Monday, May 2, 2011

Hey mom,

Soo just a heads up..... Dont think you are going to be getting a video this week. Sorry :( Things just didnt work out today and I dont see it happening. But I just wanted to say thanks so much for your email. Tell Brad that I appreciated his email as well.

Things are going really well here. Kinda frustrated right now with all the computers here in France. Its totally our fault. We wanted to start using the computers at the church instead of paying to use computers at an internet cafe because.... well they are free. But I dont think we are going to be able to do that anymore. I tried sending the video for this week, there were 2 actually, but because the computers are so horrible here, It ended up deleteing one of the videos off of my camera in the process. So in the end, I wasnt able to send either video and one of them got deleted. I will try to send the other next week. Sorry :/ Me and Elder Jensen decided that we are gonna just go to the internet cafe from now on so it should be easier to send the videos!

Anyways, on a happier note. Things are really going great here. Yesterday, church was great. I had promised myself at the beginning of my mission to bear my testimony every fast sunday, but yesterday there just wasnt enough time. And I figured since I had already shared it several times in this ward, that I would make sure that everybody else who wanted to share their testimony would have the time if they wanted to. And it ended up that honestly, I didnt have time! At first I was kinda bummed but then I realized there was no reason to be.

Grae..... Can you please make sure that she is there so I can have some time to talk to just her? I would really like that. I know she just got a job and she might not be able to make it so tell her I understand if she cant, but that I would really love it if I got to talk to her!

Andy! Oh man I am SOOOO excited for Andrew. I think about him and how happy he will be when he gets out quite often. I will continue to pray that he will be able to go to Ohio for the wedding! Have you gotten a video camera yet?????

The weather here has been pretty mixed lately. We had a week where it was pretty hot, and then a week straight of wind that led into thunderstorms and rain showers. Which I loved. It always smells so good right after it rains for the first time in a while! Yesterday and Today have been perfect. Not too hot, not too cold, and a nice little occasional breeze.

Me and Elder Jensen are working really hard. Yesterday gave out 4 book of mormons after church. It was a pretty successful day. But After all that sunlight, walking, and fasting, we were pretty tired at the end of the day! We have been trying to exercise more in the mornings and be EXACTLY obedient. Its not always easy but Elder Jensen and I are doing really well.

Some people can be a little tough to love sometimes. But the people that we get to stop and talk to I think its fairly easy to say that I start loving them right away. Its probably something I need to work on. But, occasionally there are people that well..... just make it a little tougher than normal.

Dinner with the Toulemonde family was amazing. Veronique is so sweet. She always makes a big HUGE meal whenever we come over. And because we were there on Easter Sunday she really went all out. Clem was not there but his little Brother Pierre was there and we had a great time all together.

As far as teaching and amies. We have been having lots of encounters with Jehovahs Witnesses here. Our one main super strong ami Li decided to invite us and the Temoin Jehovahs over for the same rendez vous. That was a little awkward but we must have done something right because he said he didnt plan on inviting them back. Other than that, church was pretty cool yesterday and I felt the spirit really strongly at a couple points. One of the members that we taught Li with bore her testimony on how it strengthened her own testimony and it was cool to see how much she enjoyed teaching with us. I am really loving this ward here. There are some great people. I am excited for you to meet some of them after my misison!

Anyways mom, I should get going. I am going to try and reply to Brads email really quickly. He asked some interesting questions and I am going to do my best to answer them. Hopefully he will let you read them :p anyways I love you so much. I hope you have a WONDERFUL time in Ohio and Iowa! Tell everybody I say Hi and that I love them and miss them. Feel free to share my email address with anybody who wants to send me and email or even my snail mail address if they want. But once again I love you and have a great week!

Love,
Elder Morgan

Monday, April 23, 2011

Hey momma!

Soooo guess what!!!!!????? Something absolutely crazy happened! I am staying a 4th transfer here in Villeneuve d'Ascq! It is completely unheard of for a missionary to spend more than 3 transfers in his bleu ville (first ville in the mission). And whats more, its even more rare for companions to go 3 together. And well this will be me and Elder Jensens 3rd transfer together!!! I cant believe it. Everybody was caught by suprise that me and Jensen are STILL together in Villeneuve d'Ascq as was I to be honest. However I asked president to stay in interviews. I will tell you more about those later but just know that they were wonderful and I learned so much and appreciated them so much.

I did talk to president and He gave me permission to Skype you the weekend Andy gets out. I am so excited. Do you think you could decide with Grandma a time and a place that we could skype? I could do it any day after 11 o'clock here and I would just need to be home by 9:30 pm. (other than sunday that is) And it doesnt have to be on P-day either. Anyways I will email you all about Interviews on Monday.

For now I just wanted to let you know that, unbelievably, me and Elder Jensen are staying together AGAIN in Villeneuve D'ascq.

Oh and something else. We are going to visit the Toulemondes on Sunday afternoon right after church. I will tell them you say Hi :)

I didnt get an email from Max. I'm not sure why I am so worried about him. I guess its because he hasnt emailed me back or written me for such a long time. But I am glad to hear he is alive and doing alright :)

Thanks so much for your email. It was great! I loved every bit of it! Anyways I gotta run. Love you and talk to you next week :) Have fun In Iowa and if you get the time I would love to hear from you again on Monday!!!

Love you momma :)

-Elder Morgan

Saturday, April 23, 2011

Hey everybody!

Sorry I dont have time to write you all Individual emails today but just wanted to give you an Update! I found out that I will be staying ANOTHER 6 weeks in Villeneuve d'Ascq up here in the North of France and will be serving With Elder Jensen again as well. If you want to mail me or send any letters do so to this email address or you can use my snail mail address which is still the same :

Elder Morgan
223 A05, Blvd de Valmy
59650 Villeneuve d'Ascq
France

Anyways I hope you are all doing well. Sorry to those of you who I have not yet mailed or returned your emails! :( I promise I will try and get those letters out as soon as possible.

-Elder Morgan

Monday, April 18, 2011

Hey Mom :)

Thanks so much for the email. And please dont worry about last week.
I did get your email I just didnt have time to respond.

I have tried to send Grae countless emails and I have even sent her a video on her gmail. Can you please tell her I am sending her stuff.... But I am really really excited to hear she is doing better.

Thanks so much for looking after my money! 4.25 percent!? Thats awesome! Where/how did you find that? My invested money is locked in for a year but if I am still only making 4 percent interest on it and you can find a better account then of course we should move it!

Okay I am glad you got the package! I happy you liked it. Sorry again about the videos recently. Its been a little frustrating because some of the computers here in the internet cafe are not in the best of shape and If we dont get her early enough on p-day we end up getting stuck with the slow bad computers which just cant get the job done. Sorry about that!

Conference Talks..... To be honest with you I havent really studied any of them yet. It is so much easier for me to read them. I love listening to them but reading them makes it easier to remember for me. However I did listen and read a great talk by Jeffery R Holland recently that I really want you and Brad to listen or study! Not for any particular reason, I just think its a great talk. Here is the link below.

http://www.byub.org/talks/Talk.aspx?id=3403

It really is an amazing talk. One of my very favorites I think. Dont forget to tell me what you think/liked about it, okay?

I really am so excited for you and Brad to get married. And I am stoked about your job. What a blessing that job has been for you and for Me. But how are things between you and Brad? I seriously cant wait for you and Brad to get married. I just want you to be happy together.

So Sunday May 8th is Mothers day?! I cant believe its almost time to skype again!? I am so excited. I am not sure which day I will be able to talk to you. It will most likely be Saturday or Monday. But I wanted to start talking about it now. Another Idea I had was maybe we could wait one week so I could talk to you when Andy is there? Let me know what you think. Does Grandma have internet? I would really love it if I could skype Andy at the same time that I skyped you!!! Anyways let me know if you think we could get something like that to Work. We have interviews with President Staheli this week and I will ask him what he thinks about it. I love Andy a lot. I sent him a letter this past week. I hope he gets it soon. I cant wait to come home and spend time with him either. It means a lot to me what you said about us being brothers. I really respect and Love Andy a lot.

But that reminds me, Did you ever get ahold of Max?

I am excited for you and Grae to go on your exercise and diet program. I have a good feeling that it will be really good for you and Especially Grae. You are such a great mom. And yes I will pray for you and her. Maybe you could have her email me? I have been using the citrusyfresshh@gmail.com email address for her but I havent seen
any sign that she is reading or even recieving my emails....

Anyways Momma, I gotta go. But I love you sooooo Much. Thanks for the wonderful email this week. I hope you have a fantastic week.

One last question though. Do you use my ipod regularly? I think I am gonna ask dad to get me an Ipod for my birthday but before I ask him to go out and buy anything I wanted to make sure you are still using mine. People update their ipods all the time here and it would be really nice to have something that I could upload conference talks and Devotionals onto and music ofcourse too. Anyways If you are using it at all I want you to keep it, but if not let me know.


OK, I love you soo much. I will probably be sending you an email on saturday seeing as its the day we recieve the "transfer email" and I find out if I am staying or leaving. I will most likely be leaving. But at any rate I will email you on saturday. But I hope you have a wonderful week.

Please tell Grae that I say hi and that I love her and Miss her soo much. Tell everybody else that I say Hi and I am thinking about them and love them as well.

Alright mommma Love you!

Love,
Elder Morgan

Monday, April 11, 2011

Hey mom,

Gonna have to go here pretty soon. I missed getting your email this morning but I know how CRAZY busy you are! I hope everthing is going good for you. I am gonna try and check my email again later today to see if you emailed me, but no worries if you didnt have the time. I am in the middle of sending you a video right now so hopefully that will tell you a little more about our week. Ive been thinking about you a lot lately and I hope you are happy as ever.

Please let me know if you have any new news on Grae and how she is doing! Anyways I sure Love you! Tell everybody that I say hi! Oh and have you heard anything from Max lately? I havent heard any news from him for a couple of weeks. Kinda worried about him. If you get a free minute and you feel like it. Could you give him a call for me?
If not its no big deal but I would sure love to hear how hes doing.
Alright momma I gotta go! But I love you soo much!!!

Have a great week!
Love,

Elder Morgan

Monday, April 4, 2011

Hey Mom,

This email is going to be a little on the short side. Im trying to catch up on some of the Conference Talks that I missed or didnt understand! Ha ha!!

I just wanted to say that I was thinking about you ALL weekend. I hope you had a wonderful Birthday! I liked what you said about singing the Hymns in the Conference Center. I liked the same thing when I was in the MTC!

In conference, like you I noticed the focus on Service. However, above all else I noticed a focus on getting Married (in the Temple) and just Temples in General!
But General Confernce on the mission is AMAZING. I Loved every second of it. I decided I wouldnt take any notes but rather let myself Relax and soak in the words and take notes as I read the Ensign Later. I think its much more Enjoyable that way for me. All the missionaries from Lille, Villeneuve d'Ascq, and Valenciennes which is about 10 missionaries in Total. It was almost like a little party every session. Between sessions we brought lunches and snacks and ate together. It was great!!

And as for Jarom, yeah I sent him a letter! That would be great if he wrote me back!

And now the last the that I wanted to mention was our investigator Li. Li is AMAZING! He is so nice and sincere. I was thinking last night about how as me and Elder Jensen talk with him and how I feel like he sincerely brings the best out of me as a missionary. He is amazing to be able to help him along his path. He came to conference yesterday and took quite a few notes, and then we talked for a little with him about his questions afterwords. His baptismal date is currently set for Sunday April 24th. And in our talk with him last night he even mentioned potentially serving a mission after his baptism. He is 25 years old but I think its actually quite possible if he choose to

Sadly, I really gotta go But I love you so much Mom!! I am so excited that you got to go to Conference! It sounds like you had a wonderful time!

I havent thought of anything else that I really need at the moment, but no pressure about the package. Just send it whenever you can! :) Love you so much!


-Elder Morgan

Monday, March 28, 2011 part 2

Hey mom,

Real quick, was wondering if you hadnt sent that package yet if you could add a few more things to it for me?? A couple things that would be nice is a copy of the most recent general conference on CD. I figured that might be easy to get in Utah. So yeah, I would really love that. And a cd case that could hold some cds would be great too!
It would be must easier to have one thing of cds rather than 12 0r 15 cd hard cases. I am also running low on ink for my Zebra F-301 Ball Point pen. I use it every night for my planner. I love it! You actually sent me two different types of pens last time but I like the one with a little bit of a sharper ball point. Its more precise and easier to write smaller with. And I never thought I would ask you to send my peanut butter on my mission but I think I finally understand why every missionary asks for it! So if you wouldnt mind I would really really LOVE some peanut butter. I wanna make some no bake cookies or something! Speaking of which, could you email me the recipee for the no bake cookies and the chocolate crinkles!

PLEASE!!!! Anyways I know thats a lot but I would really love it! But no pressure just whenever you get around to it. Actually, I am going to need a new Journal here soon. The one I have been using is this one: http://deseretbook.com/Classic-Journal-Covenant-Communications/i/4754607 The one I have right now is blue! Do you think you could possible get me the same one but in Red???? I would really really love to be able to keep the same kind of Journals throughtout my mission!

Anyways, I love you soo much and hope you have a blast at General Conference for your Birthday. Tell Brad I say hi! And everybody else too! And if you could swing by Deseret Book while you are in Utah and maybe checkout some of those things I would really appreciate it!

Anyways, I love you. You're the Best. Everybody needs a mom like you :)

Love you!

Elder Morgan

Monday, March 28, 2011

Hey mom,

Had a good week! I loved your email! thanks for all the recipes.

Life is really good here. I am soo excited for you to finally have some time off work! And to go to General Conference! That is awesome!!!

I got a letter from Andrew last saturday! It was great!! He sent me a couple really cool pictures! I cant believe he has less than 7 weeks left. I have a count down on my calender just for the day he gets out. This Friday he will be just a few short weeks from getting out! I am soo excited for him!! Can you please remember to film as much as you can when he does get out and send it to me. I really want to see it. And
you can use the yousendit.com account.

I wanted to wish you an early happy birthday!! I wish I could be there to celebrate with you!

But thanks for taking care of my facebook! And thats great news about Grae! So is she moving to Seattle or what? Or how long will she be staying and where? I tried emailing her at her other email address you gave me but she has yet to respond :( Same with Mekel......

Anyways that is really cool you are going to be staying with Chris and Fi. Isnt that a long commute? And how is your van doing? I cant believe we still have that thing! And Fi broke her arm?!?! Is she alright? Please tell them all that I say Hi and I miss them!!

As for spiritual experiences here. We have had some really great meetings with Li. He is keeping all of our commitments that we give to him and even going beyond that. Its obvious he Loves the Book of Mormon. But the other day he actually took us out to dinner to Chinese! It was great!!!

I am not sure why but the computer will not let me send this weeks video. I dont know why. I have tried several different times but yeah... Sorry :(

Anyways aside from that me and Elder Jensen are still having a blast serving together. And Im getting good at Ping Pong ha ha. For morning exercise, nearly every day we Jog to the Church from out apartment, play ping pong (nearly all the churches in France have a ping pong table aparently) and then we jog home. Its great. I actually gained quite a bit of weight when I was with Elder Butel and before that In Atlanta, but I am finally getting back into shape. Me and Elder Jensen have been trying to Eat Healthy and exercise more and its working! Its hard not to eat all the good french desserts and stuff though!

But I guess its about time for me to go. Me and Elder Jensen are going to try and make some whole wheat bread, and some All Bran muffins for this week. Im actually not sure if they even have All Bran cereal in France but I will let you know how it goes next week!

Anyways I love you soo much! And I will talk to you next week!

Love,
Elder Morgan

Monday, March 21, 2011

Hey there!

So before I begin, I dont know if you have, but on lds.org there is a really cool feature called "study journal" and all you need is an lds account!!! So can you get one!? and will you let me know when you do get one!? So I sent you the two talks with some highlighting and some notes. Its one of the cool features on "study journal". Please let me know if you can see the highlights and stuff.

Anyways let me tell you really quickly about our week. First off, it was amazing. Secondly, me and Elder Jensen decided to have a special fast last Sunday to start off the Transfer "right". Well, let me just say that with in one week, we found 3 new investigators, all of which are progressing. One of them came to church, and the same one has a baptismal date. All three have a Book of Mormon in their own language and all three have promised to start reading. Shawn, our baptismal date, is from China. He is simply amazing. It is very easy to tell that he is looking for friends. We originally invited him to come play ping pong with us on Saturday night. Well to our suprise he showed up. While Elder Jensen was talking to another investigator who was at the activitiy, I felt impressed to invite him to church and once again to our suprise, He came. Talk about a lack of faith. Ha ha!! Well after he stayed for the entire 3 hours of church. He asked us if we could stay a little longer after church and answer some of his questions. Of course we were thrilled to do just that!! During our talk me and Elder Jensen both felt impressed to extend a baptismal invitation and he accepted. Right now the date is April 16th, and we are both fairly confident it will stay that way. Me and Elder Jensen are thrilled. Anyways That is really all I have time for this week, But I love you and hope you enjoy the videos and the talks.

Anyways, thanks for your prayers and your emails. I love you!!!

-Elder Morgan

Monday, March 12, 2011

Hey everybody,

Great news!!!!!!! Just got the transfer email and..... I am staying in Villeneuve d'Ascq for another transfer!!! I have already been here for 2 transfers (12 weeks) but this means that I have atleast 6 more weeks left here. I was really hoping that I could stay here so I am really excited. My companion Elder Jensen is staying too which I am also totally stoked about, we get along really well and are learning A LOT.

Anyways, I hope everybody is doing well back home! I will be back online checking my email on Monday morning. Also if anybody wants to write me a letter, you can send it to the Villeneuve d'Ascq address instead of the Le Vesinet address. Anyways I love you all and will talk to you soon!

Love,
Elder Morgan

Monday, March 7, 2011

Dear mom,

I am doing great! We had a little bit of a discouraging week. I had a cold on Monday and Tuesday, and then Elder Jensen has had intense random back pain that has been slowing us down a little bit. He hasnt been able to sleep almost at all. Its been really tough. But things are really looking up today.

What a great email full of great news. I am soo thrilled about everything. Your new wedding date and the fact that Grae is thinking of moving to Iowa. This leads perfectly into my spirtual experience I have had this week.

Yesterday was fast sunday. And well, lets just say there was a lot of things I prayed for. Last month I started doing this thing where I make a list of things that I fast for in my journal each month. This helps me not only to remember what I need to fast for, but after the fast I am able to look at the list and I have learned that most times I recieving the blessings I have asked for but I forget that I fasted for them in the first place. Its been a super awesome experience. Yesterday while I was in church, I spent a good deal of time not only making my new list, but also looking over my list from last month. It was truly awesome to see the results of my fast. Long story short, You should really keep track of the things you fast for, I believe it will make your fasts more meaningful and you will more easily be able to see how the Lord listens to our prayers and responds to them. I now LOVE fast sunday. Well yesterday as I was fasting I made my list. One of the things that was on my list was so that Max could find a job. Max hasnt been doing so well lately. I had been extremely worried about him, and actually the exact wording that I had on my list was "Max- That he kind find a job/motivation". Well this morning as I got online, at the very top of my inbox was an email from him. It turns out he had emailed me just minutes before I got online. What he said in the email was simply amazing. He told me how about 45 mins before mailing me the email he had randomly been called on the phone and OFFERED a job. I was so greatful for that. Too me that was A direct answer to my prayers. It was so cool. This was the best email I have recieved from Max since he moved. He already seems 10x's happier.

Thanks so much for the link to the talk. I LOVE conference talks. I read one each night before I go to bed. I really like to do this because he helps me end each day on a spiritual note. Its great. And I thinks it is so cool that you read a talk every morning. Great minds think alike. I read This talk this morning actually

“Come unto Me with Full Purpose of Heart, and I Shall Heal You”

PATRICK KEARON

Here were a couple quotes that I like
President James E. Faust taught:
“When obedience becomes our goal, it is no longer an irritation; instead of a stumbling block, it becomes a building block. … “… Obedience leads to true freedom. The more we obey revealed truth, the more we become liberated.”
"No one can find peace in a minefield."

Anyways, I really really loved this talk. But I love pretty much every talk. Another talk that I really Liked was The Transforming Power of Faith and Character by Richard G. Scott. This talk actually brought me quite a bit of peace about everything that is going on back home. I simply just cannot wait until General Conference In April. I am so excited for that. Anyways, I just wanted to say thanks for the Talk. I am going to print it off and read it today. Anyways, I gotta get going but I love you soo much! Thanks for the wonderful email and the wonderful news.

Love,
Elder Morgan

Monday, February 21, 2011

Hey Mom!

I know I really cant believe how fast time is going! Its crazy! I am sooo excited for you and Brad!

Things here are good. My talk went good!

Before I forget, I put up a bunch of new pictures. Most of them are from when we went to our Training In Bruxelles. But there are some cool pictures so you should take a look. Bruxelles was a really cool city and I really hope I get to serve there at some point. Sadly the video me and Elder Jensen made this week was too long, and well I cant send it now unless I pay 10 dollars to send it. So I think we will have to make another one and send it later.

But I will try and give a quick summary of our week. So tuesday and wednesday we had our training up in Bruxelles, we actually came home and slept in our beds both nights, but we wouldnt get home until 9 or later so that was all we did. Those were 2 long days though, we had to get up at like 530 and be on a train at 7 in the morning in order to get to the training on time. But it worked out. on Thursday we help Jaques Duez (2nd counselor in the Bishopric) move. Ofcourse he lived on the very top floor of an appartment complex so we got a pretty good workout and it took pretty much all evening. On friday we had 2 lessons with people who we have found recently. Aurore is a really cool woman and we had an amazing 1st lesson with her. Unfortunatly she lives in Lille and so we are going to have to pass her to the Lille Elders. But thats Okay. Next was Beryle. She was really cool also and we had a great 1st lesson with here as well. She seemed to have some concerns over the definition of a prophet and whether or not there was an apostasy. After that did some weekly planning. Saturday was a pretty fun day. We had samedi sports in the morning and then we had a mini district activity and had a burito fete. It was great. After that we went to Stake Conference. Sunday morning we went to Stake conference again and in the afternoon we did some pass backs to some less active families and old investigators. Nothing much come of it but it was a good day all the same.

This saturday night we have our big Melting Popotte Activity! We are really excited for it. The whole district is really coming together to make this work. I am really excited/nervous to see how it goes. Even though I am the youngest in the district, because this was originally me and Elder Butels idea, A LOT of responsability has been left on me and Elder Butel is now gone. But I am confident all will be fine.

Anyways last monday was very crazy and I was not able to write any letters to anyone. But I plan on setting some time aside today. I recieved Liz Tuppers package she sent me on Friday! It was SOO Great! It made me so happy! She sent me 3 magazines a couple of healthy candy bars and some chapstick along with a great letter! It really made me happy. I also got a letter from Grandma with some pictures of Andy! I miss Andy so much.
Tomorrow me and Elder Jensen are going to Versaille because a member of the 70 is going to be there. I am not sure who it is yet but I am excited to find out. Anyways this week is going to be super busy but I will tell you all about it next monday!

I do need to ask for a favor though! Can you send me you Chili Recipe? by tomorrow or Wednesday!? Each missionary is bringing a family tradition meal to the Food night that we have organized for this saturday night! If you have any other ideas for something that is cheap, and fairly easy to make I would love other ideas. Anyways I am gonna check my email on wednesday to check for those recipes sooo PLEASE! I should have asked you before but I COMPLETELY forgot. I am sorry :(

Anyways Its time to go but I love you soo much! I hope things continue to come together for the wedding! Please tell everybody I say Hi! and I love them! You can also tell people that if they dont have time to write me a letter they can always email me, just make sure to tell them to include their address and I will write them back. As it takes about 2 weeks for letters to get from the USA to here, its better if people who write often to send letters to the Mission home :
France Paris Mission
23 Rue du Onze Novembre
78110 Le Vesinet
France

Anyways I love you so much Mom! Take care!
Love,
Elder Morgan

Monday, February 14, 2011

Hey mom :)

So todays email is truly going to be 1 or 2 lines :( Im sorry! But I actually got to skype with Dad today. We had been trying to arrange a day ever since Christmas! But we finally did it and it was really good to see him and to get to talk to him!

Thank you so much for your email! It made me happy. Especially to hear from Andy. Can you ask grandma if he has recieved my letter yet? I sent it to him last week or the week before I think but I loaded it full of pictures and well I am a little concerned that maybe hey wasnt allowed to recieve it. Anyways I have been REALLY good about writing letters! I am staying in touch with a fair amount of people though snail mail.

Tomorrow is the mission conference/training up in Belgium and it is also the day I have to give my talk :/ I am pretty nervous but we'll see how it goes!

I have talked to Elder Butel twice since he got transferred and I miss him a lot. He was such an awesome guy! Anyways I am glad you are keeping in touch with him!

But sadly I think this is about all I have time to tell you today! But I love you so much! Thanks again for your email!

Love,
Elder Morgan