Ellis Island and the Statue of Liberty

We just got back from the Trip. It was awesome. I didn't expect us to get here on time, but we got back in perfect timing. The trip was awesome. We were able to go up to the top of the base of the statue, but not to the crown. It was an awesome trip. I took a lot of pictures, but unfortunately I don't have the little thing to send pics, so I will send some next week.
While I was at Ellis Island I looked at the bog wall that they have of names of Immigrants that went through Ellis Island, I round a couple of Ellsworth Names on the wall, and even a couple of Strachan names (though I'm sure they aren't our family since Mom is from Canada and all that.) It was awesome. Next week on Wednesday we go to the temple, our departing temple trip, I am really excited for that.

I'll say though, the trip did make me a little trunky... Especially since almost everyone on the trip are going home in 2 weeks there was a lot of talk of home, girls, what we'll do after the mission etc. I go home in about 4 weeks, 2 weeks after they do. It was good though. I know a lot of the Elders that were on the trip. It was a huge group, too. We had about 15 of us, 5 from the Cherry Hill mission who recently joined our mission. I would love to go to the crown someday, but I don't know when I'll be back this way. I still hope to return to New Jersey in December, Perhaps I'll have the opportunity to go then.

This week has been a little slow. We are making progress. It's always a little tough when you get a new companion and you have to lead the area until he gets to know it. It's been interesting so far, but I know that we will do well. Joseph finally got back last night. We have been keeping in contact with him via text for the last week, but it was really awesome to see him again. He still is unsure about baptism. We asked him to pray about it, and to let us know. We hope and pray that he will feel like he gets an answer and desires to get baptized.

This week we had a really awesome investigator come to church for the first
time. Her name is Katherine. We have taught her the first two lessons. Tommorow we are going to teach her a third and try and set her with a baptismal date. We are really excited for her. I hope that she will get baptized before I go.

I hope that Nick gets his mission call this week. I know the suspense has been killing me! I can't imagine how he's feeling right now. Hopefully he'll get it soon, and everything will work out. Maybe it's taking a while because he's just so amazing they can't decide which mission needs him more!

I also wanted to say that I am uber-jealous about the West Coast Trail trip. I wish I could go, but then again, I'm needed here still. (could they delay it a few weeks.... haha...) I hope that they have a good time and that Uncle Cliff can go. Hopefully Sidney gets better soon.
Umm in other news, Things are continuiing as normal. I am looking forward to my birthday. Dolores said that we need to go over and celebrate my birthday. I'm excited. I just need to make sure not to visit any Mexican's on my birthday. In Mexico there is a tradition that they will give you a cake and you need to take a bite out of the middle of the cake, and then when you bend down to take the bite, they shove your face into the cake. I've never seen it done, but I've seen some pictures of when it's been done. Also Elder Godfrey and I are planning to go out to eat at some point in the day, we have the same Birthday.

I already have a bunc of stuff I need to send home. The next couple weeks will be busy P-days for me, slowly start to pack up/send home/throw away stuff.
I love the time I've had here in NJ! I know that NJ will always have a special place in my heart. I know that this is the true church!
I hope that everyone has a good week. I know for sure that next weeks email will be on time. I promise I'll send pics next week from my trip today. I love and miss you all a ton.
Love,
Elder Isaac Ellsworth.

New companion.....possibly last companion!

On Wednesday we had an all mission conference which also included a mini-transfers. My new companion is Elder Yates. He is from Miles City Montana. He is a really cool Elder. He is one of the missionaries that came in from the Cherry Hill mission. His last area was Long Branch, which is where Elder Larsen just went. Elder Yates may be my last companion as well. On the 4th of August we have transfers, and they will most likely put us in a three-some for the last 2 weeks or they will just have some areas combine when Elder Godfrey and I go home. Either way.

This week has been a little rough and stressful for me. I am now in charge of the area basically, and my companion doesn't know anything about the area yet, so planning is completely up to me. I've been in this situation before, but it's still stressful when it happens. I also haven't been sleeping very well, which hasn't been helping at all.

That's a bummer that Nick hasn't got his call yet. Hopefully he gets it this week. I know that during the summer the number of misionaries entering the MTC and also submitting papers goes up considerably, so perhaps that is one reason it is taking a while. I hope, though, that he gets it this week. I know that when I was waiting for my call the suspense was almost unbearable.

Also, I'm sorry to hear that Ian broke his arm again. Hopefully he heals soon. And I am also really excited for Em getting Peanut back. I am excited to meet this dog.

We are doing well in the area. This week was a little slow, first off Elder Larsen saying goodbye, then the conference, and then showing Elder Yates the area so he could get to know everything. Hopefully this week things will pick up.

In other news this week Joseph's baptismal date fell through. He went on vacation last week and isn't getting back until Next Monday. So we won't even be able to visit him at all this week. However, on the positive side of things, we'll be able to focus a lot on Samuel. He has come really far in the last few weeks, hopefully soon we'll be able to commit him to baptism. He has already made some big changes in his life, and I know that he can continue to improve his life, and he'll want to be baptized. I just hope that happens before I go home.

We also have another investigator who is doing really well. Her name is Katherine. She is Dominican. She said she would come to church yesterday, but she didn't come. She has accepted a baptismal invitation, and is praying about a date. We just need to get her to come to church, and I know she'll be baptized.

Things are going really well right now in this area. I love this area so much. I have grown to love the people so much. This is a great area to be my last area. The ward here is really strong as well.

Next week I do not know if or when I'll be able to check or send an email. Next Monday I have the departing trip to Ellis Island and the Statue of Liberty. So, I have no idea what time we'll be gettin back from that. If I don't get back on time Monday I'll do it on Tuesday sometime.

Also, here are a couple of pictures.

The first one is a picture of me in missionary clothes. I hope this is what Dad was looking for.

The other one is Elder Larsen with Samuel and Dolores. Dolores was really sad that Elder Larsen left. She cried. She was happy to meet my new companion as well though. This picture is from Tuesday when we went to say goodbye.

I love you all and hope you have a good week this week. I hope Ian recovers quickly and Nick gets his call. I hope everyone is having a great summer, and I can't wait to see you again.

Love,

Elder Isaac Ellsworth

4th of July and transfers.....

This week has been amazing. Because the 4th was on a Sunday, we were not allowed to go to fireworks on the 4th, but we went last night to Summit (in the short hills area) and watched the show they put on there. It was awesome, I took some cool pictures, but I forgot my camera today so I can't send any pics today...

Yesterday also officially marks 6 weeks remaining. After todays email there are only 5 more weekly emails left, I can't believe it. On Sunday we got the transfer news, President Bahr called and told Elder Larsen that he is leaving, and he will be a district leader down in a place called Long Branch, apparently down in the new southern part of the mission. Tomorrow we have a all mission conference to welcome the new missionaries to our mission, and to have as well "mini-transfers" where Elder Larsen and I will be split apart, and I will get a new companion. Next week I will have the news of who. I am so grateful to have been with Elder Larsen. He is an amazing missionary, I have learned so much from him. He is the companion I've been with the longest on my mission, it has been great, we are sad to be splitting up, but I am also excited to see who my new companion will be.

I'm glad to hear that the 4th went well. The Canada Day party sounds like it was a blast. I am so excited to hear that Nick got the Melchizedek Priesthood. It will be a really great blessing in his life. I think it would be awesome to go with Nick to the temple, I hope he gets his call soon.

I'm glad to hear Great Grandpa Smith is doing well. I feel bad though, I've really failed at writing him. I think I've only written him once on my mission. As a matter of fact, I really have done terribly at writing any extended family, most P-days there is no time to write letters. I hope to be able to write a few letters next week, but I really haven't done very well when it comes to writing anyone. Thankfully there is the blog so everyone can at least read how I'm doing...

This week was amazing, we saw so many miracles. Just one that I briefly wanted to share, on Sunday we were a long distance away, but we had planned to be on the other side of our area, so we decided to follow our plans rather than just tract in the area where we were, so we went to try and stop by some potentials, and we saw this lady on the stairs in front of her apartment, so we went to go talk to her. We had met her a few weeks before, helping her to carry her groceries home, but she rents out a small room in an apartment, so she had told us we really couldn't come and visit her. Well, we saw her outside and so we sat down on the stairs and taught her a lesson on her stairs. It was really powerful. She is really prepared. We have another appointment to visit with her outside on Saturday again and she told us she really wants to come to church next Sunday. It was really cool, she is super prepared. Her name was Magdalena.

Things are going well here, I am so excited for this area. We are still hoping to get Joseph baptized soon, but we need to let him take his time. I feel we've been pushing him too much, and he need to take this at his own pace. I have faith he'll get baptized, but at his pace, not ours.

That's about all the news from this week. I hope that everyone is doing well, and I hope that things continue to go well. Have fun at camp Dad and Ian! And I hope that camp is going well for Nick. I hope to hear from you again next week.

Love,

Elder Isaac Ellsworth

The foot........

Dear Family,

When Sister Bahr called me with the insurance information, I figured that that would be one of the fist questions in the email, So here is the story of what happened to my foot.

We were coming out of an appointment, and the lady had given us her keys so we could lock the deadbolt behind us, afterwards we were to toss the keys up onto her balcony, but she is really old, and had recently had surgery on her foot, so I was trying to hand the keys to her. I climbed up on top of the iron fence to hand her the keys, and when I handed them to her the pointy part of the fence punctured my shoe and into my foot. There was a man who lived next door who took us to the hospital, and they checked it out for me, and then gave me some Medication and sent me on my way.

I've attached a couple of pictures, they are of my shoe and my sock I took these pictures when I went to the hospital on Tuesday. I've been doing alright, it looks like it's mostly healed. And I thought I would make it through unscathed.

Other than that I've been doing well. On Thursday I spoke with president Bahr. It was actually kind of funny, he started off asking me how my foot was doing, then after a few minutes he said "Well, that's not why I'm calling". What he really wanted to ask me was about my departure date. He had heard about the confusion about which date it was and he wanted to set with me the date for sure. It was a hard decision, but I decided to come home one week earlier for a couple of reasons, 1) I have been feeling a little nervous about only having 1 week to prepare for school and stuff, so the extra time to adjust will be nice. 2) I would be the only one flying home on the 23rd, but there are 3 other missionaries flying home on the 16th. I had been thinking about it for a while, so when president Bahr called me he said that there had been an error in the office and my date was moved to the 16th, but he said if I wanted I could keep it there or move it to the 23rd. We talked about it for a while and I decided to keep it on the 16th. It's crazy to think that I'm going home in 7 weeks.

Elder Larsen and I are doing well. My accident this week slowed us down a little bit, but we still had a good week. We've been working a lot with the recent converts, we have quite a few in our area. We still have baptismal dates with Joseph and Samuel, but we need to work with them and make sure they go through.

I'm glad everything is going well. I know Em's probably disappointed but excited that she gets to keep Peanut. I hope that Nick gets his mission call this week. I know that wherever he goes, it is where the Lord needs him. For the record, I was a little disappointed myself when I read I was going to New Jersey, but I have loved it so much!!! The mission is a wonderful thing!!!!

I love you all and miss you so much. Thank you for the help you have given me as I have been out here. I hope you all have a good week.

Love

Elder Isaac Ellsworth

Mission Combination....

It was really good to talk to you yesterday. I'm sorry that Em wasn't there, but I hope she had a good time at Disneyland nonetheless.

This morning we received the transfer fax. Neither Elder Larsen or I are leaving, as a matter of fact, the only one leaving in our Zone is Elder McBroom. However, it will be shortlived. On the 7th of July we are having a mission conference again and mini transfers, because the mission is combining with the Cherry Hill mission. So basically madness is coming up. We recently found out that the Zone 3 Zone leaders area is now no longer a Zone leader area, and that Possibly Zones 1 2 and 3 will be combined into 2 Zones. Elder Larsen will more than likely be leaving in a few weeks, but for now we are staying together.

Things are going well, nothing too new recently. Of course, we just spoke yesterday, so not much has happened since then other than transfer news. I'm doing well, I was really glad to speak to you all. I can't express in words how happy and excited I am that Nick is going on his mission soon. I'll be excitedly awaiting news of his mission call.

I'm trying to remember if there was anything I was going to mention in the call but forgot... I did mention the garments, thank you for taking care of that for me.

Um... what else, I think that was everything... I hope everyone has a good summer, Summer here has been so hot, and very humid. It's really quite nasty weather.

Well, I hope everything is going well. I haven't received your email yet, but I'm going to wrap up this email for now and I will write again in a few minutes, I want to send a few pictures.

Love

Elder Isaac Ellsworth

Okay, I just got your email. I loved talking to everyone, and I hope that everyone is doing well. I hope Nick has a good time at camp. I hope he gets his mission call sooner rather than later.

I also missed talking to Em, I hope she has a lot of fun, though. I'm glad Mom and Em had such a great time at Girls camp. Sounds like it was great.

I'm so excited for Grandma and Grampa. That is really exciting they're going on another mission. We have quite a few senior couples in our mission and they all love it so much.

Have fun in Canada next month. Sounds like the summer is going to be a bit crazy. I know it'll be awesome, though.

Ok. Here are some pics like I promised.

The first one is a hilarious little "Park" in our area. The name is Brett Triangle, as written on the sign in the background. We thought it was a little Ironic, escpeically since the sign in the foreground calls it a park, and says no Alchoholic beverages, and there is a beer bottle on the ground near my companion.

The second picture is from a barbeque that one of the Bayonne Elders Recent Converts had. Dolores and Jospeh came, Dolores doesn't like pictures very much, so the pic was a little funny.

Well, that's all the news for now, Hope you have a great week,. It was great to talk to you, and I hope you have a great week!

Love,

Elder Isaac Ellsworth

Dia de los Padres + fotos

I'm also really excited to talk to everyone on Father's Day. I think it's really ironic how that worked out. I hope everything goes well with Nick's papers. I'm also really excited to hear that he is getting his Patriarchal blessing. It has really been a big blessing for me in my life!

This week has been good. We've been working hard to try and find new investigators, that is our biggest struggle right now. We've also been working with Joseph, and he is doing well. He is currently set for the 11th of July, but we are trying to move him back to the end of this month.

Brian got confirmed yesterday. This week we had to go over and explain that his step-dad could not perform the confirmation, and so Elder Larsen did it. It went really well. They are a great family.

The first Picture is from Brian's baptism. Myself, Elder Larsen Brian, and his parents. Brian was excited to get baptized, and the service went really well.

The second Picture is of Juan Hiraldo and Margie, his daughter. Margie went back to the DR this week, she flew home on Saturday. She was such a big help as we taught Juan about the gospel, she has been a huge help. He has been progressing really well. He's been getting a lot of support from the ward. The hardet part is that he is partly deaf, so he can't hear well in class, etc.

This last week went well. On saturday we went to Bayonne to a barbeque that Elder Wray and Elder Rosas' recent convert was doing. Dolores and Joseph were there. Also there were a lot of the youth from our ward. It was good to see that Joseph has been making good friends with the youth.

This week we found this really cool guy named Deryl. He is from Peru. We were ringing the buzzers of a building to try and get in to talk to people. He let us in and we talked in his hallway for about 10 to 15 minutes, He is really interested, we are going back today.

Thank you so much for helping me out with everything. Also, I don't know if I mentioned it, but I am out of medication. Please send me some more. This'll be the last refill I'll need.

I can't believe how fast time has been flying. I can't quite wrap my head around the fact that I am going home in about 10 weeks. My companion, other missionaries and even members keep teasing me about that.

Transfers are coming up next Tuesday. However, things'll get interesting because the Cherry Hill mission is combining with us on the 1st of July. So there will be transfers this next week, and then tranfers on the first of July.

This week we have all mission conference on Thursday. It'll be really cool. This week'll be crazy, though. We have the temple trip potentially on Wednesday, the conference on Thursday, and then Weekly planning and deep clean on Friday. It'll be intense.

I love you all so much, I can't wait to talk to you in a week.

Love,

Elder Isaac Ellsworth

Priesthood....

I'm glad to hear that every one is doing well. I know that summers are sometimes the most hectic time of the year. I hope everyone has a great time this summer.

As for summer, here it's been ridiculously hot recently. We come home at the end of the day so incredibly sweaty. It's been fun, though.

I'm glad to hear that Nick will be seeing the stake president Tomorrow, I hope that the papers get submitted, I'm excited to talk to everyone, hopefully he has his call by then...

Everything is goin well for me here. On sunday we had a baptism. Brian Arias, the 9 year-old we've been working with, got baptized. His step-father, brother Correa, received the Aaronic priesthood Yesterday during the third hour, Elder Larsen gave it to him. Then after church he baptized is step-son. It was really good for that family, he really needed to get the priesthood. Our next goal is to help them prepare to go to the temple and get sealed as a family.

Also on Sunday Juan Hiraldo got the Aaronic priesthood. It was really good. I have really gained an appreciation for the priesthood as I've been on my mission, and Sunday made me reflect on that a little more. It is the power to bless lives, and to bring salvation to God's children. I am so glad that I grew up in a home where there was the priesthood, and where I had a father who was a righteous priesthood holder, I know it was a great blessing for all of us, and I am grateful.

In other news, we should be having a baptism next week, but it's starting to look a little doubtful. Joseph was really excited last week, and he said he had gotten an answer, and on Tuesday he was also still excited. However, on Friday when we went over doubt had crept in. We simply encouraged him to pray about it, and if he still didn't feel ready on Tuesday when we came over we'd move his date. I trust, though that he'll get an answer.

Um, in other news, we are doing well. However, we do need to find some more new investigators, we've been baptizing all our good investigators. We have another guy set with a date, but he is going to go to the english ward, so we need to pass him off to the other Elders.

Well, I hope everyone is doing well, I've been doing great, and I love missionary work. I'm so grateful for all the prayers and support. I love you all so much.

Love,

Elder Isaac Ellsworth