So the sun is out and that means I sunburn....life is still great though!

Hey everybody!
So as you can tell by my subject, the sun is out and spring is finally here. And I have to say I love Spring, I have never seen a "spring" before. At least not one like here. There are so many flowers everywhere and all the trees have the most amazing looking blossoms on all the trees. I am going to have to take some pictures and send them to you guys of all the awesomeness because I have seriously never experienced it before. Fall and spring don't really exist in Mesa is what I decided. We have summer and winter. That's it. Anyway, so I got a letter mailed out today to the family and some other people, that should hopefully get there in the next few days. This week was probably one of the best weeks I have had since I have been out on a mission yet. We had 13 lessons this week and a baptism. That is the most lessons we have taught in one week ever, still a far cry from the 21 that the mission "standard of excellence" is at, but Heavenly Father blessed us to teach people who wanted to meet more than once a week and to find more investigators to teach. Investigators who are honestly searching to find the truth and so are excited to be baptized and to learn the truth. They are reading and praying every night and love going to church. I don't know what the deal is but Heavenly Father seems to bless us with all "golden" investigators - that or just everyone is golden in the Lord's eyes and so at the right time and in the right way, He will reach out to His children here on the earth by letting them find the missionaries. It also amazes me how we have found no investigators by tracting yet, not one. We have found all the people we are teaching or have taught in the past by member referrals. That is the way missionary work is supposed to work I think.

So Aliya Reece was baptized and confirmed on Saturday. We taught her all the lessons in one and half weeks. Crazy fast! But when someone is willing and ready to learn, they are able to take it all in. Whereas, if they are being stubborn, it takes a lot longer to teach and to get them to keep commitments. She is 12 years old, but about the size of an 8 year old. Reminds me a lot of Jamie Richardson in that way, but is a very sharp young woman. She marks all the scriptures that she enjoys and she shares them with us when we teach her. Basically, she is awesome! Her family is all less active and so they were not willing to do anything about it. So we taught her at the ward mission leader's house, Bro and Sis Brown have become 2nd grandparents to her since she spent most of the past two weeks almost living at their home. Her family came out to the baptism them - all the less actives and the non members. So now the ward is on top of getting them to start coming back to church and to work towards baptism for a few of those people.

Dakota Bradley is learning crazy fast as well. He loves to compare the gospel to things that he knows and so has taught Elder Craigo and I quite a lot since we started teaching him just over a month ago. We finished the message of the Restoration and the Plan of Salvation last week and he soaked it all in like a sponge and shared it all back with us with insight included. Teaching him is a complete joy. Teaching him at the Maynard's house is a ton of fun too. Teaching at members' houses brings the greatest joy and is the most fun because they have such great testimonies to share and experiences that are awesome - lessons are their houses always go at a slower pace though because of all the discussion that goes on. But that is why they are supposed to be disucssions and not just boring lessons, right? Our investigators sure seem to learn a lot more from a discussion atmosphere surrounded by their friends in the gospel. Dakota is on date to get baptized this weekend, but we will see. He is sincerely praying, attending church, and now reading so he should get the answer that he is searching for, I know it. The family is all praying for him as well, so things should work out.

Kristina Davis is an earnest 11 year old who wants to know the truth. She comes from a part member family who has all now gone less active. Her mom is a fundamentalist so treats us pretty coldly, but at least she let us in the house and she is ok with Kristina getting baptized. Kristina is excited to read, pray, and attend church. She doesn't know if she wants to get baptized yet (based on her getting an answer that the church is true) but she believes in it so she can get there. She should be getting baptized about halfway through May if all goes well. The trick is getting them to start coming back out to church, so far yesterday they are still giving us the run around but they should be able to come next week, they promised.

We are also now teaching Vern Peterson Jr. He is an unbaptized 9 year old who really wants to get baptized. His family has just been having depression issues and things and so stopped attending church a few months before he could get baptized. His father committed to start coming back to church though this Sunday and is excited for it. He knows that his family has drifted apart and struggled a lot harder with life since they went less active and he wants to get all the blessings of the gospel back into his life as soon as he can. His wife is going to be harder to work on, but I know that with the help of our Heavenly Father she can regain that desire to be active again as well.

Teaching Careie LeFevre (isn't that an awesome spelling for that name?!?). She is a bit more of challenge. She knows the church is true and loves everything about it. She even made it to church yesterday and loved the experience again and set up an interview with the bishop. She used to be athiest thanks to the abuse she received from the Fundamentalist church her parents belong to. But events in her life and her praying and reading of the Book of Mormon in the past 2 weeks have given her a strong testimony. She is ready to get baptized basically - she just needs to stop drinking coffee and she has to move out of her mother's house. Since it is owned by a Fundamentalist (polygamous) church, she cannot be baptized until she moves into a place that is not owned by them. Also, she will have to be interviewed by an apostle (most likely Elder Holland and if I don't get transferred I might get to meet him!) She is determined to be baptized though and she really wants to receive the gift of the Holy Ghost, a lot! She knows the feeling the Spirit brings and she wants that guidance, peace, and direction with her all the time. She hates that He has to leave when she isn't doing church stuff and wants Him there at all times and through all her righteous activities. So pray hard for her to find a place to move to and to overcome her coffee addiction. Coffee is one of the hardest addictions, that and smoking. But I know people can overcome anything through the help of the Savior and His Atonement and by pleading for help from our Heavenly Father through prayer. Careie knows that as well and is excited to overcome these things and receive all the blessings that her Heavenly Father has for her.

We are also teaching Devlin Flynn right now. He is hot and cold towards the gospel. Loves it and then doesn't see why it matters so much. So pray for him to keep his desire up so he can receive a witness that the gospel is true, because once he does, he will be good to go.

Still working on quite a few potential investigators. The Gonzales family is so close, but the mom is hot and cold to the extreme. Pray for her to be softened and for us to be able to start teaching this week. I know that as people do, miracles will happen and that household will open up. Also, might start teaching the Sheppard children this week. They are ready to go, just waiting for the go ahead from their Catholic grandmother who has had really negative experience with missionaries before. (She thinks we are all such terrible people, we have tried to show her otherwise, but hasn't worked yet.) The bishop of that ward is working hard on that family though and they have made huge strides in the past few weeks. Bishop Rassmussen is his name and he took a picture of Elder Craigo and I last night before transfers came up because he and his wife treat us basically like thier own children. It is very awesome!

Well, time is really limited today. So that is all I got to write about. Hopefully that is enough to let you all know what is going on. I love you all!
Elder Hughes

Easter week

I am so sorry I got out of the habit of posting won't let it happen again
Hey everybody!
So guess what happened?!?!?!? I am now a Utah Salt Lake City South missionary! Well, I guess I have always been one, but now it is official. President Laney pulled me in his office this week and we had an interview and he told me that I had been permanently reassigned here. I don't live in Utah so I am the lucky one out of everyone that gets to stay here. Everyone is now asking me how I feel about that expecting that I am going to be all disappointed but I am not, not one bit. I love being here and serving the people here in the Salt Lake Valley and all my ward mission leaders have been so excited that I have been reassigned here - too excited. I think they have been praying that this will be the case as well as the missionaries of the zone that I am in. But oh well, things have worked out the way they are supposed to and Heavenly Father has some great plan to get it all to work out, still not sure what I learned a little bit of the Mongolian language for but it had to be for some reason. Anyway, so that was my exciting news for the week and the only thing I am really going to have to work on doing now is not gaining weight. Members here can be faaaaaar too generous with food - they pile dinner on us and then keep on piling food throughout the night. Dessert especially. I appreciate it alot, but I have gained a good 8 pounds already being here in this mission. So my goal is not to come home fat. Not a bit, so a lot more working out and eating healthy when I have the chance to (meals we get on our own).

Thanks so much for the tie Lora and Jerah! I appreciate it a lot (not sure what I am going to wear it with yet.....but we will see hahaha). Also, can someone please update my blog? I am getting letters from my friends wanting all the info on what is going on in my mission because the blog hasn't been updated and I don't quite have enough time to write them all back with all the info they want. So if someone can post my emails to the blog, it would be much appreciated! :)

Alright, yes I loved Easter this week and I loved General Conference this week. There was a ton of messages that were just meant for me, especially out of the Priesthood session. It answered a lot of the questions I have been having and praying about, so that was awesome. Also, I think a lot of talks were directed just to our family as well, it certainly felt like that and made me think about it. I noticed the major theme was about families, which doesn't have too much to do with me right now. But it has a lot to do with our investigators and there was a lot of things in there directed towards the people we are teaching and I hope they were able to get the things from it that they needed. We watched both sessions on Sunday at Br. Beyers' house in the Mountain Point 10th ward. He reminds me a ton of Bro. Whipple and has a lot of the same humor. He and his wife are the nicest people ever and took great care of us for Easter Sunday. We had the biggest waffle brunch between sessions that I have ever had in my life. I think they got us to eat more food than I ever have in my life as well. Also, they got us chocolate bunnies :) so the Easter bunny even visits while I am on a mission just like Santa did from the very nice Howell family down in Bluffdale. I am definitely planning on coming back to visit with them when I start going back to BYU, going to their ward and being at their house feels like home away from home. That is how nice they are to us. There are quite a few people in their ward that we are getting closer to teaching as well so we might get to see more of them. Jose was also there on Sunday and at the Priesthood session and it was awesome to get to see him again. He still has the "new convert" glow about him and it hasn't lessened a bit in the past month. He is still trying his hardest to get the family he lives with to accept the gospel. Eric is ready to go and wants to meet with us and loves feeling the Spirit and loves family prayer and wants to go to church, but he is too softspoken. His wife runs the family, and she does NOT want to get entangled in the Mormon church. However, she does want to start having FHE, so day by day she is softening and I know that the Lord will continue to work with her so that the rest of her family who so much wants to join the church will get the chance to. Their 10 year old daughter Francella would pretty much hop in the water, and their 13 year old daughter Claudia has started to attend Young Women's and loved it. So every day, step by step as the ward and Jose fellowship them like crazy, they are getting closer to entering into the Lord's kingdom. Maybe it will be while I am still in this area, maybe not. But I am confident they will, Jose has been praying and fasting for them wayyyy too hard to not have some result.

Well, this week was very, very slow. Not too much is going on. We might teach as many lessons today as we did in the past week just to give you an idea of what all is going on. Sharon is getting baptized tomorrow and is excited for it. We are excited for her too! The semi-active Nielson couple that we have been teaching and working with is making huge progress. They are getting interviewed by the bishop this week to start the process for getting temple recommends. And he is getting the Melchezidek priesthood soon and a patriarchal blessing. They are both excited to start doing baptisms for the dead as soon as possible. So we are very excited for them. They are 23 years old and are excited to get their lives back on the right eternal track. Also, the Brandreth couple in that same ward is making huge progress as well. They have gone from fighting nonstop and him running away on our first lesson to now they are setting temple plans as well and are reading the scriptures and praying as a couple. As well as attending all three hours of church for the first time in years. It is amazing to watch people's faces change as we work with them and as Heavenly Father blesses them for their efforts. Br. Brandreth wouldn't even look us in the face the first time, now he is beaming from eye to eye and is asking us tons of questions to make sure he is doing everything he needs to do. His wife as well. They are an awesome couple and we love to visit them and work with them. The Page's moved on Saturday and Elder Craigo helped a lot there and so missed the Saturday morning session of General Conference. She still wants us to teach her kids though so we will be meeting her at our stake center tomorrow even though she no longer even lives in that stake anymore. So we get to keep seeing them. Other moves: Josh Bennett is moving back to Oregon to run a Jerky Hut. He is all set now to get the Melchizedek priesthood and get his endowment in just a few months. We are going to miss him terribly. But he promised that he would keep in contact with us and I think he will. I guess we are still doing some work - just all with less active people and families which is good, but not the entire purpose we are supposed to cover. Mission leaders aren't very happy with us, but I hope Heavenly Father understands. It feels like He does, helping them brings the same joy that brings working with investigators. So it works, I think. We are still looking for more investigators - we met a kid named Dakota last week who has been attending church for the past few months and wants to get the priesthood, so the bishop had an interview with him and said he would have to get baptized first. So we are hoping and praying to start meeting with him this week. Also, to start meeting with Aleah Gerleah and the Sheppard family. All have been attending church for several months and are ready to go, the trick is just convincing and pinning down their parents to starting to teach them.

Ok, so I didn't get to write very much because not very much happened. But I know this church is true and that I am where I am supposed to be right now. I know that Heavenly Father loves each one of us individually. Even those this week has been slow, He knows that we have been working hard and will help us through our struggles. I love you all and pray for you all!

Elder Hughes