Email 10/15/12

Family, This was a really decent week. We had some really rainy/bad weather the past couple days but it has been fine. Lots of rain which we needed and thunderstorms but nothing too serious. We already broke out of the cold snap and looking for warmer weather which I don't really look forward to. Besides the weather, things have been pretty good around here. We weren't able to teach a whole lot of lessons but the people we were able to see went really great. We are working really hard with this nice family. We just recently started working more with his kids who are 9,8,7,1 yr old. They are getting more involved with us in reading the book of mormon and listening to what we have to say. We also went over this past Saturday with a ward missionary that went really good. He actually served his mission in Fort Lauderdale speaking spanish. So that lesson went really good. We are also working with a couple other people and helping them progress more. Things are doing really good though. We have interviews with the president next week. I think so that should be good. Trying to work hard as a district leader. Lots of meetings, interviews to have, and phone calls and account abilities. But it is going good. I enjoy helping out. This coming week looks like it will be good so I am happy for that and looking forward to do good then. Other then that, nothing much going on. A lot of work, no pay lol. Thanks for everything. Hope all is well. Love Elder Roe

Email 10/08/12

Hola, Conference weekend was way sweet. Interesting announcement from Prez Monson. Big news for everyone. I liked seeing the shocked looks on everyone's face and the guys when they lowered the age for guys, then the girls when they lowered theirs too. Crazy stuff. I really liked conference a lot. I thought that Elder Holland's was way good. He have a very similar one in the MTC when I was there but it was a little different then the one he gave for general conference. Very good talks and thoughts to keep in mind for the next 6 months. We had an awesome time looking to invite everyone we could to the general conference. It was a really good time. We were able to get a few investigators to see it which was nice. They thought it was really nice. Lots had questions on family and how to help them in this kind of world so I think that general conference and reviewing the talks they missed would really help them. Kinda slow week though trying to see people. Not horribly great week in finding people but we had a few really good lessons with people and they are beginning to increase their faith which is our whole purpose. Really enjoying the time here though. We are trying to work better with the few members we have here in Newton. Most of the members live in areas outside of Newton really far away. All good though. So we are trying to work better with everyone. It is starting to be rather chilly which is sweet so I am enjoying it minus the crazy wind. That's about it though. Thanks for all the love and support. Love Elder Roe

Email 10/01/12

Family, We had transfers this week. I stayed and Elder Haws got sent off to Lenexa. I'm with Elder Stagg. He is learning ASL so that is pretty cool. He just served actually with Elder Decker who I also served with. His trainer was actually an elder that came out with me so that is pretty cool. So we spent this past week introducing him to different members and the investigators we have. It is going well. We need to do lots of finding new investigators and some more solid, prepared people. It is easy to find but not as easy to find those whom the Lord has already prepared. The weather is starting to cool down which is really nice. Looking forward to the cool weather again. Unfortunately that means that we have to wear suits coming up now. All good tho. We also have general conference this coming week. I am pretty excited for that. Should be pretty sweet. So this week is the inviting week where we invite everyone to come to hear a prophets voice. I noticed on lds.org that they have a really great video and resources on the home page on how members can invite people to general conference and how to do hard stuff using facebook and all that jazz. Pretty cool stuff so you should check it out. Pretty quiet week so far tho. Not much going on. Thanks for everything. Hope the Utah trip was all good. Love Elder Roe

Email 09/24/12

Family, We had a pretty slow start to the week but we ended up doing pretty good this week. Lots of traveling and no different for the next couple days. Pretty much all of our appointments with people have been falling through which isn't fun but we are able to make up for it later on. We are really trying to work with a cool part member family. This is the guy that just came from Honduras. He is interested in coming to church with us and everything and he asks lots of questions. A funny experience with them: yesterday we had some time and wanted to stop by and see them. We got to talk to him and his member sister and brother-in-law. Pretty funny because I could barely understand what they were saying. People from Honduras talk very fast, abnormally fast actually. Then since there was 3 of them, it was even worse. My poor companion who doesn't know spanish really struggled no doubt on what was going on. Then there was me going back and forth in spanish, trying to answer serious questions in the best way with my broken spanish. In the end it all worked out and it was all good. Most spanish people I talk with now understand I am still learning spanish and so they speak slower for me but when all 3 native Honduras people get together, they just go off. I don't know how I understood anything but way awesome that I can even respond. I really enjoy spanish and hope that I get more areas with opportunities to speak more spanish. I hope to teach english to this Honduras family because they don't understand anything really. They don't even understand their little kids (who are learning more english then spanish). So hopefully I can get to help them learn some english more. That would be awesome. Other then lots of spanish, not a whole lot going on. We have general conference coming soon which is exciting. We also have transfers this Thursday so interesting to see what will happen. Thanks for all you do. Love Elder Roe

Email 09/17/12

Family, How is everyone? We are doing pretty good here in Newton. We had a couple rainy days and cooler weather which is awesome. Kinda of a slow week and we had a lot of cancellations of appointments. Not too bad otherwise. We got a couple new investiagtors this week which was great. We went to visit a LA spanish family this week and we go by and turns out a family member just got here from Honduras like the other day and will be staying here for quite some time looking for a job. He isn't a member but really interested in being baptized and has been involved in the church whenever he has been here in the united states so we are hoping that we can help him out and get him to progress and get a spiritual confirmation. Way sweet that we found him though. We had stake conference here which was pretty sweet. Good stuff happening. Also found out that Gladys Knight is coming to the mission with her choir and everything. I think it is the same thing they had in Orlando some time ago. Meant to invite investigators and all that stuff. She will sing, bear her testimony and all that jazz. Pretty cool. We were really excited. Coming in October. Then came the bad news. Everyone in the mission will be able to go....except Wichita zone. That is where I am. Lame. So we won't be able to participate in it unless I get transferred or something. Other than that, we are doing pretty good. Thanks for everything. Love Elder Roe

Email 09/10/12

Family, All is well here in Newton, Kansas. Surprisingly we have had a nice little cold snap so it has been really cool and only getting up to like the 80s. So it has been really awesome. So much better when it is cool. Although that also means that suit jacket season for us starts soon with general conference coming up. Hope it stays cool during that. This past week has been pretty good. Up and down. Elder Haws messed up his neck so we had to go to the doctor and everything and he has been resting it for a couple days. So that took us out of commission for a day or two so we are starting to move into gear more the past couple days. Should be all good here in a few days. Week went good otherwise. I had my first baptismal interview on Friday and that went really well. The guy was baptized all good and everything so that was exciting for the sisters that taught him. Yesterday, Sunday, we had 2 of our former investigators come to church to our surprise. We were able to talk to them and see what got them to just get up and come to church and everything. They have had serious trials and everything the past month or so so they are looking for understanding and wanting to increase their faith by coming to church. Both expressed their desire to have us meet with them again and they have awesome fellowship. We were also able to give them both blessings at their request. They were really looking to learn more and they are showing it by their actions. So, I was really happy about that. We also got to go thru a lot of spanish and all that. I have noticed my spanish has been getting better. I gave the closing prayer in sacrament yesterday and the whole time I wanted to speak in spanish so I had to translate (in my head) all I wanted to say from spanish to english. I have noticed that I have been more comfortable in speaking and teaching in spanish then in english. Rather interesting. I think that is a good thing though. We are looking forward to this coming week to work hard. All is good otherwise. Thanks for all the love and support. Love Elder Roe

Email 09/04/12

Family, We are doing rather good these past few days. Although we need to work more with the part member family that we had on date. They are starting to back off so we are going to try to work with them more. As for the spanish work in the area we are starting to teach more. I have a lot of support with the spanish members here and they want to go out with us to see their friends. I'm pretty excited. We have dropped a lot of investigators and kind of at a stand still in the area of work so we are trying to find more people to teach and more support in helping them from the members. So a lot of the work recently has been the spanish which I love. I noticed that I teach better in spanish then in english. I can answer questions really good in english and whatever but when it comes to actually teaching a lesson, I prefer spanish since that is what I studied my whole time in the MTC. We had a really hot couple days so that is not fun but we are staying rather cool. Plus one of our tires has a leak so we have to deal with that too now. We are doing good other then that and just getting used to being a district leader. A lot of more meetings, travel, and phone calls, trainings etc so a lot more work then just being a normal missionary. All good though. Not much other to report this week. Thanks for everything. Love Elder Roe