Wednesday, November 23, 2011

Three Great Lessons

Ciao tutti! This week has been great! Especially Yesterday. We had three great lessons, one with a new investigator who is very Catholic and whenever he thinks of God he thinks of our Church and Eternal Families! So he is great and we told him to pray for a baptismal date and he said that he would! We are really excited for him and know that he wants to become a member. Then we had another great lesson about the importance of The Book of Mormon and then we finished that at about 3:30 and then we got a call from the Dornys and they asked us when we could meet and so we met them at 4 at Termini and it was so good to see some familiar faces! They were so nice and it was good to talk to them for a bit! Then we had to run and get our late late lunch at five. Then we rushed over to the house of the Sorelle missionaries to give Sorella Laws a blessing because she is sick. Then we had to run over to the Church for our last lesson which went really good as well! Then it was time to head home. So it was a fun day! Anziano Bunker is still a champ missionary. It is good to hear about the kids Thanksgiving party! Sounds fun! And that story about Jaren! That was awesome! Could you get his information so that I can write him? I'm glad to hear that Nan and Pop are enjoying staying at the house of  Lindsay and Travis! And glad to hear that the pictures got through! The bottle picture is a big wine bottle from when we were picking grapes and stuff. And the fountain one is just in the streets of Rome. You can just drink the water out of the fountains like that, it's really nice cause you don't have to carry around a water bottle all day. Thank you so much for the package! I almost ripped open all of the presents but decided to give this whole waiting thing a try. It looks very nice, thanks a ton!  Hope you all have a great Thanksgiving and eat some sweet potato pie for me. Love you tons!!!



Tuesday, November 22, 2011

Latest Pics from Rome

Caleb sent home a couple of pictures last week I thought we would post and share...





Letter about Calebs new calling

I Forgot to include this great letter we received from Caleb's mission President about his call as District Leader there.  We are so appreciative of a good mission President who is always mindful of the mission and the missionaries he serves with there! President and Sister Kelly have been wonderful.

Dear Brother and Sister Larsen,

We are pleased to inform you that your son has been called as a District Leader here in the Italy Rome Mission.  As a District Leader he will be responsible for all of the missionaries in his district.  He will meet with and teach them weekly in a district meeting.  He will also encourage them in their own areas, supervise their service, and be a mentor to them.  He will interview all baptismal candidates and supervise the baptismal services.
He has been called to this new assignment based upon his outstanding service and dedication as a missionary.

Sister Kelly and I thank you for your faith and prayers on behalf of our mission and for all you have done to prepare such an outstanding missionary.

Sincerely,
           
Thomas E. Kelly
President
Italy Rome Mission

Wednesday, November 16, 2011

"Proclamation to the World on Family" ...nothing to run from

Hey! Another week in the bag and things are going great! We are really excited about how things are going with contacts the past few days and are hoping that they will turn out as investigators in the end! This week we did exchanges with the assistants who are going home soon. That was a lot of fun and we really learned a lot! Haha funny story! Anziano Bunker and Anziano Banks were together for this exchange while I was with Anziano Garvin. Anziano Bunker and Anziano Banks were on a train and talking to people about the gospel when all of a sudden some lady stands up and starts yelling for everyone on the bus to repent and come unto Christ. The Anziani thought it was a Jehovahs Witness and wanted to talk to her as fast as possible. As they got over to her the train stopped at the big train station and they all got off. Anziano Banks chased her down and talked to her about the family, and gave her the Proclamation to the World on the Family. The lady took it and went to the elevator. So the two Anziani walked up the stairs and saw her standing there reading the pamphlet and then she just starts to rip it up and throws it in the trash! Then she walks over to her friends and family ( a group of like 10) and Anziano Banks decided to walk up to her and ask her why she threw it away. She said that it was all from the devil and Anziano Banks pulls out another pamphlet and said," The family is from the devil?!" and they all stood there in silence for a few seconds and then the lady screamed "RUN!" and the group of 10 with their strollers all just started sprinting away!  Anziano Bunker and Banks were just standing there holding their pamphlets in shock and confusion at what just happened. Hahaha It's great being a missionary! Thanks for the congrats. It has been a lot of fun and I love our district they are really great! We get to go over to help the Sorelle teach a lesson this next week to a guy who knows the Bible really good and wants us to come over to discuss the Bible and stuff. So I am excited about that! We will try to help him understand the importance of The Book of Mormon. The week has been another fun one and we are excited to be able to meet with the new contacts we got two days ago, 10 of them! So that should be good! Yes Anziano Bunker is a stud! He played football for American Fork and then for Snow College. He is a really good missionary! That is awesome to hear about the Utes game! GO UTES! And great to hear about Colt and Miguel wrestling!! That is awesome! You will have to send me pictures of both of them! And congrats on the weight, that is awesome! Anziano Cox sent me a picture of you and mom with him and I was  like"WOW My DAD has lost a lot of weight and is looking fresh!" That is way great!  Well I better run thanks for all you do! I love you tons!! CIAO!!!!!!!!!

Wednesday, November 9, 2011

Staying Busy

CIAO!! This week has been great! We found a really cool family from the Phillipines and we are excited to teach them!! Anziano Bunker is really great and we have been getting along and teach really well together. We have found a few other new investigators, so we will see how those turn out. Yes it has been getting colder here we are starting to wear our jackets. This means that we are doing a lot more house finding, cause there aren't as many people on the streets. Sweet I'm excited about those notes from the young women!! Haha  Which reminds me thanks a ton for the package!! I loved everything in it! That book looks Great! I loved his talk in conference! We are staying busy. Haha I loved Tafts letter about how they talked to 3 people and got 2 numbers! I wish that we could do that here! Last night we went tracking and got a stack of pass along cards of about 100 and gave all of those out and we got 0 numbers :(   almost always the response to us is," No grazie, sono catolico!" (No thanks I'm catholic) and walk away, but it's fun! I love trying to help them understand the importance of this message! Yes, I did meet Sorella Askew she is very nice! I can't believe she is home now! I haven't met Anziano Russell but I will have to look out for him! Yes I will try to send pictures soon! Anyway, I better run! Love you tons!! CIAO CIAO!!!!

Wednesday, November 2, 2011

I am the new District Leader

Transfer news is in! I'm staying in Roma 3 and I will be serving with Anziano Bunker from Alpine! Anziano Bunker is really great! He was in the MTC with me and has been in Sicily his whole mission! He is a good hard worker so it will be a lot of fun! And I am the new district leader so I hope that I can pull it off alright! Haha the mission is very hard but I'm loving it so much! Everyone says missions are hard but I always thought that they were talking about physically hard, which it is that to, but it is much more mentally hard. Constantly trying to fight off those thoughts of home and being lazy. I am glad to hear that Chase is going out! That is really great! He will be a killer missionary! He definitely has a strong leadership quality to him!  I haven't gotten the package yet but I will go to the office tomorrow when I go to pick up Anziano Bunker. Sorry this week is a bit short but we have to go fast because we want to get pictures from everyone in our district! Love you tons and thanks for everything!!!