Apologies in advance for a lame letter....

Lots of technical difficulties today.

Let me just start by saying I miss the people in Columbus so much. I think about em daily, I am blessed to have them as friends!

Anyways, South Bend is way different! We teach a lot more and find a lot more investigators, but good luck baptizing them!!! Haha.

I legit only have 2 minutes left, SORRY!!!

We did find a 70 year old guy this week who investigated the church for a while 50 years ago! Real cool!

We are in a good stage of the work, I have lots of hope! I promise next week I will have more to share. So much happens and it's all in my journal so one day in the future you can all come read it with me one day! Welp.... just got more time but we are about to leave anyways.

I hate shoveling snow. 

Really awkward things happen as a missionary. This black lady told me to give her neighbors Jesus, haha! This lady growled at us through her window so we awkwardly just leave..... Timing happens that we always knock a door as the people pull up..... But other than all that, I AM DOING WELL. My spanish is doing wonderful and I am grateful for everything! Talk to y'all in a week, hope to hear from you :)

Elder Groseclose

 

I forgot to add:

We had that dream experience this week,

A guy that we teach tells us

"Last night I prayed for guidance from God for what to do in my life and now you two are here and that may be my answer." Say WHAT?! lol

Oh we also had that "We are gonna knock that door over that and that'll be the last one and we'll leave" on an unsuccessful street and then the guy answers and we teach him and set a return appointment. All those missionary cliches coming true!

New companion Elder Birch

Sister Hansen who was in my Columbus district and is now in my Elkhart zone up here

My house 

Catalina and David 

Arturo and I on our last night together

Herman y yesenia and their kids, a less active family that I reactivated

Got all my converts together for dinner my last night in Columbus 

Me and Norma 

Me and Karina 

Arturo and me

All my converts plus the pellegrino family

A picture karinas daughter drew for us 

OKAY OKAY. So we don't have much times on the computer here so this message will be a hot mess and I am sorry about that. SO…

This week has been absolutely insane. So crazy. So on last tuesday, it was my last day in Columbus so I had dinner at Arturo's house with him and the family and also Karina and Norma (all 3 of my baptisms together for my last night!) It was so special and awesome and I am so blessed to know them and have had the opportunity to be their missionaries! On Wednesday we had transfers and what I said happened, I got transferred to South Bend! I am now up here by Notre Dame. It's way way bigger than Columbus and way less white people, feel like I am back in California!!! My companion is Elder Birch and he is from Utah. He is WHITE and has been out for almost 17 months, or something around there. We have had zone meetings and weekly planning and all this crazy stuff so we still have yet to have a day to fully work together in our area! I'll get more into that soon…..

So on…. I think….. Thursday, we went by someones house and we walked in and were gonna teach him. I of course was clueless about the whole situation and all being new in the area so when this lady walks by the room we are in, I holler at her to come join us for the lesson so she does. She turns out to be flipping HILARIOUS and when we walk out Elder Birch tells me that it was a miracle because that lady usually NEVER wants anything to do with the missionaries. Yay me! Haha.

We also knocked into a family and we were just talking and I felt like just asking if we can come in out of nowhere and they said yes and we taught them. Haha!!!

Other than all that, IT'S DANG COLD. We live like 30 minutes from the church and when we got there on Sunday, the English wards had all cancelled it for the week and only Spanish Branch met. WELL, it got so cold and snowy and crazy (over a foot) that we ended church after Sacrament Meeting! We ended up not being able to make it home so we had to go 30 minutes the OTHER direction and stayed with the other Elders and we were stuck there ALL SUNDAY MONDAY AND TUESDAY! Elder Birch and I only had the clothes on our backs! It was crazy. True survival man business. No food, clothes, ANYTHING! We weren't allowed to leave the house! And then it was a 1500 fine if you drove a car in the weather! Indiana got SHUT DOWN! Bizarre. So new to me. And our car battery froze and broke and we had to get a new one. JUST A LITTLE SIDE NOTE, haha.

So, crazy week. We didn't really do anything….. BUT IT'S COLD….

-Elder Groseclose :)

hi hi happy day number 209. what a LONG week. vajbkohbiiouhcad. seriously never thought it would end. I am so exhausted.

Welp, to start off, I AM GETTING TRANSFERRED. After 4 transfers here in Columbus I am hanging up my hat and heading somewhere north! Probably and most likely to the South Bend area by Notre Dame. How cold.

So, because I can't even BEGIN to think of everything that happened these past two weeks (because I was too lazy to write last week... haha), I am gonna do a really bad list of what happened with asteriks, mhmk?

*Had an outdoor pizza and wing night with Karina outside in the cold rain because we didn't have another male....

*Karina's baptism! It all went just swimming and she was balling and everyone was balling and it was all great. I was so full of joy. Karina was an amazing investigator and she is just so special in my heart. Except for that when she got in the font, the water was freezing cold and she wanted out ASAP, lol. Yay for absolutely murdering the Spirit with cold water. yay us!

*The 18 Spanish Elders all sang Feliz Navidad at the Mission Conference and everyone wished they were us. Totally awesome.

*Facetime'd the loved ones. So nice. :)

*Got a sweater from Karina and a tie from Arturo y Ana. :)

* Spent lots of time with Karina and Arturo y Ana for Christmas and Noche Buena. 

 ^ Yes I only talk about them I know, but like, they are the greatest. 

*I like totally hate bicycling. 

OTHER THAN THAT, life is good. It's really tiring but the fruits of the labor makes it all worth it!

DIOS LES BENDIGA

BYE.

The district

Missionary Christmas at 6am 

Just pics this week 

5 months!

day 195 & 5 month field mark. whoot.

I just saw HOW LAME my weekly letter was last week. LOL. I feel bad how pathetic it was.... But some weeks just literally nothing happens. This week was a lot of the same as always. Life just isn't too exciting haha, but it's life!

*Monday was preparation day, shocker. We didn't really do much because everyone is reallllly slow so we like played sports for an hour and ya. 

*Had dinner with Arturo y Ana on Monday night for Luis 12th birthday! :) I think we ate Tamales.... NO WAIT, we ate Tostadas! They were delicious as always.

*Tuesday was exchanges and district meeting. Stayed in Spanish w/ Elder Bingham and we walked for like 6 hours. BOOOOOO. Then had Guatemalan Hen Soup for dinner. Pretty crazy huh?

*Another exchange because Elder Barrio had a district leader meeting in Fishers. I was with Elder Christensen and he received his Visa for New Zealand during our exchange! He left this morning for there!

*Karina did great in her baptism interview and is all set for this Saturday :) We went with her and her husband to IHOP for lunch :P 

*We have started to teach Arturo's sister, Dulce and she is so awesome. I have known her since I got her in July but we just now have started teaching. FOUND OUT WE GET TO SKYPE ON CHRISTMAS THIS DAY * * * !

*Went to watch a little kid in our Branch play basketball at the First Christian Church Gym haha.

*Had the 4 hour branch christmas party. Hahahah. It was just a bunch of dancing and eating and fun. Our branch is wild, I love it!

Other than all that ^, nothing else has really happened. Sorry I am not exciting!

ELDER GROSECLOSE

Okayyyyy so this week was pretty cold homies. 8 inches of snow on.... Friday. Ya. It didn't stop for 10 hours. Ummm, not much else. That was my week. Well not really, but practically. Let's see what happened:

*Happy 17th Birthday to my little brother Scotty!

*I've been sick all week!

*Zone Preparation Day in Franklin. Played sports in a really small gym. Chill.

*Had Tamales at Arturo y Ana w/ Pellegrinos.

*Visited Cris y Norma and played in the snow with their son Iker :)

*Went over Baptism Questions w/ Karina.

*Did lots of attempts to find.

Sorry this is so boring! The work has slow down so much, but it's helping me grow which is nice. Christmas spirit!!!

Creed (a friend from BYU) at the turkey bowl

Turkey bowl 

Another week. Man it's day 171. Thursday is 6 months. Wow, like... wow. Words can't describe how fast it's gone. It feels slow but in reflection, wow.

Thanksgiving was nice. At around 1 we had to travel up to Indy with President Nehring and visit one of our members who is SUPER sick in the hospital. Lupus & Bacterial Meningitis with a depleted immune system due to Rheumatoid Arthritis, it was so weird for me. His wife there and his 3 daughters, all young. So weird. Reminded me so much of my dad.

I honestly only have like 5 minutes this week to write this, so sorry. LOL ok it just gave me another half hour as I typed that..... IT KNOWS.

As my mission goes on I get less motivated to write a big letter each letter, it's just all in my mind and journal. The true experiences of my time here are things that are felt and seen that can't be described. 

So just some highlights (if you want any specifics on things, please go ahead and email or write me a letter :P Missionaries LOVE letters!!!)

*Thursday we went to the Turkey Bowl and it was so fun, especially my interception! :D And get this, I saw a friend from BYU (Creed Orme) at the Turkey Bowl! He has family in Columbus that he was visiting! It was so bizarre. I felt like I was out of missionary body! I have pictures but I forgot my camera today SORRY MOM AND LAUREN!!! 

*Arturo took us to lunch at Buffalo Wild Wings :D

*Had Thanksgiving at our house with the Nehrings. :)

*Visited Cris and Norma in Greenwood which is about an hour away and always fun! :)

*It's officially the most wonderful time of the year! I love seeing all the Christmas coming out!!!

*Karina is still going awesome. She is so much fun and I just love teaching her and I love how much you can see the Gospel blessing her.

*Break The Fast was yesterday and we went up with Arturo y Ana and the family and it was good. Love our members here. 

Sorry it's not too exciting, we only have 1 investigator. We are really really struggling to find, but we are hopeful. The highlights I gave truly are everything from this week. Lots of pictures next week I promise! 

Thank you all for everything. :)

No puedo decir todas las cosas que yo quiero decir! Mi corazon esta lleno de amor por todo del apoyo que he recibido! Disfrute este tiempo con su familia y por favor enfocan su tiempo en las cosas que son importantes. Les extrano muchisimo! Yo quiero que sean felices. 

Elder Groseclose