Hello family,

This week hasn't been as stellar as you would think, but then again it hasn't been horrible. On Wednesday, we went on exchanges with the ZL's I went with Elder Preator from Burlington WY who graduated with a whopping 25 other students besides him. The funny thing is, is Elder Preator is pretty normal; in fact I would so far as to say he's hilarious. So exchanges were fun.

We have had a couple lessons with our recent convert of about 3 months, Monica Santizo. One lesson in particular we were teaching the doctrine of christ and talked about repentance and overcoming trials. Monica was in tears for the whole lesson, desperately trying not to reveal her emotions. We don't have any idea of what she is going through but the lesson definitely helped her.

We recently found out that with one of our other recent convert/less active/part member family, Sandra, a miracle has occured. She has had epileptic seizures for the past 15 years of her life. Sandra has found out that when she keeps the commandments and comes to church her seizures cease to occur. I haven't seen her at church my whole 2 &1/2 months I've been here at Riverside. Needless to say she's been having a lot of seizures. She went in to the doctor and found out she has a big ol' cancerous tumor on her ovary and there's nothing the doctors can do about it. We offered to give her a blessing and she hastily accepted and asked me to say it, I felt prompted to say as she follows the commandments exactly this cancer will pass her by without after-effects. She went into the doctor for another checkup and the doctor said it's a miracle but they can shrink the tumor with chemo and remove it in 6 weeks. WOW. Unfortunately she didn't show up to church on Sunday so I guess she's going to die........haha jk.(just kidding) But, we're planning on going to see her on Wednesday because it's her daughter Stephanie's cumpleanos. (birthday)

That's basically all this week. Thank you for the package, I'm planning on making those cookies sometime this week. (We sent all the makings for Pumkin Choc Chip cookies that he can make and share..it makes a ton!) I've had some of the pasta, and it's fantastic. I'm currently deciding to live off of tuna, 100% whole grain bread, mangoes, eggs, and sweet potatoes in a push to lose weight. It'll be fun.

Well I love you all, miss you dearly, and am extremely jealous of the hawaii trip. I can't believe you decide to go AFTER I leave. Just like there are going to be 3 WEDDINGS IN THE FIRST 6 MONTHS OF MY MISSION!! Great planning. Bye

-Matt

OOPS!!!!

hey so i left my card at the library and someone turned it in but they took my money clip. so i don't know if they made any purchases with my card or anything, so you may want to send me a new card if that would be possible. I'm sorry I'm such a pain. Also, I don't have time to write a full-fledged email but ill send a letter in the mail. Send me an email if all the money is gone off the card. If not, I don't know if i would need a new one. I'm forgetful as you know. Love you,

-Elder Dial

Miracles!

Helloooooooo,

This week has been a good one. We had transfers and Elder Link and Elder Larsen are the new inhabitants of the English elders in our appartment. Elder Larsen is from Highland, UT and Elder Link is from Seattle, WA. Cool story about Elder Link. His is actually a Visa waiter to go to Brazil. He was sent here out of pure revelation. He was born of goodly parents here in Cali, and after three years, his parents were divorced and his dad moved to seattle and he lived with his dad since. His mother had no idea that this Elder Michael Link was LDS let alone serving a mission! As he was in the MTC he called his dad when he got his temporary reassignment to the California Riverside Mission, and his dad said, "You know who lives in Riverside right?"

"My mother."

"Yep." said dad.

So eventually about halfway through last transfer his dad finally located the number of this Elder's mom and he started teaching her. He leaves a week from today and we're hoping she gets baptized before he leaves. But the chances are slim, she needs to find a place to stay because she's staying with a gay, black, buddhist man; and she needs to stop smoking (the cherry on top). SUPER cool story, that's like ENSIGN worthy bro. but pray for this Elders mother.

This week we found a SUPER golden family of 4, we're hoping to have them all baptized within 4 weeks but we'll see. Also, the Solis family, a part member family we've been teaching finally, saw a little miracle. Stephanie is 13, and is solid in the church. The only issue is, she can't get baptized because her dad (Jose) won't let her. Sandra, Stephanie's mom was baptized and has a testimony. Jose this past weekend was having a little too much fun at some parties and was arrested/deported this past week, which means.....BAPTISM for Stephanie. Little blessing in disguise. Thank you Immigration control. That's the big news of this week. It was a solid one. I love you all, and pray for you all daily!

-Elder Dial

Conference was AWESOME!!

Hello all,

So this week was a good week. We have been making a lot of progress with certain people. Gustavo showed up to ALL 5 SESSIONS OF CONFERENCE. It was super good. We are going to go by this week and see how he is feelin about baptism. We have a new Zone focus to talk with everyone. Elder Meldrum and I have vowed to get 1000 OYM's this transfer. I'm excited to fill up the teaching pool after dropping a bunch of people. Sister Van Vleet the mission nurse said I was to be here in the Riverside zone for quite a while because this is where my requested doctor is.....great. Elder Allen, is one of the Elders in our zone, he is TRAINING! Elder Allen came into the field with me and now he is training. In the Riverside mission there is a new training program that goes for 2 transfers then usually you take over your area with someone who is still older than you in the mission. But Elder Allen is taking over his area with a greenie!!! Wow. Conference was an amazing experience. I think my favorite talk was by Jeffrey R Holland. As always, Holland is a POWERFUL speaker. That guy gets me every time. You can feel that he is a man of God. We are short on time as always and I actually have to go. I know that this is the Gospel of Jesus Christ. It is inevitable for someone to eventually NOT have a testimony of the truth.

-Elder Dial

This week has been a good week, it wasn't as fruitful as we would have liked it to be, but it was ok. We've instituted this new rule in our apartment which is lights out after 10, candle light only. It's pretty fun and it helps me write in my journal every night because we all gather around the table where all the candle light is. We started teaching a part member, less active family who are on the ward list to start teaching. the last lesson we taught the restoration and watched the restoration video. The Spirit was very strong. The Navarro family is a family of about 10, we taught eight. The father just home from open heart surgery. He's not a member, and got a blessing before the surgery and his heart is tickin better than ever. So he feels it was the gospel that healed him. The only thing is, is he wasn't there for the lesson. He was bloody asleep! Oh well we're going to teach him this week. The Tiliano family (Bianca, Maria, Eric), are all still progressing, Eric and Maria are still planning on getting married, and Eric planning on getting baptized after that. They have a little girl who is 9 who will be baptized as well. Our biggest goal this week is to get everyone we can to the church building for conference, because you can always put your money on the prophet. I'm weirdly excited for conference. Odd, because I fall asleep during conference.......probably not this time. Really not much to report on. We went contacting downtown, and I got into a rap battle with a bunch of black guys crowded around an old Cadillac with 22" rims and 4 12" subs in the trunk, needless to say, I got WRECKED (I ended with a loud WHAMMY! for you Elder Ward) . But I did make a OYM (open your mouth) on my part. We handed out the BOM cards, and told them to stop smoking their weed (literally) and went along. This is for sure the Lords work and there's nothing anyone can do to stop it. Love you all and miss you all.

-Elder Dial