CHRISTMAS!

Hey gang!

This week on #whatsmysnack we have turkey on turkey on turkey! We had tons of left over turkey from our ward Christmas party and it all came to us. We've been eating turkey sandwiches for breakfast lunch and dinner! 

On Christmas Eve we had a snow storm, so after church us and the North elders went and shoveled! We rigged up our bike rack to carry our 4 snow shovels and we went to some older ladies in the ward and then we would just shovel a couple of their neighbors. A couple of the neighbors that we shoveled came out and said how thankful they were for us and offered to pay us. We told them we wouldn't take their money and they were dumbfounded that 4 teenage boys would just come and shovel their driveway out of the goodness of their hearts! 

This Christmas was awesome! We went caroling with the north elders, Spanish elders and the hermanas. We went to two rest homes and sang to all the people there. It was so cool, they would all sing along and clap for us, the spirit was super strong! I love christmas and the happiness and joy it brings when we focus on our Savior Jesus Christ! I hope y'all had a very merry christmas!

Elder Thorpe

Turkey on turkey on turkey!

Stanley's baptism in Joliet

Rock River and downtown Rockford

Merry Chrysler

Went to Wisconsin and their stop lights are wack.

Our shovel rack

(We loved seeing and talking to Elder Thorpe on Christmas day!)

BAPTISM!!

Hey gang!

This week on #whatsmysnack, (unfortunately I don't have a picture), but this week on exchanges, Elder Parkinson and I ate dinner at a members house. They are a younger couple who are vegan... so we had vegan veggie burgers. I'm not sure what veggies were in this patty, but there were all sorts of seeds. They said "our meal was going to be entirely vegan, but we decided to put cheese on the burgers."  I know for sure now that I will never be a vegan!

Solid week this week, our investigator Jesse got baptized! It was awesome, he invited lots of his friends and we had tons of people there. We confirmed him in sacrament meeting and elder Bagley conferred the Aronic priesthood on him after church! We are still trying to get 10 hours of recurring service and we started this week at the northern Illinois food bank. We did a lot of labeling and sorting canned food. When we sorted it was nasty, we had to take out the bad, dented, or punctured cans. The punctured ones would leak and so they were all rotten and had bugs crawling out of them and boy they smelt horrendous. We were all dry heaving haha. 

We are teaching this guy named N L who is from the Congo and barely speaks English. He and his family were able to come to our ward Christmas party which was awesome! A lot of the members introduced themselves to them and we found out that Solomon (a young boy also from Africa that is a member) is friends with N oldest son! We are excited to keep working with the L Family! We found a new investigator on Saturday named Cynthia, she is awesome and so ready for the gospel! We had a member pick her up for church and she loved it. She participated a lot in gospel principles class too! I invited her to be baptized on January 20th and she accepted! Things are going well here in Rockford! 

I hope y'all have a merry Christmas and focus on the true meaning of Christmas. I know that we have a savior Jesus Christ who died for each of us. But most importantly I know that he was resurrected and lives today and because he lives, we too will live again!

Elder Thorpe

Fillin' the font with Elder Bag Rag

My man Jesse got dunked!

I've seen more car accidents here in Rockford than I have in my whole life!

Miracles!

Hey Gang!

This week on #whatsmysnack we have a money meal that we cooked up for ourselves. We got a rack of ribs that Elder Bagley and I made in our crock pot, we threw some applewood rub on there and smothered her in BBQ sauce and it was phenomenal. The North Elders didn't have a dinner appointment either so we took the ribs to their apartment and Elder Hollist, being the great Idaho potato farmer that he is, whipped us up some Idaho mashed potatoes. We had worked hard this week so we had to treat ourselves! 

We had a pretty amazing miracle happen this week. On Monday night we were at our ward mission leaders house for MCM and the North elders get a call from a member in the ward and he tells us that he is having a stroke and he wants us to meet him at the hospital. So we leave MCM and go to the hospital. We are waiting in the parking lot for him to get there and we see another ward member pull up and get out of his car and start hurrying into the emergency room. We get out of the car and he sees us and says, "come on elders let's go". So we go into the ER with him and we ask if brother DeCoto is there yet, and the member looks at us confused and says what's wrong with brother DeCoto? He proceeded to tell us that he was there because a family in our ward was flying their plane home from Florida and they had just barely crash landed at the airport. We found out that the 3 kids on the plan were in the hospital that we were at and they were all pretty beat up but in stable condition. We were also informed that the dad, flying the plane, was in critical condition over at a trauma 1 hospital in Rockford. So Elder Bagley and I hurried over there and the North elders stayed with the 3 kids. We got to the other hospital just in time to get in and give him a blessing right before they took him in for surgery. He wasn't a pretty sight, the doctors said he was in very critical condition and they weren't sure if he would make it. He was really bandaged up and what we could see of his body was pretty gruesome. When we put our hands on his head for the blessing, the doctor said we had to be very careful because he has very serious lacerations on his head. I have never seen someone so beat up. Afterwards we went back to the North elders and waited with them at the other hospital until almost 11pm. We found out that brother DeCoto, who thought he was having a stroke, really just had a sinus infection and drove himself home from the hospital. When we finally went home we talked about the experience we had and We realized that the reason brother DeCoto called us and had us go to the hospital wasn't for him. It was so that we would be in the right place at the right time to use our priesthood to help another family in our ward. I know if we weren't at the hospital When we found out about the plane crash, we wouldn't have been able to get to the dad soon enough to give him a blessing before surgery. 

As of today the 3 kids are doing well, one daughter had to have surgery to relocate her hip but other than that they are all ok. The dad is alive and is recovering, very slowly but still recovering! I know that the Lord works miracles through his servants! The rest of the week went pretty great, we taught some lessons and did lots of service. We did service with the north elders at a members home, he has a ton of land and he wants us to till it all so we were chopping down some trees. I loved it, it made me feel like i was working at the cabin again!  We taught Jesse a bunch this week to prepare him for his baptismal interview on Saturday, which he passed with flying colors! I'm pumped for him to be baptised on Saturday! 

Rockford is dope and things are going great, I love and miss you all! Have a great week and #lighttheworld

Elder Thorpe

Helping a member insulate his house.

Zone Conference

Rockford Illinois!

Hey Gang!

This week on #whatsmysnack we have some Beast Powder #gainz. In my new apartment in Rockford, we have some weights and a bench press, so Y'all know I'm gonna be gettin yoked! I'm not exactly sure how old the protein powder is, it says it was Elder Hunters and none of the missionaries I've talked to know who he is haha. But hey protein is protein right?;)

I'm so grateful that Heavenly Father answers prayers and that he is always there for us. I prayed really hard and a lot this week because I wasn't too pumped about the transfer and leaving Joliet. But this week was awesome! My comp Elder Bagley is a great guy and an awesome missionary, he has been out 16 months so he has lots of experience, he's pretty shy though. We split an area with 2 other elders and we are also YSA, so we are the Rockford 1 south & YSA missionaries. We are around the elders who have the north half of the area a lot! It's Elder Parkinson and Hollist, Elder Parkinson came in with me and Elder Hollist came in the transfer after. They are dope and we have a ton of fun! They definitely would have been homies back at home.

So today I am wearing a short sleeve shirt, I honestly did not expect to be wearing short sleeve shirts in December in Illinois. It has been upper 50s all week here. Sadly that is supposed to end tomorrow, and the high for this next week is 28, so I'll finally really have to start bundling up. The area is great here, we have two guys who are YSA that we are teaching, Jesse and Andrew, and they are both gonna be baptized on the 16th! We have taught a couple lessons over Skype and that has been a pretty cool experience! President Griffin gave me the okay to go to Joliet and baptize Louie on Saturday so I'm super pumped for that, hopefully everything goes well and it happens!

This week my testimony was strengthened on the fact that everything that happens is totally by Divine design. Just a little example is we had a referral who requested a bible. So we went to go take him the bible and when we got out of the car and started walking to the door Elder Bagley said, "oh dang, I have no idea why I grabbed 2 bibles... oh well." So we knocked and his mom answered the door, she said he just left, but that she would take the bible for him. We told her about the Book of Mormon and she got excited and said, "Dang, I want to study with you boys, can I have a bible too?" We have little experiences like that so often everyday where we do something, not really sure why we do it, but in the end it works out and we see that there was a reason for it. I know that I am out here doing the Lord's work and as long as I keep being faithful and obedient, I will continue to be an instrument in his hands!

Elder Thorpe

Y'all know I'm gonna get yoked...

New apartment who dis

The boys big time chillin on preparation day.

Crappy pic of Rockford...

TRANSFERS!

Hey Gang!

This week on #whatsmysnack we have my 2 Thanksgiving meals! The first was a Philipino lunch at the Rancheros, the only thing I knew for sure I was eating was turkey... it all tasted pretty good though! The second is my Thanksgiving dinner at the Abbenes! That family is so awesome and they make some awesome food! I can now say I've had lasagna for Thanksgiving! And their sweet potato casserole was phenomenal!!

This past week has been really great, but it was really sad for me to get a transfer call on Saturday. I was really praying that I would get to stay in Joliet another transfer and continue to teach all of my investigators, but the Lord needs me in Rockford! I gave a talk on Sunday about having a grateful attitude in every circumstance, its funny the way the Lord works, he knew I was really gonna need to learn that as I have to leave Joliet. I've met some of the most amazing people here that I will remember forever. I, for sure, will be able to come back to baptize Louie, but Carol and Stanley both asked me to be at their baptism too, and Rockford is a 2 hour drive away. So we will see if President gives me the okay for that. 

It's really a bummer to leave Joliet at this time because when I got here we had close to zero investigators, but we worked really hard and we now have 8 investigators on date for baptism! The work here in Joliet is just starting to boom and I get the boot right before I can see any of the baptisms. We started teaching this new family who moved from Columbus Ohio, the Smith/Curry family. It's a mom with 5 kids ages from 11 down to 1, and her fiance. They are ready to receive the gospel, we taught the restoration and they were so interested and impressed. I invited them to be baptized and they said they would love to! We set a date for January 18th! I'm praying they all continue to progress towards baptism!

Today we have a lot going on, we had to wake up at 3am to get ready and head up to Naperville to teach seminary, I guess some kids from our ward requested us. Now I have to pack all of my stuff up which is a real bummer, I hate packing. I thought my suitcases were full when I left but I've gotten a lot more stuff and I have no idea how I'm gonna fit it all... I'm probably gonna have to wear a couple layers of clothing haha. We just got a call from a member who's brother has cancer and needs a blessing, so as soon as our laundry finishes we will head over to give him a blessing. I'm so grateful for the priesthood and the opportunity and authority I have act in God's name!

As I have finished my 12 week training and am moving to a new area, I've had a quote that one of my favorite coaches would always say, running through my mind. "Lets get after it!" -coach Bills 
I'm excited for the opportunity to go to Rockford and I know there is a reason I'm supposed to be there at this time, and I'm ready to "get after it!"

Hope you all have a great week!!

Elder Thorpe

Two great Thanksgiving meals!

The District

Louie and Carol

The Martins

The Dodds

The Abbenes

The crew!  Sure gonna miss serving around these elders!