The Old Fashioned Way

Family,

Christmas is coming the Goose is getting fat! And so am I being back in a car.... But don't worry I'm making some good new years goals to get nice and trim before I come home! Well I guess I'll just tell you how my week was.

It all started with an exchange to a place called Boston. This exchange just happened to be with an Elder by the name of Mordue, who just happens to live in Farmington Utah. As it just so happens he

went to the great school of Viewmont. He is a year younger than me and we never really saw each other at school, but we have loads of friends in common! Plus he went to Viewmont which is just awesome. There was only one other missionary from Viewmont in the mission but he went home ages ago. It was a pretty rocking exchange and we had loads of fun. Seeing as Boston is a large area like Aberystwyth, we had quite a bit of driving time which meant that we got to talk about the good old days. It was unbelievably nice to talk to someone who basically lived the same life as me. We both agreed that when you are in Utah you don't realize or appreciate how similar everyone is, ha ha. We ended up having to do a two night exchange cause things came up in Nottingham that prevented Elder Shaw from picking me up after just one day, but I didn't complain.

 Elder Stout, Shaw, me and Elder Mordue

This is all of our district leaders and the sister training leaders.

The next item of business was my first Zone Meeting. Well I guess it wasn't my first one cause I've been to about 18 but it was the first one that I was running. Things went really smoothly and the spirit was really strong. I wasn't too nervous, but a bit jittery as it got closer. I am just glad that it is over. We also have transfers this week. It came a week early because of Christmas, but I don't think that me or Elder Shaw will be leaving. But we will see what happens tonight.

Zone meeting, "Christmas Initiative"  

We had an amazing miracle that happened this week and I want to tell you about it.  Well we were unsure of where to go tracting so we decided to ask the Lord. We both got the same post code which was great and pretty specific, and then we picked five streets out of that post code that impressed us. We then decided to go and pray separately about the streets and pick three that we would go and tract. We went to separate rooms and prayed and came back together, but only had two of the same streets. So we took the other two that were potentials and prayed again. We came up with the same street after that. We then decided to pray about one of those streets that we could stop by that night. Well after receiving our answer we went out and later that night we went to the street. Pretty soon into tracting we found a young couple who gave us there number and invited us back, which was

cool. But even cooler was the last house that we knocked. A girl named Ashley answered and said she lived there with her Mom and her brother. She invited us back and yesterday we got to teach her. It was probably the best first lesson I have ever had and at the end she accepted the invitation to be baptized on a specific date! It was crazy. The spirit was super strong and she even admitted and recognized that she was feeling the spirit. It is a small and simple thing, but we are very grateful to the Lord for guiding us to her. I love this whole miracle thing!

We are with the family whose son will be baptized soon!

So just to put Moms worrying heart at ease I got my Christmas package this week! And don't worry I didn't open it, it is just sitting underneath our Christmas tree. Man that thing is heavy! But thank you

for sending it. In other news this week I had a really nice dinner that is worth mentioning. There is a member here in Nottingham that is from American and she lived a lot of her life in Texas. Well to make a long story short she made us some Tex-Mex for dinner. Enchiladas, guacamole and homemade salsa. She even made that chicken enchilada casserole that mom makes! Anyway is was by far the best Mexican that I have had in England and I am even more excited for Mexican food when I come home. 

Utah is playing BYU!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! AHHHHHHH I Can't believe I am missing it!! And of course I will be cheering for Utah! I haven't gone to BYU yet! There is still time for me to change my mind.....

Can I just say to the world that my little sister it a Hottie! Dang Girl!! But that boy on the other hand.... Did anyone tell him that he needs a haircut?? Cause I was just thinking he looked like Sunshine from Remember the Titians....  Just a little Fruit Cake, ha ha. I remember my first dance, oh those were some good times.

Me as Ironman

I don't know exactly what time I will be skyping but it should be around 7:00 my time which would be about mid-day for you guys. I will let you know for sure next week..

I love you all and hope that you have a great week!!

Love,

Elder Kmetzsch

The Power of Prayer

Family,

Faith Proceeds the Miracle, and let me tell you sometimes it takes a lot of faith and a really hard week to see a miracle. The week was normal enough. On p-day we had a rocking time with the district seeing Wayne Manor and pretending we were Batman, well maybe that was just me. But it was a great day. Tuesday I went on exchange to an area called Lincoln. One of the best and coolest things about being a Zone Leader is that you get to go on exchanges with all of the District Leaders in your zone. Can I just tell you that we have four of the best District Leaders in the mission and I am so glad that I get to go on exchange with them.

The First exchange that I did was with Elder Nogueroles. He is the District Leader in the Lincoln district and  man was it a fun exchange. We were wandering  around Lincoln street contacting and we happened upon a hill called Steep Hill, and let me tell you this hill was crazy, it blew my mind. But anyway halfway up steep hill we found the Strait and Narrow pub hahaha Cracks me up that there is a pub named, "The Strait and Narrow" See attached picture for a good laugh. After we found the Strait and Narrow we happened upon the biggest cathedral that I have ever seen. Pictures aren't very good cause it wasn't p-day so I just snapped a quick photo. But this thing was like bigger than the Salt Lake Temple. It was a crazy fun day and just an all around good time. 

The Second exchange that I went on was with our District leader in Nottingham, Elder Shumway. Man, oh man I Love Elder Shumway. He has a heart of Gold and I just felt like he was teaching me the whole time, which he really was. We had a great learning experience together of just stopping right in the middle of planning and asking the Lord where he wanted to schedule that stop by and both got the same answer. Funny enough the next day worked out nearly perfect and we were able to see most of the people we planned on stopping by. It is a simple thing but I think we both learned a great lesson. I love Elder Shumway. 

Well me and Elder Shaw saw an amazing miracle this last Sunday. We haven't had a lot of success this week and we were just really confused. We are taking Presidents training and really trying to find different ways of finding but just nothing was working. People weren't showing up for appointments and investigators were dropping us left and right. Saturday night we were just down and we needed a miracle. We had nobody committed to come to church and that is just not good. So we prayed and prayed mightily that the Lord would provide an investigator at church for us. So Sunday morning rolls around and we are at church early cause well we are missionaries. And the ward mission leader comes up to us to tell us some exciting news. Apparently one of the recent converts of just 6 months wants her 9 year old son to get baptized and she wants the baptism to be in January! We arranged so that we can start teaching him and hopefully his non member father the lessons. What a miracle! Out of nowhere we get a new investigator, one investigator at church and a new baptismal date. It really was an amazing and faith building experience to have an ernest prayer answered so quickly. 

We also did a District Service project this week. We helped clean out the basement of a less active members home. Man that place was nasty.... Like everything has just deteriorated into nothing and there was just a bunch of bits of furniture mold and dirt with some scattered bits of glass and wood. It was a fun time with the whole district and we banded closer. It was a good time.

I'm glad to hear that all is well. I had my first MLC (mission leadership council) this week. It was really cool to be with all the zone leaders and president and to receive the training that I am going to have to give to My zone. But it was great to see some good friends. 

Hope you all have a great week. Happy Birthday Ems!!! 

Love,

Elder Kmetzsch 

A Week of Thanksgiving

Family,

What a week. It was full of many miracles and a lot of craziness and tiredness. We have been relentlessly trying to find new investigators and pick up where the last Elders left off. My entire mission the main method of finding has been street contacting, really the only method of finding. President Leppard is really trying to expand the missions methods to a more thought out and planned way of finding. We have been having loads of training on how we can find in different ways. The training is really pointless if you don't apply it, so me and Elder Shaw have been really trying to use these different methods. We have even gotten tight with the family history consultants in the ward and went and did some family history with them. Turns out family history is supposedly one of Britons favourite pass times, and the whole area is making a big push with it. Besides family history we have also tried our hand with some tracting. We actually saw a really cool miracle.

Me and Elder Shaw

Wayne Manor is in Nottingham

So my whole mission I have done relatively little in the way of tracting and I have never seen any success doing it. I have never had a return appointment and never been let in. So we were out tracting and we had knocked on ever door down this one street and no one had even let us finish introducing ourselves. I was just thinking to myself, this is a flippin waste of time. We should be out talking to people in the city center thats what I am much better at. Well we came to the last house, as it always does, and a man opened the door. We explained who we were and he told us he recently started being really active in his church and had a renewed faith in Jesus Christ. He let us in for a warm drink cause it was dang cold!! We had a wonderful conversation about his family, he has a wife and two kids by the way. We got to talk about the prophet and apostles and leave a Book of Mormon with him. He invited us back for dinner sometime cause he was just really impressed by what we do. Man I was buzzing! He was a normal English guy in his 50's that has a normal family. It blows my Mind. God is good you guys, God is good.

I AM THE BATMAN!!!!

Along with our other methods we have been really focusing on getting to know the ward, especially the auxiliaries and ward council. I think it is really starting to work because we have a dinner appointment for almost every night this week! Speaking of Dinner, Thanksgiving was a wonderful and very normal day. The day started with a little miracle of God just letting me know that he loved me. So I totally spaced buying a grapefruit on Wednesday night and I was like, "dang it." But I woke up in the morning and I looked in the fridge and since we whitewashed in, the other Elders had left behind quite a bit of food. I hadn't looked through all the fruit and when I did, there just happened to be one grapefruit in a plastic bag that I thought was an orange. So I had grapefruit for breakfast. Then that night we had a very lovely English Thanksgiving dinner, complete with stuffing and cranberry sauce! It was an awesome family as well, so we laughed and played some games. Then yesterday to top it all off we had dinner with a family and for dessert they brought out a pumpkin pie!! Man, oh man was that a delicious pumpkin pie. I am very grateful for the amazing members of the Nottingham 1st ward!

Thanksgiving was good here, but it will just never be as good as home. I can't wait to be there next year and for all you cousins out there you'd better be there too! Ha ha, I was telling everybody about all of our fun family traditions. But it was great to be able to share that with others and to help them feel the true spirit of Thanksgiving. I hope Emma and Brig watched the Parade and the Dog show, ha ha. Who was the overall Winner??

We also got to put up some Christmas Decorations. I will send you guys the video of us putting up the tree! It was a great week full of a lot of work, but a lot of Miracles.

Love you all,

Elder Kmetzsch