August 26, 2013

Mother,

     So I am now in Lutsk. It is also a really old city like L'viv and there are lots of statues and memorials everywhere. My new companions name is Elder Cazanave and he is from California, despite his italian sounding last name. He is a pretty cool guy. I don't know him too well yet, but we have six weeks and probably longer than that. The day after I got here, there was a senior couple serving in Odessa (Ukraine, not Texas) who were here to do some registration stuff and had a day with nothing to do, so they asked if we could give them a tour in the morning. Well, I obviously just got here and didn't know anything, so I got a tour from my companion too, so now I know the city a little better. We went to the castle which is really cool. It was built in the 14th century I think. We actually do service there sometimes, so I'll see it pretty often. Yesterday I got to meet a lot of the active members here, which was good. There aren't as many as in L'viv, but they are all really cool. My trainer Elder Dorius served here for like seven transfers and they all loved him so they get so excited when I say that he trained me. There are also a lot more children in the branch here than there are in L'viv, which is good for the future of the branch.

     That is probably it for me this week. I haven't heard anything for a while, so how's the driving going? Oh, and before I forget again, could you send me Bishop's email address? I hope everyone is excited to start school. I'm really excited to not start school. Well, still working hard here and I hope that all is going well at home. Love you!

Elder Jolstead

August 19, 2013

Mother,

     Well, making Brady Bunch boxes is one way to get everyone in the family picture. I'm glad everyone enjoyed the rest of your time with Krystal's family while they were there. I'm looking forward to this week. I like it when everyone goes to school and I don't have to. Missionary work is hard, but at least the only "homework" is the area book and all the "reading assignments" are in the scriptures, which I love to read anyway. Still no luck getting people registered to proselyte, which will be interesting this next transfer. I am finally getting transferred! It will be sad to leave L'viv, because I've been here for so long and I love the people so much, but I am ready to leave. The next city I will be serving in is called Lutsk (pronounced Lootsk). I'm excited because that is the other city that I really wanted to serve at while I was in the MTC. It is also an old city, but quite a bit smaller than L'viv. The coolest part is that there is a castle in the middle of the city. I will be sure to get lots of pictures.  My first two companions are going home on Wednesday, which will make Elder Naumann my only surviving companion. The Elder that I will be serving with in Lutsk only has two transfers left too, so I will be keeping my record of only serving with a companion for two transfers. No one can stand me for any longer. Ha ha. At least I won't be in a leadership position. I have a goal to be one of those missionaries that every says "wow, he was such a great Missionary. I don't know why he never served in a leadership position". Ha ha. The only leadership position I want is trainer and with the lack of Elders coming in, that doesn't seem likely. President said that at the end of the year, there will be 29 Elders and 26 Sisters. Crazy. My group was the last big group of Elders. We are calling what comes after us the lost generation. Ha ha. Not really anything else to say. I hope everyone is ready for school. Love you all!

Elder Jolstead

August 12, 2013

Mother,

     It looks like everyone had a lot of fun together and the pictures were awesome. It's wierd to see all the changes in people. Nathan's face has matured alot, Jared looks like he's gained weight, Mark's neck looks like a freakin' tree trunk, and Braeden is almost as tall as Mikey. Have you gotten a picture of the whole family, yet? I'm glad Kayla and her family were able to come up. Oh, and Shantewa didn't write me or send me anything, so let her be very ashamed and sad. I loved the pictures of my little nieces and nephew! Kahlan totally terrorized that cake like a monster. I hope you got it on film so that we can put scary music to it. Makayla is so cute and she looks so girly. I hope that all the uncles and aunts were very tired after trying to keep up with Daniel. I like the sledgehammer to the wall idea. I have been looking for an excuse to buy and use a sledgehammer for years.

     So the investigator famine is continuing, which is pretty disheartening. We are the only companionship that can proselyte and we can't find anyone to teach. I hop this isn't one of those seven transfers of plenty followed by seven transfers of famine kind of things. I didn't even get seven transfers of plenty! So we have about a week and a half of the transfer left and we are going on permanent exchanges with the District Leader companionship until the end of the transfer, so that we have two proselyting companionships instead of one. Sister Lattin actually told us yesterday that it looks like the guy in the government who doesn't like us is about to get kicked out, so hopefully next transfer the district will be up and running. I will be very surprised if I am still in L'viv at that point, though.

     Church yesterday was really awesome, because there were a lot more people than usual there. I recent convert I taught also blessed the Sacrament for the first time which was really cool. He was called as the librarian a few weeks ago and he loves his calling, which is great. That's honestly about it this week. Next week I will know what's happening next transfer, so that's something to look forward to in my next email. I hope that you have lot's more fun while the family is still together and I love you all!

Elder Jolstead

August 5, 2013

Mother,

     I'm glad the week was so eventful. I loved the Harry Potter Day pictures and the ones of Braeden's birthday, especially the one of Nathan in full wrapping paper samurai armor. It looks like everyone wore the traditional wrapping paper hats as well. That's too bad about the cake, but at least Braeden saw it first and the Hulk thing was a stroke of genius. I promised others in emails that I would send pictures of my visit to the Harry Potter restaurant here in L'viv so I hope you enjoy those. I don't know if you should post them, because we were told not to send pictures that would look wierd on a missionary blog. I don't know if they are wierd or not so you can be the judge. It's still wierd for me that Riley is leaving. I didn't even know Justin Anderson had left already, but that's less wierd because he's my age. I'm glad to have a cousin who will soon be serving a mission, because I think I am the only one in the family right now.

     Well, I am trying not to get frustrated at the lack of investigators right now, but it is getting difficult as the days keep passing with no success. I have a feeling that I will leave L'viv this transfer, but I think that it is a good thing. I am the only one who can proselyte right now and when I am gone, english and members will be the only sources of finding. I think that the members will step up and actually start helping us. I think that is Heavenly Father's plan for L'viv. If He wanted His missionaries to have proselyting rights right now, they would have them. This way the members will get more involved and the Branch will be blessed. Not much else to report. I hope everyone has a great week with almost all of the family home and that they aren't too anxious for summer to end. Love you!

Elder Jolstead

July 29, 2013

Mother,

      Well, I hope you fixed the problem with the hacking. I didn't get anything wierd from you, but that could have been awkward to something weird in my missionary email account. That's really awesome that the band got back together to play for at least one more time. Was Merrill there too? That's really awesome that we have grown so much that we need a new building. Which neighbor lady was this again? The crazy one with all the dogs? "Goliath!" Ha, ha. That's cool that you are all getting missionary opportunities. Looking back, we really get a lot more than we think. We just need to look for them more. I also have something for Kelleene to help gain weight. My companion has this recipe for something he called Fatty-Fat-Fat that we made. It's a bunch of sliced up potatoes with a layer of chicken breasts on top and then a whole bunch of cheese and Mayonaise on top of that in a pan. Then you cook it until the mayonaise has melted into the rest of it. That should put the pounds on. I would also say to eat Kontik's which are a really awesome type of cookie, but I think those only exist in Ukraine.

      So, a few exciting things happened this week. We started a new program for teaching english this week which is a lot better and more fun than the old one. I think we will be able to attract a lot of potential investigators. Elder Naumann and I teach th beginning group, which is really fun, because they know practially no English. You say something and they are like "write that down!" I am also learning a lot of basic Ukrainian words from them that I didn't know before.

     On Wednesday we took a trip to the city of Ivano Frankivsk, because my companion had to do some registration stuff, so that was pretty cool. Before this week, the only city that I had seen in the new mission was L'viv. I don't get out of L'viv very often. Funny story. When we were heading back on a train, the train had stopped twice for some reason so we thought that we were going to get to L'viv a little late. Now, just so you know, the trains in Ukraine are very accurate when it comes to arrival time. Within like two minutes of the time they say they will be there. So when the train stopped again twenty minutes before the estimated arrival time, we were like, "what the heck. Why did it stop again?" Well we sat and talked for about ten minutes in our compartment, but the train still hadn't moved, and we were very confused. Then my companion lookds out the window and says, "We're in L'viv!" So we had to hurry super fast to get all of our stuff together to get off before the train started moving again. So we get off and I'm like carrying all of my stuff and my tie is just hanging on my neck untied running out before it started moving. It was really funny. If we hadn't gotten off, we would have ended up in Kiev.

     We also had a really fun branch picnic on Saturday. It was very hot and I got pretty fried, cause I was in shorts and my legs haven't seen the light of day since before I got out here. We played a lot of soccer, talked about the pioneers and ate really really good sausages. Everyone had a lot of fun, I think. The members are all getting really excited about helping us since they found out that most of us can't proselyte right now. Oh, I don't remember if I told you but, the government here didn't like that we made a new mission here and are making it very hard to get missionaries proselyting rights here in L'viv. My companion and I and the APs are the only ones who can wear name tags right now. Even President and Sister Lattin can't. It's very sad. So pray for a miracle there. Well that's about it this week. Love you!

Elder Jolstead

July 22, 2013

Mother,

     Kelleene is looking pretty thin in that photo. What exactly is she allowed to eat? I hope that she got the email I sent. I realized that the only address of hers that I had was her college one and I didn't know if she still had access to that. Maybe you could send me a different one if not. I can't believe that Makayla is one! I didn't even realize it. I need to send a birthday card. I'm glad you are starting to drive again. You and Nathan can practice together! That's awesome that Jackson is home. Kind of wierd being out here for long enough for that to happen. I loved the pictures of Kahlan. My nieces change so fast that I have to look close to see if it is Kahlan or Makayla whenever I get a picture. Kahlan being blond helps a lot.

     First week of the new transfer and we are really trying to turn things around as far as finding new investigators. We had a lot of trouble and very little success last transfer and we are hoping that the investigator drought has ended. We went to see a family that my companions bishop actually knows, which is weird but kind of cool. They were really nice and also very, very Catholic. That's okay, you know what they say about catholics making the best mormons. One thing that Satan has done really well here in Ukraine is to get people comfortable with there religion and settle for just good. Other religions really do teach good things. If people lived there religions as best they could, they really would be good people. But we should never settle for good when we can have best. Only with what we have been given can we return to live with Heavenly Father and our Savior as an Eternal Family. We were meant for more than just having something good. I feel like we should keep visiting this particular family and let the Spirit work there.

     Yesterday was a really awesome day! A less active family that I have been working with from the beginning finally all came to church and it was amazing! It's crazy how much you can care about people when you are serving them 24/7. I also spent the second and third our standing in front the Branch Presidents office keeping people from going in while President Lattin did interviews. You know how back home people knock and wait to be invited into the Bishop's office. Yeah, that doesn't happen here. They just walk right in, so you have to have someone guard the door. Not much else too exciting happened. I hope that all is going well. The best way to start doing missionary work is to set goals. You can also ask Bishop Cox what you can do to help the missionaries. Oh, and you are a great missionary, whether you think so or not. Anyway, love you and hope you have a great week!

Elder Jolstead

July 15, 2013

Mother,

I hope everything is doing well with Kelleene. Is her back bugging her again, too? I think that I will keep this email short and write her after this. I usually only write those who have written me, but she probably isn't able a lot of the time, so I will make an exception. Nathan wrote me a little about the trek, but I didn't get anything from Derek, so he'll have to fill me in next week. I don't know this Morgan Martin person that Derek was flirting with, so I'll have to see a picture before I decide whether I should scold him or give him a high-five from across the planet. The only really exciting thing that happened this week was that we split up the city of L'viv into areas! I think that President is going to do this in every city in the mission so that the work can be more concentrated. I think that the members are getting excited about the new mission and hopefully we will be able to work with them better now. It really is crazy that a new mission was created here. We have only seven cities with small branches. No wards or stakes and we were the only new mission created in Europe. This is a testimony to me that Heavenly Father is telling us that L'viv is ready to grow and that the work is about to get a lot faster here. I am so grateful to be here at this awesome time. I hope everyone is still enjoying their summer. Love you!

Elder Jolstead 

1. My MTC group with President and Sister Lattin

1.) My companion Elder Naumann at the activity

2.) Activity

3.) My trainer Elder Dorius with his 4 trainees

Here some pictures of me! The Klebingats and the Lattins are also in here as well as my MTC group. 

Elder Jolstead

1. Old Babyshka by wierd art in Chervonograd

2. Me with the Klebingats

3. Branch "Meet the Missionaries" Activity (that's Elder Call, not me)

July 8, 2013

Mother,

     Love the picture! Makayla is having a blast and Kahlan is just like "what are you doing with that camera?" I can't believe that she is already walking! Did she crawl at all or just skip straight to the running? It sounds like this week was a lot of fun and that the 4th of July was really busy. 

     This week was pretty busy for us too. We went to that city again, but had to come back early because of some registration stuff so didn't get much done. We also found out the next day that President Lattin wants us to stop going out there for a while because he wants to look at it more closely and see if it is worth trying to open right now. Kind of sad, but it will also let us work more in L'viv, which is good because our area isn't doing very well with investigators right now. 

     So our 4th of July started off very interesting. I woke up and looked over at my companions bed, which was empty. That was pretty wierd, but I figured he had just had to go to the bathroom really bad or something. Then I walk out and he is sitting in our study room with his hand wrapped in gauze. Apparently he had woken up at 5:00 because he was hungry and decided to try and cut an apple in the dark. He slashed his hand accross the thumb and web pretty bad, but stopped the bleeding and decided to sit in the study room for an hour waiting for me to wake up. I don't know why he didn't just wake me up, but there it is. So we went to a slightly ify Ukrainian hospital referred to us by a member and he got his hand sowed up. Then we had to prepare for the branch activity, which went pretty well. We made a Jeopardy game with facts about American culture. The game got a little heated because almost every Ukrainian thinks they know everything and are always right (something that makes proselyting very difficult) but I think that everyone had a good time. We also made rootbeer from some extract that my companion has. There is now rootbeer here. I miss it. 

     On Saturday we had our first mission conference with President and Sister Lattin. They actually came here from Utah, but they lived in Spokane for almost 30 years and he was the president of the North Stake. I haven't talked to them too much yet to see who we know in common, but his wife did say that they know Brother Lee, which is cool. Could I get his email address. by the way? I don't have it yet. So anyway, they are really cool. Very different from the Klebingats, but they are young and european and the Lattins are old and American, so of course they are different. We talked a lot about the vision of where we want to see western Ukraine in the future and how we can get there.

     That's it from me this week. Love you all and enjoy the really hot weather!

Elder Jolstead

P.S. They just sent us an email saying that the last address I gave you wasn't completely correct, so here is the actual one. Sorry!

(First Name, Last Name)

P.O.Box #2182

L’viv 79026

Ukraine

July 1, 2013

Mother,

     Well, today I am officially writing you from the Ukraine, L'viv Mission! I haven't met President Lattin and his wife yet, but they are coming in today, so I will probably meet them tomorrow.

   That's cool that there are sisters in the ward now. I have a feeling that that will be pretty regular all over. We just heard that after next transfer when more new missionaries come in, it will be a group of 11 Sisters and no Elders. Every sister will be training again and some will be training two. Fun times. Kind of sad, because it means I won't be training, but that's okay. Kaylee Nowels is going somewhere in Brazil, right? I remember almost no one's calls that you told me. I got to see the broadcast with the branch yesterday, but it was in Russian, so I didn't understand most of it. I am actually surprised at how much Russian I understand considering I've never studied it, I just hear it pretty often. Hopefully I will see the broadcast in English sometime this week. It was kind of funny how you said "the pamphlet with Jesus holding a lamb", because I was just like that before the mission and now I'm like, yeah, that's the Restoration pamphlet. I give tons of those away on the street and use them on lessons all the time. It's cool how familiar all the missionary materials are now.

     This week was really good. We went to that other city we are working in again and played football with some little kids. We can't proselyte openly or wear tags there, so we just carry around an american football, which they don't make here in Ukraine, and kids are so fascinated by it. We hope that by playing with kids, we can attract the interest of their parents. We don't have any investigators there yet, and that is the key to opening the city. We also had a branch activity this week called, "Meet the Missionaries", where we all showed slide shows of us before the mission. The goal is to get the members to be more comfortable with us so that we can work better together and be friends.

     I have one last funny story that I forgot to tell you from last week. I was on exchanges with Elder Gmeiner and we were walking down the street contacting people when I walked up to this one man who was plastered. I had never seen a drunk man before the mission, but now, after seeing a lot of them every day, I can tell almost immediately if they are hammered. This guy was completely gone and started yelling something in Russian about how I couldn't hurt Ukraine because they have a spirit here and that kind of thing. I tried to go around him, but he grabbed my arm and Elder Gmeiner started freaking out. I just told the guy to calm down and slowly took his hand off my arm. Then I gave him one of our English cards and walked around him. And do you know what that dirtbag did? He ran up behind me and kicked me! There wasn't much power behind it, since it was the kick of a short drunk man, who wasn't flexible enough to get his foot all the way up to my 6 ft 3 butt. I could have turned around, but I decided that I would rather stay on my mission than thrash a drunk who was going to wake up tomorrow with a huge headache anyway, so I turned the other cheek. Elder Kelley has been kicked by a drunk too, so now we can start our own club. It was actually really funny in retrospect.

     Well, that's all for me this week. Enjoy the 4th of July and watch out for drunks! Love you!

Elder Jolstead

June 24, 2013

Mother,

No I didn't get to see the training thing yesterday, but I think the Branch will watch it next week and we will probably watch it in english at the same time, so I'm pretty excited. From what I heard, it sounds like the Church is going to be incorporating technology more into missionary work, which is pretty funny, because the area presidency just ban us from using ipods and tablets that can connect to the internet. Sounds like that will be a short lived rule.

This week went by quicker than usual, probably because I was sick for a lot of it and I am still recovering. On Wednesday we went to that city that I told about before that we are trying to open up and decided to stay the night there and work again the next day before heading back to L'viv. The only problem was that I woke up really sick. By some miracle, we were able to get back to L'viv without anything happening. I probably haven't been taking it as easy as I should be, because I haven't 100% recovered yet. I have lost about 5 of those precious pounds that I have been slowly gaining.Oh, well. They'll come back. On Saturday we had a farewell meeting with the Klebingats which was really awesome but also really sad. President Klebingat is one of the most amazing men I've ever met and his wife is a genius. I have learned so much from them and I'm really sad to see them go, but I know that the Latins will be awesome too and that there is a reason why I was called to Ukraine when this split was happening. Really weird that this is my last week in the Kiev, Ukraine mission. The split seemed so far away and then I blinked. Time is going by way too quickly.

This Sunday was really awesome, because our recent convert passed the sacrament for the first time! He was pretty nervous but he did really awesome. We had a lesson with him and President Klebingat on Friday about the Temple and Family history work which was really awesome. Hopefully he will be able to go to Kiev and do baptisms for the dead soon. He is really the only bright spot in our area right now, because we are finding it incredibly difficult to find and keep new investigators for some reason. Hopefully the work will pick up this next week. That's it for me. Love and hope you all have a great week!

Elder Jolstead

Mother,

Thanks for the pictures and the update on my bank account. I didn't get an email from Krystine this week, so I assume that means that she is really enjoying her vacation. Shoot the weasel/ raccoon. I gave Nathan my brilliant plan for killing it, so he should know what to do. Come to think of it, is Nathan a good shot? I've never seen him shoot anything but an airsoft gun. Will we be getting more chickens then? I read about the talent show really fast and thought that it was just an orchestra concert at first. 35 elemantary/ middle school orchestra acts?! I think that would have defined outer darkness for us.

So this week was very busy, but unfortunately not with investigators. The Patriarch who travels around eastern Europe came to give blessings and we had to help him and all of the other people who came in from other cities to get their blessings. We actually went to dinner with him on Saturday and it was very cool to talk to him about his calling. Not much else exciting happened but we are having a kind of meeting this week for all those who will be in the L'viv mission. Kind of a saying goodbye from President Klebingat thing I think. It should be really cool. Only two more weeks as the complete Kiev Ukraine Mission. Really weird. Well that's about all I have time for. I need to stop being so long winded to the other people I write to. Love you all and enjoy your vacation!

Elder Jolstead

PS. Could you send me the recipes for chocolate boiled cake and strawberry shortcake? I miss cake.

Ma,

. Yay for the Sternods! That's so cool! All the pictures from the graduation were cool. Kahlan is so cute! It's really awesome that Krystine is there for her birthday too. Will she still be there when Krystal comes? Oh, and I think you forgot to send me pictures for that activity I told you about and also I still need to know how much money is on my card.

This week was a little bit frustrating, because we couldn't meet with a single one of our investigators. It seems like they knew that it was new transfer and decided to hit the reset button. We also went to that other city that we have been going to but couldn't meet with any of the members there, so it was kind of a wasted trip. At the end of the week we had a visit from Elder Senkins of the third quorum of the seventy, which was pretty cool. I have no idea what he talked on because he is from Latvia and spoke in russian. My russian is very bad, but I understood a few things he said. I can't think of really anything else that happened this week. It is an adjustment getting used to a new companion again, like it always is, but it hasn't been that hard. I think that's it. Love you and be healthy!

Elder Jolstead

Mother,

 My niece is so cute! Nathan said that she is already trying to walk. I know that I haven't been gone nearly long enough for that to happen. It's when she starts talking that I'll get really scared. I'm glad that the surprise party for Shantewa went well, even though it rained a little. Soggy cake tastes the same as dry cake anyway. It just has a different texture.:) I'm also glad that the funeral was really good. That depressed me for a while last week. 

This week we had transfers and it went by really fast. I worked with three different companions in the same area, but thankfully was able to get a lot of meetings. My new companion is Elder Naumann and he is really cool. A lot different than my first two companions but still really cool. It was really hard to get members to work with us this week because they all went to Kiev to go to the Temple, which is awesome. One of the members who I helped prepare to receive the Melchizedek Priesthood went through the Temple for the first time, so that was really awesome. Fast and Testimony meeting yesterday was really cool and the Spirit was really strong and several members went up to bear their testimony about the blessings of the temple. I also found out this week that when Elder Holland came to dedicate the church building in L'viv, he said that the Temple in L'viv would one day stand in that very spot. That is really awesome. It won't happen my time on a mission, but the day the Temple is announced will be an amazing day. I love this city.

I don't have too much more to write, but I do have two requests. I would like to know how much money is on my debit card now because I will need to withdraw some money from it soon and I was curious. Also, in a couple of weeks we are going to have a "meet the missionaries" activity in the branch and the district leader wanted us to ask for pictures from home of us to doing things for a slideshow. He said pictures of some kind of talents, but I don't know what those would be.:) Anyway, love you all and hope you have a great week!

Elder Jolstead