1.30.12 email

Hey all.

This week was sweet, got to see a lot of progress, not only in the new people we’re teaching but also in the members of the church that we are privileged to work with. It's an awesome adventure!

Winter has definitely hit here! FINALLY! Hahaha! But it's all good, I'm staying pretty warm.

This next upcoming week is gonna be busy! E. Hoffman is getting ready to go home and everyone wants him over! Not looking forward to playing the role of time keeper! But it’ll be fun and a good experience.

Gotta go! Think we’re going to go to Greenfield Village! Look it up, it's sweet! :)

Con mucho amor,
e. Jones

1.23.12 email

Hey all.

This last week was sweet! Lots of snow! Had fun doing some shoveling service tracting! Definitely a good way to get people to talk to you! Rained all last night and took the snow away, but it was fun while it lasted.

I got introduced to a lot of the members of the church here in the Livonia ward, been pretty fun. The members are way stoked to do missionary work and are excited to make their own Mormon.org profile! It's an amazing proslyting tool!

Well I gotta run, doing a district activity today of volleyball and ultimate frisby! Should be way fun!

Much love,

- Elder Jones

letter to the MOFia 1.21.12

{For those of you who don't know, the MOFia is a group of LDS Moms that hang out online. (MOF stands for My Online Friends.) In October of 2010, one of my favorite MOFia members surprised Elder Jones and I by going behind our backs & passing the collection hat, as it were, and presented us with a check for about a quarter of the money we needed for his mission. I think I can safely say that if it weren't for the MOFia, Elder Jones would not have been able to go on his mission when he did. We love the MOFia!}

1/16/12

MOFia Family,

What up, doe-ettes! Hey there! I wanna say sorry for not writing you in so long! But, here I am now!

Today I've been out for exactly 11 months. Feels like only 4 or 5 to me. And you know what? There hasn't been one day thus far that I haven't thought of you all. "Dat be dat truff!" (A little Ebonics for ya!) I really am eternally grateful to all of you for what you have done for me and my family. I know the Lord blesses those who help missionaries, because He's kept me from a lot, so there is definitely a buffer!

As you all know by now, I've been transferred and am now outta the D. Not too far away, but far enough to feel uncomfortable around all the white people! There is a night and day difference in how people treat you - I'm going to miss that about Detroit, being able to talk to everyone! Here in Livonia / Westland / Redford / Garden City, it's a bit different - you get a lot of doors slammed in your face; but hey, it's all for the experience, right?

But I really am loving it here in the Livonia South area. We have a constant good pressure to always do better; the APs and the Mission President are in the ward, too, so we are always subject to a 'stop by'. This ward is amazing - they are on fire with missionary work, it's sweeeeet!

A special shout out and thanks to Monty and Vina L. for all of their support, help and wonderful car rides to and from the grocery store. And especially for the birthday cake! It was wonderful! The Spirit is wonderful around them!

Well, MOFia, I hate to cut this short, but my eyes are a little heavy and we got a long, hopefully way fun day ahead, so I'm going to try and catch a li'l snooze.

Stay fresh and stay cheezin!

Love you all.

Elder Jones

{Mom brag}

{Elder Jones also forwarded this email to me, with this note attached: "Sister G. wanted me to send this to you." Awwww.}

We were so excited to have Elder Hoffman and Elder Jones in our home last night. They bring such a great spirit and are truly making such a difference in the lives of so many people! I thought you would also be very pleased to know that in addition to being very fun and understanding of the chaos in our home (we were babysitting two kids for another couple in the ward and had seven kids under the age of eight at the dinner!) they also taught a wonderful lesson and bore very powerful testimony of the need to share the gospel with those around us. They bring such a beautiful spirit to our home and to the ward. You should be so proud! :)

Also, you have clearly done something right. We sent the elders home with the left overs from the roast dinner and they not only brought the Tupperware back to us CLEAN at church the very next morning, they also had thank you notes not only for Andrew and I but also one for each of our children with pictures and such. The kids were so excited!! What treasures. Anyway-- good job mom! You did something very right! :) We will sure miss Elder Hoffman and Elder Jones when their time here ends.

Love,

Ruth and Andrew G., and family

PS Please find attached photos with the elders. My husband took them on the phone, so they are not the best quality. Sorry. :)


Elder Hoffman


Elder Jones

1.17.12 email

Hey there!

This week was sweet, gonna be a short e-mail I fear, but we'll see where she goes.

Had some sweet finding experiences and had some sweet lessons with people all around.

Went to the car show here in Detroit, the HUGE one at the Cobo center; it was pretty legit if I say so myself, got some sweet pictures of some cars y'all never heard of yet! Had a good time.

So we got a little snow last week and it was sooooooo nice to know that I didn't have to get on my bike and go out in it! Yay for cars! :)

This next week should be sweet, got a lot of appointments set up!

Well I guess that about does it!

~ Elder Jones

1.9.12 email

Hey all!

This week was sweet! Opening up a new area is a challenge, but well worth the effort! I’m lovin E. Hoffman too, I’m having a blast! He’s way funny and still super focused for him only having 30 days left on the mission. We (together) have been able to see some sweet miracles because of our goals that we set!

Just a quick example…. So we got our bikes from the assistants because we don’t wanna go over on miles, well the day we got them we had actually gone more than what we had planned. So we had like a half hour till we needed to be in, and we parked outside of a house that a member no longer lives at, and pulled the bikes off the rack! Well we started riding, and soon enough after a left turn, and a couple right turns, we found ourselves in front of a house that was the only one on its street with a porch light on. Well, we walk up to it and it had a HUGE “No Soliciting” sign on it and my first thought was “Well, we were led here for a reason” and we knocked! This lady came to the door and I spoke, but I couldn’t tell you what I said, to me it felt like gibberish but I guess everyone else understood it hahaha, that’s because she invited us back on Tuesday to share our message with the whole family. It’s sweet! And as we were riding away Elder Hoffman said to me, “Man, as I was following you I said in my head we need to turn here, and then here, and then I thought ‘that house!’ and without saying a word to you, you did it!”. So we were definitely guided!

This next week looks really good, finally gonna get some snow on Sunday! This last week we hit 60 degrees!! :O Ha! We haven’t had more than a half inch of snow on the ground at a time! It snowed more when I was on bike than now!

Well hope you all have good week!

~ Elder Jones

1.7.12 letter

1/2/12

Dear Mom,

Hey there! :) Happy birthday!! Sorry I didn't get to tell that to you today! You'll have gotten an email by the time you get this, but I had to tell ya anyway. :)

How's it going? How was Christmas and the New Year's party? Hope all went well & you guys had a good time!

I've been doing well. I'm opening up a new area, it's called 'Livonia South.' We cover 3/4th of the Livonia ward. The North area is covered by the APs (Assistants to the Mission President), and they don't have very much time to proselyte, so they get a smaller area. :) I'm now companions with Elder Hoffman. He actually was just released from being an AP and I'm killing him off (meaning, he goes home at the end of this transfer). He flies home 8 days before I hit my year mark.

I'm having a blast with E. Hoffman; he's way funny and super hard-working. It's a tough thing to open an area - we don't really have much to work with, or anyone to teach. So, we are pretty much starting from scratch - no area book, no nothin'! Ha!

I've been super tired lately. More than usual, actually. Been tracting between 6-8 hours a day!! But I'm loving it. It's the exact polar opposite of Detroit. No one is inviting and no one is accepting at first! But if we just keep talking and working, the Spirit softens others' hearts. :)

Kinda cool thing - President Holmes is in our ward! It's way weird to pass him in church or driving down the street!

OH!!! I'M IN A CAR AREA NOW!!! :D :D :D I'm so stoked!! It's hard to keep track of miles, but I think I'll manage. ;)

So I kept track - I lost a total of 27 pounds while serving in the city on my bike. Hoping to stay healthy and somewhat fit for the remainder of my time. (I promptly plan on joining a gym when I get home.) :)

Well, I'm 20 now. That's weird. Nice to know I'm not a teen anymore, but amazing how fast time goes by when you don't think about time, and just work.

Well, I'm outta stuff to write about, and I wanna take a nap! :) Love you!

Elder "Nye-Nye" Jones :D

1.3.12 photos

{Mom here. In a separate email he sent me a few photos - here they are with his captions.}

1 & 2 - birthday cake from Vina :D

3 - Christmas Eve, our district

4 - me and the Bowens with our sweet shirts and stockings

5 - Sweet! :)

6 - Me :)

1.3.12 email

Hey all!

Hope you had a Wonderful New Year’s Eve and day! I did! We got to unpack! Haha.

Had an awesome week! We got our apartment on Wednesday and got to move in on Friday the 30th. Then we got to work! And eventually here and there we got unpacked, don't think I am fully yet though!

We (Elder Hoffman & I) got a lot done for starting fresh in the area. We’ve been tracting a lot which is always a pleasure. :) We have found a good number of potentials and found some sweet part-member families!

We were also definitely guided by the spirit on where to go, too! We saw some sweet miracles! I’ll share a couple with ya, they were just a matter of being at the right place at the right time. So the first one was, we were planning and we were looking at some names to stop by off the ward roster, and this one name kept coming up, over and over and over. So we wrote it down. Well, that night we ended up getting out of an appointment pretty late but we still felt like we needed to go by. Well we did! And the son of a less active (lives with his mom) opened the door and we introduced ourselves, and he just had this puzzled look on his face, we asked if everything was alright and all he said was, “I just got off the phone with my dad (who is a member) and he told me I should go to church and be baptized.” Well, we talked with him a bit and asked if we could come back when his mom was there and so now we’re seeing them tomorrow night!

Another one happened kind of with the same circumstance! We felt impressed, so we stopped by, and he (a less-active member for about 3-4 years) let us in and told us that his mom had just passed away two days prior and wanted to re-learn about the plan of salvation! So we had like a POWERHOUSE lesson with him and he is doing awesome. We’re going to the 2-part funeral tomorrow and Thursday.

So yeah, I'm loving Livonia! Haha! I hope you all are getting your own opportunities to share your beliefs in your own ways! :)

Well I got a new address for ya’ll!

{get ahold of Taffi if you'd like the new address}

I’d love to hear from ya!

But I gotta run, hope you all have a fantastic week!

~ Elder Jones