New Companion, New Weather!

Hi everyone!

It's been a crazy week!

I was supposed to get my new companion on Monday, but that day at the Trainer Meeting, President Ballard pulled me aside and said that my companion was sick in the MTC (Missionary Training Center) and wouldn't be here for a couple of days. So from Monday until Wednesday night I was in a trio with the Zone Leaders working in their area and just hanging out with them. It was fun being in a trio, and I've become really good friends with one of the ZLs, Elder Petersen (picture below).

Tyler and Elder Petersen

Tyler with Elders Bennett & Petersen

Tracting by the river

My "son" finally got to Portland Wednesday night at 8pm! His name is Elder Giles and he is from Draper, Utah. He is really into cars and bikes and mechanical stuff. We get along pretty well.

Tyler with his new companion, Elder Giles

Thursday we had the "greenie meeting" where all the new missionaries and their trainers meet and have different training material they go over. The meeting was all day and ended at 3. We then had a lesson at Gayle's, but as we were biking over there, the derailer on Elder Giles bike totally snaps off (classic bike problems) so we were stranded for a little bit until Bro McDonald came and rescued us. I felt bad for Elder Giles, but he stayed positive and he seems to be adjusting well!

Friday we had weekly planning and then a couple lessons with Sister Scott and James Fergason. Friday evening we went and played basketball with Gilbert and Matt at the Stake Center and about 25 people showed up with 4 different sets of missionaries. It was crazy! They were almost all non-members too, it was awesome! So we played basketball for a couple hours with all of these different investigators. It got a little competitive and people were talking smack and getting in each other's faces so that wasn't good, but it was fun none-the-less.

Saturday we had our first District Meeting. In the evening we met with Gilbert and we answered some of the questions that had been troubling him about what we believe. He thought that he was going to stump us with some questions (like the bible says don't add to the bible and we have the Book of Mormon), but we answered all of them and he said well that was a lot easier than I thought!.. He is slowly progressing and taking baby steps!

Sunday Gilbert came to church... And HE BORE HIS TESTIMONY. It was awesome! It was like 15 min long, but it was awesome! He said that he did it to take another step closer to his salvation. We then had a lesson in the evening with the Daniels' boys. We did the lesson called, "The Sabbath is a Delight." We brought ice cream and we talked about the different activities we do during the week, and to represent these activities we used ketchup, mustard, and relish. Then, to represent the activities we do on the Sabbath, we used chocolate syrup and sprinkles. The ice cream represented Sunday and we had a bowl where we poured the weekday activities on one and another bowl where we poured the Sabbath day activities on it. Rico tried both! They really loved that lesson!

Hope everyone has an awesome week!

Elder Hill


Tyler's Hints & Highlights this week!

* We are starting to get the Oregon rain. It's rained for 4 days straight now.

* Everyone should go read the General Conference talks! They were super good!

* Training is going great! It's cool being able to take the lead on everything and introduce Elder Giles to everyone.

* "We do not have to be perfect, but we need to be good at getting better"

*Thank you for all the emails, packages, and support! I appreciate it more than you know!