Merry Christmas

It was a crazy bonkers week, it was a ton of fun! Christmas eve we went out and went ding dong ditching as we delivered Christmas presents and it was so much fun! Last night we went and had a great time playing games with the Duncans it was so much fun and a great Christmas! Sorry its short but I don't have to much time to email!

Love Elder Hutchings

Allergic Reaction!!

This weekend was a bit rough, I ended up breaking out in hives due to an allergic reaction. So I spent most of the day in urgent care on Saturday. I am doing much better now and have plenty of medications (drugs) pumped into me!

Monday- The turkey that we cooked ended up turning out really good!!   It was super moist and was just a really fun time. We texted Curtis and told him about it and he was like I'll bring the board games and be right over to help you eat some of this! It was a good time, we played games  and ate turkey it was sweet. What was really weird was we looked at all the instructions and we left it cooking while we came to email because we had this cooker from a member and it said it would take 4 hours to cook. 2 hours and it was done we used the meat thermometer and it was like 200 degrees in it, it was defiantly cooked!  That night we went out and just tracted all night! It was a good time.   Elder Shore makes it nice and fun!

Tuesday- We came down to Raleigh for a meeting and it was a ton of fun, it was a zone council so we had all the leaders in the Raleigh zone there and we talked about what was going on and how we can help. What was the best though was we got to have cook out for lunch afterwards and that is always good! I haven't had it in so long since there isn't one up in Wake Forest! Then we had an appointment which ended up falling through but we were able to tract around them and make it work. Then we had to drive all the way out to the boonies of  area for a dinner which killed on our miles and then it took forever and it was just a bunch of stress but we got there and it all worked out! We then had a really interesting lesson with this Muslim lady which made me so mad.  We were answering her questions and she wanted perfect answers and it was just a hard lesson. We will be dropping her here soon since all she is doing is asking questions about weird stuff she finds on the internet. Hopefully we can get her to come to church with the recent convert she lives with!

Wednesday- We had our regular district meeting and it was a party. We all had a good time and Elder Shore and I took up our turkey and we had that for lunch.  Then I went with Elder Meyer into the Roxboro area on exchange.  We met some of the weirdest people, it is a Podunk little area but it was so much fun! We tracted a ton and had a great time. He is from a little town in Idaho and it was great. It was fun to talk to him about Idaho! Nothing really happened on exchange other then we met these people that told us to stay away from this one house, the guy is crazy and thinks he is a prophet! So that was a good story to hear about and he comes and visits these people all the time!

Thursday- We came back in from exchange and we had an awesome lesson with this guy named Whitehead. We don't know if that is his first or last name but he is really cool. Our lesson with him was planned for 11 and we showed up right at 11 and as we were half way up the walk way he opened the door. We taught a really powerful restoration lesson to him and we used the scriptures and the whole time he kept saying y'all have brought me the truth.  He was super amazed by the vision that Joseph Smith had it was really cool! The rest of the day was pretty routine with most of the planning that we needed to do and we had our dinner. It was a pretty good day but sadly didn't find anyone.

Friday- We had a lesson planned with this guy named Paul, and we show up and his wife answers.  We have started to contact her and we teach her quite a bit since Paul is asleep. We taught a pretty good lesson on the door and then she was like yeah I don't have time but come back and Paul will be sure to talk to you! We were like dang.   We were low on miles so we biked all the way down there, but it was good since we planned on staying in Wake Forest all day.  We worked hard and we tracted all day and we ended up finding a few people. We taught quite a bit on the door and it was a good day. Then we went to contact some referral from some other sisters in the mission and these people live right in the middle of baptist seminary housing.  We were like yea no, another time since we didn't have anything in their language! Then we went to the ward party, and that was a blast. They did breakfast for dinner and it was really good. The bad part was when we got home that night I was breaking out in hives (thought it was just a rash). So put some itching cream on it and went to bed.

Saturday- Woke up and I thought the rash was gone showered and went out for the day. Then as we were out it came back and I could feel it on my scalp and it was so itchy! So after we came home for lunch we called the mission nurse and she said to go into urgent care and what not! So went in and sure enough it was hives. So they gave me 2 shots, one was steroids and the other was for the itching. The nurse came in to give them to me and I was talking to her and I asked if she wanted me to roll my sleeves up.... Well I found out they weren't going to be put in my arm ( edit this if their are children) But they go in the butt!!! Dang it hurt so bad when the fluid went in to! So I got those and then we ran to Walgreens and picked up everything.  We came home so I could eat and then I fell asleep from all of the drugs!! When I woke up we ran to dinner and then after wards I was covered in hives again and so the mission nurse told me that I should spend the night in and what not.  That was the worst. But I got a blessing and felt better!

Sunday- We had church and I talked to a doctor from the ward and then we tracted a ton of people from the seminary.  We think that we hit an area that was just recently hit by some Jehovah witnesses just the day before so it made our efforts pretty pitiful!

Overall the week was pretty good and we had fun while we could. Elder Shore was able to get quite a bit of cleaning done though!  (Since I was sleeping!!!)

The picture of the Guy getting baptized is Abugar!  The rest of them are the turkey and then the prep for the turkey, yes i am holding its neck in my hand!!

Have a great week

Love Elder Hutchings

Yes we're going to cook this!!

This is the neck!!!

Looking good!!

Oh yes we get to eat this!!!

Looks done to me!!!

Abugar's baptism!!!

Freezing Rain - Holes in Shoes!!!

Well I just want everyone to know that this week I found out that I have holes in the soles of my shoes. Some might ask -  well how did you just barely find this out. This week will tell and it is quite a good story so stay tuned and find out!

Monday- Was sorta fun, we drove down to Raleigh to help people with rides since we have lost some of the cars in the zone because of some accidents.  We were able to go down and spend some time with the other elders. We played some board and card games! It was pretty fun, and I got to hang out with some cool elders. I found out basically everything that was going on with transfers! It was really fun to get the assistants to just blabb it all out to me! LOL!!! So that was a pretty good part of the day, and then we had the nice long drive home with traffic! It  wasn't to bad, then we went straight to a lesson with Dan our investigator who is getting baptized here soon! We took pictures and stuff! Then we ran to another appointment and met with this awesome couple.  We went in and sat down and taught them the restoration! It was a powerful lesson, and they committed to come to church and read and pray! It was awesome, and then we ran to the store to get ice cream, and milk shake ingredients and we had a milk shake party for Elder Robinson! It was great, just me and him but it was a lot of fun!

  

Tuesday- We had our transfers, we swung by the Henry's first to grab some biscuits they were giving us and then we drove to transfers. It was fun seeing everyone and having them be like whoa its transfers again. (I was like you don't even know!)  It was cool, we got to see all of the trainers, sadly a lot of the people that I wanted to see weren't there but there was a few, so it was good. Everyone leaving was so trunky it was the best!   Then I found Elder Shore and we packed it up and left transfers. It was a pretty short drive home not to much traffic or anything. Then we got home, he unpacked a bit and then we were off to the races.  We went and tracted around the area that we were having dinner and it was quite fun to be able to see how Elder Shore works. By the way, my companion is now Elder Shore, he is from Utah and has brown hair. He is really cool and we are pretty similar so it will be a fun last transfer!

 Wednesday- We went up to district meeting and it was really fun. There was a ton of missionaries there since my district lines were changed and I now have a district of 6 companionships instead of 3 haha. President doesn't want me trunky I guess! But it was fun, and we also had the zone leaders there! We had a great day of tracting though. That is what a lot of this week consisted of! We had a great member dinner though  and it was awesome. The kids were great, and the we tracted the rest of the night!!

 Thursday- Was crazy we had 2 appointments that morning and sadly one of them fell through. It was weird because of the person that missed it, his name is Eric and he seemed super solid.  We are going to text him and try to reschedule! We should be able to get an appointment and the other appointment, we were able to teach about the Book of Mormon and prayer. We tracted for quite a bit and let me say the Christmas Initiative really melts peoples hearts and helps us to share a message with them. It was cool, and then we went with a member and visited some Baptist seminary students who he invited to meet with us. It was mostly question and answer session and what not. Nothing came from it but in the end we were able to leave them with a Book of Mormon.   They were super nice people. When we were driving though we almost hit a deer it was great! I spotted it and was like deer! So we missed it!

Friday&Saturday- Both days were really awesome, this is when I found out that I had a hole in my shoe. Friday we tracted all day and all night it was great. It started out raining and then it went to freezing rain, and my shoe got soaking wet. It was awesome!!  We tracted for  hours straight and the best comment I heard both days was " its cold out here, y'all should get somewhere warm"... aren't you in a nice warm house... Ha Ha but we were able to find people both days and we saw an investigator named Joe and we talked to him about why he missed church last week.  He said some excuses and then I said well come tomorrow.  So we arranged a ride! (he came too!) Then we had some great member dinners! At one point on Friday though we had to run into the dollar general store and buy new socks since ours were just soaked! It was a great 2 days.  I had a ton of fun and so did Elder Shore. We even got to tract in the snow and we both felt like we were back out in the west!! It was so cold though!!

Sunday- Joe came to church it was the best, and then we went and visited some of our investigators.  We had a great dinner with some newer members of the ward! It was a ton of fun. The end of the night we met with Dan and him telling us he forgot the baptismal record, and we were meeting with him to fill it out! But it was good, we visited this lady named Sister Share and she is really cool.  She gave us a turkey and was like this needs cooked... So now we are cooking a turkey today!!

 It has been a great cold week and I loved it!! Oh and here are some pictures of a mouse in our apartment!!!  We caught it and I had to dispose of him... But hes gone now! It was fun have a great week love all of you! Oh and that is my life for the past two years in all 17 of my planners!

Love Elder Hutchings

We got the little rascal!!

Now - disposing of him!!!

Last 2 years of my life in 17 pictures!!!

#HereComesChristmas

Monday- Elder Robinson and I had a pretty boring day! Haha we ended up playing scrabble, and I found out that there are a bunch of words that I didn't know were actually real words! It was quite funny, but in the end my vocab wasn't the biggest!!!  So I ended up losing but we had fun while we were at it! We also took some time and made our planners for this next transfer! Mine is pretty cool it is Christ opening the eyes of a blind man! It is pretty awesome, it was going good. Then Curtis called us and asked if y'all eaten lunch yet?  We were able have lunch with him.  We went to this really good Mediterranean place it was a Gyro that I got and it was great!! We had a good time, then that night we went out and were tracting a ton. That's pretty much what I remember!

Tuesday- We had an accounting call and it was pretty sweet, the zone leaders and us were talking about what was coming for transfers and it was pretty great! They had some pretty interesting perspectives on who all might be leaving! It was a good day though and we tracted a ton. We went and saw this investigator of ours named Joe.   Joe thought he was buff and so we had a competition to see who could do more push ups... Well I won and he said he would come to church! Which he ended up not coming!  Then we were tracting not to far from Joe and we were able to find 2 people who were interested in us coming back and teaching their families more! The rest of the night was pretty great.  We were able to see a recent convert. She was doing pretty good and it was good to see her!  Then we went and visited some investigators who we had an appointment with and we took Tyson one of the people getting ready for his mission.  Unfortunately the appointment fell through, it was the worst! But we got to visit a few people!

Wednesday- We had a bunch of appointments scheduled and it was pretty booked. Then all of it slowly fell through. We had one appointment that morning and it had to be rescheduled which was alright and it gave us time to tract.  We met this lady named Rebetha.  She was nice and she knows one of the members of the ward! So that was cool, then we swung by a few other people that afternoon and ended up not catching them.  We were able to knock on Eric's door. He is this really spiritual guy who was like oh yea if I could have more scripture on Christ I would read it immediately! So we scheduled to come back Thursday and teach him more so that was really cool! It was a pretty good day.  That night we had a good time as we went out and our appointments fell through. One after the other cancelled on us.  We ended up with one left which was good because we had a member coming out with us. Then we got there and they ended up not being really interested in continuing so we got dropped.  It was alright though, it wasn't there time yet!

Thursday- Eric was there for his appointment, so that was really great and we were able to teach him more about the Book of Mormon and he was really interested! So we set up a time next week to come back! That afternoon we did an exchange with some elders, I was with Elder Lowe in Wake Forest. We had a good long time to tract and we met some really nice people and we were able to share with them the Christmas initiative "Light the World". It works really great at softening people up to talk to us and be able to share more with them! Then what was really cool was we knocked on this super sweet older guys door.  He wasn't interested in learning more but he was super cool and had investigated before!

Friday- We had our district meeting and interviews with President James. It was so much fun.  My interview went so much longer then it was suppose to! We were just talking about different stuff in the mission and in life and it was pretty great! Then I went on another exchange but this time I was with Elder Hunsaker down in Raleigh.  It was spanish speaking!  What was funny was we ended up having to drive back up to Wake Forest because the other elder accidentally took the phone.   it was pretty great! It was so much fun, I basically just stood there and took the gringo stare from all of the spanish people it was the best! It was funny that we had chicken alfredo for dinner with this spanish family though! But hey that's my favorite meal so I wasn't even going to complain!  Then we tried a few other people and it was in this really weird complex! But it was a fun night!

Saturday- We exchanged back and it was a fun little drive up to Wake Forest again! The day flew by though it was so fast! We had a good time as we planned and waited for the transfer news!  Then we found out that Elder Robinson was leaving it was pretty crazy! 

Sunday- Dan finally came to church which was great and we had a good time.  We went in with the Priests during the Priesthood session of church! They did mission prep stuff and it was pretty funny! So we asked a few questions and then we had them do some role plays trying to teach one another it was super funny!  Then it was great because that night we went to the Duncans for dinner and we also went back to to watch the Christmas Devotional.  We went out and tracted in between and visited a few members so Elder Robinson would be able to say bye! Then the devotional was really good, we had a fun time with the Duncans as we watched it!  We are going to watch it again with Dan and the Henrys tonight!

Over all it was a great week and we had a fun time. I was sad to hear Elder Robinson was leaving but I love this area and am happy to stay! It will be exciting!

Have a great week everyone!!

Love Elder Hutchings

Wake Forest District - the BEST!!!