Zone Conference August 2022

Wake Me Up When September Ends September 16, 2022

 Another fantastic week in the books filled with lots of good stuff.

 

Tuesday we tried to best the other missionaries in our district by having the most people taught in the day (members included) and ended up teaching 10 people. We were all over the place teaching Matt, Bremmen, Chris, all the Leons, Christian, Elder Vergaray, and Mike. We even found time to help Clay, Matt, Bremmen, and Chris move into their new place together.

 

On Wednesday what really stood out was Chris taking us to Coco yet again for dinner because we helped him out. 

 

On Thursday, we met Julia for the first time, who took us to Saltgrass Steakhouse. There she told us her story with missionaries in the past and said she was ready to join the church as soon as possible, so we put her on date for baptism in the middle of October. We also got to go to institute later that night.

 

Friday we did service with all the Clear Lake missionaries and the school program again, but not for very long. We did end up going down to Texas City to help the Elders there with the same school program set up the event we've unknowingly been helping prepare for this whole time. We taught Haley that afternoon and had dinner with the younger Owens family in the branch presidency.

 

We played basketball at a park Saturday morning with our friends, then for lunch in the afternoon the older Owens in the branch presidency took us to Red River BBQ. That evening we went to a beach in Galveston to join our branch for a bonfire activity. 

 

Sunday was pretty standard with church and come follow me at a member's house. 

 

We all went to a really poor buffet place called Yummy Yummy for p-day lunch. None of our district had been there before, so we didn't know what to expect. We got to go on the ferry in Galveston which was a round trip to and from the peninsula. On the ride, we saw the Galveston Naval Museum which was an old warship and we also saw a lot of dolphins swimming near the boat. That night for FHE we played giant board games and had pizza. 

 

It was a super great week and I'm looking forward to having many more like it.

Lay Down 9/10/2022

 This week has been so exhausting, in a really good way. It just means we've been on the missionary grind and are putting in good work. That also means my weekly email is super late. 

 

Tuesday we taught one of our members but the rest of the day was long trying to find people either at apartments or in stores. 

 

Before district council on Wednesday, we had interviews with our president again, and afterward, we went instead of Fruity Party island to Bases, just to mix things up a bit. We tried a lot that evening as well to text people and stop by to check up on them.

 

Thursday we had a cool opportunity to go with the clear lake Elders and set up a table on campus at the University of Houston Clear Lake. We talked to a whole lot more people than I expected and we passed out a lot of Book of Mormons. That took up most of our day, and in the afternoon we went to Alvin for institute. 

 

Friday we got to help out yet again at the food truck which was a lot of fun, even with a little bit of rain. That evening we were super excited to join the youth of the clear lake wards for volleyball, but we showed up and found out it was actually gonna happen a later week, so that was a bummer.

 

Saturday we of course had to play basketball in the afternoon, and later in the evening we had a game night. We had a couple member and nonmember friends show up to our members house and it was a real good time. 

 

On Sunday, we had a really good testimony meeting, where one of our nonmember friends bore her testimony. We also had our friend Matt from basketball show up for the first time and we even gave him a Book of Mormon. There was a linger longer after church, and in the evening we did mission prep again with the clear lake sisters and Mike. 

 

Monday was zone p-day. We split off into two teams of senior vs. junior companions and Elder Hadley and I were captains. We played volleyball, zone missionary trivia, and ultimate frisbee. Our team won 2 of the 3 games, so we got to pie our companions in the face. It was a blast. To cap it all off, that evening we went to our member Christian's house who fed us some great food, since FHE didn't happen that night. 

 

It was a super great week, I'm so grateful for the times we've had to just put our shoulder to the wheel and really get some good missionary work in.

 

-Elder Thompson

Rocket Man 9/2/202

 This week was incredibly crazy and super wild and overall insanely awesome.

 

Tuesday we had the opportunity to teach our member friend Josh, and I got super close to beating him in chess afterward. He makes his own wooden sets and practices a lot so the fact I got as close as I did to winning is a miracle. That evening our branch missionary Jacob took us to a really upscale Korean BBQ place for dinner.

 

Wednesday we didn't have district council, but we still decided to go to Fruity Party Island. The Torres actually let us learn how to make our own food in the restaurant's kitchen and then eat afterward. We did weekly planning a day early as well since our next day would be busy.

 

We had a pretty awesome zone conference on Thursday as well. We got there early so I got to sing in the missionary choir which I haven't done in forever and loved doing. We learned a lot about strengthening our own relationship with Christ and discovering who we are, which was a nice change since zone conferences usually focus on how we can help those we teach. We of course had to stop at Montag's on the way home as well. We had dinner with the Larsons and went to institute that evening.

 

We went all the way out to Friendswood on Friday to teach a friend, but he canceled on us, so we taught a member of ours over zoom at the Friendswood building and then came back to our church building to teach our member friend Christian and give him a blessing as well. We also tried to get pizza with gift cards a member had given me a while ago, but for some reason, it took like an hour for the people at Domino's to figure out the system, so that was basically the rest of our evening.

 

Saturday, we played basketball as always. We also wasted so many of our allotted miles. I wanna say for 3 or 4 hours we were driving around to teach different scheduled lessons all over our area, and every single one of them canceled last minute. Our member friend Joel was at least nice enough that night to give us all the leftover food from his event and chat with us.

 

Sunday was really our only "normal" day. We went to church and met some new members and nonmembers that came. That afternoon we tried contacting people before joining our ward for come follow me. 

 

We woke up Monday at 4 am then took a 5-minute drive down to NASA. We were with missionaries from League City and Friendswood zones trying to be some of the first people into the space center for the launch party for Artemis 1. We got there early enough that we got a lot of cool free stuff and got to walk around NASA with other missionaries for a couple hours before the scheduled launch window. It was a blast, but sadly the launch ended up getting delayed. We went out with our district to breakfast, then spent the day with the Clear Lake district playing volleyball and card games at our church building. That evening we also got to join or branch at FHE for trivia. 

 

It was an amazing week and I've been so grateful for all experiences and opportunities, good or bad, Heavenly Father has given us.

 

-Elder Thompson

Derezzed 8/2/2022

 This week was super solid and we had a lot of fun doing missionary work.

 

Tuesday we went to a school organization and helped put together boxes of learning activities for elementary and middle school students. We were there for over 4 hours with the clear lake district which was so much fun.

 

Wednesday after district council and lunch we got to finally grind put some contacts and apartment finding, but sadly all we could manage to do was pass out a BoM. Apparently, the guy was in the middle of reading a new graphic novel about the story of Joseph Smith.

 

Thursday we meet with our member friend Yudeth and drove a lot in the rain. We made the trek all the way out to institute, just to get there and get a text from a member saying it got canceled. That was wonderful.

 

Friday we went back to the school organization and helped load the boxes and some wood onto a truck to be sent out, and basically right after went to help at the church food truck again.

 

Saturday we went to play basketball at the church and met a lot of new people there. Afterward, Chris invited us and the ZLs (since Elder Van Wagoner is our Zl now) to lunch at Coco again. The crepes there are good, but their raspberry sorbet gelato is some of the best sorbet I've ever had. We also finally got in contact with our friend Chucho in the evening when we stopped by his place.

 

On Sunday we went to church and got to set up lots of lessons and meetings with members, and that evening we got to teach mission prep again. We asked who would want a chance to knock doors and teach with missionaries, and they all raised their hand, so we're gonna try and give them all that opportunity in the future.

 

For PDay, we had lunch with the Jensons at their home. They're a member of the Texas City Branch who has a really nice house in a secluded area on the bay. We played pinball, pool, and cornhole for the entire afternoon. That night for FHE, we played a wild game of musical chairs with the branch.

 

This week I really learned how to enjoy serving selflessly and how to be better and stepping up and offering a helping hand to those around us. I'm so grateful for the opportunities God had given me to love everyone.

 

-Elder Thompson.