Dear Family,
Things have been great this week. Tami Gabel was baptised on thursday. Her brother in-law came from Michigan to do the baptism & confirmation. It was neet to see someone from start to baptism. she has been very excited about the whole thing. she started coming to church about the same time that i came to Platteville. she recognized that religion was missing in her life and wanted to get back into it. she quit smoking just before we met her, and now is reading anything she can get her hands on. It has been great to see.
I started at the beginging of the monthreading the Book of Mormon trying to finish it quickly, shortly after starting i decided that i was going to read it durring the month of October. I am now on track to finnish tomorrow. all I have left is Moroni. I have loved reading it fast and have had a lot of different things stick out to me that I probably wouldn't have noticed going through at a slower pace. I have also seen the blessings pres. Hinckley promised last year to those who read the book of mormon by the end of the year.
The District leader stuff hasn't been too bad. the hardest part in the 1 hour district Meetings on Tuesdays, but those are even starting to come. the one i did this week was on teaching the Basics. lots of missionaries will overcomplicate things trying to teach all they know when that just isn't necessary. there is a quote in "Preach my gospel" that says something to the effect of it is true intelegence to take a complicated principle and unfold it so that a child could understand t. so we applied that and went through more complicated principles to teach and made a list of what missionaries offen teach, then compared it to preach my gospel and saw if it mentioned different points of a principal or not. if not it doesn't need to be taught in many situations. I thought it turned out well, and Elder Chritensen really liked it and told me it was one of the best District Meetings he has had. Being a district leader is pushing me to see things in a new way (like teaching) and makes me thing how i can help my district to be better at some principal. i have really learned a lot.
Transfers are on thursday (2nd) And i will most likely be staying. we are hoping that we will both stay. we are enjoying being together. Elder Chritensed really wants to stay for christmas, but doesn't think he will make it that long. he is hoping for at least Thansgiving here.
On saturday one of the members of the branch gave us a pumpkin, and this morning we used the pumpkin to make pumpkin pie out of scratch. we have it all done now, we are just waiting for it to completely cool, and it will be ready to eat. it made a lot more than we had originally thought. we could have gotten at least 4 pies out of it. we left a large portion of the pumpkin alone, made one pie(we only had one crust) and put all the extra into a big pan and cooked it that way. It was fun to make and we are both excited to eat it. It was one of those fun experiences to say that i have done, but we had a member tell us just before we did it that it realy wasn't worth the effort. we enjoied making it, but i now see what she ment. now that i have done it, I probably wont make another one from a pumpkin any time soon.
tomorrow because it is halloween we are meeting all of the madison elders (i think about 30) in madison and are having a big zone district meeting and games. it should be fun. we are excited to go. it should be fun.
Well, i got to go. I got the package, thanks for all you do. I love you all.
Elder Lundberg
30 October 2006
23 October 2006
Pikachu Chick
Merilee says, "thought you'd get a kick out of this! So, this is my wonderful daughter getting a fantastic education at BYU-I. She was getting ready to run in the traditional ward relay race. Their ward's color is yellow- hence the horrid outfit. Pretty hilarious!!! by the way, since she had a lightning bolt tail, and a sleek, aerodynamic helmet, her team won for the fourth straight semester. Yikes!"
Letter from Mark 23 Oct 2006
Dear Family,
It is neet to hear all of the expieriences everyone is having with wisconsin. It truly is a small world. Elder Free is my Zone Leader right now, and elder Frandsen came out with me, but they are not serving together, however they are both in madison, i will have to talk to them to see if they know Brett Hales
Things ahve been going great here. We are Preparing for Tami Gabel's Baptism on thursday (26th) her brother in law is coming out to do the baptism and confirmation. she has been very excited and it has been a great blessing to watch her prepare herself fot this. it is amazing how the gospel can change people.
One of the members in our branch has a huge garden that he grows all kinds of squash's and pumpkins and such. he recently gave us a spaghetti squash that week cooked and ate. He grows Pumpkins that are supposed to be good for pies that he might be giving us. my companion and i are excited to try to make a pumpkin pie. the member told us the whole process on how to make them. my companion has a few things that he likes to cook, he makes a biscut bread occasionally, and we have done some things with the crockpot. it has been fun to have real food that we make.
This week Elder Christensen and i made up a "word of the day" he pressed play on his tape recorder for a second and whatever it sounded like became the word of the day. when it wasn't a real word we decided that the fake word was the word of the day. the first one was "Permandigashe", meaning -of or relating to squid, then my companion said it should be from an old lanugage so people couldn't look it up. so he said, how about an old kiwian Language derived from "Perma"- meaning squishy, and "gashek"-meaning fish. We had a great time doing it. then we started to tell people and no one questioned us. one person said "squishy fish, i can see that." It was all i could do not to laugh when our member said that. we told probably 5-10 people. it was halarious. It is great to be able to goof off and have fun while being a missionary.
The time in this area is just flying. I have been here a month now and transfers is comming up in a week and a half (november 2) we are hoping to stay, but not sure. Elder Christiensen wants to stay here for chrismas, and has asked president Hunt a few times to let him stay. If he does that there is a posibiliy that i could leave either this transfer, or next and he will stay.
I have started to collect a lot of differant mind puzzels, like wood things that you have to take apart and then put back together, and also several differant metal puzzels that you have to take two things hooked together apart, or take something off. It is funny because every time another missionary sees them they try to figure it out, and there are a few that most figure out but there are a couple that almost no one can figure out. some times they will try to tell me they are imposible, and without showing them how to do it i will take them apart. some of them took me a lot of thinking and time to put them back together (when i found them they were apart,) but i can do all of them now, and there are a few that most people won't even attempt.
Thank you for all that you do. I love you all.
Elder Lundberg
It is neet to hear all of the expieriences everyone is having with wisconsin. It truly is a small world. Elder Free is my Zone Leader right now, and elder Frandsen came out with me, but they are not serving together, however they are both in madison, i will have to talk to them to see if they know Brett Hales
Things ahve been going great here. We are Preparing for Tami Gabel's Baptism on thursday (26th) her brother in law is coming out to do the baptism and confirmation. she has been very excited and it has been a great blessing to watch her prepare herself fot this. it is amazing how the gospel can change people.
One of the members in our branch has a huge garden that he grows all kinds of squash's and pumpkins and such. he recently gave us a spaghetti squash that week cooked and ate. He grows Pumpkins that are supposed to be good for pies that he might be giving us. my companion and i are excited to try to make a pumpkin pie. the member told us the whole process on how to make them. my companion has a few things that he likes to cook, he makes a biscut bread occasionally, and we have done some things with the crockpot. it has been fun to have real food that we make.
This week Elder Christensen and i made up a "word of the day" he pressed play on his tape recorder for a second and whatever it sounded like became the word of the day. when it wasn't a real word we decided that the fake word was the word of the day. the first one was "Permandigashe", meaning -of or relating to squid, then my companion said it should be from an old lanugage so people couldn't look it up. so he said, how about an old kiwian Language derived from "Perma"- meaning squishy, and "gashek"-meaning fish. We had a great time doing it. then we started to tell people and no one questioned us. one person said "squishy fish, i can see that." It was all i could do not to laugh when our member said that. we told probably 5-10 people. it was halarious. It is great to be able to goof off and have fun while being a missionary.
The time in this area is just flying. I have been here a month now and transfers is comming up in a week and a half (november 2) we are hoping to stay, but not sure. Elder Christiensen wants to stay here for chrismas, and has asked president Hunt a few times to let him stay. If he does that there is a posibiliy that i could leave either this transfer, or next and he will stay.
I have started to collect a lot of differant mind puzzels, like wood things that you have to take apart and then put back together, and also several differant metal puzzels that you have to take two things hooked together apart, or take something off. It is funny because every time another missionary sees them they try to figure it out, and there are a few that most figure out but there are a couple that almost no one can figure out. some times they will try to tell me they are imposible, and without showing them how to do it i will take them apart. some of them took me a lot of thinking and time to put them back together (when i found them they were apart,) but i can do all of them now, and there are a few that most people won't even attempt.
Thank you for all that you do. I love you all.
Elder Lundberg
16 October 2006
Letter from Mark 16 Oct 2006
Dear Family,
This Week has been great. On of our investigators, Tami Gables, called us up this week and wanted to set a date for baptism for the 26th of this month. her brother-in-law is comming down from out of town to do the Baptism. she is very excited, along with us. She loves learning about the gospel. she will be good to work with in getting referals because she is new to it and absolutly loves it.
One thing I don't kow if I have told you or not, but i thought it was cool. Platteville is the Home of the Worlds Largest "M" they have a Huge "M" on the biggest hill they can find. I find it Funny that dispite the fact that Platteville has no m in it, it still has the largest M. There is a University of Wisconsin extention here in platteville and it use to be a mining college. but they aren't anymore, and they even changed from the miners to the pioneer's. so now they have no connection to the M other than History. It is funny. We like to say "M stands for Platteville"
This past week has been cold. we have gotten down to the 20's a few times this week. and even found a blanket of snow on the ground on morning, it has since melted though. in some ways i am excited for winter, but in others i don't want it to come yet.
Elder Stephen E. Snow came on tuesday, and we had a little ofver half of the mission all together in milwaukee. the other half met on monday. It was great. he had everyon prepare a 5 min talk of faith, and randomly called up 3 people to give theirs, then he evaluated them and we talked about good and bad things that they did, and how to be better public speakers. It was really neat. he also talked about 4 things we can do to help us have the spirit with us, adn can feel it more. he said, prayer, scripture study, obedience, and service. he then talked on the importance of each one. it was great. they try to get a general authority out about once a year, so unless i get realy lucky this was probably the last one that will come out to visit the mission while i am here. I really enjoyed it.
I have been loving it out here. missionary work is great. I love you all.
Elder Lundberg
This Week has been great. On of our investigators, Tami Gables, called us up this week and wanted to set a date for baptism for the 26th of this month. her brother-in-law is comming down from out of town to do the Baptism. she is very excited, along with us. She loves learning about the gospel. she will be good to work with in getting referals because she is new to it and absolutly loves it.
One thing I don't kow if I have told you or not, but i thought it was cool. Platteville is the Home of the Worlds Largest "M" they have a Huge "M" on the biggest hill they can find. I find it Funny that dispite the fact that Platteville has no m in it, it still has the largest M. There is a University of Wisconsin extention here in platteville and it use to be a mining college. but they aren't anymore, and they even changed from the miners to the pioneer's. so now they have no connection to the M other than History. It is funny. We like to say "M stands for Platteville"
This past week has been cold. we have gotten down to the 20's a few times this week. and even found a blanket of snow on the ground on morning, it has since melted though. in some ways i am excited for winter, but in others i don't want it to come yet.
Elder Stephen E. Snow came on tuesday, and we had a little ofver half of the mission all together in milwaukee. the other half met on monday. It was great. he had everyon prepare a 5 min talk of faith, and randomly called up 3 people to give theirs, then he evaluated them and we talked about good and bad things that they did, and how to be better public speakers. It was really neat. he also talked about 4 things we can do to help us have the spirit with us, adn can feel it more. he said, prayer, scripture study, obedience, and service. he then talked on the importance of each one. it was great. they try to get a general authority out about once a year, so unless i get realy lucky this was probably the last one that will come out to visit the mission while i am here. I really enjoyed it.
I have been loving it out here. missionary work is great. I love you all.
Elder Lundberg
09 October 2006
Letter from Mark 09 Oct 2006
Dear Family,
Things are going great here. we are heading into madison tonight, an then to milwaukee tomorrow because a General Authority is comming to the mission. Elder Stephen E. Snow. It should be Fun.
We have a lady named Tami Gables that has been comming to church the past few weeks, she is a member referal and has told us she wants to be baptized. be talked to the branch president and he wants to do it in 2 week, so we are going overthere today, and talking about it and working out all the details. we have been excited about it. she has a 14 year old girl that we are going to try to baptize with her, and she has 6 year old twins. she told us that she has had a void in her life that she wants to fill. there are also a few other investigators that we have that are doing well. the best thing as a missionary is to see people that understand, and accept the gospel, and let it change their lives. It is truly a blessing to be a part of this work.
thanks for the package, that was great, i also got the enzymes that you sent, thank you, I now have a bottle that i keep in the car so when i eat away from home i can still take them and it has been working well so far. Those pictures you sent of Alex and Allison suprised me. they look like they have grown a lot. I hadn't thought about that untill i got the pictures, but people do change.
It is wierd getting back into the cold season. I have enjoyed it so far, but it is funny being able to remember last year in wisconsin, and not having everyone else remember. I am the same age now as some of my seniors were when i served with them, and all but one of them are home now, and it hasn't seemed that long to me. the thought of 2 years seemed a lot longer at the start of my mission than it does now.
We have approval in this area to go camping, or to stay in members homes who live far away to save miles, unfortunatly, the members that qualify to have us stay the night are not far away, and the members tht are far away, can't stay the night. there aren't too many places to camp, so we get around the whole thing by camping in a members back yard. we did that Thursday night. we have a tent, but for some reason, no sleeping bags, so we just brought a ton of blankets. we found out that it is too late in the year to be camping without warmer sleeping bags, it was a cold night. The member told us that it probably got down to the 30's that night. it was fun thought, i can now say that i have been camping on my mission, even though it was in a back yard. that member also told me friday morning that the Utes had won their game the previous night (he is a big Byu fan but follows the Utes as well)
I talked to president hunt about what is approved as far as talks on CD go and he said that any CES instructer is ok, he said basically any church speaker is ok, anyone that has spoken at EFY, etc.
I am excited to be able to see the temples in New York, it should be fun.
Thank you for all that you do. I love you all
Elder Lundberg
Things are going great here. we are heading into madison tonight, an then to milwaukee tomorrow because a General Authority is comming to the mission. Elder Stephen E. Snow. It should be Fun.
We have a lady named Tami Gables that has been comming to church the past few weeks, she is a member referal and has told us she wants to be baptized. be talked to the branch president and he wants to do it in 2 week, so we are going overthere today, and talking about it and working out all the details. we have been excited about it. she has a 14 year old girl that we are going to try to baptize with her, and she has 6 year old twins. she told us that she has had a void in her life that she wants to fill. there are also a few other investigators that we have that are doing well. the best thing as a missionary is to see people that understand, and accept the gospel, and let it change their lives. It is truly a blessing to be a part of this work.
thanks for the package, that was great, i also got the enzymes that you sent, thank you, I now have a bottle that i keep in the car so when i eat away from home i can still take them and it has been working well so far. Those pictures you sent of Alex and Allison suprised me. they look like they have grown a lot. I hadn't thought about that untill i got the pictures, but people do change.
It is wierd getting back into the cold season. I have enjoyed it so far, but it is funny being able to remember last year in wisconsin, and not having everyone else remember. I am the same age now as some of my seniors were when i served with them, and all but one of them are home now, and it hasn't seemed that long to me. the thought of 2 years seemed a lot longer at the start of my mission than it does now.
We have approval in this area to go camping, or to stay in members homes who live far away to save miles, unfortunatly, the members that qualify to have us stay the night are not far away, and the members tht are far away, can't stay the night. there aren't too many places to camp, so we get around the whole thing by camping in a members back yard. we did that Thursday night. we have a tent, but for some reason, no sleeping bags, so we just brought a ton of blankets. we found out that it is too late in the year to be camping without warmer sleeping bags, it was a cold night. The member told us that it probably got down to the 30's that night. it was fun thought, i can now say that i have been camping on my mission, even though it was in a back yard. that member also told me friday morning that the Utes had won their game the previous night (he is a big Byu fan but follows the Utes as well)
I talked to president hunt about what is approved as far as talks on CD go and he said that any CES instructer is ok, he said basically any church speaker is ok, anyone that has spoken at EFY, etc.
I am excited to be able to see the temples in New York, it should be fun.
Thank you for all that you do. I love you all
Elder Lundberg
02 October 2006
Letter from Mark 02 Oct 2006
Dear Family,
This week has been great. Conference was Awesome! I have decided that conference as a missionary is great. it gives us a ton more material to work with and to use in our teaching situation. as a missionary working with less active members i especially liked ELder Bednar's talk. I'm already excited to get a copy of the talk and start using it. I also enjoyed the 1st and 2nd talks of saturday morning.
My reliese date is friday July 14th 2007. thursday the 13th is transfers, and we stay the night in the mission home, and friday we fly out. when Elder Hill went home, he flew straight to salt lake, and got there at 10:00 in the morning. most groups don't do that, but they only had 2 flying to salt lake so they put them on a very small plane. New York sounds fun.
I have tried those ensymes and they have done alright. where did you get those? i am actually almost out and was going to buy more. do you think walmart would have it?
After sending the pictures home i noticed that something is wrong with the card i have and my camera would not read it, so i went and baught a card. walmart was having a sale on their memory cards and they had 1 GB cards for $40, so i got one of those. needless to say, i can now take a ton of pictures. my companion loves to take pictures, so we have started to take a ton of fun pictures.
My district is just us and one other companionship, who just moved from Prairie du Chien to Richland Center (just above Gotham WI, they are way excited about that.) Every Tuesday (except for interviews week and Zone Conferance week) I am in charge of a District meeting where i chose a topic and do a training on it using the scriptures, Preach my gospel, and any other resources that i can. district meetings usually last and hour to an hour and a half, and include a few other things beside me. Tomorrow i will go to Interviews, right before that they do a district leader Training that i will go to. I also report the numbers for the district to the zone leaders 3 times a week, who send them in to the office. I am also the person that my district goes through to get anything approved (most of it i then tell the zone leaders and they approve or disaprove it)
It is wierd to think about christmas already. the only thing that i can think of at the moment is the study manuels (Book of mormon, teachings of christ and his apostles, and/or the pearl of great price) talks are also great, I think there is some sort of restriction to who we can listen to. I know we can listen to general authorities, there are missionaries that have talks from people that teach at byu, i think tomorrow i will ask president what the regulations are on talks. I have also thought of a small picture book, i haven't kept many pictures out here, but it would be fun to have a few pictures from throught my mission (not nessisarily all of them) other that that i don't know. i will try to give it some thought.
the mission had a goal to finnish the new testament by sept 30th. I was origanally hoping to finish the whole bible by then, but then i fell behind, so i skipped to the new testiment and finished the morning of conferance. I went through the newtestiment fairly quickly so alot of it, especially the end was still in my mind for conferance, it was neat. i also finished the book of mormon on saturday morning( i planned it that way) and have now started over with the intent to read it as fast as posible. i have talked to a few people that have done it that way and they like to do that occasionally. this morning i got 30 pages in, and i hope that i can keep up that pace.
I have recently been debating what to do with school when i go home, and while i still have not decided pres Hinckleys remarks about education in the Priesthood session has helpfull in letting me know that i do need to persue education. i thought for a little bit about working for a semester, then picking up in spring. but have now decided not to.
thank you for all of the prayers and support. i love you all.
Elder Lundberg
This week has been great. Conference was Awesome! I have decided that conference as a missionary is great. it gives us a ton more material to work with and to use in our teaching situation. as a missionary working with less active members i especially liked ELder Bednar's talk. I'm already excited to get a copy of the talk and start using it. I also enjoyed the 1st and 2nd talks of saturday morning.
My reliese date is friday July 14th 2007. thursday the 13th is transfers, and we stay the night in the mission home, and friday we fly out. when Elder Hill went home, he flew straight to salt lake, and got there at 10:00 in the morning. most groups don't do that, but they only had 2 flying to salt lake so they put them on a very small plane. New York sounds fun.
I have tried those ensymes and they have done alright. where did you get those? i am actually almost out and was going to buy more. do you think walmart would have it?
After sending the pictures home i noticed that something is wrong with the card i have and my camera would not read it, so i went and baught a card. walmart was having a sale on their memory cards and they had 1 GB cards for $40, so i got one of those. needless to say, i can now take a ton of pictures. my companion loves to take pictures, so we have started to take a ton of fun pictures.
My district is just us and one other companionship, who just moved from Prairie du Chien to Richland Center (just above Gotham WI, they are way excited about that.) Every Tuesday (except for interviews week and Zone Conferance week) I am in charge of a District meeting where i chose a topic and do a training on it using the scriptures, Preach my gospel, and any other resources that i can. district meetings usually last and hour to an hour and a half, and include a few other things beside me. Tomorrow i will go to Interviews, right before that they do a district leader Training that i will go to. I also report the numbers for the district to the zone leaders 3 times a week, who send them in to the office. I am also the person that my district goes through to get anything approved (most of it i then tell the zone leaders and they approve or disaprove it)
It is wierd to think about christmas already. the only thing that i can think of at the moment is the study manuels (Book of mormon, teachings of christ and his apostles, and/or the pearl of great price) talks are also great, I think there is some sort of restriction to who we can listen to. I know we can listen to general authorities, there are missionaries that have talks from people that teach at byu, i think tomorrow i will ask president what the regulations are on talks. I have also thought of a small picture book, i haven't kept many pictures out here, but it would be fun to have a few pictures from throught my mission (not nessisarily all of them) other that that i don't know. i will try to give it some thought.
the mission had a goal to finnish the new testament by sept 30th. I was origanally hoping to finish the whole bible by then, but then i fell behind, so i skipped to the new testiment and finished the morning of conferance. I went through the newtestiment fairly quickly so alot of it, especially the end was still in my mind for conferance, it was neat. i also finished the book of mormon on saturday morning( i planned it that way) and have now started over with the intent to read it as fast as posible. i have talked to a few people that have done it that way and they like to do that occasionally. this morning i got 30 pages in, and i hope that i can keep up that pace.
I have recently been debating what to do with school when i go home, and while i still have not decided pres Hinckleys remarks about education in the Priesthood session has helpfull in letting me know that i do need to persue education. i thought for a little bit about working for a semester, then picking up in spring. but have now decided not to.
thank you for all of the prayers and support. i love you all.
Elder Lundberg
01 October 2006
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