Arizona

Week 28

     This week has been good.  The weather is hot as usually.  All I still need for my bike is a lock and inter-tube and patch kit and it should be fine for a long time.  Sun City is in our mission.  Not in my zone, but pretty close by.
      We had a pancake breakfast for Pioneer Day in one ward.  We have been getting a lot of referrals recently.  There are more member here, I'm not sure if there are more active members.  The two wards we have are 1/3 of the size of our home ward.
      We got rain like one or two days this week.  I didn't see any flash floods.  All the big rain is close to where we are, but never right where we are.  We made up a guy for fun because I heard of other Elders who have done it and it worked.  So we thought we would give it  a try.  We get dinner every day here with members.  The week of transfers p-day is on Tuesday and transfers are Wednesday.  If you are transferred or not you get to do a quick e-mail home to tell your parent and let them know your new address. Transfers are every 6 weeks and you could stay or not.  But most USA missions have been increasing the average time in one area, to more around 6 months.  But it's not quite there yet.  Yes, my companions have all been great.
      I haven't got in any bike accidents yet.  Just some close ones, but we never hit each other, or anything else.  We live right behind a golf course.  We went golfing today and I got a lot better at the end then when we started.  One of our ward missionaries is moving to Leisure World.  I can't really think of any funny stories or things to share right now.

Bye, Elder Swift

Aizona--Hot!

Week 27

     I doing fine and I am drinking water and;  they tell us to drink water on fast Sundays. We don't really run into to many people who speak Spanish and I have no idea how many Spanish missionaries we have in the mission. We drive to church. I have played golf, maybe later today. And I haven't gotten a new mission shirt the last one was a present and I can't go online to get a new one. 

      I will probably just go with the December release date. It rained the most since I got to this area and it was only an inch or 2. We do shopping and laundry and stuff on p-day and if people really want to we might play sports. Usually people like to play basketball; I haven't play tennis since I have been out.  WE have grass where we live. There are a lot of bike lanes on the medium to small used streets. 

     It is the holy ghost that converts, but it is our job as missionaries to do the finding whether it be by working with members a getting referrals or knocking on down. The Holy Ghost can't testify of truth when the truth is not present and that is our job. With out missionaries the Holy Ghost would not be able to convert people. And with out the Holy Ghost missionaries wouldn't have any reason to teach people. How one missionary acts can make a differences in the number of people that are being taught.  So missionaries can work hard and make a difference. I'm was called to this area so that I would make a difference and would change things, that's how all missionaries are called to their areas. 

     Any way it's still hot down here. I met someone from my last area that moved out of my ward months ago and into the ward I'm in now. We watched the "Work of Salvation, or I thing that's what the missionary broadcast was called, for district meeting last Wednesday. I found a shinny penny from 1956 that was cool. 

     In daily planning one night we decided to do some tracting the next day, so we made up a guy, what he would look like and what he would be wearing. We met that guy the next day when we went tracting. SO we did things like height, cloths, and hair color. We helped someone clean up their back yard a little bit. They had a lot of garbage to put on the curb. The next day was like over load trash day or something.

      There's a persons who brings us bags of snacks on Sunday right before sacrament starts. After district meeting some sister missionaries were giving out tons of food, because they helped a member move, who decided not to take any food with them at all so most of our zone got a lot of food. There was more than one district meeting going on at the same time. SO most of our zone was there. Nothing else exciting really going on so,

Bye,

Elder Swift

Mission President

Here is a picture of Caleb with President and Sister Taylor.

This is the logo for the Arizona Phoenix Mission.

This is the banner for the Arizona Phoenix Mission.

Phoenix Mission

Week 25

     This area I'm in now, I have only gone tracting once for like 30 minutes or less.  I got the package, I think it was left at the door.  The gummy bears were a little melted, so I froze them.  Did you know that's the first time I have had pistachios?  I think they taste a lot like peanuts.  Thanks for the package, I love the water bottle it's pretty "cool".

There is no limit on us being out on temperature that anyone knows about, so I'm out all day long in the heat.  We just bike everywhere. That address I sent is where we live, but its not actual a resort place at all, but a golf course goes through in-between the houses.  We get to play at the golf course for free, so next Monday I think that's what we will do.

There are some rural areas in our zone.  We cover two wards: Garden Lakes, and Villa de Paz.  My new companion is great; he works hard.  We do have a few people we are teaching here, not as many as my last area, but I can change that.  I don't really have anything to say in letters other than questions you ask.  I haven't been in this area very long so I can't tell you a lot about what is happening with the people.  But things are going great.  Hope you have a nice week, bye.

From,

Elder Swift

Phoenix Arizona

Week 24

Right now it is 116 degrees and it's going to just get hotter.  It's not to bad though.  They say no one ever gets used to it, they just deal with it. Our address says that we are in Phoenix -

Elder Caleb Swift

10126 West Sells

Phoenix , AZ 85037

So with this mission, when its transfer time we have p-day on Tuesday and not Monday.  I did get the bike but I still need to pay for it, it was one that they had at the mission storage and it was a Schwinn bike.  I think its called Ranger or something like that.

My companion is Elder Rushton and he is from Vaughn, Montana.  He has been out for 9 months.  I have no clue how many missionaries are in Phoenix.  There were 16 in Flagstaff, so 16 came into the Arizona Phoenix mission.

 Not really any thing else going on.  Packages are OK to be send straight to our address in this mission if you want to.  Just don't send them within a week of transfers to be safe.

It sounds like the reunion was a lot of fun and I think it might be interesting to see Malachi teach a gospel essential class.  Tell Julia I say thank you and I love you too.

I live in a four Elder apartment, I hear they have a lot of them in this mission.  The other two Elders are Elder Empey and Shin and it's weird because they are actually in a whole different district than me and my companion, but we are in the same apartment.  Things are going good.  Feel free to send as many packages as you want. 

From,

Elder Caleb Swift

New Mission

Week 23

New Mission address:

The new mission office address to send things to is:

18001 N 79th AVE Suite C50

Glendale, Arizona  85308-8394

It's was over 100 degrees a couple of days, but the temperature went down a little bit.   So it's 90's now.  I don't have air conditioning in Flagstaff.   I did meet the new mission president and his wife.  He has been there for about 2 years now.  Yes, there are a few thing that are different between the two missions. Transfers are today, don't know where I'm going, but I am changing areas.  Yes I have had some real Mexican food.  The only difference is that it tastes a little better since it is more authentic. Nothing really exiting happened this week.  Don't really have any thing to say. We have a baptism this Saturday that I'm going to miss and I was going to confirm them in church the next day, but now they have to find someone else.

Elder Swift