Happy Birthday to the new District Leader!

Ever feel buried under past mistakes?

http://www.mormonchannel.org/youth-videos?v=1795507066001

Through Christ's atonement we can all be reclaimed.

We've all made mistakes in the past. Even long after the fact we often have the temptation to go back and dig up old garbage. Through the atonement and mercy of Christ we can move beyond the person we were in the past to become the person God intends for us to be.

"...though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool." -- Isaiah 1:18

My destroyed shoes, filled with hot glue, so they last a bit longer!

This week was a bit of a slower week, we had a lot of appointments cancel, and the backups we had were all knocking on doors, so we had a lot of knocking this week! We had some good success, but a lot of the week was enduring rather than enjoying, but it was still fun.

We found a nice young family last week, that we taught this week, and have an appointment for this upcoming week! They are really cool, and their cousin Nikita just got baptized Saturday, so they already know a bit, and are excited to learn about it for themselves!

Oh, and I don't know if you realize, but Squash over here is not a vegetable, but it is juice concentrate that you mix with water to make juice! And biscuits of course are cookies. So same name, but not even near the same thing! LOL

We have the family history center in our chapel here, so we actually get to use nicer computers this week! WOOOH! Afton will be missed, I really enjoyed seeing her each week when we went over to give her the sacrament, she was a funny old lady. Send the Kaltschmidt's my love! I am getting a new companion so I hope he will enjoy doing the video journals as much as Elder Smith! Elder Smith is moving, but we don't know where yet! We will find out later today. Elder Copper is leaving the district and I will be the District Leader here.

I love you guys, and thanks for the weird kitten card! (Elder Brown turns 20 on Tuesday)

 Filipino food!

Elder Smith and Elder Brown

 Elder Smith

Bestest Creation!

Bought some new cloths in England.

This week went by extremely fast, but it was very successful. Elder Cooper and I worked my area here on exchange on Tuesday. We had a good day, and were able to learn from one another which was great. We had a lot of success and saw some miracles, which uplifted us and taught us. I really enjoyed it! All the people we taught were girls. 12-20 year olds. Some of them wanted us to go clubbing with them. Not going to work because of several reasons.One of these girls we taught later on in the week and seems pretty interested. The rest of the week was just as successful as well. We had some really good sit down teaches, and also found many new people to work with. T__ is progressing very well, but was quite ill this weekend and wasn't able to come to church. She is reading a lot and praying as well. We are hoping to get her to the visitors center at the temple this week, and she is excited to go! We had six less active members come for church this week, which was awesome! We have quite a few of them who are really ready to come back fully, and we have been able to help them and watch them progress which has been really cool. We are hoping to get a few more baptismal dates here, and almost got another one on Sunday, but he is not comfortable with a date yet. He said he would be baptized as soon as he knows it is all true, and he has committed to come to church, read and pray, and is going to be meeting with us weekly, which is great! So as you can see, we DO work here! All of the fun happens after planning and writing in our journals. We put our priorities on the most important things! The best ones usually happen on P-day though!

Sunday we were riding home with the bishop to his house to eat lunch when we got hit from behind by a guy that's foot slipped off the break. That was interesting. The bishop got out of the car to see if they were ok. We were all fine.

As for the cake, I am surprised none of you thought the kool aide was a good idea! It was perfect! Did you see how it turned out!? The kool-aide helped out with the appearance as well as taste! I attached a photo for you guys that just shows you how good that cake was! The second wasn't as good, because it was orange kool aide instead of cherry, but it still tasted great! 

Chocolate Orange Kool-Aide Upside Down Cake

Created by Elder Brown and Elder Smith 

Chocolate Orange Kool-Aide Upside Down Cake

Milk chocolate digestive

caramel wafers ( kind of like a giant kit-kat, but more caramely)

Nougat pillows

orange kool-aide

Chocolate mini-rolls

Jaffa Cakes (one of the few unique and delicious things in Britain! The taste a lot like the orange stick things that Dad always gets at Christmas time, but they have a muffin like base)

Peaches

Peanut butter mix-Chunky Peanut butter, hot chocolate mix, brown sugar, milk

Almonds

Vanilla extract

white chocolate pieces

cinnamon

Chocolate Cherry Kool- Aide Upside Down Cake (This is the better recipe)

Milk Chocolate Digestive Biscuits (American replacement would be some sort of graham cracker with one side covered in chocolate)

Custard creams (Basically a vanilla Oreo style cookie)

Chocolate mini-rolls ( I don't know what you would find over there, but it basically is a mini Swiss roll, kinda like those chocolate Twinkie things)

Cherry kool-aide

Bannoffe pie candy stick (you wont find one of these over there, but it is banana and toffee flavor)

All Butter Fudge (probably can find something similar over there, should be called the same thing)

Ginger Biscuits (these are nasty German things and I wouldn't recommend putting them in there, they didn't really change anything)

Apples (that's pretty easy to find)

Peanut butter mix-chunky peanut butter, brown sugar, milk, weather's original ( all easy to find over there)

Almonds ( once again easy)

Marshmallow (these are harder to get over here than there, you could even use the marshmallow puff stuff)

Cinnamon

Vanilla extract

Nougat pillows (basically some sort of chocolate filled cereal, I'm sure there are all sort of possible replacement over there)

This cake is like the gospel, you won't know if it is good or not, unless you try it! That cake was like my bestest creation!  We bought some KFC on my year mark and the stamp said we bought it the next day so some how I traveled in time. ha! ha! This was quite funny!

Time flies on the mission!!!! The more I think about it, the more blown my mind becomes!!! It does not feel like it has been a year!!!! I remember how fast last school year went, and when I think about that it scares me at how soon I will be leaving the mission! The time really is short!

Hope you guys have a great week! I love you more than all the kool-aide in the whole world!

We stop by some peoples place and they told us to come back in one hour so we did but they were not there so we left this card with this scripture on it. 

 I don't even know what the giant steel ball is, but it was cool!

The sign on the door says, 

Village lock up. 

This grade II listed building was last used for custodial purposes since 1842.

The stir fry was of my own invention, and was one of the best things I have ever made, I would suggest it as a meal to anyone! (cinnamon, ginger, soy sauce, oyster sauce, chicken, onions, bell pepper, sweet chilli sauce, pineapple.)

How sad is this?

One year mark!

 http://www.mormon.org.uk/yvette

Does Structure In Life Constrain You?
As we have faith we are able to find freedom in structure.
Yvette is a math teacher and she believes that her faith helped her have structure in her life that brought a greater amount of freedom.  Her life has not been easy but through those challenges she has learned that there is no 'cookie-cutter' person.  No matter what type of person you are faith will help you accomplish great things.  Through Yvette's faith she won the Presidential Award for Excellence in Mathematics and Science Teaching.  What has your faith led you too achieve?

"For behold, I am God; and I am a God of miracles; and I will show unto the world that I am the same yesterday, today, and forever; and I work not among the children of men save it be according to their faith."  -2 Nephi 27:23

 

 

We went on exchange with the Zone Leaders, so that Elder Herrod could drive me to my appointment in Woking. That was fun! Our year mark, both of us! We played basketball in Welling, London with loads of african kids. My health is fine, I just need more fluids than most people, but Dr Jaques gave me the OK for any physical activity of any kind. I have been downign water as often as possible, and it is helping fairly well. Still get lightheaded, but not as bad. Mostly the trip was A WASTE OF GAS, MISSION FUNDS, AND THE LORDS TIME! We drove about 1.5 hours to have a cup of free hot chocalte, and get told what we already were told about a week ago in a letter from them, and then we drove about 1 hour back. Traffic was better on the way back. Oh, well, at least I don't have heart cancer!

 Elder Brown and Elder Herrod both are 1 year out!

 

You think the first year went by fast! The second is supposed to be even faster! This week we were really blessed! We saw many miracles and were able to have a lot of success! T_ is doing really well, she relapsed on the WofW a bit, but is keeping strong and trying hard. She said she really wants to work for the 30th of Aug, and is doing her best. She is following her reading calander and even reading extra from the Book of Mormon as well! 

 

LOL Actually, we went camping this week! Made our own cake, and just had fun all around!

 

 

 

                 This is our Tent!

            Hot Kool Aid!
         We made a skit to go with it LOL!

 

A few worldly Objects in this Posh area!

 

                Nice Cars!

 

 

 

 

 

Spidy and the Cops!

Does God Actually Care About You?

 http://www.mormonchannel.org/video/mormon-messages?v=3701964025001
Your Heavenly Father loves you perfectly.  He will answer your prayers in His timing and His own way, but He will always answer.

 Many of us have wondered if God knows us or if He even exists.  Todd was someone who made fun of people who thought God was real, and so he was not surprised when he did not receive an immediate answer to a prayer.  Two years after his fervent prayer Todd recieved an answer.  The answer he recieved was that God does exist and He wants you on His side today!
"Regardless of our current state there is hope for us.  No matter our distress, no matter our sorrow, no matter our mistakes, our infinitely compassionate Heavenly Father desires that we draw near to Him so that He can draw near to us." - Elder Dieter F. Uchtdorf

Last week I talked about the flat I live in.  Here is a picture of the Mansion!

The picture I was sitting in front of last post was a hospital. Also to explain the picture of elder Smith and I sitting was a picture of us at the bus stop waiting until a guy came by and told us the bus was not running. We ended up having to walk an hour and forty five minutes to get home The police had blocked off the roads and police tape was everywhere.  It was around 9:00-9:30 pm and we didn't get home until 10:45. We hadn't eaten anything and we were so tired and hungry when we did get home. We found out latter that someone had hit a policemen and then ran so A man hunt was going on. That's why the bus wasn't there. The policemen has a spinal injury but is recovering. The guy that hit him turned himself in.

Elder Brown being Manley

This week was even more interesting than last week! We had a lot of miracles, were able to get member involvement for nearly every appointment we had, and some of them were a direct result of praying for inspiration when we really needed it. God blessed us with the inspiration we needed each time, and we had great success! We have a new Baptismal date we picked up this week, T_. She is super solid! She was a former investigator, who we called up and she answered on the first try and we set an appointment for a few days later. She said she had just been thinking about missionaries right before we called! We met with her twice this week, taught her the restoration, half of the plan of Salvation, and the Word of Wisdom! She accepted and understood everything very well, and has a baptismal date for the 30th of Aug 2014! She fasted with us on Sunday for her to be able to give up smoking and coffee by the 30th and to be ready for baptism. She came to church and had a great experience in testimony meeting, and learned a lot in gospel principles! We are really excited for her, and are going to teach her tomorrow about the rest of the Plan of Salvation and about Temples and Family History.

I have had some intense moments, crazy experiences, and hilarious situations nearly everyday in this area! Man the experiences we had taught me a lot, and I reflect on the things I have learned a lot as well. I keep learning so much! We decided to start doing video journals together. You will literally have hours of fun from us this week! I figured you guys would enjoy feeling a bit closer and more informed on my experiences, and I hope it increases your faith! 

We are pretty tired in some of them! In each video we say the date first thing, so you will know what order they are in. We started on the 25th of July and have done one each day.

We got flogged a couple of times (this means are appointments cancelled on us) but then ended up with 3 new investigators all on the 30th of July. We also had a great water gun fight with some kids from a family we had a dinner appointment with.

The other Elders here are Elder Piseth from Cambodia and Elder Cooper from Northern California.

 I got a letter from the hospital telling me they couldn't find anything, but they still want me to come in for a follow up consultation.

 Here are a few pictures for you.

Lots of little Miracles!

What did your family go through for you to be here?

As you learn about your ancestors you will be inspired by the faith and determination they had to follow their dreams.

Through your Family History work you will be able to find out the stories of those who came before you.  It is through their faith that those who came before you were able to accomplish many great things, and it is through your faith, in your Savior Jesus Christ, that you can leave a legacy behind for all to remember.

I am still having good old pasta, stir-fries, curry, chocolate cakes, candy, egg muffins, cereal, and anything any member decides to feed us! I don't know how, but I have still managed to slim down! I weigh more, but I am slimmer! I would say it is all of the walking, but we have buses now. I thought I was rid of the long walks, but Saturday night we had a fun experience. 

The flat looks like a house on the outside.......HAHAHA i'll send you a picture next week! The area is really nice here, lots of diversity, so it's nice to talk to all sorts of people. We have been having good success so far, and saw loads of miracles this week. Just little things, but undeniably influenced by our Father in Heaven. One time I prayed for Elder Smith to have inspiration on who to text for an appointment the next day, as it was 9:30 PM already and we hadn't found anyone to come with us yet and it was a single Less Active sister. Elder Smith had decided to just try one person as it was getting late. He texted Brother McKenzie, who replied almost instantly with a yes I can for sure. The appointment was at 1:30 on a Tuesday, so most people aren't available, but he happened to be free at that time this Tuesday! Also on top of that, we found out after the teach that he is her home teacher, and hadn't been able to get a hold of her, because her phone number changed, but now he has all of the information he needs again, and she came to church on Sunday because of the visit! EPIC RIGHT! All sort of little miracles like that everyday! The ward is great, every member we have asked to teach with us has been willing to and has given us a time that they are available, if they couldn't do the time we needed. Super excited to serve here! 

I am hoping to buy a nice suit here, and some nice shoes for Sundays as well. I want to get a few slim fit shirts as well, as most of the ones I have now are actually starting to look a bit big for me! Especially the short sleeved ones. Either I keep slimming down, or I am getting used to British style too much! You could either just get me something to surprise me, or put a bit of money on my card to help out with the clothing. It's up to you! Just don't break the bank on postage this time!

 Elder Smith my Companion

Elder Smith and Elder Brown

Living in a Mansion!

How Do You Smile When Life Gets Hard?
When you choose to serve the Lord today, you can feel His love.
When you go through your hardest challenges, pray for opportunities to serve. As you choose to serve those around you, the Savior's love will become more apparent in your life. Feeling of the Savior's love will help to wipe away feelings of complacency and discouragement. It is through serving God's children that you can feel pure joy in your life.
"And behold, I tell you these things that ye may learn wisdom; that you may learn that when ye are in the service of your fellow beings ye are only in the service of your God"
- Mosiah 2:17 -

This week has been crazy, fast, and successful! Elder Jackman and I went out with a bang! The move went well, I got to see a few missionaries I have worked with in the past, so that was cool. My new companion is Elder Smith, from Utah. 

I am in Maidstone 2 which is the west half of Maidstone itself and goes all the way over to West Malling, down to Kings Hill (which is super posh). The River is the border between our area and the other Elders in the ward. Our district is just the two companionship's and we are in the same ward! So much smaller than what I am used to. Our flat is freaking massive! It is basically 1/8 of a mansion! A lot of big houses in England get converted into flats because there is such a need for housing, and they never tear anything down, they just reuse it. So basically our flat is half of the first floor of a 4 story mansion! The flat is about a five minute walk from the chapel and a 3 min walk from the high street in the main part of town. We travel by bus, so I don't have to walk nearly half as much! I am the senior companion by one transfer, so Elder Smith is out just over 10 months. 

 

Here is a photo of me and Elder Smith we took this morning, and also some nice cars we saw while we were on the bus, and also a photo of London Victoria from the train. We had to leave our mission boundaries to get to our area from Staines.

 This is a photo of London Victoria from the train. We had to leave our mission boundaries to get to our area from Staines.

We saw some nice cars we saw while we were on the bus

My heart is good, but we are still waiting on the blood pressure! They are sending me the information through the mail.  

The area here is so nice and the work is great! We have no Baptismal dates........YET, and no progressing investigators..........YET, but we have some solid potentials, tons of former investigators that we can stop by. People actually walk in the streets here, so we have plenty of people to talk to! The ward here is relatively small, but they all seem very nice, and the lessons in church were really good. We had a good dinner appointment with a young couple named the Connalys. He is from Ireland and she is from Utah. Brother Connally knows Elder Lamb's Parents! We taught 5 people in the street on the first day I got here, and have since then taught 12 or so more people some Less actives, some from the street and knocking on doors, and others were sit down appointments, etc. One member in this ward gave us 14 referrals and is going to take us with him to another area and give us even more! He's Philipino and his first name is Philipino, how epic is that! 

Ward activity a slip and slide and water balloon fight

Bunnies that have the priesthood Ha! Ha!

It looks like it's giving a blessing.

 Show message history

Moving on to Maidstone

Spiritual thought: How do you receive comfort in trials?

The Holy Spirit can provide us with comfort during the difficult times in life!

Whenever you go through trying times, or need a helping hand in life, you can pray for strength.  The Holy Spirit can bring you those feelings of peace, love, joy, happiness and encouragement.  He will help us overcome feelings of fear and doubt.  It is through the impressions of the Holy Spirit in your life that you can feel true joy!

Turns out my heart is perfectly fine as far as they can tell, the cardiogram was about 20 min, and is the same kind of process as an ultrasound. Elder Jackman kept on joking about how I was pregnant! It was pretty funny. He got to see on the screen how my heart was working and he just said it was really gross-looking. After the cardiogram was done they had me do a treadmill test, where the intensity increased every three minutes. My heart rate was totally normal, but my blood pressure was really scattered! They said there wasn't really any obvious pattern in it which was strange. They put a 24 hour blood pressure monitor which took my blood pressure every 30 min or so. Every time it went off it beeped and then had this whirring sound as it pumped up the arm cuff, so that was interesting, especially doing missionary work! It went off twice while we were teaching a guy named T_. He is our newest investigator, and is really cool. He lost his wife two years ago and really wants to know more about the Resurrection.

This is me holding up the blood pressure monitor and giving a thumbs up. We went on a bike ride to this tiny lake, because the cardiologist said to try the bikes again while the monitor was on, so they could see what goes on with my blood pressure. I had to record all of the activities I did and the corresponding times and how I was feeling as well. the bikes didn't take me out half as bad this time, so I am not sure what's going on.

 

 

We finally got J__ to church this week! After 6 Sundays of begging and pleading we had decided to stop teaching her and about three days later, she texted us and was like, "Ok, Alright, I can't stand it anymore, I'm free on Sunday! I'm coming to Bracknell." We were a bit shocked, but it was nice to finally have her come. 

We haven't seen S_ for a long time, so I have no clue what is going on with her. Haven't heard from or seen M_, I hope he is ok. The ward is doing well, we are finally getting to know a few more of them, we decided to just spend a bit of extra time going up to everyone after church and talking with them. We got a few Dinner Appointment's out of it as well, which was good! 

I'm moving on Wednesday and so is Sister Brittain. I'm going to Maidstone 2 which is really far East, and Elder Herrod (one of the missionaries in the photo I took when we went up to Oxford two weeks ago) is moving to Maidstone to be the Zone Leader. Sister Brittian is going to Orpington which is in the Maidstone zone as well, so we will see each other every once in a while still. Elder Jackman is follow-up training a missionary who has had a really rough time and wants to go home. He was originally going to train, but President gave him this as a special assignment. Moves are always exciting, so we'll see where the next area takes me!
       
     Sister Anderson, Sister Brittian, Elder Jackman, Elder Brown,                       ,Elder Tauman

The beard I was wearing in last weeks photo was made out of yarn, we used it in a zone training presentation as part of our Lehi costume about 5 weeks ago. it took me about 2 hours to make total time, but it was worth it! We couldn't find any fake beards that were under £20! Ridiculous right! 

Serving a mission has been the best decision of my life. Their is no greater work or experience that can be had in this life than that of serving a mission! 

Thanks for all the support you guys! I love you all. 

Elder Brown

Elder Jackman

Elder Taumen 

                      This two are of the really posh Wellington college                                          close to our flat!