Hi Everyone!

Everyone,

Hiiiiiiii! So this week has been pretty darn baller!!! After our tour
of the Capitol building last week we were walking to the car from the
metro station and the rain came down hard on us!! We were soaked! The
tie I was wearing that mom just sent me got ruined! Dang it! It was
that nice blue one too! Mom my favorite tie that you have sent me is
that purple one by the way!:) wow so this week was busy we helped a
part member family from the Franconia ward move in to this super nice
apartment complex on Tuesday and she bought all of us smash burger
after the move because we had to carry all her furniture down this
hallway that was like 100 yards long it was crazy... I made a joke
saying that Tuesday was our pday number two hahah yeah my back was
dying!! But she bought us smash burger so I was cool with it. On
Wednesday we went to district meeting and we were walking out and this
random person gave each missionary 4 ten dollar gift cards to
McDonald's...pretty legit huh? Yeah we have been doing a lot of
tracting around here it's been pretty great. We have have been
teaching this guy in our ward named Josh. He is a super awesome he
used to be addicted to drugs and alcohol and has been clean for 8
years now. He is going to the temple soon and the bishop asked us to
reteach the lessons to him! Yeah this transfer is pretty crazy so far.
We have passed out like 30 book of Mormons this week and people love
it but they will NEVER give us a return appointment dang it!! It's
just part of the work I guess. We asked president Riggs for
suggestions and I am hoping that he will come tracting with us. He is
a baller when he goes tracting. The elders will street contact and if
they get denied he will wait or walk somewhere else where the person
the elders contacted and say to them "did you realize what you just
did?" And then he goes on and says "you just denied angles sent from
God!" Hahahah I want to see him do it so bad he kicks their butts!
Let's see on Wednesday we went over to the fitzgeralds house for
dinner they are so much fun! Thursday was the bad day I was trunky in
the morning it was raining and we were weekly planning which is not a
good combination. But as Dwight shrute would say "my feelings
regenerate three times faster than the average human being" haha So
I'm good. Friday was just a lot of knocking doors and we helped out
this lady named Ronnie with her yard. She is funny! We go there every
week to do service for her and she smokes like three packs of
cigarettes while we are there hahahaha. On Saturday we went on a blitz
with the Franconia elders. It means that you do tracting in both of
your areas. I was with Elder Haddon in the Franconia area and we
contacted this guy named Wesley and Preston. They had some great
questions about the church! I didn't even know what I was saying but
all my answers were right! It's amazing how the spirit can work
through us... Wow! Okay this morning we had a Memorial Day breakfast
it was great and our ward is great! We played flashball which is like
ultimate frisbee with a football. And I was bombing it down the field
to the priests yeah it was fun! Anyways It's now time to give you all
some homework! It's the story "repentance is real" it's on the April
2015 ensign. I love it. The last paragraph says "If we ever find
ourselves thinking we’ve fallen too far for Heavenly Father to rescue
us, let us remember we can turn to Him and that through the miraculous
Atonement of Jesus Christ, we can be made new. All is not lost, for
with God our potential is endless." I couldn't agree more with this
statement. Everyone it's simple... God love us and he literally gave
the hardest and greatest gift to us. His son. The atonement is a
powerful thing and I am so happy that God was willing to give his
perfect son to us. We are so imperfect! We need to use the enabling
power of the atonement for everything in our lives! I am eternally
grateful for the atonement of Jesus Christ. I want you all to watch
the Because He Lives video on Mormon.org. It puts the atonement and
resurrection in a better way than I could say it. I know this church
is true and I know that we have a living prophet on the earth today
that loves us deeply! I hope everyone has a great week and stay safe!
Enjoy Memorial Day and thank those people that lay their lives down
for our freedoms! Love you all!
Elder Routsong

Another Week!

Hey hey hey Everybody!!!

Sooooooo how is everybody doing this week!? HAPPY BIRTHDAY EMILEE!! 6 years old today wow!!!! This week has been pretty crazy! So we went to mini golf on Monday it was so legit its at this place called top golf. It's $9 for unlimited mini golf! Yeah and there are 36 darn holes in two courses!! We heard some people yelling at us from the driving range  (which is sick! Dad we are going there when you pick me up) yeah so we were just like okay and went on playing... Turns out it was president Riggs and the assistants....hahah holy cow president Riggs is pretty baller at golf. We went up to see them after playing cause we finally saw them as we were walking out. Yeah it was a good pday!

This week has been pretty darn good. We have been meeting with this lady named Norma from Guatemala. She is so cool! I really hope she takes our commitments seriously. So far she has, but she is really skeptical about the Book of Mormon. She sticks to her bible. We meet with her tonight so I hope she has prayed and received some personal revelation about the power of the Book of Mormon and the bible! 

Tuesday was our celebration for transfers we had a little mini party at Robecks which is a smoothie place, to send off Elder Johnson.  He is going to be a traveling assistant to the president this last transfer of his mission. Elder Johnson is a beast I'm so glad I met that guy he is hilarious!

So Wednesday we had some training in the morning and it was a blast! We were taught about the role of the Holy Ghost in conversion. It was pretty amazing and I took a lot from it. We need to recognize the spirit and if we don't, our investigators won't either!! We have been tracting a whole lot this week as usual! Thursday was transfers and Elder Adair and I stayed here in Kingstowne! Elder Haddon is with Elder Stenquist and we have a lot of fun! We went on a "blitz" with the other elders so we tracked the Franconia area and the Kingstowne area. It was so dang fun! I got a lesson with a Muslim guy!! I told him about living prophets and he loved it! His name is Mohammad. We have a return appointment this Saturday! The people in the Franconia area were so darn rude...glad I am not there.  Friday we just worked and had no real luck!! Saturday either!! On Sunday we had church and went tracting. We went to this area called Rockshire. We had a lesson with this guy and his wife came home and she grilled us for an HOUR. We literally said no words... Her name was Olga and she was from Russia.

Yeah, my week was pretty baller here just working hard every darn day sweating my face off every day. Seriously, once you walk out every morning it hits you like you just got out of a steam shower... Oh this morning we went to the gym cause Elder Haddon and I are crazy about lifting and we went hard!! I benched 225 for 3 sets of 10 yeahhhhhhh budddddddyyyyyyyyy!! (Dalvin). It was a good morning lifting and I have been losing weight! I. Pretty sure I'm close to 10 pounds! It's cause we bike every darn day! And we don't get fed  much, but I don't mind I'm losing weight and working out so its chill! Anyways, on a more spiritual note I want you all the read the talk "Approaching the Throne of God With Confidence" it is an amazing talk. It tells us that when we are feeling unworthy of God's presence we need to repent or change because satan is influencing our thoughts to make us feel terrible before the eye's of God when in reality we are completely worthy! I feel like this is a problem that most members of the church have including myself. After reading this talk my mind was blown! It has changed the way I look at myself as a member of the church and as a full time missionary. Ahhh I love it! So I started reading the New Testament this week and it is awesome! I've almost finished all of Matthew and now I can watch some bible stories online and know exactly the verses hahaha I know I'm terrible with the bible. Most people are catholic here so I need to learn my bible better. Oh this week has been crazy it's been super rainy and it is weird, the rain is super warm and so is the wind... nothing like Colorado haha! We got super soaked on Friday daaaang! People were laughing at us as the drove by and I was just like dang it... Oh well it's a good work! We also get flipped off pretty often Haha. And this teenage kid drove by us one day and yells "GOD ISNT REAL". He stopped at the stop light and I stood there and smiled at him he was so nervous haha it was hilarious. Hey momma, I got both of your packages this week! Yessss thank you they are awesome! My ties look so fresh!:) and the food you sent made my whole week! Yes! What is new at home!? I hope all is well keep me posted on everything everybody!! Love you all

Elder Routsong

 

Happy Mother's Day

Hello hello!! How is everyone doing!? I hope Mother's Day was a huge
success for everyone! Skyping back home yesterday was great and I
needed it A lot!! So..... this week has been pretty eventful! We have been
doing a lot of tracting! Yeah, so this is one of those emails where I
look back on the week and I have no idea what we actually did cause we
were so darn busy! But after emails we went to a bbq and it was
a lot of fun we went with  4 other elders in the district
it was a lot of fun!  We had a half mission conference and
we read Nehemiah chapter 6-9.
Read the story it's about fasting and rebuilding ourselves! It's
pretty darn good! President Riggs is just the best... He is amazing!
We have been challenged to be more bold in our missionary work! We
have been working also on "going holland" on people hahahaha it's
hilarious!! Yeah it was great! So this week we met a lady named Ellen
she is super super nice and we recited the first vision with her and
she said she felt something in the pit of her stomach! She also said
that we were meant to see her that God sent us... We are hoping to
bring her to church next week! Oh we had a rando dropped investigator
show up the church and go for all three hours!! When he introduced
himself in Elders Quorum he thanked us for showing up to his house!
Too bad he is going to New York for three weeks... Dang it!! Oh I read
a sweet talk this week!! It's called "The Reason For Our Hope" by
President Packer! It's so darn awesome! So this week has been pretty busy!
Last night we were supposed to have a lesson at 7 but turns out he
wasn't home surprise surprise! Hahah it's all good! Today we woke up
and had studies and then went shopping at Walmart. We got some Taco
Bell and are going to go mini golfing after emails so it's $9 for 36
holes of mini golf here! Sick huh? Darn it was so good seeing you all
yesterday Emilee has a funny way of counting in Spanish haha and
peaches and cream hahaha Dan, that was the first thing I asked yesterday
when I skyped!! Hahaha I well I hope you all have a great week! I miss
and love you all!! Keep sending me great emails!! Oh this picture is
pretty funny and self explanatory! Love you all!!
Elder Routsong

Hi Everyone!

Hey hey hey hey! How is everyone doing!? This week was pretty darn interesting ha there was a lot going on! I hope all is well with everyone!! This week was also a lot of door knocking haha! It's a serious problem cause we can find like 9 investigators but they never call us back or answer the door!! Oh so we had an awesome experience yesterday! We knocked on this door of this total hillbilly house full of trucks and trailers and this HUGE guy comes out all tattooed up and with a beard... Needless to say I didn't want to talk to him.. But turns out he is a super nice guy! His name is Joey! He is great and we gave him a Book of Mormon and a return appointment for this Saturday!! Oh we just got back from Walmart and I am straight broke basically cause I bought a 12 pack of Baja blast!! So on Thursday we had zone conference! It lasted literally all dang day! But president Riggs was there and he is just the man I love him and he shares the coolest stories. He is also one of the most spiritual people I've ever met!! Keith and Rhiannon are back home now huh? That's awesome I wish I could hangout with you all! Seriously though, I am excited to skype you all this Sunday :) I am going to make a new account with my church email! KAYLA I HOPE YOU HAD A HAPPY BIRTHDAY YESTERDAY!!! Seriously! I was singing happy birthday to you on my bike yesterday In the melting sun haha:) dang you're 17 now!! Woah. I was talking to elder Adair the other day and I blew my mind cause I thought the next time I see you...you will be in college... What the heck!? And Emilee will be baptized and Kari will probably be married! Dang. Yeah so that's pretty crazy. Oh yesterday we had a dinner with a recent convert sister Reyes and her family and brother Pocock and his children it was fun and the picture is of us. Brother Pocock reminds me of Andy! He is so cool and he has the same amount of kids as Andy and Stephanie! The most I have biked my whole mission was yesterday so I wanted to die I was totally covered in sweat.... It was a successful day we passed out 4 book of Mormons and got 3 new investigators! Still nobody has committed to baptism :/ but it's okay. (Mom i promise I am working hard out here!) haha everyday is like a blur it goes by so fast and it seems like I'm waking up in two seconds... Idk if I told you all last week but we got a gym membership and it's pretty nice!! We only get an hour to lift though! So the past two weeks we have had stake conference and it has been awesome!! I highly suggest that you all go back and read "The Comforter" by President Eyring! It's such an awesome talk! It seems like the stuff I am learning here is too much!! Haha it's like drinking out of a fire hose! It's the best though. I've been learning how to own people with the one lord one faith one baptism though Haha it's pretty funny:)  Well I am super excited to see you all on skype next weekend:) what else is new at home? Kayla what presents did you get for you bday!? Kari Kari are you almost ready to come home!? Life is great and very simple here just work work work all day everyday! I hope you all have a great week love you all! Oh we went to Ft. Hunt park for a zone activity and it was bomb! Look a pictures of it it's beautiful! 

Elder Routsong 

 

Another week!

Hello hello everybody! Another week down? Wow! This week really flew by it was insane! So we are doing pretty good here! We have been knocking door after door after door.... Yeah I've talked to some pretty interesting people it's been a blast haha but it makes time fly! It's so funny cause on the mission the days have no relevance so you will hear people be like "oh yeah it's Friday yessss!" And as a missionary you just think of it as another proselyting day Hahaha it's pretty interesting. OH! Keith and Rhiannon congratulations on graduating from BYU! Man I wish I could have been there to see you but your pictures looked so awesome and that one of Emilee wearing those glasses is hilarious I laughed for about 20 minutes at that picture hahaha did you ever see sister Nixon!? I hope so! The Nixon's are awesome... What did you all do when momma and grandma were down there? I hope that it was a blast! So Keith and Rhiannon when are you moving to Nebraska? Oh yeah, I'm dying here the members have only been feeding us twice a week so yeah it's rough just eating pb&j all meals of the day but I'm sure it's not as bad as Kari eating like cow brains and junk like that hahaha. It's all good we have been working super hard and actually found 7 new investigators this week. We have been having some trouble contacting some of them again but the main bummer is that the guy Daniel we are teaching we may have to drop him cause of the drug and rehab programs he's in cause they don't know who we are... Yeah it is hard. So we are trying to find a way around that to be able to teach him again cause he is so cool! Seriously we have just been knocking doors all week... We have given out 16 book of Mormons since Tuesday and have gotten 9 new investigators... But unfortunately we set up return appointments and they aren't there or don't answer their phone... Lame. Yeah but we are working super hard out here it's great! Seriously it feels like I wake up and then it's a blur then we go back to bed. Haha I love it. Seriously. Oh mom and dad! Would you please send me a picture of me throwing the disc and a picture of my beautiful truck? Thanks :) everyone I want you all to look up the song "crossfire" by Brandon flowers. It's so dang good. Elder Johnson showed it to me the other day and I loved it. Oh we went on exchanges on Friday so I went to the Franconia area with Elder Johnson. I was nervous for exchanges cause I didn't know Elder Johnson very well... Turns out he is a total bad a. He plays video games and football like me! Oh and he also loves rock music and world of Warcraft (Zach) hahaha we talked all day while driving around looking for less actives and recent converts. We also talked about avenged sevenfold and system of a down and all that good stuff! We talk about the office all the time as a district! Haha it's great. So the word we use for a slacker here is "pile" it's so funny. So sorry mom today we went to Walmart and I had 42 dollars on my mission card and I spent 43... So I had to use my debit card... Will you tell me my balance on that one? Dang I'm sorry I feel bad about that! So it's been like super Rainey here it suckkkks! But it's kinda fun to walk outside in it cause it's pretty warm! And you know what they say.. Every time you walk In the rain your wife gets even prettier... Hahaha I'm a lame corny missionary now.... Hahah but it's great!! So on Saturday for exchanges we went to a baptism her name is Whitney and she is soooo cool! The baptism was awesome it was my first convert baptism and it was so spiritual there!!! I want a baptism so dang bad! So the main guy we are teaching named Daniel said we can't really see him in person Anymore only can call him on the phone... If we want to see him we have to get drug tested and screened by the addiction recovery program that he is on... It's so dang sad I was super disappointed when he told us that... We had to drop another investigator named Josie last week too cause she told us to.. Dang it. But we have found a decent teaching pool. With regards to teaching the lessons I feel like I'm doing okay! Elder Adair mostly talks and I just try to compliment what he says but I take the lead in tracting which is crazy... It's fun and we have had some dang crazy experiences as eEder Johnson was saying most people here are two fruit loops short of a whole bowl hahahaha. Sister Kari Routsong HAPPY BIRTHDAY TOMORROW!! And RHIANNON! HAPPY BIRTHDAY TODAY! I miss you all a lot and wish I could be there for your birthdays have a good one! Geese that's crazy then Kayla and Emilees are next month too! Oh and I get to skype home on May 10th yesss! Oh hey mom I got a haircut last night hahah Elder Johnson gave me one and it looks pretty good I don't look like a goober anymore with long hair. I was nervous cause we were at the baptism on Saturday and President Riggs showed up and I was nervous he was going to say something about my hair hahah! Anyways I hope you all have a great week and I love and miss you all a lot!!! 

Elder Routsong 

P.s. Look up the song "harvest this field" by Brandon Heith. It's about missionary work and I love it :) oh yeah 13 days until I skype home :)