9th P day in Phoenix

I asked Kevin for a picture of him 1- in front of his house and 2- a picture with his bike.  He combined the request above after they had played basketball and ultimate frisbee today.

Kevin's bike has FINALLY arrived!

Hey, Mom and Dad! We have a zone activity today at 1:30 so that will take out a big chunk of email time. I probably won't have much time to email back and forth today. I saw two Mesa elders at the temple and asked if they knew Elder Mullins! I told them to tell him that Elder Jones, his cousin, says hello! Haha. They knew him. I think they're in his zone.  

This is mom -- they did tell Elder Mullins and he commented on it in his letter last week.  It is so weird they live closer than they ever have, one mission away but they can't communicate to each other like they used to when they lived 1200 miles apart!



Then we received this picture of him titled "here's a picture like 5 seconds ago!"











Dear Family and Friends,

(I apologize in advance for the—sort of—mass email. We don't have much
time to email today.)

This week has been pretty good. Another pretty slow week, but it was
fun. We had the opportunity to go to the Temple twice Tuesday! We
took an investigator family who loved it. They didn't have a
'break-down-and-start-crying' moment or anything, but they loved it!
They brought their four kids. It was a great time. We also had the
chance to take a district temple trip with the Elders in our district.
We actually saw our Sister companionship working in the Tent so it was
a reunion! Haha. I got pictures, but sadly I can't send them this
week. Way too busy today! I'll send them next week, though.

Dennis got a job (yay!), but that means we were unable to meet with
them again this week (not yay). On the bright side, Mary read the Plan
of Salvation pamphlet we left her and is reading the Book of Mormon!
She's in 1 Nephi 10! We only committed her to read the introduction.
She's awesome. Hopefully we'll pick the lessons back up soon...at
least we know they're not losing interest.

Oh yeah. I hear so much about the Arizona Cardinals it's not even
funny. It seems like there are more fans than Chiefs fans back home,
if that says anything. Haha. Speaking of sports, I hear the Royals are
killin' it in the World Series! Yeah! Go Royals! The only year they
don't stink, they make it to the World Series!

My bike is riding really well. It's super comfy. Plus it's red which
makes it even more awesome. The only downside is that it's hard to
keep on Sister Simon's bike rack when transporting it....let's just
say it almost fell off twice. Yiiiikes. Yeah it was getting nice here
but then it randomly hit 102 degrees one day. Come on...it's almost
November. I keep forgetting it's not summer anymore. I'm only used to
this kind of heat like three months out of the year—not eight.

Yeah! Webb City is number 14 in the country! We actually ate dinner
with the Crockett family and they asked where I was from. I said
Joplin, MO. They asked if that was close to Webb City because they
used to have relatives there. Sadly, they aren't related to our
Crockett family. That would have been wild. Haha.

Hope you all have a great week! I love you all!

Much love,

Elder Jones

Elder Jeong and Elder Jones at the Phoenix AZ Temple open house this week

Elder Jones and Elder Syndergaard on exchange (district leader)

Excited for the day 

This picture is me and Elder Jeong love our pumpkins hahah

Here's our stake center. Our church building. It's nicknamed "the bathtub building" because of the tiles haha.

I asked Kevin about the Celebration and if they (the missionaries) were still going to be participating.  He responded below along with a reminder about his buddy Brett Leaving on this mission next week.  He has a few words of wisdom for him.

Yes! The Celebration is on November 15th @ 7 Mountain time. You can
watch it live on lds.org from what I hear. We will be singing "Called
to Serve" and a song with Sign Language with the youth. All
missionaries will be singing and signing those two songs! You will
cry! I don't think we're going to the dedication. Just watching it.

Yeah I thought about Brett leaving soon! Tell him I said good luck and
to keep pushing. It gets better! The first 6 weeks are meant to be
brutal! And tell everyone I said hello. I'm challenging you to near
your testimony on fast Sunday! Tell everyone from the pulpit that I
miss and love them all! Give Brett a hug for me. Tell him I'm proud of
him.

Explosion at Midnight 8th P day in Phoenix

Elder Jones & Christ Statue at Phoenix Temple

Iron Phone (don't ask me I just put down what he says!)

At the temple with Anil

Elder Jones in front of Phoenix Temple

Elder Jones & Jeong with investigator Anil

Elder Jones and Elder Burgoyne

Greetings from where it's still 95 degrees every day! I am doing well.
It feels like I just had a P-Day yesterday. Sadly, no call from the
bike shop, so no new bike yet. Not much happened this week. Just a
couple things I'll mention!

We ate so much fish! Sister Simon bought a bunch of tilapia fillets
for us so we've been eating them a lot. Surprisingly, I'm becoming
extremely fond of fish. I'm not getting tired of it yet! Actually, I
just ate a breaded baked tilapia fillet...I love it. Fish, fish, fish!
We had the best fish tacos ever a couple days ago for dinner at a
member's home. I ate five tacos. They were surprised that I could eat
so much. I'm up to 126 pounds! I was 118 when I left home.

If you're wondering about the title of the email, Sister Simon's dog,Midnight, had a HUGE accident Friday night. When we woke up to run, we
opened our door and a wave of the most foul smell punctured our souls.
The pile was as big as the base of our trash can. We had an exchange
with the zone leaders (by the way, I killed it) but we ended up going
to study at their place because of the smell. It took all day to air
out the house. Yikes—it was a nightmare, that's for sure.

We took our Hindu investigator, Anil, to the temple Tuesday. He
loved it. We are taking an investigator family, the Senreisos, on thiscoming Tuesday. Their main interest in the Church is being sealed
together as a family. I think the sealing room will be very special
for them.

Sadly, Dennis and Mary had to cancel this week as Dennis was very
sick. We are meeting on Sunday night. Mary did say that she had been
reading the pamphlet and she's reading the Book of Mormon. That's
super exciting!

Well, that's about all that happened this week. I got the package!
Thanks for all of the candy and clothes! I love you both. Good to hear
about Webb. What is their national ranking now? Man, I miss going to
the games.

How's everything going there?

Much Love,

Elder Jones

A late email from Kevin!  an update on his bike!  I can't wait to see it.

I just called the bike shop and they said that it is in, but they are tuning it up a bit after they put it together. She said it should be ready tonight, but since we have a busy night and day Tuesday , we probably won't get it until Wednesday or Thursday. The person at the bike shop said, "Oooh, it's the red one, isn't it? Yeah, just so you know, that thing looks SWEET." She said the bike shop peeps have been looking at it a lot and they love it. 

I'm super excited to get it! :D

7th Pday in Phoenix

Elder Kirk and Elder Jones

Elder Jeong

Elder jones is excited it's P day!

Elder Jones with sunset

Study time!

*This was a pre email note we got this morning with personal stuff to do!  I'm excited to add that date to my countdown app!

"Can you believe today marks 2 months? OH and
I will be home August 10, 2016.  Not too far! 1/12 of the way
through! 8.3%! Hahaha."


This week has been really exciting. Well, mostly just
yesterday—Sunday. I'll get to that in a second. It's been cooling off, except for one random day when it was 100 degrees and humid. It's the middle of October; it shouldn't be 100 degrees!! On the bright (no pun intended) side, every morning when we run is from 55-60 degrees consistently. I even wear a hoodie. Crazy stuff. I forgot what cool weather feels like. Let it be known to the world that Elder Kevin L.
Jones has a tan. Crazy, I know. It shows even more against my white shirt. You all should be proud! I've onLy acquired three new ties. I even wore that orange paisley tie one day this week. I got a lot of
weird looks, but I am getting used to that because you know, I'm a missionary and such.

Sadly, my lovely red bike hasn't come in yet, but I'm waiting patiently. Sister Simon's bike is holding up. I may or may not have broken one of the pedals....shhhh....haha. I bought. My lock for my
bike but I still need a front headlight. I can't wait to get my new bike. I already have a name for her: Riven. All of my League friends will understand.

I eat a ton of cereal...Reese's Puffs, Oh's, Cocoa Puffs; you name it. A box a week! Elder Jeong makes fun of me because I eat so much cereal..he makes like an omelette, breakfast burrito, etc. every morning. It's crazy! Haha.

On a more spiritual note, this week was pretty bland up until yesterday. Sunday, yesterday, we had our lesson with Dennis, my first street contact. Let me tell you, they get it. Mary, his girlfriend, read and FILLED OUT THE QUESTIONS on the Restoration pamphlet. Who does that? She does. Dennis read the pamphlet and they discussed the questions. Mary had a question about whether or not her baptisms were valid, and she totally understood when we explained the Priesthood. I invited them to be baptized, and when I asked if they would be baptized as they come to know these things are true, and they said, "I would in a heartbeat." We're gonna extend a date next lesson, which is next Sunday night. I love them. They're so special.

Missionary work is happening! We're taking one of our investigators, Anil, who is Hindu, to the Phoenix Temple open house Wednesday.He's psyched. We're excited for him too. Hurrah for Israel!

It feels nice not being the freshest—in terms of time on the mission—missionary in the mission. There were 24 new missionaries in this past transfer. Insane.

Let me know how things are going there! Love you!

Much love,

Elder Jones

cool sunset

Standing in front of Sister Simon's map of where all her missionaries are from

Elder Jones and Elder Buckway

Elder Jones on his way to General Conference

Elder Jones is getting a tan!

RIP Chance.. 6th Pday in Phoenix

Elders Jones and Jeong

Elder Jones and Sister Simon

This week was pretty good! It was a day longer than normal... Haha.
Nothing truly phenomenal happened this week, but I'm still pushing
along, Elder Jeong and I are still great friends, and the Church is
still true. So, I guess one could say, life is good.

The temperature is cooling down—kinda. It's still around 95 degrees
every day; however, it's about 55-60 degrees in the morning which makes for a chilly run. Thank goodness for my hoodie! Anyways, yeah, it's still pretty hot here. I'm getting used to it though.
Surprisingly, I haven't gotten a sunburn yet. I am actually—no
kidding—getting a pretty good tan. I haven't gained any weight since
I've been in the field, but I have maintained the five pounds I gained
in the MTC. I drink so much water it's not even funny. Oh, and Sister
Simon's ancient dog, Chance, died last Tuesday. He was miserable. I
found him motionless in the laundry room. We were all pretty happy he
finally died! Sister Simon was going to bury him in one of my boxes
but she decided not to....hahaha

On a more spiritual side, I'm sure everyone knows what the best part
of this week was: General Conference. Hearing from prophets and
apostles while at home was awesome. Hearing prophets and apostles
speak as a missionary was ten times better. I felt like they were
speaking directly to me at times. I found it amazing that Elder Bednar
spoke directly to nonmembers. The words he used—I believe—can help so
many people come to the truth. I have always known that the Church is
true, but seeing it change peoples' lives out here on my mission is
amazing. I'm never going to forget this adventure. Oh, and it's
definitely going to affect how I study in college. I've never studied
this much for anything. Haha.

Unfortunately, the lesson with Dennis and Mary got cancelled. We are
going to stop by and try to reschedule sometime this week. They are
amazing people.

Well, that's about it. Conference made my week. Love you, Mom and Dad.
I miss you both dearly.

Much love,

Elder Jones

A side note he finally ordered his bike.  The one he picked didn't look good in the large size after they put it together, so he ordered a different one and got to pick the color, so he got RED!  It will be ready next Monday on his P Day.