Is this YSA? 4th P-Day in Peoria - 27th P-Day in Phoenix

Dear friends & family,

This week was great. I'm seriously loving it here in Peoria. The title
of this email is what I've been thinking since I've been here. It's
truly a new experience teaching so many young people. However, I am
noticing that they are all more committal than what I'm used to! They
come to church, read, and do what they know is important to help them
progress and gain a testimony. Let's get started! Here was my week:

Monday: P-Day. Not much happened other than the typical Monday stuff.
We had dinner with the Foulk family and they made really good
meatloaf. I usually hate meatloaf, but it was really good. Haha, I
just really think "meatloaf" is a funny word lol. Elder Flynn wowed us
with his piano skills after dinner. It's always a treat to hear him
play.
Temp: 70°F (rainy)

Tuesday: Another pretty slow day. We were supposed to have a lesson
with one of our investigators, Megan, in a member's home, but she
wasn't feeling well so she had to cancel. We ended up rescheduling it,
though! We went finding for the open time today and we had
coordination meeting. We went on splits with the Elder's Quorum but we
didn't have much success there. When we rode up to our house after
splits, we had a few minutes so Elder Flynn taught me about the stars.
He showed me some pretty cool constellations. He's really sharp.
Temp: 68°F

Wednesday: A pretty slow day. I was informed that my Grandma Margaret
passed away this morning. It was pretty sad to hear that I lost my
past grandparent, but it's also comforting to know that she's wanted
to go for a while. She's definitely happy, I can say that much. I
missed not being able to attend the funeral and see a lot of my
family, but it's okay. President Griffin called and made sure I was
okay, which I was. He's the best President ever!
Temp: 72°F

Thursday: GREAT day. We weekly planned most of the day, and we had
dinner on the OTHER side of our area at 5. It was about a 30-minute
bike ride over there, and after dinner we had a lesson on the complete
other side of the area. That lesson was at 6:30. Man, it was a haul.
It was SO worth it, though. We had a great lesson with one of our
investigators, Leah. She's 18 and is the boyfriend of a priest in the
ward. We taught her the Plan of Salvation and she accepted it so well.
She comes to church every week, and they taught about the plan of
salvation in her Sunday school class. She had a lot of questions and
we were able to answer them. Her boyfriend's family—the Pottle
family—is awesome. Brother Pottle is in e bishopric and really knows
his stuff. The lessons are always super fun because they're a super
tight family who has a lot of fun together. Leah fits right in with
the whole family. We can have fun, then feel the Spirit 5 seconds
later. It's unreal. Being a missionary is pretty cool, huh? :) Anyway,
we weren't able to set a baptismal date with her yet, but we're
working on it. She's keeping all of her commitments and reading the
BoM, praying, and coming to church every week despite her busy
schedule.
Temp: 75°F

Friday: Today was rough. I woke up really sick; I had a migraine and a
very upset stomach. It was pretty miserable. I woke up with a
headache, and got up when the alarm went off at 6:15. When I stood up,
I almost threw up right there. I told Elder Flynn that I'm going back
to bed. He studied while I tried to sleep off this plague. It finally
went away around 10 AM. I studied for an hour and then had district
meeting. I was still pretty messed up because it was the first time
I've slept in past 6:30 on my mission. My head wasn't very clear all
day. We had dinner with the Moore family! The father wasn't home, so
we had a little picnic at their neighborhood park. We took some
pictures on the grass. It was a beautiful night. Great picnic weather.
Oh, may I remind you all, IT WAS FEBRUARY 27th! And we had a picnic!
:) Our only investigator over 21 had to cancel because she was in the
hospital getting an MRI. :(
Temp: 75°F

Saturday: Day 200 of my mission! It's flying by (I think...). The more
I think about it, the MTC felt like an eternity ago. But then again,
I've almost been out 7 months. Now THAT's crazy. People I know well
are beginning to go home. Yikes. Haha. Our morning run was in the
drizzle. It was actually kind of refreshing. That's a shock to a lot
of you who know me well because you all know I HATE rain. It's
terrible! But today it was pretty good...I got my package from home
and it was super exciting! I'm loving the Patriots Super Bowl shirt my
family sent. Oh yeah! Represent! We had stake Priesthood leadership
meeting and the adult session of stake conference tonight. Elder
Rheine(sp?) of the Seventy was there. He was a great speaker! Our
Oakwood Ward mission leader, Brother Wincek, took us to jimmy johns
for dinner in between meetings. It was great.
Temp: 72°F

Sunday: We had another wonderful day. We had stake conference! Elder
Rheine put on a really special Morningside for all recent converts,
returning members, and investigators in the stake. We had three
investigators—Leah, Pedro, and Megan—go and two recent converts there.
It was a really special meeting and they all loved it. We then had the
Sunday General session of Conference. Elder Rheine was there again and
spoke amazingly. It's so cool that our investigators got to hear from
a general authority. They all loved it. We met a friend of a kid who
just moved in to the ward a couple weeks ago. He has been coming to
church with his friend. His name is Alberto and he's 17. He said he
really wants to be a member of the Church and wants to hear the
missionary lessons and be baptized. Haha, he even went up and sang
with the youth at Conference. He's the man. We set up an appointment
for Monday night! After dinner we got to teach Megan in the Smith's
home. We taught her the plan of salvation and set a baptismal date for
March 28! She really loves what we've been teaching so we're very
excited for her. She comes to church every week since we've been
meeting with her. She's also keeping commitments! :)
Temp: 75°F

That was my week! For everyone who doesn't know, almost everyone who
we're teaching is pretty young. Here's a list of them:
Megan: 20, Leah: 18, Pedro: 18, Alberto: 17, and Brittney who is older.

I miss you all and look forward to hearing from you. Keep in touch!

Much love,

Elder Jones
Oakwood / Centennial Wards

Area boundry

study couch

# bikestatus

Storm's a coming

selfie

"Joneswood & Flynntennial" 3rd P Day in Peoria 26th P day

Hello, friends and family!

 I hope you all have had a wonderful week! I know I sure have. I'm
enjoying my time here in Peoria! It's much quieter and peaceful....but
it still has some of the chaos of Phoenix. Peoria is like Webb City to
Joplin. Kind of.... To explain the title of this email: We cover the
Oakwood and Centennial wards in this area, so our zone leaders came up
with "Joneswood and Flynntennial". I think it was pretty clever. Then
again, I love puns. I'll stop boring you. Here was my week! Enjoy! :)

Monday: P-day. It was my first pday in this area. We did the normal
things, though. The only different thing was having to get a ride from
our zone leaders because we don't have a car. It's weird not being
able to just go ask Sister Simon when we need a ride! Haha. We were
super spoiled there. Anyway, after shopping we biked up to get a
haircut and we got one at this legit barber shop. I am pretty sure the
guy who cut my hair was either French or Russian and he kept talking
to me in his language. It's like, dude, I don't speak your language
just chill haha. His name was Ed. He did a great job, though. Elder
Flynn had a gift card to Burger King so we ate there for lunch. After
pday we went to a less-active/recent convert's house named Chris. She
has had trouble praying recently, so we've been helping her with that.
This visit was mostly to introduce her to the new missionary and she
gave us cake and ice cream. And soda. And lots of other things that we
probably don't need haha. I swear they have a clock on every inch of
wall in that massive house. The ticking would drive me insane. Pretty
good day, though!
Temp: 79°F

Tuesday: It was a very great day! HAPPY BIRTHDAY SAM! :) Not much
happened in the morning, but it was a successful evening. We got a new
investigator! Her name is Leah and she's the girlfriend of a member of
the priests quorum. She is a senior in high school. None of her family
is religious, but she has been for a while. She really wants to know
what church is true and her boyfriend's family set us up! We taught
her the Restoration and she really liked it. She has tons of
questions, which is great. It means she sincerely wants to know, not
just follow her boyfriend. She has been coming to church every week
for about a month! We have another lesson this week with her. She's
great!
Temp: 77°F

Wednesday: Pretty normal day. Study, lunch, finding, dinner, and then
a lesson. We taught Darin, who has been investigating the Church for a
while now. Pretty sure it's been for about 4ish years. He's had some
drug problems but is working to overcome them. He has great fellowship
from the Ward; someone stops by like every other day to check on him
and see how he's doing. He wants us to re-teach the lessons again so
that's what we're doing. He really likes to talk, so we only got half
of the lesson done. That's okay, though. Bonding time is good for him,
I guess. Haha.
Temp: 82°F

Thursday: Another great day!! I'm really enjoying being here with
Elder Flynn. He's the man. We weekly planned most of the day until
dinner, then we had interviews with President Griffin. Elder Flynn and
I are the zone tech specialists, so he talked to us a little bit about
the new iPads. I'm super excited because my iPad is a wreck. The
screen is cracked everywhere and pieces of the screen are falling out
hahaha. Thank goodness we're getting new devices.... He told us that
we will be having an all-mission conference March 3rd, so that's when
we'll be getting our new iPads-most likely. We then had separate
interviews and I love that guy! President Griffin is so cool. He's
very encouraging. That night we got a new investigator! Her name is
Megan, and she's 20. Her boyfriend just got baptized in Tempe, and we
believe she was taught a little bit over there with her boyfriend. The
only problem is that we think hey taught her in Spanish...haha. That's
what the referral said. Anyway, we taught her the Restoration and she
accepted it well. Invited her to church and baptism and she accepted
both! She's really solid. She's been reading the Book of Mormon too
which is essential.
Temp: 79°F

Friday: We had district meeting. Our district leader, Elder Canny, is
super awesome. In case you forgot, he's from Norway so he has a pretty
sweet accent. He's a Spanish-speaking missionary so it's like a mix
between Spanish and Norwegian. :P We had a lesson with a newer
investigator from the Centennial Ward, Brittney. We taught the rest of
the Restoration and committed her to be baptized on March 211! She is
super great. She's probably in her mid to late 50s, and wants a change
after being catholic all of her life. She saw the change the Gospel
made in her son who was just baptized about a year ago. She said she
knows the Book of Mormon is true and that Joseph Smith is and was a
true prophet. It was awesome; I've never felt the Spirit that much in
a lesson. Oh, and she gave us cheesecake to take home. :)
Temp: 80°F

Saturday: Pretty dull day. We helped clean the church building in the
morning, but that's about it. One funny thing did happen, though. We
were out biking and this guy was pulling out of a parking lot and sped
up and almost hit Elder Flynn. We slammed on our brakes and so did he,
then he leaned out the window and rudely said, "Calm down, I want
going to hit you." Yeah, that's why you sped up. Man, Christlike love
is hard sometimes. I have discovered that "bike rage" is way more real
than "road rage" haha.
Temp: 79°F

Sunday: What a wonderful day. Pedro and Leah came to church and sat
down pretty early, but we were sad because we didn't see Megan. I
turned to Elder Flynn and said, "Dang, no Megan." And right when I
said that she walked in! One minute to spare! Haha. She loved church
and got fellowshipped really well from the relief society. We actually
set up her next lesson to be in the home of a member she met today.
Pretty cool! It was her first time ever being at a church service and
she loved it. Leah stopped us after church and said that they talked
about the Plan of Salvation in young women's class, and said she had
some questions. It was perfect because that's the next lesson we're
teaching her! It was fast  Sundayy so we took a nap for our lunch hour.
We studied a bit and headed to dinner. We had some kick-butt jalapeño
stuffed burgers straight off the grill. Man, best fast-breaking meal
ever! We taught Chris again tonight. She gave us some Oreos :) oh, and
Elder Flynn broke our toilet seat.....hahahaha


That was my week! We have a dinner appointment tonight, so I will
probably have to be done emailing by 4:300 rather than 6. Pictures are
on the way! I love you all and if you need my address to send mail,
just email me and ask for it or ask my mom!

Much love,

Elder Jones

REBELLION!

"Grass Angels" instead of Snow Angels

Elder Jones and Elder Flynn at park 

Lounging on the grass 

Elders at Stake Conference today!

Love this!

Waiting can be fun!

on the road!

on the sidewalk

Elder Flynn riding onto the sunset

Mission: Peoria 2nd P Day in Peoria! 25th Pday on mission!

This week was a really great week. I left my first area after six
months of service there. I will seriously miss all of the people I
worked with and, of course, Elder Shurtleff. However, I am very
excited for my next journey here in Peoria. Let me just tell
you....it's beautiful here. It's half city, half rural and it reminds
me a ton of home. Some of the roads we bike on remind me of the roads
in Oronogo: narrow. Here was my week!:

Monday: it was a Monday work day. Those are always rough! I actually
did my laundry today because I was pretty sure I was getting
transferred. Not much happened during the day, but we did end up going
to Jack in the Box for lunch. It was my first time eating there and it
was pretty good! It was pretty warm for February...I honestly keep
forgetting it's winter. We taught Eliza the Restoration with Jenga
blocks. It was pretty fun!! They had homemade pizza and asparagus and
gave some to us. It was a blast! I love teaching Eliza and her family.
Temp: 83°F

Tuesday: P-Day. I got word that I am transferring out of my first
area. The members in Shaw Butte and Moon Mountain because my family so
it was pretty hard leaving them. It felt like just yesterday that I
was walking into Sister Simon's front door for the first time. It's
already been six months—crazy. We had two lessons tonight and they
both went alright. An investigator accepted a baptismal invite which
was cool. Too bad I won't be there to finish teaching him, but I
really enjoyed the time I had to teach him. Packing is stupid so it
was good to get that out of the way. I apologize again for the short
letter last week; I packed until like 6pm. Then we had to go out.
Temp: 81°F

Wednesday: I got transferred! I am now with Elder Flynn in Peoria, AZ.
He came out with me so it's pretty cool to be with a companion who is
learning too. We will definitely learn together. I got assigned to be
senior companion so that will definitely be a new experience. Elder
Flynn was with his trainer for four transfer periods (all 6 months) so
that's new. I'm his first companion that isn his trainer! We cover the
Centennial and Oakwood wards. Our area is just about as big as my last
area and we're on bikes still. I like being on bikes...especially with
this weather. I got to see Elder Jeong at the transfer meeting which
was AWESOME! Oh, and if you heard about that big Tongan guy who came
in to our mission, yeah. He's in my zone. He's a gentle giant. He's
6'7", 410 lbs and his trainer is about my size. At the meeting he
introduced him like: "This is my new bodyguard..." Haha. My new
companion is awesome! Love the guy already. We live with members, but
not quite like Sister Simon. We live in a renovated garage and it
smells kinda weird...haha. Don't let the word "renovated" make you
think it's nice—it's not very nice. But it works and it's gonna do!
Plus, this is my first time actually having to budget my money because
there isn't all the extra food from Sister Simon. ;) haha. We biked
around and I met some of the auxiliary leaders from both wards. We had
coordination meeting for Oakwood. They're some pretty great members!
Temp: 79°F

Thursday: Weekly planning! It was interesting kind-of leading the
planning session since I'm senior companion. I don't really know what
I'm doing but it went well. We planned for upcoming lessons and stuff.
The area book is kind of a mess, so we were thinking of ways to clean
it up. Their finding hasn't been very productive so we were thinking
of ways to make it more productive. Both wards are pretty slow
regarding current work, but it's about to pick up. And I'm in a very
wealthy part of Peoria, so that's nice! Almost every house is big.
It's awesome! We visited some more auxiliary leaders tonight and the
RS president of the Centennial Ward gave us a box of Thin Mints Girl
Scout cookies! The Holy Ghost totally prompted us to go there. Haha!
;) today marked my six-month mark! Crazy, I know.
Temp: 79°F

Friday: We had district meeting. Our district leader is a
Spanish-speaking Elder named Elder Canny. He's from Norway! His voice
is pretty cool. He's really tall.... His companion, Elder Rodriguez,
came out with me too. The other elders in my district are young too. A
missionary who came out a transfer after me, and his companion who is
in training. Met the bishop of the Centennial Ward and he gave us a
lot of people to go visit.
Temp: 81°F

Saturday: We spent the morning geocoding our area. I mentioned before
that the area book was a wreck. So. I just applied the same method
that my last area was geocoded. For example, in my last area, we split
up the wards into sub-areas. For shaw butte, we did: SB0, SB1..etc. So
for this area we split up the wards into CT0-4, and OW0-3. It's worked
really well so far and have made finding way more productive. We went
out and taught a lady in Centennial Ward who is recently interested
after her son just got baptized into the YSA Ward. We taught her and
she's really receptive. Her name is Brittney and she's from Belize.
I've never felt the Spirit so strongly in a lesson. The words just
came out of mine and Elder Flynn's mouths and they touched her heart.
She is reading the Book of Mormon and is very solid. It's the first
new investigator in centennial Ward in like 8 months. Crazy. It was
kind of funny because she gave us dates (the fruit) as we were leaving
and I HAD TO SAY IT: "We aren't allowed to date...." Hahahaha. We took
them anyway. They're pretty good, actually...
Temp: 82°F

Sunday: It was my first Sunday in the new wards! The Centennial Ward
is HUGE. They fill the front and the overflow. I got to meet Pedro,
who is an investigator. He's 18, a senior in high school, and is
dating one of the laurels. He's really awesome. He actually taught
priests quorum this Sunday...haha. We're waiting on his dad to soften
his heart and let him get baptized. He doesn't want to do it without
having the support from his dad. We also got to meet Leah, a 17
year-old girl who is dating one of the priests. She's interested too
so that's awesome!! We have a lesson with her and her boyfriend's
family Tuesday at their house. Her boyfriend's family is active. She
was at church! After church we went to meet a referral that we just
got and her name is Megan. She's 20 and her boyfriend just got
baptized in the Spanish Ward. She doesn't know Spanish so she wants to
come to our Ward. We set up a time to go teach her so that's awesome!
Two possible new investigators right there!!! Apparently this is super
good for these two wards so I'm excited.


So yeah, this area is awesome. It's slow just like my last area but I
love it. The members and investigators are awesome. I look forward to
my new journey! My address is safe to mail packages and letters to. My
mailing address is:

Elder Kevin Jones
7535 W. Banff Ln
Peoria, AZ 85381

I love you all! Have a wonderful week, pictures are on the way.

Sincerely,

Elder Jones

 Oh, I forgot to mention, Elder Flynn and I are
the zone tech specialists. 

Elder Jones packed and ready to move to Peoria!

Elder Jones, Elder Shurtleff, and a priest from their ward

Elder Jones and Sis Simon before he leaves

Look who Elder Jones sees at the transfer meeting!  Elder Jeong!

Elder Flynn, Elder Jones new companion

The kitchen in the apartment in Peoria

Elder Flynn in action!

Elder Jones Selfie!

Old ward name

Hard at work... notice the orange tree in the background.  I gotta ask about that!

Making an appointment I am sure, but check out those diamond studs on the sunglasses.  I'm not sure they are mission approved!

Favorite Restaurant!!