October 20th 2014

Hello Family!

So on Tuesday we got in a 5 Car pile-up on the freeway... We all tragically died. Isnt that crazy?

Wait, sorry that was something else. We lived! :) 

It wasnt our fault, we stopped because of sudden heavy traffic and we were rear ended by a car (who was rear ended by a car)^4. Involved in this accident was us in our Ford Fusion, a Mazda, a Limo, and two big pickup trucks. We were very blessed though. No one was hurt in the accident and our car really doesnt even have any noticeable damage on it. Just a little paint scraped from the Mazda that ran into us. But the Limo and the Trucks had a ton of damage. The poor guy driving the limo just purchased it about 25 minutes before the accident and was driving it back to Minnesota. Minnesotans are crazy. He was a weird old man. The whole thing took about two hours to figure out. Good thing i had a sweater cause it is getting chilly! :)

The work in our area is like a rollercoaster! Seriously, we see amazing miracles and then everything crashes and burns the next day. It is exhausting to say the least! We are teaching some really cool families right now; in fact, we are teaching six different families.. They each have different things keeping them from progressing but we are super busy! Hopefully this week goes a lot better than last week ended cause we are in a bit of a low spot right now, but things always turn around. Enjoy every minute of this week and help someone have a better day by feeling good about themselves! 

Love, e `D l `O d `M e `A r `N

Hermiston-zing it up!!

Well hello there family!!

So guess what, I am STAYING IN HERMISTON!! Yeah im super excited. Not only that, Elder Stringham is staying here with me!! :) this is our third transfer together! I dont wanna say we are special or anything, but that almost NEVER happens in this mission!! So we are expecting some pretty big miracles in the next month and a half. We received our transfer calls on saturday night and we went nuts- I think we woke up the members that we live with, but it was worth it! 

This week has been full of interesting stories! We saw a semi truck driving in the middle of town... On Fire!! Yeah it smelled like burnt rubber because the tires were melting... And it was still driving cause the driver didnt know! Also i would like to share a story that pretty much sums up Tracting a Hispanic area in the United states. _*Door opens. Me: "Hola!" Her: "Hi." Me: (Because i thought she spoke english) "How are you today?" Her: "Bien." *Door slams._ Haha elder stringham and i have been laughing about it for a few days now.. Maybe you had to be there.. :) 

We also found out there is like 4 panaderias here in hermiston! (Spanish Bakery) So we have been tactfully visiting them all, being careful not to eat too much because the "swelling" of my cheeks finally went down since we started eating healthier and going for a run during our exercise time in the morning. In the 30 degree weather. Its great. Also, remember when elder Young and i exterminated our pet mouse named Juan? His brother Paco came to avenge his death, and he is the smartest little guy i have ever met!! We havent even seen him! All we know, is that he likes sunchips and ritz crackers. Have you seen the movie Mouse Hunt? Yeah we are about to live that movie in Hermiston Oregon. 

Well, love you all!!

Elder Doman

Dear Utah Sept 16, 2013

Hi!

Are these weeks going as fast for you as they are for me? I have already been in the field as long as i was in the MTC!? Crazy stuff. This week was really good! I just have to brag about my juggling real quick.. So pretty much i am a professional juggler and the whole ward was impressed at my ability. Especially when they heard i learned in a week! Yeah, Thats how we missionaries do it. It was a way fun activity because i lured them in with my juggling talent and elder hansen kept them there with his killer voice. It was a grand ole' good time!

Transfers are next week. I cant decide if i want to leave or stay. I am torn because i want to leave to a Spanish area, but i want to stay because i am in the best English area in the whole mission! (mostly cause the members cook dinner for us almost every night) I havent had any exotic food yet though. Probly cause i eat at american's houses. Speaking of food, I have some awesome news! I have gained twenty pounds since i left for the MTC! I weigh more right now than i ever have in my whole life! Its fantastic!! Probly because the members are super good cooks and we have a car so we just drive everywhere. Exercise time is great but a half hour of pushups and sit ups can only get you so far.. I thought about trying to go for a run, but Elder Hansen doesnt even excercise in the house, there is no way i could get him to come on a run with me. I did have a realization this week though- if i continue my eating habits, i wont fit into my pants in a month!! ;) So i decided to start eating healthier. I dont really know if you care about all this, but its okay. I dont feel bad for making you read my boring emails.

I will find out if i am transfered or not next saturday, and then transfer day is wednesday. That means probly dont send me any letters after friday or saturday in case i am transfered. But i will let you know next monday. 

I hope all is well! Love you all!

Elder Doman

Dear family of mine Sept 9, 2013

Howdy fellas!

How are things in Utah? I am pretty sure i have the exact same weather that you do, but I doubt you are having as many forest fires as me. Wenatchee is crazy. Its super dry and every single rain storm starts a forest fire from the lightning. I am getting accustomed to the smell of smoke. Good Stuff! 

This week flew by. I feel like i just barely wrote an email to all of you, so i dont really have too much to say, but i guess i can just ramble for a bit. Elder Hansen and i are still getting along really well. We have a 12 week training program that is supposed to train me as a missionary but its been a little frustrating. I am all for the training, but they make it seem like you have to wait until a certain week to learn certain things. I told elder Hansen that i wanted to act like the senior companion for a week so that i could learn everything quicker, but he turned me down.. Something about obeying the rules..? I dunno i wasnt really listening.. :) However i did convince him to let me do my training in whatever order i want. So that was good. 

I am trying to think of the "story of the week" but this week was a little more mellow.. I think my favorite part was on exchanges. I went to an area called Leavenworth with our district leader and we went tracting for most of the day. He is a super awesome elder and we get along really well, so we had a lot of fun tracting. We made up games and stuff as we were knocking doors and we were just being goofy. But the best part was when we knocked on a door and this guy answered and said, "I dont think this is your kind of house boys, I am gay and happily married to my husband." You could say we were stunned for a few seconds. You would not believe the type of people i have met out here. There are some interesting folks in the world!! 

We have a ward "Get to Know You" party this friday with all the members and less actives and hopefully investigators. I am really excited, except me and elder hansen were asked to do a talent. He is a super good singer so he is set. They said i cant do anything with a soccer ball and that kinda stumped me because i dont really have any other talents. I told them i would come up with one. I am learning how to juggle!! Yeah, its pretty cool. I have been working on it during our meal times this week and i pretty much have it down. But i wanna become a master so i will continue to work on it. I will let you know how it goes next monday! I have come to the realization that i need to stop worrying about being the "stereotype missionary" because thats not why i am here. The Lord sent me here because my personality and talents can help the people in this area come unto christ. So thats what im working on. I dont know what that has to do with juggling, but whatever. 

I love you all! Have a fantastic week!

Love, Elder Doman

All the Elders at the Mexico MTC from Bingham!

Week 3 in the field Sept 2, 2013

Hey Fam!

It has been a fantastic week. It seems like every week is just going by faster and faster. That kinda worries me because in a few months the weeks are going to be flying by faster than i want them to! I am started to adjust to all the hustle and bustle of the mission life. Not gonna lie, its pretty crazy. My favorite time of the whole day is between 8 and 9 in the morning because that is my personal study time. That is time where i can just read the scriptures and listen to what Heavenly Father is trying to tell me. I wish i would have dedicated an hour to studying before i left for my mission. Everyday i get more and more excited to learn new things in this time. It has really opened my eyes to how much i don't know. If you all have the chance, maybe try dedicating a half hour or an hour to studying the scriptures or General conference talks or something every morning. (if you arent already doing it)

Me and elder Hansen have had a challenging week. We realized at the beginning of the week that many of our investigators arent too interested or are losing interest quickly, so we decided we would dedicate this week to finding new people to teach. That involved a lot of tracting. And a lot of rejection. It was a really depressing week at times, but we learned something. (by the way, we didnt come up with a single potential investigator with all our tracting efforts) Anyway, what we learned is that the Lord knows what he is talking about when he asks the members and the missionaries to work together. The only successful "finds" we had this week were referrals from the members. We likened this to the story in the bible when the Apostles are fishing out the left side of the boat all night and they dont catch anything. Then the savior appears and tells them to fish out the right side of the boat, and they catch a whole multitude of fish. The Lord has asked the members and the missionaries to work together, that is fishing out the right side of the boat. However, this presents a problem. Not very many members have referrals to give us, and i cant blame them. I never gave the missionaries any referrals before my mission. So we are now trying to figure out how to get the members involved more in our work. It will be good! :)

So i have a pretty cool story this week. This experience pretty much turned this week from "not very good" to fantastic. Emotions are all over the place out here in the field. Everything is super dramatic. (if you couldnt tell from my emails) Anyway, so we were having a tough week, lots of rejection. Then on Friday the Sister Missionaries in our area asked us if we would go to the Migrant camps(these are camps where all the mexicans live during the picking season of all the fruit) with them because there was a less active man there who wanted a blessing. So we went with them around 6:00 and the less active guy wasnt even there. But a drunk guy who wanted to "learn God" started talking to us. So we talked to him quite a bit and eventually all the Hispanics started flocking to us! It got to the point where me and elder Hansen were teaching 7 different guys and the sisters were teaching 7 different guys. It reminded me of the stories you hear of old times when everyone is in a big group listening to someone preach. So we taught the plan of salvation to all these men for two hours!! In Spanish. You know in the scriptures when it says "the spirit of the lord was upon them and they spoke with tongues" or something like that. Yeah that happened to us. The spirit was with us and we didnt have a language barrier at all. Or if we did, it was at different times so we could still continue teaching. For example if i didnt understand something, Elder Hansen did. Or if he didnt know how to say something, the words came to me. It was a very cool experience that just made the whole week! Then after the lesson elder hansen gave the less active guy a powerful blessing. It was really cool.

My favorite part about being a missionary is all the service we get to do. Not too many people want to hear what we have to say, but there are a lot of people who need help chopping wood or weeding or putting up christmas lights or even moving. It has been fantastic. I made a book this week and i am organizing all my emails and written letters that i receive. They lift my spirits when we have a hard day. I have no doubt that all these challenges are to help me grow. Sometimes they arent very fun though. I pray for you all everyday. Thank you so much for all the love and support!! Until next week!

Elder Doman

Week 2 Aug 26, 2013

Hey Family and Friends!!

Okay, to start i would like to apologize about my letter last week.
Things were super hectic and i was just happy to get it done. This
week i have a better feel for what i am doing out here so my brain is
able to think a little more normally! So i am sure you all have many
questions about my area and companion and all that good stuff, so i
will explain my life out here as best i can.

So i forgot to say in my last email, i am in an English area. We are
covering the Wenatchee River Ward, which is three seperate towns. It
is a pretty big area. Good thing we have a Car! There are a ton of
Spanish speakers up here because pretty much all it is, is big farming
areas. The reason me and elder Hansen dont get to teach spanish is
because they have Sister missionaries in the ward as well. So
basically we have all the english work and they have all the spanish
work. It is kinda cool because we have been able to work with the
sisters a lot, exchanging referrals and such. I am finally getting the
hang of missionary life in the field. It is so much better than the
MTC. The days have seriously been flying by. The only hard thing is
that because i am in training we have an extra hour of companion
study. So a typical day is wake up at 6:30-excercise, eat, get ready.
8:00-personal study. 9:00-companion study. 11:00-language
study(Thankfully they still let us study the language). 12:00-lunch.
1:00-Serve and Teach. 9:00-plan for the next day. The studying part
goes by kinda slow sometimes, but the rest of the day flies.

We have been doing a ton of service lately. We found a couple that
doesnt want anything to do with the missionaries, but they had a ton
of wood that needs to be chopped. So we have been there four seperate
times chopping wood for them. They still dont really want to hear our
message, but they said we can come over anytime we want. This is just
in two weeks too. I can already see their hearts softening. I really
havent had anyone swear at me or chew me out yet. I am kinda looking
forward to the first time.. Mostly just to see what my first reaction
is. (I will probly start crying). The people up here are all super
nice. They have a lot of problems in their lives, but they are all
very nice. The ward we cover is awesome as well. There are some funny
people in it. Last Sunday me and Elder Hansen taught a gospel
principles class and yesterday we spoke in church. So most of the
people know who i am by now. The hard part is learning all their
names. Especially because half the ward is related some way or
another. About a fourth of the ward has last names Webb or Smith
because there are a bunch of brothers that all live in the same ward
and have their own families. So that has been fun to decode.

Elder Hansen is the man. We get along so well!! I dont think we would
have been that great of friends in high school because we have
completely different interests(he doesnt like sports but is huge in
singing and playing the piano). However, we are really becoming close.
We spend a lot of time joking and keeping things light, but when we
want the spirit in our lessons it is there. I have learned a lot from
him. He has some awesome mission approved music we listen to in the
car, and i am pretty much hooked on it. Not all mission approved music
is boring! Who knew?

My Story of the week is when we did exchanges with the Zone leaders on
Friday. I went with Elder Decker in his area and Elder Davis came to
our area with Elder Hansen. Me and elder decker taught one lesson,
went to our dinner appointment, and then got in a car accident. It was
elder deckers fault, he tried to do a UTurn but didnt check if there
was a car behind him. We were there for two and a half hours figuring
everything out. No one was hurt but there was a lot of damage done on
both our mini van and the 2013 Honda Civic he hit. So the one thing i
learned in my exchange with the zone leaders: Check your blind spot.

Thanks for all the love and support from home. I pray for all of you
often. I love what i do. Look for missionary opportunities around you.

Love, Elder Doman

Week 1 in the field. Aug 19, 2013

Wow. What a week!!

Okay, so here is the deal; I don't exactly know how much time i have to email today, but i know that it is less than i had in the MTC. Also i need to email my mission president and stuff. So this week will be more of a test week for me with emailing. I will try and get everything in this general email and if i have time, do some individuals, but no promises. Worst case, you might just have to wait til next week for me to answer your questions.. Because i have a TON of them to answer!! Also, i am going to send a letter home with my area address on it so if you want to write me a letter you can get that from my dad. (i dont have any other addresses...)

Okay, well here goes. I know that i am going to forget a lot of things but i will try and get the important stuff. Leaving the MTC was interesting. I was happy to finally get out to the field, but at the same time i was sad to be leaving all of the friends i had made there. We stayed up til about 11:00 taking pictures and packing and saying our goodbyes. We then went to sleep for and hour and 45 minutes, and woke up at 1:45 because our bus left the MTC at 2:30. By the time we got through security it was 5, so we slept for about an hour and a half in the airport. It was a fantastic nap. There were 14 of us. Sorry i am being distracted because there is a latino in my zone who is sitting next to me and keeps asking me questions! Okay. Anyway, i had been praying for an opportunity to give away a Book of Mormon on the plane. In spanish. So i asked Heavenly Father to prepare someone for me. And he did. I sat next to a lady and her daughter heading for Vegas, her daughter spoke a little english but the mom didnt. So i talked to her for most of the flight, she helped me with my spanish a lot. She was catholic, but i introduced her to the book of mormon. I wrote my testimony in it and challenged her to read the last two paragraphs in the introduction on her next flight. I also challenged her to pray to know for herself. She was very grateful for the book and said she would. I have no doubt the Book of Mormon will change her life. 

We landed in Dallas and went through customs. The lines were super long and we had to run to our flight, made it five minutes before it left!! I slept that whole flight. It was amazing to be in america. I was ready for some food though. We landed in Seattle at 4:30. Which, if you do the math, means we didnt eat all day. So you could say i had a good ole time at the Wendys in the airport. I got their biggest burger, (3 patties), a large fry, a frosty, and a water (with ice cubes!!!) It was a fantastic american meal. We had an hour layover then flew on through to Pasco. The mission president, his wife, and the assistants were waiting for us when we landed, so that was cool. The mission president (president Ware) is awesome. He is seriously the best. He is super goofy and funny and relaxed. But in a good way. Everyone really respects him. We stayed the night at the mission home, and then the next day was transfer day! I found out my trainer/companion. His name is Elder Hansen. I also found out my area, Wenatchee River Ward. Which is almost as far north as i could get in this mission. It was a six hour drive up here, so i spent the whole day on Wednesday in the car. Got to Wenatchee, met my companion, and then we went and visited an investigator. There are so many details i cant include or this email would be 18 pages long. I will just include most some basic details about the rest of the week.

My companion is from Pennsylvania. He has only been out for 6 months and he is already training, which is a great sign. He is super obedient, very hard working, and extremely spiritual. I kinda felt dumb asking questions at first because he isnt too friendly sometimes, but then i got over that and decided i am here to learn and he is here to teach. I will tell you more about him when i learn more about him. I am in an area that is actually very pretty. I heard its one of the prettiest places in the mission, so that is pretty cool. I have met a lot of people. I am having a hard time keeping track of them all! but i will figure it out with time. It is really different out here. I expected it to be different from how it is, but it is great. I am excited to write again next week! Hopefully i wont be so scatterbrained! Keep the prayers up please! I sure have been!! Love you all!!

Love, Elder Doman