Dec 18, 2011

This was the most amazing weekend of my mission. Although I have been a little bit sick and just exhausted the last like 3 days. But other than that, it's been incredible. We had the ward Christmas party on Friday, than the wedding saturday and the baptism Sunday. I think I spent more time in the church these last 3 days than I have spent sleeping. The wedding was so good. A lady in our ward decorated the chapel really nicely. Ken and Toni were both really nervous, but also really happy and exctied. Toni got to spend the night before at a Bed and Breakfast a ward member owns, and then a couple ladies went over and did her hair and makeup, and then a guy went and picked her up as chauffeur. Ken I think got a lift with the best man and borrowed my pink tie. It was really funny that Elder Simmons gave a talk in the marriage ceremony about marriage. He obviously has never been married, but talked really well about the example his parents have shown him. Me and Simmon were also the witnesses for the signing of the marriage certificate. THe reception afterwards was really fun. There were like 30 ward members and only 5 of Ken and Toni's friends, but there was great food, some really good toasts, we got some great photos, and hopefully it will be a day that they always look back on and remember. There were a bunch of love songs playing, and they shut off the lights and they got to do their first dance to I don't want to miss a thing by Aerosmith. I was actually the DJ of the wedding. Kind of strange, I know. But a ward member set up his laptop and speakers, and then had to go back to work, and had me run all the music. I enjoyed it.

And then the baptism yesterday was also so great. It didn't get started until almost 2 hours after church, so not many people stayed around to watch it. But for those who did, it was such a good experience. It was such a strong spirit there. As they were changing back into normal clothes, we had a kind of testimony thing in which people were asked to talk about their baptisms. It was really going great, people were crying and feeling the spirit, until one lady stood up and started telling everyone how here baptism was the worst day of her life. And she started right as Ken and Toni got out of the changerooms and sat back in the congregation. Then she just broke down and started talking all about how horrible her life has been. It was just out of control. Bishop signalled for me to come up and bear my testimony, so I went up right after her. By no means did this like ruin the day or anything, it is just another example of how crazy this Helston ward is. After the service, we went back to Ken and Toni's with Simmons and White. We had some of their wedding cake, and the best man came over as well. We ate leftover wedding cake, and watched the video that we made in Plymouth last monday. It was really funny, even the best man loved it. We had all seen it before at our big London Christmas conference, but it was good to watch it again. I will try to find a way to send a copy to you guys.

It is really strange that everything has happened. They are now members of the ward. I feel a little bit lost, I just don't know what the next step it from here. I guess just get right back to work, but it is strange that everything I have been working for the last 5 months has now all finally paid off. I've been out almost a quarter of my mission, and in terms of people baptized, this is all I have to show for it. But I feel like it has been totally worth it.

I really wish I had videoed that last sacrament meeting. You would have loved to be there. The church here is a little different.

Okay, I will call you guys between 6pm and 9pm on christmas eve in my time. Which will be sometime between 11am and 2pm your time. Hopefully that works?

Just in case I can't get a hold of you, we will plan on starting skype sometime between 4pm and 5pm on christmas day. So that will be like at either 9am or 10am your time. Hopefully that is not too early. We can discuss this saturday night though on the phone.

The London conference was awesome. Wow this has been a long week, so much has happened. We got to do a temple session, which I really liked. I am starting to get used to it more now, and I noticed a few things in there that I never had before. Than the conference itself was awesome. Each zone did 15 minutes of a Christmas entertainment thing, and our zone blew everyone else out of the water. The movie we made was really funny, and spiritual, and Oscarson did a really good job editing it. And then we got to spend the night at the temple apartments, with like 12 other missionaries, and that was pretty good as well. The 6 hour drive though is always pretty rough.

See you guys in 6 days!

Love Elder Steed

Dec 18, 2011

That was a long email. I loved it though. I really like hearing the details about everything that is going on. Sounds like you guys had a pretty sweet Christmas party. I miss all that stuff. That food sounds amazing. I don't think I am going to even buy groceries this week. The ward here has given us like 30 christmas gifts, and I am pretty sure they are all food/sweets.

I'm glad you guys have some good friends in the Carter family. Are alyssa and Josh a thing?

I would have loved to be at that sacrament meeting for Tanner and Kyle. I can't believe Brooks is leaving in like 3 weeks on his mission. That guy is going to be a good missionary.

So what are Hayden and Dan doing with Riley out of the picture? Is Draycott upset that he is losing one more rent-payer? Hopefully Riley does better living at home, and is able to do well in school and also prepare for his mission. My advice to him would be to remember everything I did, and then just do the opposite. I'm still behind a lot of other missionaries because of my lack of preparing when I was back home.

That Derek story is horrible. What triggered that? That is going to really shake southern alberta I am sure.

Last sacrament meeting was just legendary. The one this week was good as well, but for other reasons. We had 8 investigators at church yesterday! It is always nice to have people that will show up, except it gets really hard to talk with all of them and make them all feel welcome because there are too many of them. But I think they all enjoyed it. Gareth and Rachel even showed up, and they said they really enjoyed it. Not what they were used to, but really good. It was like a 2 hour sunday school special christmas presentation, with primary children singing, reading the christmas stories in the bible, and like 10 really short talks. It was kind of a long sacrament meeting, but it was a nice change.
I'm glad you are still in contact with Toni. She loves getting your emails. I can't wait for you guys to meet them. I'll send some pictures today, if I have time, of the baptism.

The Steed family seems to be struggling with their health at the moment. Keep me updated on Wes and Grandma and they are in my prayers.

Thanks for all the Christmas traditions! We are going over to a members house on Christmas eve, and we have to all share our favorite Christmas traditions with each other. And apparently we are eating a huge meal as well. We are having 3 big Christmas roasts in 2 days. The only problem is, everyone here eats Christmas pudding, this big fruitcake like thing, and I'm pretty sure it is alcoholic.

I'll keep you guys posted on Gareth and Rachel. They could be the next Ken and Toni (I hope)!

All we have done for Christmas so far is decorate our flat, get a bunch of Christmas cards, and go to the ward Christmas party. For Christmas cards here, no one does pictures of their families, they just do normal cards and no letters or anything even with them. We did have an awesome Christmas party here though. We had a bunch of food, a Santa Clause came, there was barn-dancing, this pass the parcel game, and we also did a bunch of minute to win it games. Over here instead of calling it 'Minute to win it' they call it 'The Cube' though. Ken was the overall winner of that. And then right at the end, they set up this game on the Wii called 'Just Dance.' It was this game where a guy is dancing on the screen and you hold the Wiimote and try to copy his dance moves. I took a go at this game, against a couple of the young men. I lost, but apparently was the most entertaining to watch. It probably helped that I wore a Santa hat and a bright, ugly Christmas jumper to the party. Ken and Brett both recorded it on their iPhones. We are trying to figure out a way to send it back to you guys, because it is a really funny video.

Love Elder Steed

Dec 11, 2011

My legs are really sore as well. We had the most amazing weekend. On saturday, we did like 4 hours of service. The 2nd counsellor in our bishopric, Jeff Bray, and his dad Eric Bray were going over to this guys house to clear a bunch of trees for him. Laura Bray (jeff's wife) met a lady named Rachel as they were both dropping off their kids at school, they started talking and eventually Laura went over to Rachels house. They started talking, and had this big conversation about religion and our faith and stuff. Rachel, and her husband Gareth, just moved into Cornwall like 3 months ago, they are in a huge house but it is one that needs a LOT of work. So they are doing some major renovations. Gareth and Rachel are both like 30, are both really well educated and come from pretty affluent backgrounds (as far as I can tell). Because they just moved here, and they are living out in the country, they have like no friends. This guy, Gareth, one day just felt this strong desire to become a vicar for the church of England. He was running his own buisness at the time, making a lot of money, but he felt the need to become a vicar even though he had never really been religious before. However, the vicar school didn't accept him, and he was a little bit mad about that and so he no longer likes the Church of England. So I guess to wrap this all up, Laura Bray went to their house, noticed how much work they had to do, and offered the services of Jeff and Eric as well as us. Jeff and Eric are landscapers by the way. A few days before we went there, Gareth had bought a chainsaw and just took down like at least 100 trees on his property. So there were just these massive piles of trees and branches all over the yard. We went there with chainsaws and a big chipper, and cleared a bunch of the felled trees. It was really hard work, and that is why my legs are sore.

When we first got there, Rachel was there. Jeff introduced me and Elder Oscarson, and she gave us a tour of the house and chatted for a bit. Then she brought out like hot chocolate and cupcakes for us, and then went over to Lauras house. 4 hours later Gareth came home from work. He was also really cool. He saw all the work we had done, and just got out of his car and came up to me, shook my hand and gave me a big hug and said he didn't know what to say. We then all went over to Jeff and Lauras house, where she had made a big pot of this awesome soup. We had soup and hung out there, just chatting. It was actually really comfortable and just fun. There were like 6 kids running around screaming and playing, I was chatting with Gareth and Jeff in the kitchen, Oscarson was explaining the book of mormon with Laura to Rachel, and it was just really cool. I don't feel like I am describing it properly. But these two are golden. We are going to go to their place like every week and do more service for them. They are both just really nice and easy to talk to. And really interested in the church. We have their number, and any night we are free they said just to come over. They also said they will come to church next week. I am so excited for them. And it really helps that Ken and Toni are getting baptized after church next week...

Yesterday was also so good. We had the funniest sacrament meeting I have ever attended. The first speaker was actually Elder Casey. He is a missionary from Scotland and it was his 3rd day in the mission field yesterday, and he was on an exchange with me in the wrong ward. Oscarson was up in St. Austell doing a baptismal interview. So after he talked, an older lady in the ward gave a talk about the true meaning of Christmas. This was a really good one. It pretty much consisted of her talking about her Christmas' before she joined the church. She told us mostly just about how much fun she had drinking. She told us about her days going to pubs, to nightclubs, told us about her favorite drinks and just about her parties before she was a member. She did manage to tie it all together at the end, and she explained to us that she has now learned you can have fun at christmas without alcohol. I thought this one was hilarious, but I didn't laugh out loud or anything. The next speaker I have no idea what she was talking about. She stood up and started reading from a piece of paper. Really monotone. I got really bored really fast, and for the first time on my mission I may have nodded off for a minute. However, I woke with a start as I heard singing. I have no idea why, but she just seemed to burst into song in the middle of her talk. She started singing this Christmas hymn I had never heard before. After I recovered from the inital shock, I was fighting to hold back my laughter. But it got better. She got really emotional though, and choked up about 4 lines in. As she stood there fighting back tears, a man in the congregation yelled out 'I love this song! Let me help!' This is an older and very eccentric member of the ward. He jumped up from his seat, and literally ran down the aisle up to the front of the chapel and put his arm around the speaker, and they then proceeded to sing an impromptu christmas duet. A few members of the congregation joined in at the end as well. When they finished, people started clapping. Well, needless to say I was just dying. I was laughing almost to the point of tears, luckily I was seated in the back row. I The bishop was trying to keep a straight face, and he told me afterwards that he saw me laughing and was doing everything he could not to make eye contact with me so he wouldn't start laughing as well. The weird thing is, the rest of the ward didn't seem phased by this at all. I'm chuckling even as I write this email.

Aside from all that, things are still going good. We are headed to plymouth again with Ken and Toni, our whole zone is making a christmas missionary movie for our upcoming zone conference and then we are all going out to Nando's. Ken and Toni are goingto be like investigators or something in it. Our zone conference in on thursday. We have to travel all the way up to London on wednesday night and thursday morning. But, we will get to do a session in the temple, which I am pretty excited for. I should also mention, this Eric guy we have been teaching has accepted a baptism date! We have taught him 4 times now, all with Chris Thomas, and on the third teach he agreed to be baptized on Jan 15. The fourth teach was WOW, as he smokes. The ironic thing was that Chris Thomas also smokes, and there he was trying to help Eric to quit. So Chris felt pretty bad about it, and a bit hypocritical. On Sunday he asked for me and Brett Joliffe to give him a priesthood blessing to help quit. So we did, and it is really amazing to see his renewed desire to quit smoking and be baptized. So hopefully all will go well for that. He has been trying to quit for like 10 years, and hopefully this will be just the push that he needs.

The bad news is Elder Palmer and Elder Conkling were transfered. Actually, I might have mentioned that last email. The new guys that transferred in are kind of lame. Luckily Elder Evans is still in Redruth. Oh, and I think I will be doing a two day exchange with Elder Simmons in helston for tuesday and wednesday, which should be pretty fun.

I'll need your skype name and cell phone number that I can call on Christmas Eve.

Thanks for everything,

Love Elder Steed

Dec 5, 2011

Hey,

I'm glad you haven't forgot about me! You both did amazing on that half marathon! I guess you are faster than we gave you credit for.

That is so cool that Riley is an Elder now. I am pretty sure that when he sends his papers in, I will be able to get permission to skype home when you guys open the envelope. As long as I keep behaving myself and stay on the Presidents good side that is. One of the greatest blessings of being an elder, and something I wish I would have done better before I left, is to be able to give priesthood blessings. It is such an amazing experience to be able to give one and really strengthens my testimony of the priesthood. It is really scary to give them, especially for the first time, but I hope Riley gets the opportunity to do that sometime soon.

If you haven't sent the pacakage yet, there is something else you could throw in there. My journal is almost full! I have wrote in my journal every single day, except maybe 2. So I need a new one.. but I want to find another nice one and I haven't seen any here. But other than that, why are you sending me another package? I don't think I need any more gifts. I did actually just send you guys a package yesterday as well. It was pretty expensive to send. It isn't much, but if you guys can wait until Christmas morning to open it that would be cool, because nothing inside is wrapped.

I'm so glad to hear that Alyssas bball team is a good team. Hopefully they can run some fast break offense and use their speed and small size to their advantage.

And no, I was not transferred. I was pretty sure I would be staying here so I wasn't to worried. But I am also pretty sure that now after Christmas I will have to leave Helston.

And here are some missionary stats for you. In my first 16 weeks, we taught an average of 11 teaches per week, with 3 of those being less-active member teaches. But, we have been having some success finding lately, and this last week we taught 17 teaches, with only 2 less active teaches! It was an awesome week, and it seemed like we were just teaching non-stop. So hopefully the work in Helston will continue to gain momentum. And as a missionary, as I'm sure you know, teaching is much more effective and enjoyable than finding. I don't mind finding, but I like teaching people a lot more. And sometimes when we find for hours on end, I find myself just kind of shutting down and just going through the motions. Which is something I am trying to work on. Having the 'faith to find.' But when it is freezing cold and raining, and everyone is just shutting their doors, it is hard not to think about great of a cook our dinner appointment is.

Alright, I will set up a skype account after I'm done emailing and send you the details next week. We have permission to call you guys on Christmas Eve, so I will call then and we can set up a time when we can skype and make sure everything goes smoothly.

Tell Brad and Toni I say hi back... I haven't had a good sushi in a long time. They don't seem to be very into that over here.

We figured out the baptism plans with Ken and Toni. Simmons is dunking Ken, and Oscarson is dunking Toni. I am confirming both of them in church on Christmas morning. I think it might be the greatest Christmas ever.

Love,

Elder Steed

Nov 27, 2011

Haha it really wouldn't be a proper holiday if Uncle Mike didn't get hurt. I'm just glad it wasn't anything worse.

Sounds like an amazing trip though. Except the sea-sickness. I would have been exactly the same. So when you catch a bunch of fish like that, what happens? Do you have to give them to the guy who took you out? I can't imagine you would even want that much fish.

I'm so jealous you guys went to the temple.. I think all the missionaries are going to be allowed to go around Christmas time. So that is pretty exciting. I haven't been since my first day in the mission.

The trip to Plymouth was really fun. The ice rink was pretty strange... it was a weird kidney bean shape, and the ice surface was horrible. I fell once and it cut my hand because it was such rough ice. It was worse than curling rink ice. And the skates were crappy plastic things. But I still had a lot of fun. And Ken and Toni loved it.

I swear, you guys are on some crazy holiday like three times a month. Las Vegas should be fun, try not to gamble to much.

This has been a pretty good week. I think the best part was that we were able to watch this movie called 17 miracles. It was a real movie, all about the Willie Martin handcart companies that crossed the states. It was really good, but pretty sad. It was just nice to finally watch a real movie again, it has been so long since I've seen one.

We also had a couple of new investigators this week. That grandaughter of the less active lady we finally got to teach, and that went really well. We also went and taught this guy whose door we knocked on, and he was really cool. He had read the first 5 chapters of 1 Nephi, and was talking all about them. The crazy thing about this teach, is that Oscarson invited Chris Thomas, the bloke who smokes who has been coming to church for 10 years but isn't baptized, to come on the teach with us. I was really hesitant about that at first, but after seeing how the teach went I know that it was inspired. Chris was actually better than some of the members in teaching the restoration with us, and it turns out this Eric guy (the new investigator) also has a smoking problem.

Elder Oscarsons hair was getting really long. Like really long, just completely out of control. So I borrowed clippers from Ken and Toni and cut his hair last night. I am actually getting pretty good at giving hair cuts.

I had an exchange with Elder Palmer this week, we were in Helston. I'm pretty sure that he is going to be moved at the end of this transfer, so it was our last exchange together. It's kind of sad, he is like my best friend, and he goes home in 6 months, so who knows if I will even see him again. I guess that is the nature of mission friendships though. He has really helped me through a lot of the struggles I have had as a new missionary.

I'm trying to think of what else really happened this week, but I can't think of much. I think it was a pretty ordinary week. We did run into a really cool deaf lady while knocking yesterday, and we are going back to see her wednesday. Hopefully that goes okay.

I hope all is well back home,
Love Elder Steed

Nov 27, 2011

Actually the skating wasn't even my idea.. it was Ken's. I just told them after wards I used to love playing hockey and I love skating. I have some good videos as well, but I am too lazy to figure out how to email them. You can see them in 19 months when I'm home. Okay and although my face might look similar, my belly is much larger.

Toni and Ken are seriously the best. And the ward here is awesome. Penzance is a beautiful city right on the coast... you guys are going to love it so much when you come to pick me up. I might want to not bother going anywhere else except Cornwall.
I'm glad to hear you guys are getting into the Christmas spirit. We have got a bunch of decorations from an investigator named Agnes, and so on Dec. 1 we are going to decorate the flat. I already have all my wrapped presents sitting on the floor under the foam tree, but we might buy like a bigger fake tree and decorate it and the flat really well. And on Dec. 1 we can listen to all the Christmas albums we have bought! So I am excited for December, especially when I get to skype you guys.

I can' t believe Riley is becomming an Elder. He really will be on mission in no time, that is such a crazy thought. I won't see that bloke for such a long time.

I am not suprsied at all to hear how well your paper went. The idea, or framework of the paper you told me about last week, was really really good, so I had no doubt the paper itself would turn out great as well. I'm trying to keep my mind sharp as well... I had some time last night, and tried to draw out the physics behind each of the stones, especially the keystone, in a classic roman arch. (Because everyone always says the BoM is the keystone of our religion). I was trying to find a way to create a really good analogy uses all the forces involved, but I realized there is probably no one else who would be interested in hearing that kind of analogy. But I still thought it was fun.

Noah is a stud. I can totally picture that kid doing a Moses talk. And that just brought back great memories of home, me and him working together at Trico. Those were such good times we had, even though it is just a small thing, its things like that which are my favorite memories.

I hope you continue to adjust to the ward. One thing I am finding is that good friends don't always need to be your same age or your same situation. I'm sure as time goes on you guys will find your niche.

I have had an amazing week. I hope everything is going well back home, and that you don't just sugar coat everything for me.
Love Elder Steed

Nov 20, 2011

Hey

Sounds pretty awesome. I think at the end of these two years I might need a vacation... we will have to do a Mexico trip like that when I get back. Who was it that caught the 30 pounder? Daran actually emailed me last week, I think he was missing you and I didn't realize he was going to be in Mexico with you guys, that is really great though. The biking sounds sweet, but I can't believe you haven't gone surfing yet.

We are so excited that they are getting married on the 17th! And also really cool, they are getting baptized the day after! If I get transfered right before all of this (the transfer date is Dec. 8) I will just be devastated. However, I get along really well with the bishop, and there are quite a few problems in the ward at the moment and he doesn't want to bring anyone new in. So last night he called Pres. Shamo, and also had the Stake Pres. call Pres. Shamo, and he told me he is pretty sure I will be here for at least one more transfer. So I'm really happy about that. I want to spend Christmas here so bad, I have such good friends here and having it here would probably be the next best thing to a normal Christmas with you guys. I would hate to move to a new area and then two weeks later have Christmas with total strangers.

Oh, the Christmas package you guys sent arrived. However, they keep bringing it by at 1130, and because we are never home at that time, I am never here to sign for it. The tax on it was like 20.63 or something. Next year we will have to remember to send it to the mission office.

I am no longer upset about the fact I am in an English speaking mission. It would have been so tough to learn a language. I struggle enough as it is teaching people in English, if I was trying to do so in another language I would be a total mess. I think I have realized this is exactly the place I need to be in, and I honestly love being here in Helston.

We will get the chat thing going one of these weeks. I think I'll always be on about 130 your time.

We have the best p-day ever planned today! We are going up to Plymouth (Helston has about 10,000 people in it, and Plymouth has a couple million) with Ken and Toni in a couple hours, and meeting Elder White and Simmons there (it is about a 1.5 hour drive). Ken is driving us up in his beamer to save us from using our cars miles. We are going to an indoor ice rink and going ice skating! I am really glad I am going to get a chance to ice skate this winter after all, although everyone else says they don't really even know how to skate. If only we could play some hockey... but after skating we are doing some shopping for matching onesies for christmas and then we are going out to eat at a really good resturant called Nandos. It is going to be an awesome day!

Enjoy your time in Mexico,

Love Elder Steed

You didn't let me know about Sean or anything like that I asked about last week... he has just stopped emailing me and I was wondering what his plans were.

Nov 20, 2011

Good Morning,

I hope you guys have fun today with the whole gang! Tell everyone I miss em!

I actually just bought a new hoody last week, but I wouldn't mind some thermal underwear. And a scarf and/or a sweater would really be nice. But I know you just sent the Christmas package, and I can wait till it gets really cold if you want to wait a couple of months to send anything else. Or I could just buy stuff on my card.

Okay, that homework assignment you are doing sounds awesome. It sounds like you picked four amazing books, and I think you could really write an amazing paper based on that. I'm really impressed.

I miss scone fridays. I'm gonna miss about 100 of them in a row, so we will have to be making up for lost time when I get back and have scones everyday. I even miss the drop in center. I didn't use to like doing service projects like that very much... but now I love it.

Have you heard anything about Mike Cooper? How is he doing? What happened with him?

The Steed Christmas' are always so much fun. I am really sad I am going to miss it, but I will at least get a taste of the big skating party today. I don't know if you can read the email I sent to dad, but we are going ice skating today. Actually a really crazy thing happened yesterday. I was eating dinner at a members house and we had one of her friends, and investigator, over as well. I mentioned where in Canada I was from, and she asked me if I knew any Bauldries. I said ya, and she asked if I knew a mark Bauldrie. I said no, but I did know a Ryan and a Nathan. So it turns out, Nathans dad, Mark, served here in Penzance in like 1978. Sis Maddern, or Mo as we call her, was really good friends with him. Mo had a picture from Nathan and Whitneys wedding! I thought it was so cool, such a small world.

I actually havent even got your Christmas package yet. They keep trying to deliver it but keep missing me. It will be like 20 quid. I'm excited to set up a tree! That is too bad about Riley... especially the saturday night hockey. I think it is pretty sweet that he is still keeping that tradition alive, but lame that he isn't making everyone pay. I did sometimes feel guilty about always bugging people who never payed for the money, but I think you just have to do it. I miss hockey... no one here knows anything about it.

So how come Lolo (lauren) is coming back? And I just realized, you never seem to answer any of the questions I ask in my emails. Like last week I asked why you were worried about me when I first left, and also I asked how Tyler Skinner is doing because you said Janae is worried about him. I think I asked a few more things as well...

I had two pieces of toast with nutella for breakfast. Thats what I have everyday now.

It is really going to be so fun at the end of my mission when you guys come pick me up and we can go tour around all the places I've been in. Especially Helston. You will love to meet all these people.

This has been a really good week for us. A crazy week even. The work here in Helston is lighting on fire. In my four months, we haven't had much success outside of Ken and Toni. But the last two weeks, we have picked up 5 new investigators and we have like maybe 3 or 4 more that will probably be investigators this week. We had 6 people at church yesterday! We are getting lots of chances to serve people, things just seem to be looking up right now. Early in the week, we were asked by our High Priest group leader (Eric, one of my really good friends, he is the one who bought me my cornish tie) to go help a less active lady who is REALLY struggling. So we helped her clean her garage, and we are going back this week. She is still amazingly vibrant, and happy and full of life, and really mobile and witty for a 90 year old. I really did just enjoy chatting with her afterwards, we were able to have some good laughs even in this rough time in her life. Other than that, everything has been really good. We managed to teach a refferal we got from the bishop, and it went amazing! We taught him about the restoration and BoM, and he was really receptive to it and open to finding out the truth for himself. He even offered a kneeling prayer with us at the end. We are going back wednesday to show him the joseph smith movie. His wife is currently investigating the j-dubs (jehovas witnesses) but we will see what we can do about that. We also are starting this week to teach a grand-daughter of a less active lady. I think I might have mentioned her before, but she is only 17 and kind of a rebellious kid, and had a crush on a previous missionary. So I don't really know her motives yet, but she claims she wants to take the discussions and be baptized. She told me the only reason she didn't when she last took the discussions is because she had a boyfriend who was opposed to it all. But now that is over. So we will see.

On saturday we had like an hour to kill before some teaching appointments, so we just went and knocked a road me and Simmons had felt good about like a month ago. It was incredible! It seemed like everyone was really receptive and just nice, we gave out a bunch of Boms and pamphlets, and we booked four return appointments for this week, and all 4 of them were families! I don't know if that even sounds amazing to you, but I have never had anywhere close to that much sucess in knocking doors before.

Then at church yesterday, a lady just walked in. She was a tall, young african lady, and because one of our less actives is a tall young african lady, I figured it was probably just her and so I just introduced myself and didn't really talk with her when she first came in. Then as I am up on the stage after Elder's quorum, the relief society president comes flying out of the hallway and grabs me and tells me I need to get my butt over to the front doors. Turns out this african lady has never been to our church before. Her friend who usually goes to the Redruth ward was going to meet her here for church, but for whatever reason her friend never came. So this lady just ended up at our church all by herself. So we grabbed a couple members and went and taught her about the restoration in gospel principles. Actually we also had Chris in there, our 10 year investigator, and he was even helping to teach the restoration story, which was really weird. This lady, whose name is Friskani, was really cool. She normally goes to a born again church in Truro. And, as it turns out, the same church Ken and Toni used to go to! So when Ken and Toni rolled in for sacrament meeting, they were all like What the heck? They apparently knew each other from that church, and started talking. Friskani has a 4 year uni degree in buisness administration, but can't seem to get ajob with that so she just does some part time modelling jobs. She is really smart, and knows the bible really well. But she loved the idea of the restoration, and the priesthood, and stayed for all three hours. The ward really made her feel welcome. It was just crazy. She said she will come back to our church, and we are going to teach her again on Wednesday. She has some serious marriage problems though... some really weird stuff, but has two young kids.

Then after church and eating with Mo, we went and stopped by a refferal we got. We got the refferal from the less active grandma of the 17 year old I mentioned earlier. Apparently this lady who cuts her hair every week has shown a lot of interest in the church. I guess they just talk about it as she cuts her hair. And the hairdresser, whose name is Paige, is going to New Zealand in a month to live with her sister, who is lds, and whose husband is in the bishopric there, and wants to learn more about the church before she goes. So we knock on the door of the house, and this big, tough looking bald guy opens it. He just eyes us down looking angry for an awkward amount of time, then just smiles and says; Come in! I was really taken aback, we hadn't even spoken to him. So we went in and introduced ourselves. Turns out Paige, the daughter, is 18 and lives with her parents. Her mom used to be a member, but got exed when she moved in with her non-member husband like 30 years ago before they were married. So they were really cool and nice, and knew a lot about the church. Although Paige knew like literally nothing. She didn't even know who Moses was. But we had such a good time with them, we just seemed to hit it off with them right away and were having a good conversation and laughs. They invited us back next sunday, we shared a really great verse from the BoM with them, and they aren't opposed in anyway to the church. We are going to try to teach Paige about the church, and hopefully dunk her before she leaves. But there really isn't much time to.. so we will see what happens.

It has been a crazy week. Sorry I wrote so much.

Thanks for everything, enjoy this precious time without Joel,

Love Elder Steed

Nov 13, 2011

Ya we can skype on Christmas day. I also am going to see if we can skype when Riley gets his mission call. How is that going by the way?

I also just wanted to mention that Toni made us Mom's parmesan chicken this week. Me and Simmons did an exchange, and went to teach Ken and Toni and have dinner with them, but we didn't tell them it would be simmons coming. They were really suprised and excited and we had an awesome night. Ken had a really tough night at work the night before, he got spat on and a couple of guys jumped him and he is just really sick of his job.

I also just remembered that in the Christmas spirit, and as a service project, we are going to be putting up Christmas lights for an older lady in the ward. I'm really excited about that, she is really cool.

Oh, and we had a really good meeting in Reading this week. The area 70, a general authority, came to Reading on thursday so we did the 7 hour drive down to hear him speak. Actually, just a side note, on the way down one of the sisters we were travelling got really sick and I had the chance to give her a blessing. It still scares me half to death to be asked to give blessings, but that was my second one now and I am always amazed to see the power of priesthood blessings. But Elder Wright was amazing. He was a great speaker, and I gained a lot from this one. We had another q and a session with him, like we did with Bednar, and everyone was asking really lame questions that I could have answered. So I got sick of it, and near the end I asked one about the role of the spirit in goal setting and he spent like 20 minutes answering it and really just answered all my questions about it. So I really enjoyed being able to have some of my concerns about that get resolved. I was in the front row and he was just like standing beside me talking to me. It was pretty cool.

I should be on the same time next week, ifyou get a chance to be up to chat.

Love Elder Steed

On Mon, Nov 14, 2011 at 9:49 AM, Tanner Steed <tanner.steed@myldsmail.net> wrote:

I might as well respond to your other email while I wait. As you mentioned seabiscuit, I just though about a movie I get to watch soon. We are having a ward fireside where we will be watching the movie called 17 miracles. Its about the handcart companies crossing the plains. I'm so excited to watch a proper movie! Also, we might be allowed to watch Its a wonderful life on Christmas day. I've never seen it, but everyone says it is really good.

You should totally knit me a toque for christams. Although no one here or even any of my companions have heard the word toque. They all call them beanies.

Actually mom didn't tell me about Riley... that is really too bad. He is doing design at SAIT? That kind of sounds lame to be honest. What is Hayden and Dan doing? And why did he decide to come back? I guess he must not be enjoying it that much... It's probably hard to fit into a YSA ward like that when you are pre-mission.

That is really cool to hear about what you are doing with Sean. Mom said you took him to a flames game as well, has he talked with you at all about plans for a mission? And I'm sure him and Jordan will love doing floor hockey. Haha you need to get one of thost big girls? When I get back I better still have my spot on the team though! I'm gonna come home and you are going to be better friends with sean than I am.

Teaching gospel principles is pretty good usually. I'm actually kind of bad, I just go in a wing it every week. But we get really good members to come in the class with us and they help a lot.

I'll let you know about the VAT for the Christmas package. Also, I might need to get some dry cleaning done this week, which costs maybe 15 pounds. Elder Oscarson I think would enjoy anything really, even if it is small just so that he has something nice to open on Christmas. I am learning a lot from him. He really likes old stuff, like any sort of old church films or music or talks or any MOTAB stuff he just loves.

Just thinking about what you said about that Cooper bloke, I think that is a realization I am coming to as well. The first few weeks or even months of my mission I was really uptight about everything, and just stiff and even a little bit awkward. I just wasn't being myself. I think it also makes it tough when you are with your trainer who has a really dominant personality (as do I...). But as I've gone on, I've tried to find the balance between being serious and still having fun. I think I am doing a lot better with that now. I have a lot of fun with the members and investigators, but I know when the time is to be serious as well. I think I just realized a missionary doesn't have to be stiff all the time, and that if you don't have some fun on your mission you won't enjoy it and you will go crazy. So things are starting to get easier and easier, I am enjoying serving here pretty much every day now. And even though time still seems to be passing really slowly, I don't really mind.

Have fun in Mexico! I actually still have the scar on my lip from that impromptu surgery,

Love Elder Steed

Nov 13, 2011

Sounds like a good weekend. I miss those rolls Grandma phillips makes. She actually sent me a letter this week in the mail. If you talk to her, tell her I really appreciated the letter and the 20 quid! Tell her I used it to buy some much needed new clothing. They actually also do remembrance day here, but we didn't go to a service or anything for it. I really wanted to though.

Ethnic novels and literature? That sounds like a ridiculous assignement. The only novel that popped into my head is Island of the blue dolphins. Oh, and 'Keeper of the isis (or maybe iris??) light' or something like that. Both of those probably fight into that category.

That sounds like the perfect calling for you. In our last ward, I remember all the yw loved you, and so I'm sure it will be the same here. You're a great teacher, and you are great with the girls. The added bonus of keeping an eye on Alyssa is always nice as well.
I loved Christmas as Uncle Mikes! Im sad I'll miss that, and I don't think we are going to have any decorations or even a tree to set up. Maybe I'll see if I can find someone who will let me borrow some, because we need those things for it to be proper christmas. I did just buy the Michael Buble Christmas album, and Oscarson bought some other oldies Christmas collection, so I am pretty excited to start listening to that music. Ya I didn't know about the 50 pound VAT or anything like that until today when I got on my emails. Hopefully they don't charge me too much.

I'm really excited to SKype all you guys, and to see Noahs suprise! You will have to make sure to get me all the right numbers and stuff.

Ya a lot of missionaries who leave with girlfriends get dear john'ed. Actually, pretty much all of them do. And it just destroys some of them. They go out of commission for like weeks or months. And even if they keep working, their heart just isn't in it for a while. So yes, it may have not been my own wisdom, but it is good that no girls would date me before my mission.

What is Aunt Janae worried about Tyler for?

And what is all this about you being worried about me the first month? Worried about what?

Thats awesome to hear about Jackson and his wrestling. Keep me posted on how that is going. He needs to find that fire. Tell him to think of Iginla and how good Iggy plays when he gets mad. I think Jack could be really good at wrestling. A missionary here who I am pretty good friends with won his state univesity wrestling championship just before he left on his mission. He said he would go to school 2 hours early and stay one hour late every day to train.

It was a great week for miracles, but the thing with Kathy may not pan out. I don't want to say too much about it though, because there is still hope things will work out.

Remember that I love you guys as well,

I'm excited to hear about your missionary expereinces you are going to have soon...

Love Elder Steed

Nov 6, 2011

Hello my mom,

It has been a good week. It seemed to just fly by, whereas most weeks seem to pass by really slowly. Thanks for sending the package! I hope you didn't spend too much on it... I don't know if I will be able to resist the temptation! I am going to try not to even read the label on the side of the box, so I have a good suprise on Christmas. My companion actually said he isn't really expecting anything.

Elder Oscarson is great. He is a lot different than Elder Simmons though. We get along really well, and we both like to work hard so things are really good so far. He loves movies, especially the old classics. So we talk a lot about his favorite movies and music. Back home we wouldn't have had like anything in common, but over here we are really good friends. I think that is like what dad was saying, about having a common interest. Elder Simmons is coming back to do an exchange on Tuesday though! We are going to go teach Ken and Toni, and suprise them!

That sounds like a great trip in Montana. It was really cool to hear about your weekend then about Dad and the boy's weekend, sounds like you both had a lot of fun. And actually it does usually snow like once a year here, and when it does the whole country just shuts down. Buses stop running, no one drives their cars, schools close, people here just have no idea how to drive on snowy/icy roads. They would all think you are crazy driving through a mountain pass with the road just covered in snow and ice. Actually, even I think it is a little bit crazy.

You bought yourself a camera like mine for Christmas, and you are already using it? Pretty early Christmas present...

Of course I am using my camera! I have taken like over 300 photos. The problem is that I don't have a cord for it to connect it to the computer, so to send photos I have to take my memory card out and put it in Elder Oscarsons camera and then use his cord. But I'll make sure to do that and send some photos today.

I'm glad school is still going good. Keep up the hard work! Stats is actually pretty tough.. it starts out really easy but the end is tricky. At least my stats class was.
I actually love the Old Testament. If I am really tired one morning during personal study, I will sometimes go to the Old Testament for a treat. I love just reading all the crazy stories in there, especially about David and Saul and all around that time.

Even if Riley doesn't figure out stuyding before his mission, he will on his mission for sure. What does he do with all his free time? Hopefully he doesn't just game all the time. He didn't feel like filling out the paper work of a police check? It is really easy, and a lifeguard is a WAY better job than a grocery store. Hopefully he figures things out soon enough. Is he starting on his papers any time soon?

I love the church in Eureka. And I really do love the ward here as well... but it is way different than anything I have ever known before. They call this church a worldwide church, they say it is the same everywhere you go, but that might not apply to Cornwall. Everyone is this ward is just a character, and there is always some crazy things going on in the ward. The ward is actually going through some really tough times. I met with the Bishop this week to discuss some things going on in the ward, and I realized one of the main reasons I think that we are here is to help strengthen this ward. Bishop has been talking to Pres. Shamo and said he will try to make sure we are here into the new year.

Ken and Toni getting baptized will be such a boost to this ward. The ward is helping them so much with their marriage. They are going over for dinner, or just to hang out, with members of the ward at least once a week. Some of their best friends are in the ward now. We have set a tentative date of Dec. 3 for their wedding, and then Dec. 4 for their baptism. We keep having to push it back, but we hope this will be the one. There is just so much you don't anticipate when you plan for a wedding, and it seems something always is coming up that causes delays. We are trying to just stay out of it as much as we can, and let them do their wedding when and how they want to. There is nothing I want more than to push them towards baptism, but I realized it isn't really my place to be trying to tell them how to do their wedding.

We also have a new lady with a baptism date, but I'll mention that more in Dad's email.
I love you guys, thanks for everything,

Elder Steed

Nov 6, 2011

Hey,

We ended up doing a bunch of street contacting last night and were walking around town for 2 hours, between potential investigators houses and along the high street and stuff. I was exhausted after just that, but I've started to exercise more in the mornings now.
Haha you forgot it was fast sunday? Sounds like quite the Sunday adventure. We fasted yesterday, and broke the fast with the Joliffes. The Joliffes and the Morris' are like my best friends here. We had a huge sunday dinner, and maybe the best dinner I have had here. I had thirds it was so good. Brett Joliffe is an RM and comes on teaches with us all the time. He actually is helping Ken and Toni a lot financially with their wedding, and I promised I would buy their family chinese food (to show how grateful i am for all his help). So that will be on the VISA if thats alright? Oh, and another really cool thing is both Ken and Toni fasted this week.

I'm so glad Jackson is doing so well. That kid is going to be ripped when I get back if he keeps up that lifestyle. Good for him, I need to follow his example. And Noah is a whiz. I love getting his emails, I am amazed he can type and spell so well. Those SDS's were brutal. Hopefully doing the AP english will count towards a university class if she does it in grade 12. I'm sure Alyssa will make the bball team. She just needs to start talking to Zelez and let him know she is a Steed. I think he really liked me and Riley.
We had a pretty crazy week this week.

Me and Brett Joliffe and Paul Morris did a little bit of an initiation thing for Oscarson this week. We had an Elder's quorum presidency meeting, and Paul offered the opening prayer and in the middle started talking in Irish instead of English. Brett told him he was talking in tounges again, and I said it sounded like English to me. We told Oscarson it happens quite a bit, and he was just so confused. Then we started singing primary songs and doing all the actions becasue we said it helps us relax after a hard day of work. He was going along with it, but is just a really guillible guy I think.

We also got to go eat at our Landlords house this week. We have a great realationship with him, and because his wife just had surgery on her wrist we went over there an hour before dinner to help them prepare dinner. Oscarson peeled a bunch of apples and I cooked the whole meal. It was a lot of fun, it was this really nice fish and egg rice dish.

We had a few miracles this week... do you remember me talking about Chris Thomas? He is the guy who has been investigating the church for 10 years and the only reason he won't get baptized is that he can't quit smoking. Although Elder Oscarson is all fired up, and is convinced we are going to be able to help him quit smoking and baptize him this transfer. I had the same faith when I first got to this area. It is kind of sad that I have given up on ever baptizing him. Hopefully Oscarsons faith will be enough to carry us. But anyways, the miracle is that we went to teach him on wednesday and he brought along this guy named Luke. Luke was baptized a year ago, but then had some family opposition and stopped coming to church. He didn't tell anyone, or give anyone his number or address, so he was just completely lost. But it turns out Chris is friends with him, and Christ wants to get him active in the church again. So he invited him over when we went and we were able to get him number and address, and teach him and invite him back to church. It was the first contact he had with the church in almost a year. Chris was literally the only link that he had. We are meeting with him again next week. It was amazing to see Chris, an investigator, doing missionary work. His problem is he already sees himself as a member of the church. And he pretty much is, we just need to dunk him. I just wish more members would be as active in doing missionary work as he is.

The big miracle of the week though is that we have another person who has accepted a baptismal date! This is a pretty crazy story... About a month ago when it was me and Simmons, we were cleaning the flat. I found this old folded up scrap piece of paper, and opened it up and there were like 6 or 7 names on it. I was about to throw it away, but 2 of the names, which had a phone number and the word 'seeker' beside them, stuck out to me so I wrote them down in my daily planner. About 5 days ago, we were doing some finding and I was leafing through my planner and saw one of the peoples names, Kathy. I felt like we should call her, so Oscarson called her and she didn't really sound happy or interested but she said we could come over on saturday if we wanted to. So we did. She let us in, she was a really nice lady, and we started talking about her. Turns out she met Elder Tanner over a year ago on a bus. He talked with her, and she gave him his number but Elder Tanner was never able to go see her because they didn't have a car here back then and she lives in this small village by Penzance that is really tough to get to without a car. She told us she has a drinking problem, and that her whole life is just a mess right now. She said the last week she had been praying everyday that Jesus would help her, that he would be able to show her a way to make a huge change in her life and get her life back on track. And she said that as soon as we called she knew we were the answer to that prayer. At this point we were just blown away. We told her about how we ended up finding her number, and started to teach her about the gospel of Jesus Christ (faith, repentance, baptism, holy ghost, endure to the end). We told her how through baptism we recieve a remission of sins, and that we get a clean slate. She told us immediatly she knew what we were saying was true, and that she wanted to be baptized, that this was the big change she had been praying for. We extended the date of Dec. 17, and she said she will be baptized then! It was such a miracle. We talked to our ward mission leader, and he said he will give her a lift to church next week. We have been trying to hard to find new people to teach and more baptism dates, and the Lord provided a way!

I just wanted to share that with you guys, Thanks for all your prayers and support,

Love Elder Steed