July 26^th 2011

Yes I do eat a lot here. And thank goodness, cuz I’m hungry! The other day I ate something that before my mission would fill me up but I was sitting there feeling hungry still so I know my appetite has gotten bigger. Hopefully I can shrink it along with my belly before I come home. Monday was pretty good. We went and visited with Malachi for a little bit. He is doing great. He was supposed to get baptized on Tuesday but the bishop wanted to talk to his less active mom to make sure she understood the commitment she was making in letting him be baptized. After him we just tracted most of the night. Tuesday morning I had a good leadership meeting. We talked about the zone needs and what we would be training on for district meeting. Afterwards we had a few appointments and went to see some potentials. My ward is pretty big so there are a lot of people we can go see in it. A lot of our appointments fell through this week but we tried our hardest to use our time wisely. It was Malachi's birthday on Tuesday so we went to the pharmacy, cuz I needed more allergy medicine, and we also got some candy for him. We took it over and boy was he happy. He got a lot of candy for his birthday but what we got were all his favorites. We tracted quite a bit on Tuesday it was fun. I love tracting because you get to talk to your companion and just talk. I love talking. All my companions can attest to that. We have this lady we have been trying to work with named Marium. She is an alcoholic. She always wants to hug us. She loves Elder Moss and always tells us how good looking he is. He is a good looking kid but its weird cuz she is like 45. Wednesday our morning appointment fell through again... so we tracted a lot. We had lunch then went and visited a guy who claims to be a less active member but we think he is a nonmember. He watched Lakeview on TV but said he was baptized as a Mormon in Houston when he was five... hmm didn't know they did that down there. It was good though. He is kind of weird but is very very nice. We went and visited with Malachi to go over the baptismal program with him. He wants Elder Moss to baptize him so that’s real cool. I have to give the talk on baptism. We had a few appointments that day that didn't fall through so that was great. Wednesday we had dinner with somebody. I made Elder Moss write down our calendar so I don't remember who it was and what we had... sorry. But I am sure it was good. The rest of the night was kind of dead cuz no one was home... Thursday we had a great district meeting. I trained on getting people to church. The hows and what’s about it. We role played for a bit so it was fun. Our zone leaders have done this twice now. One plays the uke (a baritone like mine) and the other one sings and they sing these songs that a Polynesian wrote and it rocks! They did one this week and I recorded it for everyone to enjoy. It was grand. We had a delicious lunch afterwards of taco bell. I got the xxl burrito. I wasn't a fan of the sauce in it but it was ok. Next time I’ll stick with my beefy five layer burrito. Afterwards we went home and started working on things for the blitz we would be having on Sunday. We had to write down all the potentials and less actives we wanted to see and map them out from where they live so we could have people go see them and use their time effectively seeing people all in the same general area. So did that for an hour on Thursday Friday and Saturday. It paid off too. We had a few appointments on Thursday then in the evening we met with the bishop at the church. He was going to sit down with Malachi and his mom but she couldn't make it so we ended up just talking about the work in the ward and then we went over the ward list of people he wanted us to go see in the ward that he didn't know anything about. That ended up being the night. Friday we did a swell weekly planning in the morning. We had an appointment with Bro. Meisner to go out to eat at a pizza place. Usually he pays for us but he didn't have any money and so since he takes us out so often we decided to treat him to it. Boy was he excited about that. I think we made his day. We saw a few people we have been trying to get in contact with. Mainly people we had been working with or whom missionaries have worked with in the past. A lot of them aren't home ever, or they moved. It’s a more ghetto area so a lot more people move in and out pretty quick. We tracted for a while then had dinner with the Durants. They are a very nice young couple. We had stir fry and almost ate it all but there wasn't that much so we felt bad and held back. After dinner we tracted some more and then did our blitz stuff. Saturday we went to see someone and they weren't home and on the way over there I realized I had forgotten to comb my hair... so we had to go back home and do that... then we went all the way down to the Elk Grove Park ward to Elk Grove Park and went to the pioneer day lunch the stake was putting on. There are more people at our ward events than their stake events. It’s kind of sad. But the fried chicken was good along with the potato salad that has made me irregular I’m sure for the past three days. It was a pretty late lunch so we just saw some people and tracted till dinner. We had it at home... I can't remember what we had. We were supposed to be doing a temple tour with the whole zone but the person we set up for it wasn't going to make it so we didn't go. Instead we just went and visited Malachi and set up his appointment with the bishop for Sunday morning. Sunday morning Malachi and his mom met with the bishop. He gave us the ok to baptize him this weekend!!! So that will be just great. We had church then dinner. At night we had our blitz. We had good participation from the ward which we are thankful for. We had great success on the blitz. We had like 4 appointments yesterday from it, most of which flaked, but nonetheless it was still great. Yesterday was transfer Monday. We went out and worked all day. It was great. Like I said a lot of our appointments were flaky so we had some good backups. We got our calls about 8 o clock at night from President Lewis. He is a great guy. He is very loving and you can feel it when he talks to you. As well he is very spiritual and calm. So it’s great. I am leaving the area I am sad to say. I love serving here with Elder Moss. I will be going up to the North Sacramento zone and I will be a Zone Leader with Elder Manukailea who was one of my zone leaders in Lodi and I went on exchanges with him. He is a great missionary. He served in the Florin ward as well and baptized like 13 people while there. He is from Long Beach Cali and is Polynesian. I assume Tongan by the k in his name and no f's. I am excited. He is a hard worker and the zone is an awesome baptizing zone so let’s hope I don't mess it up too much. I'll tell you more about him next week. I am nervous to be a Zone Leader but I believe this experience will help me to grow and become a better servant of the Lord. So mom, the next time you send me a package, idk when, can you send me some Claritin and Benadryl. It seems like I run out too fast. It’s the only stuff that keeps me well out here. So this past week I have been trying to remember my dreams more so I can use them to my advantage. I want to learn how to realize I'm in my dream so I can tap into my subconscious mind and create more in depth stories, but every time I realize I'm dreaming in my dream my eyes open and I wake up. So that will be cool to get down. Also I was thinking this week; I might want to be a seminary teacher when I come home. Of course I would have to go to school and I hear it’s super hard to become one but I think it would be fun. I could also write books on the side of that if I so desired. Book writing is my goal but I need a profession that will bring in steady income while writing a book. Why not a seminary teacher? I'll think it over some more and talk to my old seminary teachers that I had in high school to see if it’s a good idea. Well that’s it for this week. I hope you all have fun.

Love,

Elder Tyler Pete Arnett

July 18^th 2011

Man I wish at my football camp we had a bonding hike... I guess that’s what the water tower was for. But this new coach sounds like he is really cool and nice. I like nice people. Maybe Porter should be a quarter back. He will be able to run the ball if he never learns to throw. This week was pretty good. I'll tell you about it. Monday night we had dinner with our bishop. He went to Italy on his mission, so he knows how to cook good Italian food. It was pretty good. Then we went and visited with Mark Childress. It was a good visit. We had left him a copy of The Restoration and were hoping they had watched it, but they hadn't and they didn't tell us till it was time to go. So hopefully they have watched it by this week. Tuesday we had a good leadership meeting. I like them. Afterwards we had lunch. We had some good Cheddar Brauts that Mark Childress gave us. They were pretty good but Brauts aren't my favorite. We went and taught Malachi afterwards and it was good. His mom who has Lupus was up and ready. I didn't even recognize her! She usually wears this dress around the house and she has no teeth. Well this lady had teeth and was all dressed up with makeup and ear rings and her hair done up and everything. I swear it was two different people. But she sat in the lesson and taught him faith better than we could have. It was real cool. She is already a member. We had a few other appointments but they all fell through. We tracted a bit as well. We had dinner with the Phelps. They are really nice funny people. We had spaghetti. I like spaghetti. But Dads is the best. We saw a few other people the rest of the night. Wednesday we had a good morning tracting. We had an appointment that fell through so we went to a pizza buffet for lunch. It was pretty darn good! It’s called Mountain Mikes. I don't know if we have it back at home but its real good pizza. Afterwards we went and saw a guy named Adam. We had found him tracting and he told us to come back at 2 and he seemed super solid, but he wasn't home. This week Elder Moss' family sent him a package and it had an article in it about Mormons and why they are successful in life and it said it’s because they go on missions. It was in Bloomberg I don't know where that was. It talked about Mitt Romney and it made me decide I want to be successful in life. I thought maybe if I just try really hard to learn in school and college then it wouldn't be as hard to just know things after that. I think I have been blessed with learning abilities and it seems pretty easy for me to learn things so I think I will write books for sure. I don't know how but I have some good ideas and I think if I try really hard I can learn how in school. Wednesday night Bro. Singh gave us dinner. It was pizza. How fortunate. Little Caesars. Good thing that’s my favorite pizza! We have been looking for some people that have disappeared randomly. We looked again on Wednesday night but we couldn't find them. Thursday we had district meeting. I trained on being committed, Pres. Uchtdorfs first presidency message this month. After doing my training on it I felt bad because of all the times I went with Dad before and I just sat they. Man how much I have changed. Now I can tell stories for an hour and tie it in to the Gospel making it really spiritual. It’s awesome how much the mission changed me. After Lunch I had to write up transfer reports for the Elders in my district. It was cool recognizing the progress of some elders from last transfer to this one. After that we went to teach Malachi again but he had friends over and there weren't any adults in the house so we didn't go in. We tracted later after seeing some other people. We had dinner with the Lindsay’s. She is super old and he is kind of old. He likes ice in his milk like grandpa did. They fed us Lasagna. I liked it. They are real nice and it is always enjoyable. After dinner we had a meeting with the district to talk about numbers and stuff. Friday we had the New Missionary Training meeting. It was super good. President and Sister Lewis are great but they sure are new, but I love them. We split up from our companions and all the trainers got together and talked. I realized how truly lucky I am. A lot of missionaries have said they don't like training but I have loved every minute of it. It’s because my boy is awesome! He is obedient and hard working. If I tell him to try something, he tries it. If I tell him that something is against the rules he changes it. It’s great. So I am super lucky to be with Elder Moss. Afterwards we went and taught Malachi. We went over the Baptismal interview questions because he was scheduled to be baptized this Tuesday but we might wait a few more days so the bishop can meet with him and his mom. It was fun teaching him and for a nine year old he really remembers a lot about what we have taught him. We saw couple of people after that and then had dinner. Bro. Singh gave us dinner again. His wife signs up if no one does because she is in charge of our Calendar. After dinner we tracted. It was good. We talked to a lot of people. Saturday morning we had weekly planning because we weren't able to have it Friday night. It was good. We have a good week planned up. We went to In N Out for lunch. It was a little bit of a drive but it was in my district so I was able to go to it. It sure was tasty. We had like five appointments on Saturday. All of them fell through. We had dinner with Bro. Chaides and his family. He made some real good enchiladas. They weren't as good as yours mom but they were some of the better ones I’ve had. Afterwards we had another appointment that fell through then we tracted for a min. Sunday no one came to church. Malachi was at a funeral. Marium wasn't drunk this time but her dog had puppies and she didn't want to leave it. So that was a bummer. It’s fun to hear about all the farewell talks going from our ward. We have a lot more than they do out here. Well this past week was great. I have started doing P90X again with elder Pelfrey. Sometimes it kicks my butt pretty good but I live. I hope everyone is having some good summer fun. It’s almost the end of July. Boy how time is flying. Happy Birthday to Braden tomorrow.

Love, Elder Tyler Pete Arnett

July 11^th 2011

Man Uncle Chet that was a good one. I don't know what I was thinking when I said I didn't like McDonald's because I really do. I get 3 Chicken Sandwiches and 2 McDoubles and a large soda pop for about 6 bucks. You can't beat that. Who’s ever idea it was to do $1 pops is a genius and should be rewarded. Ronald McDonald knows how to run a worldwide corporation better than any president I've heard of. So I hope that makes up for my Hatin on Mikey D's. (His mom also let him have it about McDonalds because they have the best Diet Coke in the whole state and it’s only a dollar.)
For the 4th we had an all-day P-Day. We went to an Asian person’s house with the elders we live with and it was pretty good. I have built up a resistance to spice pretty good now so I can handle a lot more than they give me credit for. So they laugh when I put a lot on my food then get confused when I can eat it. It was a good meal though. I'm not a big fan of fish but somehow Asians make me like it. For the rest of the night we got together as a zone and played the Standard Works Trivia. It was a lot of fun. But it got pretty competitive and a lot of people were pissed off at the end. On Tuesday we had a good leadership meeting, then we switched up with the zone leaders for exchanges. It was good. I went with Elder Kaloohiokalani from Hawaii. We had a lot of appointments that fell through but we made it a good day. We taught Malachi and his cousins. They were so rambunctious so it was difficult to teach them. But we had a good lesson. We tracted for a good long while then had dinner with the Armonds. They fed us some burritos they made. They had ground turkey in them as well as peas and avocado's, which I’m allergic to. But I made do with the potato salad that I filled my plate with. Then we went and switched up for another exchange with Elder Nguyen and Elder Archer. I went into Elder Nguyen's area and got to take my car. Sister Adams said that as long as I need to puff my inhaler at least once in a day I can't ride my bike. What she doesn't know is that in the past five years I don't think I’ve gone a day without puffing it, so it looks like the bike will be getting rest for the next 10 months. On Wednesday Elder Nguyen and I had a great day. We tried to see a lot of people. I met his ward mission leader Brother Newton who lived in our stake on brown and gilbert for about 3 years 13 years ago. His wife is from Snow flake and knew Sister Allred. It was fun chatting. This really nice member in one of his wards took us out to dinner at a Pho restaurant. It is a Vietnamese soup and it’s pronounced Fu. Its super good especially when you get it spicy that it burns your lips. I also did an interview for one of their investigators to get baptized. She is a 9 year old girl. She said the longest prayer with the least amount of words I have ever heard. But she was nice and tried so I am proud of her for that. We then tracted till it was time to switch back up again. Thursday was meet the president day. President Lewis rocks! It’s amazing how we can share so much love for each other before we even knew each other. I know he is supposed to be here. He is very nice. He's a little guy. Maybe as tall as me but probably more than a 100 lbs. skinnier. Then after the meet the president he interviewed our zone. It was great. He said he was grateful for me being candid. I didn't know what that meant so I looked it up. It means frank or honest. He asked everyone the same question which was a big one. He asked if I felt like he could trust me where ever I was with whomever he put me with. I told him 4 months ago I would have had to answer no but that I can honestly say that now I can. Interviews took so long we were not able to make it to our dinner appointment so when all else fails we go to... Taco Bell! I got the 5 buck big box meal. It was good and what a deal?! Then we went and visited Mark Childress. We had a great evening with them and then we left them a copy of the restoration DVD. We'll be going by tonight to see if they watched it and see how it went. Friday we had a good morning with weekly planning. For lunch we went out to Wendy's. Elder Moss has been craving it for a while now so I took him there because I’m the only one that knows where the hidden one in our area is. Elder Pelfrey has been in this area for a year and he didn't even know it was there. Sadly their chicken sandwiches aren't as good as McDonald's but their double stacks or "Stack Attacks" are exceptional. We taught Malachi later. His cousins were living with him because their mom didn't want them anymore. Well the mom came back and took them which was against the rules and they don't know where they are, so Malachi will be the only one getting baptized. We had a few other appointments that fell through but that’s ok. We kept busy. Bro. Singh made us some good wings for dinner. He always drops them off at our apartment so I watched Joy to the World on our DVD player during dinner. It was good. The rest of the night we tracted and it was a lot of fun. Elder Moss is a Boss and has some great missionary skills. He's just still new but as he gets more experienced, he is going to be awesome. Saturday was a weird day. The morning was amazing. It was 70's until noon then it got to around the 90's. We saw some great people all day but unfortunately none of them were home. We had dinner with the elder's we live with again at an Asian's house. We had pig hooves... they weren't that bad. They also had wild boar meat and beef short ribs. They were super good. They also have this plant that they cook with onions and it is amazing. They love it when you can eat a lot so they love me and Elder Moss. He is always hungry ha. After dinner we tracted some more. We had a lot of success on the street we tracted two days in a row. Church on Sunday was fun. The morning was filled with meetings. After lunch Elder Moss went with Brother Boyd and they picked up Malachi and Mariam. Mariam is a lady that rode up to Elder Moss and Elder Clark when we were on exchanges. She was drunk and crying and said "Can you help me?! I need to stop!" They said yes and then she came to church drunk. I had to prepare the lesson for Gospel Principles because Brother Wheeler, our ward mission leader, had a death in the family so I took the honors after his wife asked me to that morning. It was a good lesson, I hope. It was on honesty, and honestly I told stories I know for the last 15 min. because it was too short of a lesson. Luckily our old mission president, President Jardine, wrote a book on honesty and gave us a couple of pages from it. I used it a lot. Sunday night we had a blitz. I was with Elder Beveridge and Jacob a priest in the ward we were blitzing with. It was fun. We met 3 girls that Jacob goes to school with and knows and they were so funny and he was so awkward it was a mighty fine time. They weren't interested in the gospel though and after they declined our baptismal invitations we continued on. We had root beer floats and brownies afterwards as well. Today we played soccer with another zone and some Mexicans. I tripped a lot of people and almost scored with my belly but I tripped over a Mexican I had tripped and missed... Karma. Today should be a good day. We have dinner with our bishop tonight. Well I am done now. I love you. Bye.

Love, Elder Tyler Pete Arnett

P.S. - Elder Moss' parents’ names are Richard and Sharon. They live near power and queen creek rd. They are in Ceville ward. Anything else?

July 4^th 2011

Man what a week. It is warmin up! This week was great with many miracles. Monday night we went and taught a black lady. Her name is Yolanda. We had a really good lesson with her. We taught her about the Book of Mormon. She said she wants to get baptized but she didn't come to church so it will take a bit. Then we went over to Mark Childress' house. He's extremely nice. We have wanted to teach him a lot but its tough cuz he doesn't want to be pushed. As we were driving over in our air conditioned car we both decided how we would bring up teaching him or basically asking him the question of why he isn't a member of the church yet. Well we talk for a bit then he says "well boys whats your good word today" We both got a grin on our faces so he knew he asked the good question and says "come on I know you wanna say something just say it" So we asked him. He opened up to us like a book of an hour and a half about all of his concerns. It was amazing. He committed to read the Book of Mormon to know if it’s true rather than just to read it. I know he'll get his answer. We were late getting home that night because it was so good. Tuesday morning I had a good leadership meeting. Then Elder Moss and myself went to an appointment. She forgot but we talked to her for a while. She is a member but has 4 unbaptized kids. One being 8. Then we had T-Bell for lunch. Man those beefy 5 layer burritos are good. Then we went and visited a bunch of people, it rained on Tuesday and was about 60 degrees out. It was cold. I had to get my rain coat. I let Elder Moss borrow my cardigan. He looked good in it. We had a couple of appointments fall through, and we were supposed to go tracting but that was the last thing I wanted to do in the rain just getting over pneumonia so we went to visit an 8 year old kid who turns nine in two weeks. His mom is a member so by nine it will be a convert baptism. It was a miracle because his two cousins are living with him now and they are 10 and 11 and both want to be baptized. It was an awesome lesson. We then saw a few people then went to Golden Corral for dinner with Bro. Boyd our assit. Ward mission leader. It was delicious. Then we went home and packed our bags cuz we were having an exchange with the whole zone and no one knew where they would be going or if they would go at all. We had a dance off there and I got second because I had to go first and I didn't know how serious they wanted me to take it so I just did a couple of jiggy moves that Dad might have done with my own twist and it was well liked. Second was pretty good for how much I held back. I went with Elder Villar who is in Spanish work. It was great. Wednesday we saw a lot of people in Spanish and tracted a lot. His area covers mine so it was like doing both of our works together. That night we met back up and then had a meeting with the stake presidency. It was really good. They are all awesome guys. The first councilor wanted to trade me ties. It was the Blue one with red and white stripes that I stole from Jeff and have been wearing since I was a teacher. I think it might have been grandpas so I refused to trade even though his was nice. He said mine was one of a kind. Friday we had weekly planning and then went to burger king to get the delicious soda from the coolest machine in the world. I'm sure you've seen it. I made a delicious Diet Dp with cherry lemonade in it. Man it was good. I got my package during lunch and it was awesome! I loved it. Thanks so much. I was able to show Elder Moss the rest of my pictures. We had a few appointments fall through so we saw random people then we went and taught the kids again. We watched the Restoration movie. They loved it. We saw some people than had a bbq with our ward mission leader and his family. It was good. They had some amazing corn on the cob. Then we went tracting for a long time. Then we drove down to Elk Grove to switch up for exchanges. Elder Archer came with me. It was good. We had to go get our tires rotated, and an oil change. It took like 3 hrs. It was fun though. We had a butt load of appointments. We struck out on all but 2 of them. We taught the kids again. We also taught a Jamaican man who thinks I will be the leader of the Mormon Church because I know my Bible real well. I stumped him a lot and he agreed with most of what I said. Then we had dinner at McDonalds. Their soda wasn't as good. Then we switched up from our exchange. Sunday morning rain was falling. Actually it wasn't Friday, Saturday and Sunday were all over 100 degrees. Today was hot as well and we played football on a turf field. Sunday we had 5 people to church. All 11 and under. It was fun walking in with 6 black kids to the chapel and everyone looking at you funny. But hey they will all get baptized so funny is good I guess. The three kids came and the other member’s kids came minus one that didn't have any shoes. Church was great. Fasting was awesome as well! We didn't have any food at home though so dinner wasn’t so great. Oh and at church something really cool happened. So the family of the Sabrina who is the cousin of Lexy, they got baptized together, well Sabrina’s family is working towards going to the temple to be sealed together so the dad has a calling now and they come every week, well the mom just got put into the Young Woman's as a second councilor. Well in the middle of church she was following someone and looked all rushed and flustered and she stopped me and she said "this is all because of you, you know!" It seemed mean at first then her face calmed down and she said "Thanks" It made me feel so good inside that I have been able to assist the Lord in shepherding a family back into the church and now they are receiving blessings all over. It was a great experience and it really touched my heart. So me and Elder Moss get along great. He rocks seriously. We have a lot of fun and do a lot of good work. Training is so much fun. It’s funny because I have heard a lot of missionaries say it was the hardest part of their mission but I am loving it. I just show him what I do and he follows and puts his own edge to it. So it’s great. He is going to be a super stud. So yeah that’s my life right now. Thanks also to Grandma for the pictures I think I got them on Thursday. It was fun to see everyone at the cemetery and at breakfast. The letter was great as well. I'll try and write back asap. I love you all. Have fun and don't get too hot over there. My Air conditioned car is treating me well.

Love,
Elder Tyler Pete Arnett