March 24, 2014 

Hey Everyone,

Man Kayaking sounds fun. I wish I could have been there! I remember when we did that and the time we went to Blue Ridge. That was fun too. I got all the pics. I love them. No there are no Panda Express here, but we did go to Mooshiro sushi again today. I am so full. I’ll send you some pictures of that.

On an exchange this week we went to Noah Moose's house. He’s a less active blind native and we taught him and gave him a giant book of mormon. We stopped by a lot of less actives this week as well, and that was good. We’re getting things set up and this week we had 6 less actives at church! It was great. We taught an investigator this week but she’s not going anywhere so we’re not going to go by again until she calls us.

I gave a lady at the hospital a blessing and she literally had 9 names and I had to write them out on a piece of paper and read them out so that I could get them all. It was really good and the Spirit was strong.

Well things are moving along and I’m working hard. Love you!

Elder Porter

My boy Elder Barton

At a dinner appointment at the Sanchez's. Bro Sanchez went to the same mission as my Dad, Chihuahua Mexico. They are the same age, maybe they knew each other...

March 17, 2014

Elder Coombs

Hey Everyone,

It was an okay week. We tried to do some stuff this week but we can’t do much. It’s starting to drive me crazy, but I’m just trying to make the most of it. We’ve just been focusing on the 250 less active members that live here. We went to a really nice guys house on Saturday. His name is Noah Moose, but he goes by Noah Tracy. He is a blind native man who has recently been trying to commit suicide, so we felt like he should get a visit. We went over and there was no buzzer on his apartment building, so we called him and he let us in. His house was really dark, and was lit only by old Christmas lights. It was surprisingly clean. Anyways, he showed us this old 1970s video of missionaries entitled "Called to Serve" and it was really boring but kinda interesting. We taught him about how the Atonement can help us in our everyday lives and we taught him how Christ not only suffered for our sins, but for everything we go through. All of the pains and emotions that we feel. He felt the Spirit. He also came to church yesterday and talked with Bishop. We’re going over again this week to bring him a giant Book of Mormon because he can see if things are right next to his right eye. He still needs to use a cane though.

It was a rough day on Friday. The less active that we brought back to church "Scott" took a hard spill on his bike again and the doctors took a scan of his brain and there is a bruise that is most likely going to cause another brain aneurism... we were teaching him a lot about the Atonement and why we get trials and keeping the faith during difficult times. He was bawling. He’s going into surgery in a few months to get his brain operated on and he only has a 30-45 % chance of living. It was tough hearing the news but hopefully things will all work out.

We’ve had some crazy experiences the past few days. Yesterday at church, Mark and Lorraine walked in who I’ve given blessing to in the past, and they’re nuts. They walked in the church and said "I need a blessing. There are demons inside of me.." and I believe that there was. We went into a classroom and gave them a blessing and I just didn’t feel right. Something was not right, but they said they felt better afterwards and they went to sacrament meeting. A lot of the natives here get into weird stuff. I don’t know if you remember, but they were the ones who Elder Olguin and I gave a blessing to and when I opened my eyes during the prayer, Mark was just standing in the corner in the dark in his boxers staring at me.. it was creepy...

We broke some serious rules last night... okay so the zone leaders know, and it was an emergency and we saved a life. Okay so Elder Barton and I went out last night to help shovel walks cause it blizzarded like crazy last night, and while we were driving to a members we saw this 80+ year old lady stuck in the middle of the road with her walker on the main road, at like 830 pm. We asked if she needed help and she was freaaaakking out. The handi transit bus never picked her up and she was so lost. So we drove her home, and the whole time she was just yelling "I didn’t see no bus, I didn’t see no driver!" So we dropped her off and called the transit place to tell them we got her home. Then we called the zone leaders to tell them what we did, and everything was fine. I’m not going to let someone die because I cant let them get in my car, and she was so old and I know she would have died if we didn’t go and pick her up. That was a situation that I had to break the rules.

So yesterday we had to drive out to the country in La Salle, and it was blizzarding so bad. It was the worst weather conditions I have ever seen and it all started when we were half way there. So we were going to the Gross's 3rd Sunday dinner and I was driving, and the sisters were following me. Oh the new Sister who was driving lives on Val Vista and Brown. She’s from Mesa too! Okay and I literally couldn’t see 10 feet in front of me. Snow was pounding us so hard. Then on the way home we had to make a huge caravan so that we could all make it out. It was so freaking nuts! Then we were driving through the city romping through the snow and ice. One of the Sisters took a video of me driving. You won’t believe it until you see it. Canada is crazy!!!

Anyways, we get to start online missionary work soon and President is saying how I’m going to have to focus on that more for this transfer because of the condition of Elder Coombs. So I’m bummed. I met with the mission counselor Sis. Marx and she helped me out a lot and she’s making me go on exchanges with my bro Elder Barton every Wednesday so that we can just street contact the crap out of downtown and actually get some freaking work done.

I’m doing the best I can and I will never fear

Love you all!

Elder Porter

Being a goof ball...

Pet store on P-day...

March 10, 2014

Hey Everyone,

This is tough. My new companion Elder Coombs has something called Perthies Disease meaning that he can barely walk and when its cold he can’t walk barely at all... and we’re in Canada, and we didn’t have a car for his first 3 days. We got our car today so that should be better. I just don’t know what to do. It’s going to be a really tough few months. We went out to build a huge snow fort today and it was the warmest it has been in 6 months and he couldn’t stay outside for more than an hour and he was limping around almost falling down. I don’t know what I’m going to do. We can’t go street contacting or tracting or anything that I usually do. I’m just really kind of depressed almost, but I’ll just have to make the best of it.

Anyways I got my birthday package! I loved it! Thank you so much! Everything was great! Was that Max Halls signature on the Bombers hat?

Some crazy things happened this week. I street contacted this guy that was super, super drunk, and he tried giving me a bunch of weed, so that was nice. I didn’t take it in case you were wondering. I talked to him for like 45 minutes and I was not in the best mood, so I was pretty condescending to him. He kept telling me all about the partying stuff that he did and I said to him multiple times that if he wanted to change his life and stop doing the stupid things that would probably get him no where in life that he could definitely call us. I’m pretty sure if I wasn’t so intimidating to him he would have fought me.

We got a new investigator this week. Her name is Marcy. She is a new girlfriend of the guy we’ve brought back to church (Scott) and she even came to church yesterday. It was great! We’re teaching her again Friday. That first lesson was really rough because Elder Coombs hasn’t ever really taught, but it went good enough. We go street contacting for a few minutes every day because he can’t be out for long and I just hang him out to dry every time. It sounds mean but that’s the only way he’s going to learn hahaha.

Elder Coombs is from a small town in Utah called Salina. It has about 300 people in it and so his social skills aren’t the best that they could be, but he’s a good enough guy. I’ve scared him half to death already probably by telling him all of the crazy stories that we see of natives and stuff.

But anyways I’m just trying to do my best to stay motivated and stuff. Hopefully things will work out for the best, and that we will be able to figure stuff out. I’ll keep you all posted.

Thanks for all the support. Love you

Elder Porter

Hey Friends and Family

1st Breakfast appointment this morning, really good!!

I get my new comp on Thursday. He is one of 3 new Elders coming out in the field from the M.T.C. So I get to be his trainer, I am super nervous!!! Elder Olguin leaves Wednesday night on a 12 hour bus ride all by himself up to Flin Flon, the land of gold. So thats crazy. I have to stay with our zone leaders.

That’s great that Carson started baseball. That should be fun. Man everything sounds like its going great! I didn’t get Devons missionary email, I have his one from back home but didn’t get his new one so I can’t email him.

This week was pretty slow, didn’t do much teaching. We went on exchanges this week. I went with Elder Muirhead and we made a goal to street contact lots of people and we talked to so many people on the street. It was great. We passed out lots of cards and met a bunch of crazy people downtown. So that was fun. 

Just skinning the squirrel

voila

Okay I have kind of a sick story. So we found this dead squirrel and we put it in a bag and took it back to the apartment cause Elder Barton has stuff to tan hides, so Elder Barton and I skinned this squirrel and tanned the hide (which turned out amazingly) and we left the dead skinned squirrel on our zone leaders car, and it froze to the windshield! haha they were ticked! It was so funny! We have the tanned hide in the apartment. It’s kindof weird. It turned out really good though...

We have lots of dinner appointments this week cause Elder Olguin is leaving. I have a b-day party with my favorite family in the ward cause their son is turning 16 on the 9th, so that will be really fun.

We’re still teaching Scott and the Pettys (the deaf less actives) and hopefully Scott will introduce us to his new girlfriend so we can teach her. S’hes coming to church next week so thats good.

I got some bad frostbite on the tips of my ears. They’re healing though, so it should be good. it was -52 the other day and it was so cold we couldn’t leave the apartment... I got a good nap in haha. It’s been -40 every day this week basically. Like its already March, WARM UP!!! Hopefully soon. I’m sick of the cold. It has been the coldest winter here in Winnipeg in 100 years. So it was a nice welcome to me. But anyways. I’m ready to train this new kid and find some  people to teach. Love you!

Elder Porter

just a car buried in the snow

Some curry we made, so good!!!