August 25 - Winnipeg

This week was crazy Monday. We had 4 meal appointments saying goodbye to some friends and families.

Tuesday we had district meeting and saw some other people before I left. 

Wednesday was even busier as I said bye to everyone, taught some lessons, and set a baptismal date again for Jonnie.

Thursday got up at 4:30, left at 6 to Winnipeg and 

Friday and Saturday and Sunday I got situated with some of the members and the area and some of the leadership in the area and taught a few lessons to some members and less active members. 

Winnipeg is okay. It is just a big city with lots of road construction and concrete roads everywhere! The weather has sort of sucked ever since I got here. It was super hot and super humid the first day that I got here on Thursday, then it rained. Friday, Saturday and Sunday it just kept raining on and off, here a little there a little. Today it has been doing the same thing but I have not seen any huge storms yet?

I really didn't want to leave Regina but what can you do?  I had a brand new truck and now I have a car that lurches randomly and is dirty and smelly and wiper-blades don't work properly and it's always raining here! I had a lot of people that I was working hard with in Regina and lots of dates set for baptism or people who were set for baptism and here we have nothing!  Went from having it all to having nothing! And I can't find one of my journals I believe I may have lost it during packing/transfers! Also I miss the temple:(

But really that is just me being the pessimist I seem to be. I just need to get to work.

I love you, you take care! And don't you worry about me! I am fine.

-Love Elder Shane Dola

Goodbye!

August 18

Last week Monday we had P-day.

Tuesday was DM and other stuff throughout the day, and then we had dinner with the Burgess' and then went to a addiction recovery support group with one of our investigators and met a bunch of other people.

Wednesday we were on Exchanges and went to another DM and then we went out and helped out in White City again and then we came back and visited two different families and taught lessons, one which was super powerful. We also picked up trash in the hood but no worries I didn't run across any needles.

Thursday we had like 30 missionaries out in White City cleaning up and I had a stroke so that was not fun. We were there for 5+ hours straight and it was like 40degrees outside with the humidity! But after that and having had a stroke we went to East Side Marios with Sister C and it was so hot in there.  Then we did online work and then came home and I collapsed from my stoke of the heat (heat stroke) and didn't come back to my senses until the next morning.

Friday we went out and did some more yard work for the M's, who then fed us via BBQ, which was good. Then we went and did our "weekly service" and that involved more yard work. Then we visited E, had dinner, and taught X and H with Bro Speers and set a date for X to be baptized. It was great!

Saturday we took a load to the dump that we had been hauling around all day before from the M's service and while there, we got a call from the assistants telling us our transfer calls...then we had lunch, did our online work, weekly planned, and visited some more of our investigators. Then we had dinner and helped a new family move in and then visited P, and M and T before we came home.

Sunday we went and had a correlation meeting with breakfast at Brother Speers and then had church. H and X both came and so did A, so that was really good. C and I blessed the sacrament and we had a really good service the rest of the day. We said goodbye to E and then had dinner with the M family and then said goodbye to C, which was super hard. He did not want us to leave at all and whenever we said we had to go he just kept cutting us off and kept talking, trying to keep us there longer. When we went to our truck, he walked out and kept talking to us more. It was super hard and sad to see how upset he was about me leaving. Then we visited D and took indicators and did online work and that was our night.

But I have to get going now! Love you! You take care!

-Love Elder Shane Dola

August 11

This week was pretty slow and busy at the same time.

Monday we had our P-day and had dinner at the Forness' home, which was great and shared a message with them and shot a t-shirt gun. Then our appointment got cancelled so we went to the Basketball night and had a really good turn out. There were lots of non-members and investigators there, which was really great to see! 

Tuesday was a crazy day. I don't remember all that happened because almost nothing went to our original plan. We ended up giving blessings to some sisters and had almost all of our appointments launched. Then we visited C and were surprised by President and Sister Thomas showing up for interviews. We had dinner with the W family and then we picked up C and went to J's baptism, which went really good. There were tons of people there. The entire relief society room was overflowed (mostly because there were people there for meetings that night, but hey whatever). After that we planned for our Zone Training meeting.

Wednesday we got up and the entire Zone went to the Temple and we were able to do an endowment session. After the session, we quickly got lunch and went to the church and had our Zone Training meeting, which went pretty well. After that we visited C, who is doing really well. Then we had dinner with the famous B and his wife. Then we visited a member named S and then started our exchanges with Lewvan elders.

Thursday we went to the church and had interviews with President Thomas, which went pretty well. Following that we volunteered at Sarbis Brain injury place and then we had lunch and studies and visited a couple families, which was pretty good. Then we went to dinner at Denny’s with Sister C and then we visited another couple people before we closed our exchange.

Friday we went on a very dangerous quest. Then we did our online work and then we went over to President Woods (temple presidents) home and had a good visit with him and his wife and had a good lunch. We then had to get our oil changed, which was the worst. It took over 2 hours... and we were late to our Dinner appointment, but that went well. We then started another exchange with the other Elders in my District and visited a recent convert family, which was really good. Later that night there was a huge storm and the wind was blowing like crazy. We stood there and were hoping that this one tree would blow over, but unfortunately it did not.

Saturday we went and helped our Ward Mission Leader put on a pancake breakfast for the ward, which went pretty well. Following that, we went out and met a lot of people and potential investigators and handed out a few Books of Mormon and set some appointments up with some former investigators. We had a lot planned to do the rest of the day but were interrupted as we were called out to White City, which is like 10 Km's out of Regina where the storm the other night was a lot worse than in the city! So we went out there with the other missionaries in the City and helped people clean up their yards from tons of over turned trees and what not. Apparently there was no tornado, just a huge gust of wind in the storm that was going over 150 Km's an hour and just knocked everything down! But that was fun! I got to swing an ax around and found a Chainsaw and got it to work so we ended up spending the rest of the day out there clearing and cutting trees and branches and didn't even come close to getting everything done and this was just on one persons yard and there was like 30 people there at one point! 

Sunday was good. We finished our exchange and had a mission wide fast we participated in all day. We had N come to church and C and I were able to help C as he was able to pass the sacrament for the first time! I taught the gospel principles class and then we had priesthood and then things went a little Crazy as we were talking about Celestial marriage and N was super confused and one old guy in Elders Quorum just went off in all of these scriptures confusing him... but it is all good. We were able to explain some things a little bit better and we will see N tomorrow. After Church we had to do some things on the computer and then we visited C and had a good visit with him. Then we had a good appointment with H and X. They are doing pretty good. We then had dinner and broke the fast and then we went over to D, who we met on Friday after our dangerous quest. We taught him about the Book of Mormon a bit and he gave us some homemade pie and hot Chocolate and thank goodness it was only 28 degrees out at the time! But it was good. He will be coming to Church this up coming Sunday with his friend, who is a Bishop in Kingston, Ontario, and who will be in Regina. We then went and collected and sent in our Zone's indicators.

So it was a pretty busy week. Unfortunately we didn't see too much get accomplished missionary-wise.

Take care and have a good week! 

-Love Elder Shane Dola

August 4

This week was a little crazy. We got fatter at Fat Burger and then e-mailed and shopped and cleaned our house. Then we went over to a non members house and they fed us pop and pizza for dinner and following dinner, we helped them move some stuff and then we went to the YSA activity for a while and played basketball. Then we went over and visited the Mantilla family and shared a message!

Tuesday we drove to Yorkton and attended their district meeting, did a teaching evaluation with Yorkton, ate their food and then went back to Melville and went on exchanges with them after we had a teaching evaluation with them. Had a good time and were able to teach a few people and had some good experiences.

Wednesday we drove back into Regina and went to some more district meetings and then we went and helped Brother S, out in Sedley move everything out of his basement. Then we went over to Brother Sa's home and we loaded the shed that we demolished a few weeks ago onto out truck and took it to the dump and on the way over to the dump we were on the Ring Road (Main highway) and even though the boards were strapped down, the wind caught some of the boards and they broke off and were all over the highway! It was not a really good time! We ran out and cleaned all of it off the high way and then put lots more straps down, took it to the dump and rushed over to the B's home and had dinner with them and our investigator N, who has been progressing very well! Following that we taught him the Plan of Salvation and half way through reading a scripture he felt the spirit so strongly that he got up and HAD to have a smoke to calm him down. But afterwards he shared some really great insights he had received and then we went and stopped by a few others.

Thursday we helped Brother and Sister M lay new sod at their house and cut down some trees with a chain saw and then they took all of us to DQ for lunch. We had online proselyting and we visited E again and shared a conference talk "Come Join With Us" and he really enjoyed it. It hit him really hard and he is getting closer and closer to deciding to come back to church! It was great! After that we went and had to go to Tony Romas again with sister C! ;) That was great! We then visited some former investigators the rest of the night and collected month end K's from our Zone and then the 2 sets of Zone Leaders came from Saskatoon and stayed the night.

Friday we shoved 12 missionaries into a 12 seater van and drove all the way to Brandon for our MLC (Mission Leadership Conference). It was really good. The Chapel had been renovated since I had last been there and it looked really good and I got to see some members that I knew from when I was last there!; Bishop Palmer and his wife. We had a really, really good meeting and learnt a lot and received a lot of great insights and things that we will need to apply more into the Zones around the mission! Then we drove all the way back after our 6-hour meeting and went to bed.

Saturday the Saskatoon Zone leaders left in the morning and we went to the temple last second. There was a family who came in and wanted to do some baptisms for the dead and we helped out and participated in those with them. Then we had a correlation meeting with the missionaries in our district, did a bunch of stuff I don't remember, had a good appointment with H, and found out that the reason he and X were not at Church last week was because X crashed the car on the way over to the church! But we had a good lesson and then we saw a ton more former investigators and visited N with brother Mason. It was a really good lesson again! 

Sunday C blessed the Sacrament for the first time! It was great! We had some good gospel principles classes and Co and N were there! Following that, we went and broke our fast with the Crebas' and shared a message with them, which was good. Then we had a lot of planning that we had to take care of and saw a few others, took indicators and then that was our week!

Take care and have a great week!

-Love Elder Shane Dola