Brad's weekly email July 22, 2014

Hello all:

Okay, well today I hit my 11 month mark!!! That's crazy insane!  I look back and think that flew by!~ but I look ahead and say well I got another long year! But its crazy that I am already at a year! (almost)

Well this past week was not a bad week. We did a lot of service this week. I painted ceilings almost every morning in that same house that we are remodeling! So my neck was really stiff yesterday!  

We met this guy on Friday. I don't think he is too interested but he's still a really fun guy. His name is Chief White Eagle. He is part indian so that kinda makes sense, but half of his house burnt down and so we were seeing if he needed any help.  He didn't want any but he did say that we could come over again and talk to him! He has tons of crazy war stories so he is really interesting to talk to!

We went and saw one of elder Hasenauers old recent converts and they are really struggling and are having a hard time but we had a great time seeing them.  I was able to share my testimony with them and to help them in a way that they will be able to see things from a different perspective. They are awesome people! We are actually going to go to Cascade with them next Monday and we will go fishing so that will be fun, but we are helping them build a shed and we will do that on Wednesday and that will be a good quality time to talk about important gospel topics and hopefully get them to see how important the gospel is in their lives.

On Friday we went to a rodeo with a family that is investigating the church and got to spend some good time with them. It was nice I think for them to see that we are there for them and there to build a relationship with them rather than seeing them as just another number.  They said that the missionaries in this area about 9 months ago just wanted them to get baptized and that's all that they would talk about with them and just basically didn't treat them very well, so I think things are headed in the right direction with them.   They should be moving along great within the next few weeks,  but I want to visit with them as much as possible because transfers are on August 4th. Not sure if I'll stay in this area since I have been here for three transfers, so we will see what happens!

Today (p-day) we are gonna go fishing again and we are going to go to Black Canyon and try and catch some trout! So that will be fun!

I am still trying to lose some weight, but it gets hard cause there is so much good food.  But its okay I am losing weight and I am feeling good!  I am going to keep it up so I can be more healthy and be able to feel a lot better!

Well that's it for this week sorry it's kinda short, but we will see what happens next week!

Love you guys!!

Elder Brad Riley

Brad's email 7-2-14

Okay so now that my busy day is over and we finally made it to the library to email, we have been really busy today.  We have been doing a lot of service and today we textured walls in an entire house my shoulders are really sore. Yesterday was a good day of fishing! We didn't really catch anything but we were able to spend some time with an investigator which is really good! We had some really good conversation and we were able to get to know him a lot better! We went to lake Lowell and fished from the dam. I only caught a little baby bass and then a tiny trout but it was still a fun day! I bought some fishing gear yesterday and ended up buying a new pole and reel... I didn't really need to do that but I don't want to worry about breaking or ruining someone else's pole and I will be doing a lot more fishing with our investigators.

We are going this Saturday with an investigator and we are going cat fishing and some salmon fishing so it should be fun we are going to Payette! So that should be fun!  It seems to really be working the fishing thing with investigators, mostly the guys.  It gives us two on one time with them and they can't leave. haha.

This past weekend we had a baptism and it went sooo good.  We were able to get some other investigators there and they said they felt something that they have never really felt.  It went really good. The musical number was really really good it sounded professional and the baptismal ordinance was good and the spirit was for sure felt. The talks were really nice too!

This week is supposed to be busy and now that I can wear closed toe shoes people are wanting us to move them and do a ton of work!! But it will be okay I like doing service it nice and gives me a chance to do some hard labor haha and help get those less active active again.  Well right now that's really about it!

love you guys!!

Elder Riley