Monday, April 25, 2016

Football, Scooby Doo and Deer Meat

Dear Family & Friends,

This week was pretty incredible! On Monday, we had the Moultrie Elders over for P-Day activities. We ended up playing a game of football in a field behind our apartment. The Sisters of course were the quarterbacks. But before the game even started, we were just tossing the ball around. I was going for a pass when I stumbled on a mound and down I went. Now, I am 6'5 and around 250 pounds. I don't go down soft. Going down, I kept my weight going and landed back on my feet with no injuries, thankfully. I should probably be more careful in the future...

After P-Day activities, we went with Bro. Hayes to teach James the Plan of Salvation. We had an absolutely awesome lesson with him. As we went through the lesson, it was plain to see that the Spirit was working on James. 

On Tuesday, we went to Moultrie for District Meeting and we were allowed to take the Sister's car since they had a ride up there. You really can appreciate being in a car when you are in a bike area, for sure. after lunch and seeing Elder Ray, my MTC companion, now Zone Leader in Tifton, we came back to Albany and enjoyed the trip. 

Wednesday was an interesting day. We biked over to Bro. Hall's to go over the ward roster and get a game-plan to visit some less-active people. About 30 minutes later, the Sisters called us and asked us to help one of their investigators move out/evacuate from her boyfriend's place in East Albany, which is a very rough part of town. We got that taken care of and we had a light lunch of Banana & Mayo sandwiches with Bro. Hall. We had a Book of Mormon class that night to finish the day and talked to Chris for a bit as well.

Thursday was Sister Walker's birthday so we helped her celebrate it. We met with Sister Walls and had dinner with her at a place called Gargano Villa, an Italian restaurant. There we all got pizza. Sis. Walls looked at me kinda funny when I ordered a pizza with sausage, ham, green peppers, onion, and jalapenos. And it was delicious! Bro. Anderson had taken us there and picked us up. We then stopped at Wal-Mart and he bought us milk and family pack of Oreos for each of us. We get back to the apartment and it is a little past 8 pm. Our plans had burnt out and we were thinking of something to do. I mentioned that we should see Maquez, who lives in our apartment complex and whom we have tried for a few weeks to get back in contact with. We knock on her door and she immediately invited us in. As we came to find out, she had questions about a few things, mainly fasting and how to go about doing it. We answered her questions and she invited us back for the next day, but she wasn't home when we went by.

On Friday, we were kept very busy. Bishop Tolma picked us up to go to Leesburg to help out at a Methodist Church put together food orders for needy people in the community. One thing I noticed and others helping was about 80 % of the food had a 'Deseret' label on it. The Church is certainly not excluding other churches for assistance with that kind of a need. And the need was certainly met. Bishop then swung us by his house and there we met Scooby. Not the cartoon, but Bishop's dog, a Great Dane, who looks just like Scooby Doo. He then took us to Cracker Barrel and the spoiling began. He then took us to TCBY (frozen yogurt) and got some stuff. After getting dropped off, and Maquez not being there, we talked with Ralph and the Sisters. WHAT A DAY!

Saturday was also busy. We went up in the morning with Ralph to Leesburg to help the Methodist Church again. We get back around noon and Chris calls us to see if we could help him mow his lawn so he doesn't get a fine from the city. He promised to feed us, so we jumped at the opportunity, naturally. As it turns out, his grass is almost up to my waist. No problem. Chris borrowed his neighbor's riding lawnmower and got to work. A couple hours later we finished and we have dinner. A dinner of Deer steak wrapped in Bacon with Tator Tots. I know, very redneck, but that's Chris! He then dropped us off at the church for Ward Correlation with Bro. Spiers.

Yesterday, after Church and doing other things, Bro.Spiers took us to his house for dinner. I also brought a tie I found in the apartment and the shirt I destroyed by mud in Gray, to burn. After dinner and the burning, I got a haircut by Sis. Spiers who is a hair-dresser. What a week!

Love y'all and have a good week!

Elder Alexander Kestner