Happy New Year!

Elder DeMarco and Pres. Gelwix

Ugly tie Christmas

Charlie Brown Tree

 

(sorry....a few of the posts are out of order)

Hi Family

Well I forgot to print out the cards so I hope you will forgive me. I can still print them out next Monday if it's not too late?

This week has been really good. Yesterday we had a tri-zone activity and played the most craziest game of dodge-ball! And then for new years eve we went to a members home and had a really fun FHE (family home evening).

Not much happened this week because a lot of people were gone during Christmas vacation. By the way before I forget to tell you, because of all the missionaries that are coming, the transfer days have been changed and my transfer day for coming home will be December 18th, 2013. Looks like I'll be home for Christmas.

Wow, I can't believe a whole year has passed! I remember when my teachers in High school told me how life is going to by even faster. I didn't believe till now haha.

This year I'm going to work harder and squeeze every drop of joy out of my mission. I've learned some much and there is still more to learn. I'm excited for this year and I know it's going to be GREAT!

Elder DeMarco

Post for December 12th

Dear family and dad,

Transfer calls came in and I will be staying in the Clovis 7th ward another 6 weeks but my trainee Elder Lantz is leaving to the Fresno North Stake to be in a YSA ward (Young Single Adults).  All I know is my new companion is Elder "H" and that he has been out for a couple of months and that I will get him tomorrow.  I know my trainee is going to like his new ward and is going to do some great work over there, plus he gets a car (he is so lucky).  So I realized that I have been on a bike for a whole year! Can you believe that! haha.
 
Anyways, we talked to "E" about her baptism and she said she wants to be baptized on Dec 29th!  We are really excited about that.  She has changed a lot and is truly going to be a great member in the church. We are still searching for other investigators as always and hope to get some from Sister "H". She's been working with a couple for a few weeks. We are going to set up a time when we can meet with them.
 
-We had our Ward Christmas party last Saturday and a lot of nonmembers were there. Me and Elder "L" were talking to EVERYONE! haha. We sat down for 5 minutes to eat then we started talking again. I never knew how much I could talk. We are hoping to get some investigators from it and to ask the members what their friends thought of the party.
 
As for Christmas....i can call anytime. So just tell me when a good time would be to call you.
-could I get those 180 ear muffs? It's starting to get cold at night.
 
Were you able to get Mike Ahern's address so I can write to him.

I hope all is well.

Love,
Elder DeMarco

Post for December 5th.

(Sorry it has taken me so long to update Jacob's blog.)

This week has been normal.  Here in the Fresno East Stake they held their 30th annual Christmas Concert. It was really great and we got a new investigator from it. Before the concert began we were going around saying "hi" to members when one of them told me that there is a young man interested in learning about the church.  We went up to him and started talking with him.  He's 15 yrs old. We taught him the restoration in 7 mins. haha  That is the fastest I've ever taught a lesson. We got his number and we are going to try and see him later on this week.

As for our other investigators...."E"  is going to be baptized into a different ward because she lives outside of my ward boundaries. I'm okay with it because we are all on the same team and whether she is baptized here or somewhere else  doesn't matter as long as she is able to make a covenant with our Heavenly Father.

We had an FHE with a family in the other ward we are working in.  The mom is from Boston and she had the accent and everything.  It was great to hear her talk. haha  She said she misses  Dunkin donuts and I told her I did too.  We were able to commit them to invite their friends to church so we will see what happens.

The last thing is transfer are coming up on Dec 12th. We get the call this Saturday night to see if I'm leaving or staying.  I never get the feeling of whether I'm leaving or not, so it's up in the air.

That is pretty much it for this week and yes I did get the candy from Judy's package she sent.  Tell her I said thank you.

I  didn't get my camera fixed because we didn't have enough time to stop by "best buy".  We will try next Monday.  Also can you find out what  Mike Ahern's address is? I think he is Utah right now but  I'm not sure.

I got to go. See you all later.

Love,
Elder DeMarco

Happy Thanksgiving!

Pic 2

Pic 1



Pic 3
 

The following happened this week:
- On Thanksgiving me and other missionaries played football from 9am - 11am
- We had dinner at 12pm at the Shiner's house ( I ate a lot of food)
- Then we went to another dinner at 3pm with the Wright family ( I ate a lot of food again) -Then we went to the Averall's house for some dessert around 7pm and played some board games.
As you can tell I did a lot of eating on Thanksgiving day. I'm glad to hear that everyone else had a good Thanksgiving also.
-Yesterday we taught our investigators "K" and "E". "K" said she wants to learn more about the church. I have realized that sometimes people ask deep questions about the church but we just need to let them know that the basic principles are the most important right now. I think we will probably have a baptism soon.
So...that was pretty much my week. But before I go I wanted to ask some questions for you and grandma..... -Who were the missionaries who taught and baptized both of you? - This question is for the both of you, why did you both join the church? and what was it that the missionaries taught that peeked your interest?
Well I have to go but I hope all is well in New York. Have fun helping out those in New Jersey. Love,
Elder DeMarco

picture 1: I am sooooo full.
picture 2: It's a spider and bees next to my plate. one of the members we had thanksgiving dinner with is a bee farmer so he showed me some of his bees and gave me a gallon of honey. picture 3: I took this picture because this pie was really good and I wanted to show elder Blanchard and Elder Gagne the nasty food I have to deal with here in California haha. P.S.

Can I get Elder Gagne and Elder Blanchard's mailing address. It keeps changing and I'm never sure which one to write to haha.

Fantastic week!

Hello everyone!!! The last week has been fantastic! We found 2 more new investigators and we are now covering another area. The assistants called me last Friday and asked if me and Elder "L" could take over another area, I said sure. ( right now we have "Clovis 7th ward" and will be taking over "Clovis 3rd ward", today). I'm nervous because there is more work to be done and I've never done this before haha. Both wards start at 9am on Sunday so I'm trying to figure out the best way to go. I think we will probably change wards every other Sunday or go on splits. I'm also excited because we are going to be as busy as a bee, balancing both wards and getting to know the new members. I know that this transfer I'm going to have to stretch as a missionary spiritually (with more teaching to do) and physically ( with more biking to do). I'm excited to see what this new ward is like.

Today we just finished having Zone Meeting and decided that a goal for baptisms by the end of November will be 30. We have 12 baptismal dates so far and will be working to get more as a Zone throughout the week. I had a spiritual experience happen to me last night. An inactive woman recently came to church, she has a little kid and wants to get her life back on track. We had set up an appointment to go see her yesterday and so we did. Some members went with us and we re-taught her the 1st lesson. During the lesson I quoted Joseph Smiths 1st vision and you could see her feeling the spirit because she became a little emotional. I reminded her that she was feeling the spirit and the spirit speaks to us through our thoughts and feelings. She said she hasn't felt good in a long time and she wants to come back to church. We are going to see her later on in the week and continue to help her get back to church. It was neat for me to again recognize the power of teaching people the restoration, even if they heard the lesson before.

Well that was pretty much my week and I hope to hear from you soon.

Love,

Elder DeMarco

Fun Activities!

So last week was normal...the weather is getting cooler except is going to rain more so I need to get my rain coat out. Which reminds me that I need an umbrella because I lost my old one somehow. I really liked the one you bought me so if you could get that one, I would be super grateful. My cold is slowly going away, I had a cough and stuffy nose. The missionaries here all must get a flu shot so I'm getting mine tomorrow at CVS or somewhere else.
  -Yesterday we had a quad zone activity. It was way FUN! took some pictures....there was a lot of different sports going on and a lot of good food like hamburgers, hot dogs, chips, and everything else. There was also a pumpkin carving contest. I lost the contest but there is always next year. By the way....if you are looking to send anything...I would love some TIES! But the ties cannot be pink or paisly. Tell Joshua to stop being a bum and email me. Fun fact of the day...when I was talking with President Gelwix he said that there is around 58,000 missionaries all over the world right now and by the end of next summer there will be around 80,000! How great is that? He also said that salt lake called him and asked if he could handle more missionaries and he said yes. So...in this mission there is 224 so we will probably get around 300 next year.
  -Elder "L" and I are teaching 2 people right now and our goal is to find 1 new investigator a week so that means more tracting and street contacting. That was my week! I hope everyone is staying alive in New York. Love you all! Make sure you invite your friends to the Ward Halloween party.
Love, Elder DeMarco

October 16, 2012

Stuff that happened this week:

-Leadership was so great! I learned a ton of stuff about what I can do to become a more effective missionary/trainer. we had a special guest Greg McKeown ( he is Mormon) come talk with us. He is a business guy who travels around the world helping big businesses with their problems. He's written a couple books and stuff. President Gelwix is friends with him so that's how he came here.  We were with him for about 7 hours and all talked about the mission and how to reach our goal for baptisms.

He told us how to improve ourselves .....he said "less, but better" meaning we need to eliminate the non-essentials and focus the important principles. We need to get rid of the things which distract us and become better listeners so we can baptize! I learned more stuff but it would take forever to talk about it haha.

- We found 2 new investigators this week.  One who is around 22 years old and the other  is around 65 years old.

-Yesterday we brought "J"  to go to the temple, she wanted to go see it because she learned about it during stake conference . She is good friends with a family in my ward so the family took us all to the Fresno temple.  We were able to go inside the waiting room so she was able to see that.  We also were able to talk to one of the members of the temple presidency (President Ashcraft, I knew him pretty well because he was in my last area aka Peachwood). He talked to her about why the temple is a sacred place and how only certain people can come in. At first it was hard for her to understand it but after many questions she understood why. Overall she had a good experience and next Monday we will continue to teach her.

That was pretty much my week in a nutshell. Tell grandma that I got the package and thank you for it. I really do like it and so does my companion elder "L".  

See you later.
Love,
Elder DeMarco