New Area

So my new companion is Elder Simmons. I like him a lot, he's from Boise Idaho basically, he's kinda quiet like me, he loves outdoors and dirtbikes, and he's a great teacher of the gospel. This area is a little harder because the houses are so spread out here, but we taught a new investigator at a members' home for family home evening so that was a great way to start out the week. Except that night Elder Simmons got the 24 hour flu or something and we had to stay in the apartment the next day. At least I was able to finish the Book of Mormon and Pearl of Great Price. Our area is right in the middle of Palmer and Wasilla so we're in both towns. Our apartment is huge. There used to be 4 elders so there's 2 bedrooms(we only use one for the walk in closet that I get) and it's 2 stories with 1 and 1/2 bathrooms. This shower actually has pressure too! There's some great members in the ward. I'm so surprised how many people know where St. George is or have been there. Like one guy is related to the Ence's if you know any of them. Oh and yeah it's Sean Stoker who's coming here in March. I didn't know him way well but that'll be cool to see him. I actually might not since I'm not in Anchorage anymore and I don't think I'll be able to go to the temple up here. So Dad, the Elder Smith you told me to look out for was my last companion.(I think I forgot to tell you that) That's sweet there's an ice rink there. We're going to try and find someone with some skates we can steal and go skating.
Anyway, that is crazy to hear your putting the house up for sale and everything, but I'm glad your trying to follow the Prophet's counsel and I know you'll be blessed for it. I definitely know we're tried when we are doing what's right. I'm glad my room is a good memory for you:) It's gotten up to 50 degrees up here! We're just wearing our suit coats. I better be telling you guys to stay warm it sounds like. Well, I'll definitely pray for you all and, stay warm.
Love,
Bryce

PS my address is:

7850 Duchess A5
Palmer, AK
99645

transfer 2-15-10

I'm sad I didn't get a letter or email from you. Maybe the mission office is just holding my mail because I'm getting transferred today. Yeah, I'm going to Wasilla, so it's less than an hour away. I only had 1 transfer with Elder Smith, he's going to be training a new elder, so that's way awesome because he's only been out 6 months. It's kinda hard to be leaving this area. I got to say bye to a lot of the members yesterday. But what's sad is we just set a baptismal date for a guy we're teaching, Russ King, (that's not the sad part) and I will miss the baptism and didn't even get to say bye. However, I feel good about my new area and my new companion. I hear he's a hard worker. So we did eat some of the octipus. I didn't dare bite the head but I got a good 3 1/2 tentacles. I almost gagged at first, but it wasn't as bad as I thought. We tried to warm it up first in the microwave, but one of the legs started to blow up. The Iditerod is going on this week (it's a dog sled race across Alaska if you don't know what it is) and I might be able to help out with it. That will justify missing out on the Olympics. Actually I didn't even know they had started until the next day. It's crazy there is so much bad weather down south, especially on the East Coast, because it is the warmest winter they've had here in a while. I think that's evidence of the signs of the times. Anyway, I'm doing great and I gotta go to pick up the old AP from the airport. Love you Mom and Dad.
Bryce

Super Bowl Sunday

It's been a pretty warm winter here, except it finally started snowing again the past 2 days. We're playing racquetball again today and Elder Smith is way excited to play.
So we checked up on that Samoan guy we gave a blessing to at 2:30 am and he said "I feel great Elders, I'm going to take you to Taco (Taco Bell)" They had us order what we wanted then they ordered a ton of taco's. I was thinking man they must be hungry, but I should have known they were getting it all for us! I was so bloated. Yesterday another one of the Samoan family gave us a whole ton of baby octipus! Luckily we were fasting so we didn't have to eat it in front of them. We're going to try some today, atleast one. I think they're raw in some coconut milk or something. Like the head and suction cups and everything! We had some more tracting success this week and it was a whole family. They are catholic, but I don't think they're practicing because they had a hard time remembering their churches name. They didn't really have any concerns either and accepted a Book of Mormon. However, it was lame, none of our investigators came to church! Oh well, we can't do much about that. But it's been a pretty busy week except yesterday being SuperBowl Sunday was tuff. It was worse than any holiday. Well, I gotta go and try and figure out how to change my email stuff.
Love you all,
Bryce

Special Sacrament Meeting

Hey Mom and everyone,
This week has flown by. We had Zone Conference and this Sunday the wards in the whole state were supposed to bring investigators to church and Sacrament meeting was devoted specifically to Christ. Our ward only got 3 nonmembers to church, and we didn't get any of our investigators there. We even picked up 5 new investigators before Sunday and 3 of our 11 investigators had committed to be there for sure. At least we were able to teach this older lady, Kim, who came to church on her own and is a friend of a member in our ward. We've been so blessed in our tracting and 3 of our new investigators came from that. So last night, or this morning I should say, Sister Motuga (Samoan family) called us at 2:25 am and I thought it was just the alarm and hung up on her. She called back and said Bro Motuga was having a hard time breathing and was asking for a blessing before they went to the hospital. We called our ZL's to ask for permission, but they obviously didn't answer. So we decided to just go. Bro Motuga's brother was there, but he couldn't give him a blessing so I'm glad we could help. I was so tired this morning though and we slept instead of showering.
Sorry, I told you I'd send some journals last week, but I didn't send them until this morning. I did get everything from Summer, but I don't think I wrote her. I'm having a hard time finding time to write, but I can do better. Fast Sunday, I'll remember everyone, (As long as you all remember your red ties :)) I did love working on that house and shop(in Washington)and I miss it actually. Not really the heat. We went to the ski resort in the mountain range by us last Pday, I started to tell you about it. It was way pretty there and the mountains seemed huge. We went up a lift through the clouds and half way up the mountain. I got some nice pictures that I don't know if I should print or just wait and send my sd card with all my pictures. Today we want to play racquetball again or maybe basketball. I finally tried Moose meat with some rice. It's pretty good. And a less active guy gave us some more Halibut and Moose burger meat to cook up. Man, I'm excited for summer when I can actually go fishing. It's pretty expensive though until I've lived here for a year, so my second summer I'll likely fish more. I can't believe I've been out for over 4 months and Bruce has been out half a year. I can already see how my time is so short here. Last night at dinner this lady was talking about advice for life and she said "don't blink." I agree.
Oh, we're changing email addresses just so you know. You can still email to this address, but I'll probably switch over soon. I counldn't figure out how to do it today though.
Anyway, thanks for the letters. I love you, you know.
Bryce