DUSTON WEEK #16

Hi Everyone!

First off, CONGRATULATIONS to Sarah and Sebastian on their wedding this past week!  I wish I could have been there but I am very happy to hear that your day was so good.  It sounds like it was a really great time and the pictures look really good as well.  Everybody seems really happy in them and they all look great.

It was really good to talk to all of you on Christmas!  I have been missing everybody a lot lately and it was nice to see everyone. 

All of the changes in church meetings will be exciting!  I'm sure there will be some growing pains over the next few month, but I'm sure everybody will figure it out before too long.  At least I hope so!

As always, I'm sad I missed out on all of the fun.  I'm happy for you Sarah and Sebastian.

Have a wonderful week everybody!  And HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!!

-Elder Lott

MERRY CHRISTMAS!!! 2018

OUR CHRISTMAS JOY!!!

December 25, 2018

DUSTON WEEK #15

Hi Everyone!

I hope you all have a very Merry Christmas tomorrow!

I'll be calling home tomorrow at 4:30 pm here.  I think it's 9:30 in Utah.  I won't write a longer email today become we have loads to do and not much time.  I'll talk to you tomorrow!!!

Love you!


Photos from our phone call with Zach on Christmas Day 2018

DUSTIN WEEK #14

Hello All!

We've had a good week!  Not much has happened, but we've taught Nancy and Christina, so that's been nice!  We also had a Zone Preparation Day today which was a lot of fun!  We have so many good missionaries in the Zone and it's a lot of fun to be with them.

On a sadder note, I didn't pass my practical driving test.  Hurrah for second chances though! I was close but made one mistake one too many times so no luck.  I didn't check my blind spots enough for the English.  I'll get some more training and keep my head on a swivel more fully next time!

We have Zone Conference this week so that'll be good!

A cool scripture I read this week is D&C 124:49 and it says,

   Verily, verily, I say unto you, that when I give a commandment to any of the sons of men to do a work unto my name, and those sons of men go with all their might and with all they have to perform that work, and cease not their diligence, and their enemies come upon them and hinder them from performing that work, behold, it behooveth me to require that work no more at the hands of those sons of men, but to accept of their offerings.

I really like that scripture because it's a principle we hear a lot about in the church from a person's point of view so I thought i was cool to hear God's point of view on it.

Love you all!

-Elder Lott

December District Leadership Conference

Another one

DUSTON WEEK #13

The biggest things that happened this week were Christina and Nancy. We taught Christina yesterday after church and we had a really good lesson with her.  She has a lot of the apostasy Christian beliefs very firmly rooted in her mind, but she is also willing to listen to us.  When we taught her about the Book of Mormon she looked at us like we were silly for asking her if it was important that she knew if it was true or not, so that was good!  she's busy with Uni for the next few days though, so we'll try to teach her over Facebook or something like that!  We are meeting with Nancy this Thursday, which is good.  We had quite a lull in our meetings with her so it'll be really good to get back to that and help her progress again!

My new companion Elder Waterbohr is really good!  He's a super solid missionary and a really good guy.  He speaks very good English as he learned it in school (most of the people in Germany do) and has spoken it for many years.  He has been a great companion so far.  I'm just adjusting back to not having a North American companion with all the little cultural differences!  All is well though.

I take the driving part of my license test tomorrow!  I initially had to book it for the 17th of January but some closer days opened up.  Please pray for me! Fewer than half the people pass their first driving test over here.  While I'm confident in my driving abilities, I am a little nervous and I really don't want to take it again. haha.  I'm not super nervous, but some prayers never hurt!

No details yet on the Christmas call.

Also, we had MLC on Friday, but that's about it!

I hope everyone has a great week.

-Elder Lott
#lighttheworld

The best Christmas lights I've seen this year

MLC Meeting December 2018

A creepy ukulele in the Kettering flat

DUSTON WEEK #12

Hello All!

A good week and transfer this has been!  I'll be staying in Duston for the next 7 weeks and I'll be getting a new companion, Elder Waterbohr from Germany!  He has only been out for 2 transfers so I'm follow up training him, which will be exciting.  I am sad to see Elder Tollestrup go, but I'm really excited for the new transfer.  I'm also a little sad because Elder Tollestrup is going to Cardiff, which is the area I wanted to go to next.  But if he's there then the chances of me going there next greatly drop.  We shall see though!

This week we had Elder McLennan, one of our Office Elders, in the Zone visiting all of the District Councils to give a presentation so we spent a couple of day with him and drove him around everywhere he needed to go.  It was so much fun haha.  I love that guy so much.  He's from Scotland and he is absolutely hilarious.

We also found a couple of pretty promising people this week, which is nice!  One, named Christina, was like really happy when we said we were missionaries and I didn't know how to react.  That has never happened to me before lol.  She's really cool though!  Kinda pretty sure we will baptize her!

Elder Tollestrup and I were in Birmingham for a day this week for a doctor appointment.  Elder Tollestrup has a subfluxating shoulder which means it partially dislocates when he moves it.  It's pretty exciting to watch.

We're still working with Nancy.  Please keep her in your prayers.  Hopefullly we can get a ccouple of things moving along so she will be able to be baptized soon.  We shall see!

Well, I think that's pretty much it!  I can't believe I've been in this area for 2 transfers!  It feels like I"ve been here for a month or so.  I'm excited for more time here!

A scripture I liked this week is 3 Nephi 9:13.

13. O all ye that are spared because ye were more righteous than they, will ye not now return unto me, and repent of your sins, and be converted, that I may heal you?

I really like that because it explains the attitude Christ has when we make a mistake!  He wants us to return so He can heal us,  He never will push us away.  The only thing between us and Christ is ourselves.

Have a wonderful week!  Love you all!

-Elder Lott

Northampton Missionaries!

Northampton District Council with Elders Davey and Vuki

Ramsey District Council

Milton Keynes District Council

Elder McLennan snoozing

I tried to draw Elder Tollestrup

Elder Tollestrup drew me

DUSTON WEEK #11

Sorry I don't have time for a long weekly.  I'll send some pictures instead.

Also, an update on Nancy.  She's off a date right now, but we are still working with her.  There are just a couple of things we need to sort with her that take time.  She has a testimony and wants to be baptized and believes the Book of Mormon but she just needs to do some things first.  We're shooting for early to mid January for her baptism.

I passed the written part of my license test so I just need to take and pass the driving part of it.

Thanks for the photos from Thanksgiving with the family there.  It looks like lots of food and fun.

We had two delicious Thanksgiving dinners here.  The members in this area are wonderful and take good care of us.  It was fun to spend some time with them all.  They had a lot of questions about Black Friday.  They do it here too, but it isn't that crazy so they asked how it was in the States.  I've only been once but I did my best to explain it!

Happy Birthday to Dad!  It looks like you had a great celebration while everyone was in town for Thanksgiving weekend.  I love you and I'm so grateful for you!!

Have a wonderful week everyone!

-Elder Lott

My first blood pudding (pig blood, pig fat, herbs and oats)  

It was weird.

Exchange with Elder Long in Ramsey

Missionary Thanksgiving

Our super steep stairs.  I'm not sure the pictures do them justice.

DUSTON WEEK #10

Hello all.  What an exciting week!  Well, kind of at least.

We had exchanges with the Kettering Elders, which was great!  We have Elder Mauro from Italy and Elder Bluth still.  Elder Mauro is hilarious and Elder Bluth and I get on super well, so it was good fun.  I got food poisoning though, so I about died the next day haha.  I was struggling!  We did some service on a members farm, which made me even more sick, so pretty much from 2:00 onward on Wednesday I was useless.  I threw up in the evening though, so I got feeling better pretty quickly after that.

I took my written driving test at 8:00 the next morning.  I wasn't feeling well at all.  But I passed!!!  Shout out to the Lord for helping me through that because I wasn't feeling ready to take a test.

We made fried chicken today for P Day and that was pretty good.  Fun stuff!

We have two Thanksgiving dinners lined up for the week!  One on Thursday with the Bates, the Senior Missionary Couple in our ward, and one on Friday with some members, so I am excited for food this week!  I hope that Thanksgiving is great fun for everyone back home!

Have a great week!

-Elder Lott

DUSTON WEEK #9

Hello All!

We had a lot happen this week!  We had Zone Conference, Mission Leadership Council, and District Leadership Council! It was also Remembrance Sunday yesterday, which is when the UK commemorates World War One and all the soldiers who died in it along with honoring all the military past and present.  We went to a Church of England service in the afternoon for it.  We also went to a short service in the evening where they lit a massive beacon that has been there since the Saxon era, Circa 680 AD.  The church building we were attending had arches outside that were as old as the beacon.  It was a really cool day!  Kind of sad because of what it was for, but we saw some really cool stuff.

Also, Nancy wants to get baptized!  We met with her this week and she has decided to work toward the 1st of December.  There are still some things to sort out with teaching and stuff, but she is progressing so well!  It has been loads of fun teaching her.

Zone Conference was good!  It was a massive rebuking session in the morning.  We even split off from the Sisters during the rebuking so it was pretty intense.  But after that it wasn't too bad.  It's always loads of fun seeing all the other missionaries and hearing from President.

Mission Leadership Council was good too.  We had some really good discussions and it made for quite a good District Leadership  Council the following day.  Elder Stock made some lasagna for that meeting as well, and it was really good!

We did Sharing Time in the Primary and it went surprisingly well!  The kids were really well behaved and it was a pleasant surprise.  We also had to go and sing to a Primary class at the request of an elderly lady in the ward and that was pretty interesting. 😂 I was glad when we were done.

We went to Five Guys today and it tasted exactly like it does in America.  What a blessing.  I miss American food so much and eating at Five Guys just brought it all back.  I had a dream I was eating Chick fil A the other night and I ate a chicken nugget with Chick fil A sauce on it, but when I put it in my mouth it tasted like curry and that is how I realized I have forgotten what it tastes like. 😭

Love you all!

at the Beacon lighting

at the Beacon lighting

The Beacon

the old Church exterior

the old Church interior

an oooold hymn book

Mission Leadership Council

The Squad

Sisters Knight and Nelson go home this transfer

Elder Misalucha

DUSTON WEEK #8

Hi Everyone.

Not a lot to write today because we did a Zone P Day and we have been here, there and everywhere and I am super short on time.  We carved pumpkins this week because nobody could before Halloween.  We had Christmas music playing too and it was quite a combo.

Congratulations to Austin and Shelby!  I'm so excited their baby is here and that everybody is well and healthy.

I am taking my written test for my license on Nov. 15.  I'm not too nervous, but it would be great is you would still pray for me.  It can't hurt.

Have a wonderful week!

-Elder Lott

The new District

Zone P Day carving pumpkins

DUSTON WEEK #7

Howdy!

This week was really good and I actually have an update on somebody we are teaching! #rare
But anyway, we have been meeting with Nancy and she is great!  She came to church on Sunday and I realized that she is the first person on my mission that I was in the first companionship to bring to church.  Everybody else had been to church before with other missionaries, even if they hadn't been in a long while.  So that's cool!  She soaks up everything we teach her, though we invited her to be baptised which sadly she didn't accept but just because she doesn't feel like she has enough knowledge about the church yet so we will keep teaching her and try again.  She has two really funny kids named Reggie and Chelsea and they are so great.  Chelsea was just making me turn to different hymns for almost all of Sacrament Meeting yesterday.

We also went to the Milton Keynes District Council on Thursday and then we were on exchanges with the Milton Keynes Elders after that, which was good fun.  I was with Elder Davey from Australia, who I was with in the MTC.  It was a good time and there was a carnival/fair going on in town which increased the regular mayhem of the city center, so that was interesting!  It has also been absolutely freezing this week.  haha  I've been wearing a jumper like every day because I made the mistake of not wearing one one day and it was awful.  I have learned. The rain hasn't been too bad, thank goodness, but wow it has been freezing!  The colors are pretty here, but I don't see them too much because I am in the city most of the time.  Nothing like the Forest of Dean, sadly.  (Mom note:  jumper is the British word for pullover sweater.  He's not wearing women or childrens clothing.)

This week we get our flu shots, or flu jabs as they call them here, so wish us luck!

Not loads else happened this week, but life is good!  If you all would pray for Nancy that would be fantastic.  She just needs a little help realizing she is ready for it.  Thanks so much!

I haven't done a spiritual thought in awhile, so I'll leave a couple of scriptures here...

Joshua 1:9
Have not I commanded thee?  Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed; for the Lord they God is with thee whithersoever thou goest.

Joshua 3:5
And Joshua said unto the people, Sanctify yourselves' for tomorrow the Lord will do wonders among you.

Joshua 24:15
And if it seem evil unto you to serve the Lord, choose you this day whom ye will serve; whether the gods which your fathers served that were on the other side of the flood, or the gods of the Amorites, in whose land ye dwell; but as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord.


Love you all!  Have a wonderful week!  Celebrate Halloween a little extra for me!

-Elder Lott

Milton Keynes District Council.  

For some reason Elder Tollestrup and I are glowing 

like Celestial beings.  Not bad if you ask me!

Exchange with Elder Davey

A cool Obelisk we found in our area

DUSTON WEEK #6

Hello All!

It has been a really good week here!  Nothing crazy has happened but we've been busy and it has been a good one.

We have a new friend named Nancy who we are going to start teaching tomorrow.  The Sister missionaries in Northampton found her but she lives in our area so that's nifty.  We unfortunately had to cancel on her last week because the member we were going to bring with us fell through.  But she looks really solid!  We are hoping that this goes somewhere because we don't have a lot in the way of teaching right now.

We came up with a way to help the Zone make and follow up on daily goals.  It was originally a pdf, but everybody wanted a physical copy of it, so our Ward Mission Leader figured out a way to make a copy of it for everyone.  It was quite a process and it took him ages.  Brother Ford is a legend!

I'm so glad that you and Dad were able to go to Temple Square and meet Sister Woods.  It was fun seeing the pictures with all of you guys together. It's a group I never thought would be in one place at the same time at the beginning of my mission.   Her family was one of the reasons I loved serving in Forest of Dean.  There were so many great people there.

My provisional license has come!  Which means I can now take the written test.  I'm booked to take it on November 13.  Hopefully that goes well!

We're making a transfer calendar for our Zone and the tradition in the Zone is to put peoples faces cropped onto images of a picture.  Last transfer we did the whole Zone, but it took so much time that this month we just did Elder Tollestrup and me. We had two options to choose from and in the end chose The Lion King.

Those are the biggest things this week.  Keep being good and do something nice for another person!

-Elder Lott

The new Zone Goal Cards!

The New Zone!

Calendar Background Option 1

Calendar Background Option #2

(we chose The Lion King)

We went to visit Sister Woods, who is from Whales.  

Her family lives in Zach's first area and took wonderful care of him while he served there.  

She is currently serving in the Salt Lake Temple Square Mission.  

We were able to find her and take her and her companion, Sister Drennan, to lunch this past week. 

DUSTON WEEK #5

Hi Everyone.

Just a short note this week - I'm out of time.

We've had a good week.  I have been sick the past couple of weeks but am starting to feel better.  We are going to be getting our flu shots soon - not excited.  I'm kind of dreading the day but it will happen sooner or later though, so might as well get it over with.

It sounds like lots of fun with the Prescotts in town - sorry to have missed their visit.

Exciting to hear that we have a new Bishop in the ward.  Bishop Brady was a great Bishop, and Bishop van Dijk will be an awesome Bishop as well!  It sounds like he has chosen some great counselors.

Our Zone is doing really well.  The work isn't super busy right now, so some of the missionaries get a little sad and feel like what they are doing isn't always worth it, but we still have a lot of good missionaries who are working hard.

I'm working on getting my British drivers license.  It's a much bigger process than in the States.  It is still early days in the process, but I'll be taking my theory test in a few weeks.  I'll get my provisional license (same as a permit) in a couple of weeks hopefully - it depends on if I filled out the forms right- and then I'll be able to take the multiple choice test.  After that I'll take the driving test.  We will see how it goes!

Have a good week everyone!

-Elder Lott

Photos from DLC

DLC

Our Bishop's classic Mini Cooper

DUSTON WEEK #4

Hello All!

It has been a good week.  Wow!  We have been here, there and everywhere so it's been a bit crazy!

We had a chapel tour with Lily and Wayne last Monday evening which was pretty good.  Lily is a member referral and Wayne is her Dad, but we think that a little interest sparked in him as well throughout the tour.  It was a good one!

We also had an exchanged with the Assistants on Tuesday so I was in Birmingham with Elder Kinard for that.  We spent pretty  much the whole day in the city talking to people and it was loads of fun!  I think the coolest thing that day was that we just sat down by a random guy to eat our lunch and we ended up teaching him and his wife the whole Plan of Salvation over the next 45 minutes, so that was pretty neat.  We also ran out of supplies because we were handing stuff out like crazy and it has been awhile since that has happened for me.  I love cities!  The Conservative Party had a conference in Birmingham that day so there was loads of security and we walked past some protesters.  I think we even got on TV when a Member of  Parliament walked by.

On Thursday we were on exchange with the Ramsey Elders in our Zone.  I was with Elder Stock who was in my MTC District so it was fun to be with him again.  We were together over our year mark as well, so that was cool.  It was a good exchange.  Crazy to think that I've been out here a year now.

Friday we had MLC (Mission Leadership Conference) in Birmingham and that was really good.  President Hughes is such a champ.  He's an amazing guy and the leaders in the mission are all great as well.  It was a fun meeting.

General Conference was great too!  Crazy about 2 hour church though.  I think it's a great thing because it puts more responsibility onto the members for their own spiritual welfare.  One thing I've noticed recently is that the Church is doing a lot to make members more personally responsible for a lot of things and I think it is great.  It helps everyone learn to stand on their own two feet.  President Nelson is making moves over there!  He came in and is getting some work done!  It's really cool to see.

I love you all!  Have a great week!

-Elder Lott

Exchange with Elder Kinard

Exchange with Elder Stock

The MTC one year ago!

Elder Staheli!

With half of my first District @ MLC

(the other half is home now)

MLC  October 2018