Letter from Elder Morrison

well, it sure sounds like you've had your hands full this last week.
sickness is no fun. i cant believe i havent been real sick on my mission so far. i've had a few colds, but no throwing up or anything. so i'm really happy about that. watch, now that i've said that, i'm going to be getting sick here pretty soon...lol. just out of curiosity, how small is 3rd ward?
if they have 2 counselors to the bishop, they're doing better than us. lol.
we only have about 25 active members. soon to be about 27! andria, who is 9 years old is one of them. she is so excited about the gospel. this week, we went to teach her, and she had to clean her room before we could teach. her parents had tried taking toys, and taking down her hannah montana posters (she LOVES hannah montana) and all sorts of stuff. didnt even phase her.
they told her she couldnt take her lessons until after it was clean and that really got her going. each fast sunday for the last 3 she has had someone help her, and she always wants to bear her testimony. 2 times she had someone write it for her, and then the beginning of september, she had me go up with her to help her. it's so great to see her enthusiasm for the gospel.
the other baptism we have lined up is tonya. she's doing really well, and i believe she's been 2 days without a cigarette. she's making a huge step in her life. she's really solid too. in our gospel principles class one of the members asked her how she knows the church is true and she said something to the effect of "when i walk into other churches, i feel dread. when i walk into this church, i feel peace." SOLID!!! she's changing her baptism date to the 18th, the day after andria's. she wants to know what to expect before she get's baptized. she's pretty excited about it thought i think. she also has 2 kids that are 7 and 5. i think i was put here to help build the primary. lol. so far since i've been here, we have 4 new people in primary.
that more than doubles the amount we had to start with.
the weather has been pretty warm again lately. i cant believe september is already gone when it feels like august still. lol. i cant say i'm enjoying the heat, but i think it's supposed to start cooling down a little bit here soon. the leaves are starting to change now. i'm really excited for that. i love the fall in missouri. you'll never see anything like it back home. can you believe that a year ago i was in st. peters? i was in my 2nd area a year ago. about 7 1/2 months left. either i'll have 1 or 2 more areas. when you put it that way, i dont have much longer.
i got an email today from Russelyn Callahan. i guess she's decided to go on a mission. i'm way excited for her. she will be a great missionary.
as for my shirt, i made it with acryllic paint. elder grayson found the stencil, cut it out, and then i just used it with acryllic paint. i think it looks pretty cool.
well, i guess that's about it for this week. i hope you all get better if you havent already. love you lots!
Elder Morrison

Letter from Elder Morrison

well, sounds like everyone has had a pretty hectic week. ours has been sortof a downer, but i figured things had to be going too good. salt lake denied brittany's baptism, so she cant get baptized for 2 more years. she did come to church though yesterday, which was good. 2 years will be a good test for her. her friend, shreenia told us that she doesnt want to be baptized anymore. she said she is planning on it in the future, but doesnt want to right now. so we're down to 1 date instead of 3, but the 1 is pretty dang solid. her name is tonya, and she has a small smoking problem (1/2 pack a day, which is really low for missouri) but we're going to help her with that and she said that she's felt more peace since she's been meeting with us. she said she used to have anger problems, but they've gone down a ton since she started meeting with us. miracles happen, what can i say. anyways, that's really all that has been happening this week missionary work wise. elder grayson hit his year mark (which was also his birthday) on friday, so we bought an ice cream cake. New Franklin also had a little festival that reminded me of spring fest...except do it in the park by the funeral home. lol. really small but we got to listen to a country band that was pretty good.
this week, i made a couple shirts. they're of the same thing, but different colors. i like the gray and red better, but you tell me what you think. i'll send a couple pics.
the new place is good. it's an apartment, but that's fine. i've realized that i've been in this area forever. i was here before i hit 11 months. this last week (if you recall included the 16th) was my 16 month mark. i'll be home 8 months from yesterday. crazy huh? i also just got a cd from ashlie that had all of you guys on it. i was glad to get that. it's interesting that i've forgotten what it's like to be a real person, and be able to just hang out. oh well, i'm sure i'll have no problem getting back into the real world. ashlie had made the comment that she made the video just in case i forgot what she looked like. truth is, it wasnt what she looks like, it's what she sounds like. i've forgotten how a lot of people sound. pretty weird.
well, i guess that's about all this week. hope you're all doing alright, and for grandma (who i think should be in ML right now) good luck in the MTC. Sunday = Celestial Sandwiches and BYU Creamery ice cream. soak it in...lol.
love you!
Elder Morrison

Family Home Evening

Good family home evening. Not that most of our family home evenings aren't good, but this one will stand out. A lot of the time it is more like "family hell evening", but this time Creesh took the bull by the horns and prepared a lesson that would be meaningful to our family. She taught us Jacob 2-19 and hand wrote the scripture on a piece of paper for all to keep with a string attached for us to put on our finger this week. This is reminding us to be of service just like mom who is in Oakley serving Heavenly Father by helping Grandma get ready for her mission. She challenged all of us to do something this week to help Grandma Burch.

Letter from Elder Morrison

well, transfers didnt happen exactly the way i wanted to, but i'm still here. me and elder grayson are both here in the fayette area for another 6 weeks. we have a baptism interview this week for brittany, who has a date of the 27th. she has to be interviewed by president turley because she is on probation. she has really come a long way though. it's amazing to see people progress and to change for the better.
things have been pretty hectic this week. we had to get all our moving done while juggling all our appointments. we were pretty tired by the end of the week, but we got it done. when we got moved in on friday night, we found that there was no running water. wow, that is definitely something i've taken for granted. we had to go back to the boonville house on saturday morning to shower and brush teeth. then we cleaned up in that house. we finally got the water turned on saturday night. i think someone in the office dropped the ball with that one. oh well, its all worked out now.
someone left a piano at our apartment, so we have a piano. it's pretty nice to be able to play again.
well, it's good to hear that grandma is doing alright getting everything together. i know what it's like to close up a house and move. i just did it.
lol. lots of work, and not very much fun.
oh, before i forget, here's my new address:
102 Sulphur St. Apt. D
New Franklin, MO 65274
mom, get used to speaking. yesterday at church, a speaker didnt show up until half-way through sacrament meeting, and i was the backup, which i found out about 2 minutes before the meeting. luckily i didnt have to speak, but i've had to do it before. you'll find once you get doing it, it's not that big of a deal. as for talks, i remember the talk that rolan lybbert gave at my baptism, when he took rocks (sins) and put them in a backpack i was wearing. it started to get really heavy, and then the 'baptism' was able to take off the backpack. just an idea. maybe it wasnt rolan lybbert, but it may have been. it's been a while...
well, sounds like coltin had his fair share of fun getting out of school. i dont recall doing that that early in life. i know i did it a couple times in high school. ( note from craig: this comment was in ref. to Coltin playing sick at school, heating up the temp to get out of PE)
i talked to Alex this morning, and he is still in Jackson, which is a zone leader position. he's doing well.
weather has been pretty crazy lately. it's been generally pretty mild, except the last couple days it rained a lot. the missouri is flooding again, and it was so bad last night that we couldnt even get to boonville from new franklin because there was water over the roads. we went into the lower parts of franklin and people were being flooded out of their houses. they werent even able to drive to their houses, so they were just out chilling in an intersection, waiting for the water to go down. crazy stuff.
well, i guess that's about it this week. i'll let you know next week how the interview went for brittany. love you lots, and drive safe, those of you that are driving.
Elder Morrison

Sorting Pictures

I have spent the last several weeks trying to save photos that were lost on my hard drive. It's official, I've got 25.7GB of the 109GB I had. As you can tell, I was able to save the important ones.

Leaving On A Jet Plane

Deb takes off tomorrow to spend some one-on-one time with her mom. She will be helping her mom prepare for her mission (New Mexico). Wilma leaves for the MTC on Monday Sept. 29th.
The kids are already freaking out wondering what we are going to eat for the next week... I didn't learn to cook mac-n-cheese on my mission for nothing.

New Critters

Dwarf Hamsters. Just 2 more things to worry about.

Letter from Elder Morrison

hey family!
things are looking up here in boonville! we set 2 more dates this week, and will set another this upcoming week. if all goes well, we'll have a baptism every week for 4 weeks starting september 27! all seem to be progressing well. we had 3 of them at church yesterday.
transfer calls were supposed to be last night, but since things are being thrown off, they will be tonight. the most logical thing would be to keep us here another one together, but i'm kinda hoping that elder grayson will be transferred. the members dont care for him much, and he doesnt care too much for the area, plus i dont think he even wants to be on a mission. its making it hard for me to be motivated. we'll find out about our apartment today, after i'm done here i have to call the mission office to ask about it. i'm going to miss the old house, but i guess a change of scenery (at least a little bit) wouldnt hurt.
Elder Grayson has gotten me into origami. i've been making a ton of them in spare time. its really some pretty crazy stuff, but it's a lot of fun, if you know what you're doing.
as for the little girl that needs surgery, her eye muscles are too tight.
she's had the surgery before, but needs it again. it basically makes her eyes cross sometimes. the kicker is that they dont have insurance, so they have to pay in full before they can even schedule the procedure. i appreciate that you pray for them. i'm sure they do too.
man, nothing like getting grandma on her toes. going into the MTC early would be a big deal. i can only imagine if they called me a week after i got my call and said "ok, just kidding. instead of coming in 2 months, we want you here in 2 weeks." that would be insane to get everything in order. i'll make sure to drop Rick a line. i'm sure he could use it. i remember getting mail in the MTC. it is definitely appreciated.
sounds like the ball game was pretty good. i would have loved to go. i really want to go to a Mizzou game, especially since they're off to a good start. i guess i just miss doing regular people stuff, but only 8 more months until i can again. i suppose i'll be alright with that. lol.
well, i guess that's about all the news for this week. next week, i may be in a new area. i just dont know. transfer calls will be tonight. maybe i'll come to the library tomorrow just to write a quick email for you so you can be in the know.
love you all,
Elder Morrison

Letter from Elder Morrison

well, we've had a pretty good week. probably one of the best since i've been in fayette. this week we had an appointment with Brittany, and she now has a baptismal date of september 27. we hope that goes through, because there are some legal issues and stuff that have to be approved by president turley, and possibly the first presidency. i dont know exactly how that all works. but yeah, we have a date!!! also this week, we'll be meeting with the jacksons, and discussing a baptismal date for their 9-year old, so we'll set a date there this week. also, Tanya i think is progressing well, and we're going to try to set a date this week. i hope you've been praying for her. she really needs some financial help for her daughter. so yeah, we could have 3 dates this week! we had presidents interviews this week, and i told president turley that i'd like to stay here, especially since the jackson girl wants me to baptize her. but that i was kinda getting tired of elder grayson. he's not a bad guy, but he's kinda antisocial, and i find i'm doing almost everything myself. it's getting pretty tiring. president was talking about leaving me and transferring elder grayson, but he needs to pray about it first. next week, i'll be able to tell you what happens with that. transfer calls are this sunday, and then transfers will be next friday, which is a different day, but things happened that we had to move it a bit.
we found a new place, and got an application sent to the office to fill out. i need to call on how that's going, but i dont know for sure if that's going to work or not.
thanks for the package. i was pretty stoked to get all that stuff. you're right though, it doesnt matter what it is, as long as it's from home. lol.
that's really weird about the church. in fact it reminds me of an experience we had the other week. we went to drop off some missionaries in columbia late one night, and when we got to the apartment, the lights were off and the place was trashed. the thing is, is that there is another set of missionaries in that apartment that should have been home by then. we went to try to turn on the lights and none of them would work except the bathroom light. one of the missionaries went into the room across from the bathroom and we heard him scream. followed by laughter. the other missionaries had trashed their own apartment, unscrewed all the lightbulbs, and then waited for us to come in there, and pointed a knife at the first missionary to go into the room. it scared the crap out of him, but it was way funny. that was the night that we made that cake for the zone leader. i'm sending a couple pictures of that. elder swenson made the cake from a cake mix, and then did all the decorating from scratch.
well, i guess that's about all for this week.
hope you all have a good week. remember i love you!
Elder morrison