The members here are great missionaries

This past week was great! Michele and Emma are progressing quickly. Both came to a Baptism on friday and emma came to another one on saturday. All of our lessons with them have been in members homes which makes such a huge difference! This area is going to change how I use members and teach investigators. I've seen that if you start an investigator off with a member being present in a lesson and you have great fellowship for them, they progress super super quick and it works so much better. Honestly in this ward the missionaries help the members do the missionary work instead of members helping missionaries. Thats how its supposed to be, and this ward is starting to do it. Both Emma and Michelle were found through members. So awesome.

Tonight at 8 Michelle and President Woodbury are having an interview at the church. She just needs to talk to him about a few things and get them off of her shoulders. Shes great. Gonna be an awesome Baptism. She's taking everything super serious. 

Not much else has happened this week. Elder Jensen and I are getting along great. He is super funny and is a goof ball. He's pretty quiet during lessons but he is good at contacting people on the streets and is very sincere. 

oh and today I hit my 8 month mark haha This past month has gone by kinda slow for some reason but thats ok! Can't believe I am a third of the way done with my mission! I've been kinda homesick lately, we have a couple of Elders in our district that are going home in 3 weeks and they talk about it a lot and I just get kinda jealous of the things they are going to be doing in 3 weeks. I miss home a lot sometimes. But...then I remember how awesome my mission is and I forget about everything else! I love my mission! Its hard a lot of the time but its super fun and we have awesome stuff happen to us all of the time. 

I love you all so so much! Have a great week!

Elder Eastin

P.s- the pics are of us driving somewhere in the car and the other one is my wood chair that broke when I leaned back on it. It was already kinda broken when I first got here and one day it just randomly broke on me. Scared the crap out of me... 

Thunder over Louisville

Hey everyone!

  So this week was pretty good! We have a new investigator named Emma and she is awesome. She's 14 and she lives behind a couple members. On the first lesson we set a baptismal date with her for May 10th and she is definitely going to make that date. She has gone to all of the Young womens activities and she loved church yesterday. We teach all of the lessons to her in members homes, which makes it really nice and the spirit can be a lot stronger.

  Michelle is doing awesome. She is already in Mosiah 4, ha and its only been like 2 weeks! She is super Golden. We have taught her most of the lessons in the Kastelars home, he is our ward mission leader. They are awesome. Michelle and Sis. Kastelar get along super super good. We taught her the word of wisdom yesterday after church and she said she had already ready that section in D&C and she agrees with it. She is still trying to quit smoking so we gave her a blessing yesterday, so she will be good! Her baptismal date is on April 26th.

  On saturday night we were able to go to Thunder over Louisville. It was super crazy! Its the biggest firework show in the US. There were like 800,000 people at it. It was crazy. The sky is just lit up and it literally is like Thunder. It ended at about 10:15 and we didn't get home until 11;45. Traffic was super nuts. I haven't been out that late since I was home haha but President Woodbury said we could go so we did! 

  Training is going good. Elder Jensen is doing pretty good. He's a goof ball. He's humble and willing to learn and do whatever I teach him haha so no complaints. 

Other than that It's been a good week! My testimony grows every single day!

Elder Eastin 

Exchanges and a great Fireside

Hello everybody!

It is a rainy day today! Woke up this morning at 6 and there were flashes of lightning every 10 seconds! It was nuts. It just wouldnt stop and it was pouring super super hard. The rain storms here are crazy and awesome! It supposed to rain for like the next 4 days haha. I happy about it. Its been so hot and humid this past week.

Today we are planning on driving over to Louisville to go tour church hill downs! Its gonna be sweet! And then we are going to go to the science museum across from the slugger museum. We are also going to be picking up our new phone at the mission office because our phone randomly just died and wont turn back on anymore. So we have been without a cell phone for the past 3 days haha its sucks. Missionary work is super hard without a phone. You can stay in contact with investigators or members. So we have been doing a lot of driving the past 2 days so we could keep in touch with investigators. 

Last night we attended the mission home fireside, in Louisville, that they have on the last sunday of every month. It was awesome. Its just for missionaries to bring an investigator to and they have someone give a talk and then they do a testimony meeting and a lot of investigators got up and bore their testimony. We brought Michele to it. She got up and gave an awesome testimony and invited everyone to her baptism on the 10th of next month. She said that she knows that everything we have taught her is true and she is so glad that she has found this church. So the fireside was awesome and I'm super glad we got to go. Oh and side note, driving through Louisville is nuts. The roads are crazy. And it was night time when we were driving and it was raining. But the city is super cool to see at night.

Emma is doing great also. She is being Baptized the day before Michele, so on the 9th. And they will both be confirmed on the 11th, which is mothers day!! What a great weekend to get 2 Baptisms! Emma is already planning on going to girls camp and she has a ton of friends in the ward already. When you have awesome fellowship for investigators they progress so quickly. Its been great with both of them. Our ward is awesome. 

Earlier this week I was on an exchange with Elder Evans, my district leader, and it was super great. He was my zone leader in Evansville and now hes my district leader. It was a super fun day working with him. Learned a lot and a ton of crazy and awesome things happened. Exchanges are always eventful. We had one of our investigators get mad at us during a lesson because he was saying that he already had the gift of the holy ghost, but we were trying to explain that you recieve it through the laying on of hands. Well he wouldn't buy that so he just kicked us out haha it was a super intense lesson.

Elder Jensen and I are getting along great. He is super funny and is an Obedient missionary. He has no problem taking counsel and we just get along great. I like training a lot! 

So, this week has been great and I'm loving my mission! I have really noticed how much the Lord answers prayers. When I first got here we basically had no one to teach, and we were praying for at least one person that we could consistently meet with and teach. Well we were blessed with two GOLDEN investigators. The blessings that are happening here are amazing and I am so grateful.

I love you all! 

Elder Eastin

Farewell Bonzi

Elder Eastin's family dog passed away on Friday, April,4th and this is the letter his parents sent:

So happy to know that Colleen was baptized before going to the other side.  There she is ready to greet and meet Bonzi.  I'm so sorry to say this via email but have gone over this many times with everyone in the family as to how we should tell you.  

Bonzi was put to sleep on Friday night around 7:30 at the Cedar Ridge Animal Hospital.  We wrapped him in the red blanket he lays on while lounging on the couch and layed him carefully and lovingly in Dad's arms while I drove to the Vet's to have his help.  We felt like he should be quickly and immediately be put to sleep to allow him not to suffer any longer.  The Vet advised us to do the same because of injuries to his back side after a car backed over him in our driveway. 

We are so sorry Devin.  We have cried and lost sleep over this for your sake.  We feel so badly but are grateful for our belief in knowing that we will be able to greet him in the next life.  I find it so incredible that Colleen’s funeral was on the same day of his death. She loved you like her own son.  She has text this to me on many occasions.  “Hey Robyn and family how ya doing we sure miss elder Eastin.”  This is her text to me on Feb 21st, 2013  I know she will find comfort in knowing she is holding and playing with your dog and will take care of him until we meet again.

All the family were called.  Tears were shed of course by Tyson and as I spoke on the phone.  Others felt badly but know you are in a good place.  We are sending a few pics and letters from them to share their feelings and empathetic thoughts.

The Groom family heard of the accident and made cookies and brought over a poem I have taken a picture of and will send it to you along with a photo of Bonzi and the cookies they made.  That was so kind of them.  

Since you have been gone, Bonzi has aged, slowed down and it seems lost some of his hearing.  We have noticed also that his health was going down hill somewhat.  It was getting time for him but didn’t know it would be so fast.  We miss him in our home and it seems strange to not have him around following our every move.

What more can we do for you at this time?Maybe the mission President will let you call home but then Mother’s Day is just around the corner and that is a bright thought.  I’m so glad we have that to look forward too.

We plan on having a small family burial tomorrow night in our back yard where we will bury him next to Sully and place a marker to mark the spot.  Balloons will be let go as we think about the lessons Bonzi has taught each of us in the 11 years we have enjoyed him as part of our family.  

I’m putting $25 in you account right now to take your companion to  celebrate his life.

Much Love,

Mom and Dad

A difficult week

New companion is Elder Jensen. He's from Morgan utah. Its been interesting training a new missionary. He's humble so thats good. He's doing better and better each day. This transfer will be a good one. Michelle is doing good. She enjoyed conference and has lots of questions. We are having FHE with her at a members house tonight, so that will be good. She accepted Baptism, she just thought the 26th of this month was too soon, so we are working with her to pick a date. Had a huge rain storm come through a few days ago and it flooded. And its raining again today really hard.

I'm gonna go play basketball for a little while and get my mind off things for a little bit. Ill be back on later to email. Love ya all.

I'm not quite sure what words to use in this email to express my emotions. its ok and I understand it was an accident. 

Man this week has been tough. Losing Colleen and Bonzi. It's been really tough on me. I miss Bonzi so much. I've missed him since the day I left and I dreaded the day of hearing of his passing. Many prayers have been said, pleading that he would be there when I get home. But somehow I knew inside that he wasn't going to be. I guess it just wasn't the will of Heavenly Father. I just don't understand why it had to happen while I am on my mission. This is so hard to type this. Each sentence I have to hold back tears. I had to just get up and go into the bathroom to pray and cry because I couldn't hold it in any longer. Knowing of the Plan of Salvation is a blessing and it helps to cope with the pain. But the pain is still there. I know we will see him again but, I just was hoping to see him when I got home. This is going to be a tough day to finish out. Ironically we will be teaching the Plan of Salvation tonight to Michelle. She came to conference on saturday and she is interested in temples and Families being sealed together. I have a new perspective on the Plan of Salvation and the atonement and a greater testimony of them. I pray that the atonement has been comforting you all. I sure miss Bonzi a lot right now. He was one of my best friends and buddies. I remember when Eden broke up with me and I was losing it and really sad, I layed next to him and just talked to him about it and I remember how much that helped. I hope you told him how much I loved him and miss him. Thank you for the pictures and the letter. I love you all.

Elder eastin

A trainer

Hey everybody!

Well I found out on saturday that I am going to be training a brand new missionary!! I'm gonna be a dad haha. Im a little nervous but more excited about it. Elder Prows and I will be going to Louisville tomorrow to go to the transfer meeting and there I will meet my son! It gonna be awesome!

This week was pretty great. Did a lot of walking because we were low on miles for our car haha. We are given only 1050 miles to use per month. That only gives us 34 miles per day, which is not very much. Our area is big, almost half the ward. And out here wards boundaries are huge.

We have a new investigator name Michelle, she is great. Shes a refferal from some other Elders in  another ward. A member in that ward gave her a Book of Mormon and shes been reading it. She lives out in backhills of our area, but her house is pretty nice. We helped her move some stuff out of her house but we couldnt set up a time to come back and visit. She didn't want to at that time. But a few days later we were walking down the street in New Albany and she was driving and she saw us and pulled over and she asked if we could have a prayer with her, so we did. And she said we could come over on saturday and see her. So we saw her, taught her the restoration and she came to church yesterday! It was great! She texted us after and said the message was good at church but she wasn't used to how quiet it was. Guess we will just have to work on that with her! So Please pray that she will continue to progress!

We also were able to find 5 other new investigators this week. One is a Pastor at a Pentacostal church I think. He's crazy haha but funny. He started talking in "tounges" in our lesson, haha it was just a bunch of mumbling. Also found a nice old lady and her daughter that lives with her. They are really nice and super funny. When we went back for our follow up appointment she said that she agreed to have us back because we were groomed so nice and we just looked really healthy and she wanted to know why, it was great. Looking forward to bringing the new missionary to visit them.

The T's, the huge family we had at church last week, didn't come this week... Richard, the father, is a bumb and is going to the bar and is abusive to his wife. It terrible. We are trying to help Crystal figure out where to go with the kids. So please pray for them.

Well thats about it for this week! Im looking forward to meeting my missionary son! I miss you all so much and I love ya too!

Elder Eastin