked why I was wearing a skirt like 25 times but It was funny none the less!

Well that is just about all I had to say this week, and I want everybody to know that I love them! I love you guys, and I love my time on my mission. I don't understand how Aunt Effie thinks that two years was long, because it feels like yesterday I was at their farewells (Tyler's and Spencer's), and farewell party saying goodbye to two of my brothers in the Gospel!!

With Loving of your Gutz

Elder Nick Ellsworth

Holla from your son in Yuba City!!

Hello from Loma Rica!!! Well technically I am emailing over here in Yuba City, but still I am hollering from Loma Rica. So not to be redundant or anything, but I am here in the Yuba City library emailing you guys, but I am serving in the Loma Rica Ward. Does that make sense?

Well my first week in Loma Rica was awesome! It is pretty much nutz that I am serving with Elder Kevin Whitney from New Fork!! It is pretty awesome to say the very least. So as we have been talking to each other, we have discovered more about our relationship at Camp New Fork. We were roommates for about half of that summer. We both stayed on the two bottom bunks in the Cardboard Cabin, and I like him a lot. I got sick of our other two roommates, because they thought that our cabin was possesed by demons or something crazy! ha ha Still what are the odds, that five years after we lived together we would be serving together out here in Roseville Cali! We get along great, I think that it is the best I get along with a comp since Elder McAllister like 6 months ago!!

But I am not too sure of this area yet. I have such a love for the area, and for the people that live up in Mount Shasta, I know that as a I serve diligently, and pray earnestly I will grow to love these people as well.

My area is as country as it gets. As a matter of fact, it makes Cottonwood, and Mount Shasta look like bustling metropolises. But the funny thing is, the ward over here is bigger than any of the other two I have served in.

Plus the work is going really good as well, we have a couple of solid investigators, and we even have two Baptisimal dates! It is pretty sweet time to be serving here! It is a big adjustment though. I don't think that after serving here, I will ever forget the smell of marijuana! You drive down the road, and you just smell a nasty scent in your nostrils, a little bit like skunk, every five to ten minutes or so. It is not skunk, it is the pot industry going strong out in the countryside of California. It helps me sleep well at night to think that the welfare system is helping people to grow this lucrative crop! haha

Our apartment out here is pretty nice as well, there are only a couple of problems... there are spiders everywhere, we live above members so we have to be very quiet, and the members we live above their grand daughter lives next door to us, and she is gorgeous!!! It is pretty sweet too, because we are teaching her friend, and they are both like 19! haha

It actually freaked me out a little bit the first time we went over there to teach. It was weird for me because I have never really taught lessons to people my age, let alone girls, that are very pretty. But I will endure ;)

Well other than that I don't have a whole ton to say. The work is sweet, we do a whole bunch of service, which I love! Also I have been able to be more obedient, and hard working since I have been with Elder Whitney. He encourages me to be better, rather than a few companions that have encouraged me to be worse... It is a little funny to me, because I didn't really realize that I was becoming relaxed with the rules, until I had an obedient companion, who is strictly obedient. It is a good thing, and it will help me to improve personally.

Well love all y'alls' gutz

Elder Ellsworth

Loma Rica!, but again I am emailing from here in Yuba

Life is good!

Well just for a minute I wanted to start off by telling you guys just a little bit about the Gardners, and when I say a little bit, I will probably ramble on and on, but that is okay. The first time I met them, it was the end of the month, and Elder Brown, and I had many extra miles, so I wanted to go and see all of the towns that were far away in our area. So we drove to Lake Shastina, which is like 18 miles from our house in Mount Shasta. We got out there, and Brown was like we should contact his Former Investigator family named the Gardner's, and I really wasn't too thrilled, but we knocked on the door. Nobody answered, so we walked down their walkway towards the lake, and when we got down there, Vonda poked her head over the balcony, and said "oh, somebody was knocking on the door" So we talked to her, and set up an appointment. She was always a little more ready than Jason as we taught them, and wanted to come to church, and pray. Jason started to change and open up as he read from the Book of Mormon. I remember one week at church how he said that I said something that inspired him to start reading. I said that the Book of Mormon is the foundation of our testimony. That was the reason he started reading. Oh, also they have a 3 year old daughter named Kya, and a 1 year old named Roman. So they were reading, and started to pray, and it took a while for Jason's schedule to change, but eventually they made it to church again. They asked me to baptized them before I left, I was more than obliging to that request.

So, this Saturday around 10:45 I had the amazing experience of baptizing this family, that I love so much. I am so grateful that the Lord has touched their hearts. I love them, and know that they will be awesome members. And a year from now, they will receive eternal blessing when they enter the temple, and are sealed for time and all eternity! I hope that I can make it! They were confirmed Sunday in church. Brother Taylor in the ward did that. And Jason was interviewed, sustained and Ordained to the office of a Priest in the Aaronic Priesthood! One cool thing that happened, was when Will Weidmann, passed the Sacrament to Jason and Vonda. That was a sweet experience for me.

In other news. Transfers have come in this morning, and I am getting the boot! I am getting transferred to the Loma Rica ward in the Yuba City stake! Pretty crazy too, my new comp's name is Elder Kevin Whitney, you might know his name, because he worked with me at Camp New Fork! He is one of the Four Whitney Brothers, he has been out for 3 months I think, and he is excited about his work. I am excited to serve with him!! We are going to work our butts off down there. I have loved my past few companions, but I have been waiting for one that just has the fire!! I think Elder Whitney does!

Well that is about all. Life is Good. I love my mission so much, I know this Church is true! It changes lives, and it blesses families!! I know because it has changed my life, and it has blessed my family.

Ian! You heard what the apostles had to say! I urge you, and command you with all of the brotherly love that I possess to prepare for your time to serve now!! This mission is the best decision I have ever made. When you get to see, and be a participant in somebody's conversion, it makes it all worth it! There is sacrifice involved, but that makes this experience so much sweeter. Read, Pray, and Prepare boy! I say that with love ;)

Love all of your gutz do I,

Elder Ellsworth