08/29/2017 - So Whatever It Is, I Am Excited!

Hey y’all.

Well another week flew by. So let me tell ya about this week. We had interviews, which are always good. I have the best mission president. So it was good. We were challenged to throw ourselves at the members. So that is what we have been doing, we have 18 member lessons this coming week. Which is great. We were also able to meet with our bishop in coulee ridge to talk about some things that are going on. What has been happening is ward council is about to be dissolved basically. Our ward mission leader moves this week, and the young men’s president and elders quorum president move in the next few weeks. And I think the high priest group leader is going to be changed. So basically our ward is going to be completely flipped. So we have weekly coordination meetings with our bishop to help him out and he is kinda filling in for WML. Which is awesome. Our bishop is the best. We also met with the RS president and offered help it was really cool because she said she never thought of asking us for help and she told us she would love to keep us in the loop and then gave us some names to follow up on. So that was awesome.  We also got another bishop in Chinook. He is a great man and will be an excellent bishop. But similarly that ward council is going to be flipped soon. So tons of changes to come. But things are going well.

The YSA sisters had dinner with a member in our ward and they said they loved us!! So things are improving. We also found miraculously 2 potential investigators tracting. Which is rare. It was wild, I give my spiel at the door to this lady, I said something like families can be together forever, would you like to hear more and she was like yes. Which caught me off guard. So that was cool. But things are going good. I am all fired up and super pumped to keep working here. I have this feeling Elder Vea will train here and I will leave. But I am here to do the Lord’s will. So whatever it is, I am excited! I love this gospel brothers and sisters. It is true. Don't ever doubt that. I love you all see ya next week. 

08/22/2017 - Zone P-day at Writing-on-Stone Provincial Park

Hello from the north. Don't forget about me.

Well Brothers and Sisters sorry I was so late. We had a zone pday and went to this cool rock canyon place called Writing on Stone. It was fun and a nice break from the same old basketball. So sorry I don't have a ton of time. But to let you know how this week is going....

It is been tough. We try and stay positive but currently we only have about 3 investigators. And that is between two wards. And none of them are progressing. Needless to say we are doing a lot of finding by ourselves. Which is really hard here. However we had an excellent meeting yesterday that gave us a little idea of what we need to be doing. Since we purged this area we were kinda at a loss with how the ward has been helping and what we can do to work with them. Well we had a meeting with our high council men over missionary work and he told us all the stuff our stake has been doing and we need to be doing so we are super excited because it gives us a little more to do than knock doors in a mormon town. So we are excited. As for that the only other thing I could mention right now is we had zone conference and it was really good. It applies to me so I am not going to bore you with what we learned and tomorrow are interviews which is super exciting. But that is how things have been. But to tell you what I mean by this is a mormon town. Yesterday we went to Costco to get hotdogs after District meeting cause it is a super good place to talk to people. Anyway, we had six elders in all. None of us paid and we received 60 dollars between all of us because members would walk up and say "Elders, let me pay for that."  And give us a twenty. Even though a member had already payed for it. This place is weird. It was super funny though, Elder Pentz walked into Costco with no wallet. He said "boys I walk by faith today." And sure enough a member paid. It is super awkward I hate taking money from them but they always say they insist and we cant really deny them buying us food. It is like denying blessings. But that is southern Alberta, have a good week!

Elder Ollis

In an email to Mom: Yeah we went to some place way out in the middle of farms. It is called Writing on Stone. Kinda like goblin valley but with a river and no red rocks but it is cool. it is a zone pday. So president Miles approves it and we get to use a write off. Meaning we don't count the kilometers to our monthly alotment. No it wasn't our area but we can do special zone pdays where we get Presidents permission to leave. We also almost ran out of gas and some lady on a farm filled up our car....And running out of gas wasn't my fault. We got a ride because our car has had some issues. It is all ok. All according to rules, it was just a funny moment. And we just pulled off to a farm as we were driving past. I took lots of pictures but I'm running out of time.  I will send them next time.

From Mom: So I decided to look up Writing on Stone. Writing-on-Stone Provincial Park is located about 100 kilometres southeast of Lethbridge, Alberta, Canada, or 44 kilometres east of the community of Milk River, and straddles the Milk River itself. It is one of the largest areas of protected prairie in the Alberta park system, and serves as both a nature preserve and protection for a large number of aboriginal rock carvings and paintings. The park is important and sacred to the Blackfoot and many other aboriginal tribes. Writing-on-Stone Park contains the greatest concentration of rock art on the North American Great Plains. There are over 50 petroglyph sites and thousands of works. See images below I found on the Park's website.

A path through hoodoos in the park.

The park is located in the Milk River Valley.  To the South are the volcanic Sweetgrass Hills.

08/15/2017 - And I just hear, "Hi missionaries, wait that is THOMAS!"

Heyo everyone. 

Well this week flew by. And had a lot of weird stuff happen, and some cool stuff. First off, it was really weird that I saw the Tongas, a family from my home ward. Let me describe what happened. We are walking down the street, and I just hear, "hi missionaries, wait that is THOMAS!" Which was weird because I hadn't heard that name in forever. Anyway they ran across the street because they were across from my area and sure enough I was standing right there in front of someone from home. It was the weirdest thing I have experienced. I apologize to them however, as I was shocked, and in my mind I wasn't supposed to really see people I knew.  So it freaked me out and I said we had to go kinda quickly.  But one thing I did learn was that I cover where Sister Tonga grew up. So that is cool. 

Anyway this week we were still trying to figure things out and meet up with investigators who seem like they probably will drop us because we aren't the sisters. But that was expected. We are currently working with quite a few LA's (less actives) because finding in Lethbridge is really hard. We also called all the Part Member Families in the ward to try and pick up some new investigators. So we have quite a few lessons this week. We are worried however that they are just really nice old people who just like to have company. So we will see if there is anything solid. But that has been our work here.

This week is zone conference, which I am excited for. And before I go I wanted to tell a story of the last zone conference in southern Alberta. So we get people thanking us for what happened all the time, but last transfer the craziest thing happened. All of the south, basically all the missionaries that don't cover Calgary got together. Near the end of the conference someone felt inspired to leave. Sure enough outside across the street they see smoke rising from a retirement center. They rush back into the zone conference and all the missionaries rush across the street to help evacuate all these older people into the church to get them out of the smoke and away from the fire. It was a miracle, honestly many lives were saved because of someone listening to the holy ghost. So I hope there won't be a fire this week, but I know that our Savior is leading this work, he guides us if we seek it and we can find those he has prepared. love you all!

Note from Mom: We received this video from the Tonga family shortly after they saw him on the streets of Lethbridge.

08/08/2017 - Can't Wait to Get This Work Moving

Well I have unfortunate news. I am no longer serving in Calgary...

I got transferred, haha. So this week has been absolutely crazy. And I am going to do my best to explain the situation in the mission right now. The past few days have been a headache of just weird stuff going on. so let me try and explain this and I hope you follow.

So last week was the huge transfer and I apologize I heard an incorrect number, only 29 missionaries came our way last transfer, one of which is my MTC comp Elder Henderson! he is back from tearing his ACL. I am really excited for that! But also nearly 40 missionaries went home. Including my mission dad and mission mom. (my trainer and the oldest sister in my district when I was being trained) So it was crazy. I got transferred. I am now serving in the Lethbridge Zone, which is down south.

Lethbridge is a college town of about 100,000 people. And because it is a college town there is weed everywhere. Especially cause it is legal. But let me tell you about what is going on. They just re-organized every stake in Lethbridge and created a new YSA stake, the first one outside the states by the way. So a headache of trying to figure out new boundaries and things. But let’s add to that. I was purged in along with my companion. So we are replacing sisters who were here., sort of. What happened is there were two companionships of sisters. Each had a family ward and YSA ward. Well President pulled a companionship out and put me in, so we now cover both the family wards (Coulee Ridge and Chinook wards) and the remaining sisters now cover both of the YSA wards. I hope that  made sense. So the past few days have just been a headache trying to figure out what our area is, who we teach, and just a whole bunch of other stuff. But to add to that confusion, almost every single companionship in our zone is opening a new area because of all the mix ups. We are the pinnacle of all the change. So as my zone leaders said " this transfer is going to be goofy." So this week is truly weird. 

But it is cool. We are replacing sisters, so of course our apartment is way dope. Way nicer than my last one. And my new comp is Elder Vea, from TAYLORSVILLE UTAH. He lives on the other side of Truman elementary on the other side of 47th. He lived just down the street from me. Crazy small world! But love you all. Can't wait to get this work moving. And I know Christ lives!

In an email to his dad: We only figured out our boundaries yesterday. But I like it. It is a small town, which is awesome, Calgary was too big for me. But it is going to be tough here. This city was settled by Mormons, like much of southern Alberta, so everyone knows who we are, and tracting and street contacting is really ineffective because of that. People either love us or hate us. No in between. So we are going to work hard. I am only worried our wards will take some time to warm up to us. At church I can't tell you how many times members would say "we are going to miss the sisters."  But we will change their mind. I am way excited for this. I can't wait to start finding and teaching. Most of the investigators we had weren't super solid but I am really excited.

08/01/2017 - I Love Him and Will Follow Our Savior Anywhere

Hello everyone,

Well this week flew by. So first off there is still no surety that I am leaving. Elder Wiwchar didn't get a training call. So we find out tonight if I go. I have this sneaking feeling I will stay. Which would be a long time in my first area. But as for that I have no idea what is going on. But I trust the lord knows what he needs and knows where I need to be. So regardless I trust that I will be where he wants me to be.

As for that this week was odd. To be honest I don't even remember what happened. Like I don't know what we did. All I remember is we tract a lot, talked to a ton of people and the Zone leaders called us this week and asked us to raise our people contacted goal because we have been absolutely crushing it and the rest of the zone. Last tuesday we contacted more than the zone combined. I am a little proud of that. But when you work hard time flies. And it has been such a joy to work hard. And honestly this is really weird I can't remember much about this week. I just know we worked hard. But one thing I know, we must keep pressing forward with faith. I know that our savior leads this work, I love him and he absolutely loves us. Regardless of what we do or say. I love this gospel and will follow our savior anywhere. Because I trust that he knows what is best, it might be hard but I will always seek to do what he asks. I love you all, please remember our savior always, if you take the sacrament you have promised you would, so try. He lives, he loves you and I love you all. Miss you and have a good week.

Elder Ollis

In a letter to Mom when asked if he's getting any more dinner appointments: We are fine. We had some cool experiences. Honestly multiple times this week members of other wards we saw on the street would stop us and give us cash or give us food. It was cool. Some less active guy wants to take us this week too. I am not worried.

07/18/2017 - P-Day with the Zone

07/29/2017 - Brother Nagtalon, a good member Elder Ollis helped move

07/31/2017 - Elder Ollis and Elder Wincher with investigator, Adeline, and her dog Savannah

07/31/2017 - The Berkes, a couple the missionaries helped build a fence

07/31/2017 - The "Funeral" for an Elder who is going home