HALLOWEEN!!!

(Pennsylvania, Pittsburgh Mission)



The apartment - HOME!!!

Ok, let's get caught up!!!

Elder Bartlett and his new companion (Elder Curl ~ from Lehi) are staying super busy with their Zone Leader responsibilities.  Going on exchanges with other missionaries in the zone, planning, participating in and teaching at Zone Conferences.  He loves being a Zone Leader!!!  He loves the added responsibility and the closer association with more missionaries and the Mission President ~ President Topham, who he loves a respects so much!!!


Zone Leader Conference  There are always crazy pics from Zone Leader Conferences!!!



Zone Leader Conference ~ don't even ask becasue I don't have a clue!!!  hahaha!!!  I don't know if he's an angel or has sweet ballet skills we were never aware of!!!



Elder Bartlett and Elder Curl on exchanges

 

Ok, let's get caught up!!!

Elder Huber and Elder Bartlett thought they would be together until Elder Huber goes home mid- November.  BUT, you never know what Heavenly Father's plans are or where he (or someone else) might need you!  Elder Huber unexpectedly got transferred Sept. 4th.  Elder Bartlett and Elder Huber were both pretty sad about that!!!

 

 

Elder Huber, Elder Nobbs (the counselor to the mission president that is in the ward), Elder Bartlett
Good luck Elder Huber ~ FINISH STRONG!!!

That means Spence only had Elder Huber to train him as a Zone Leader for one transfer (6 weeks)!  YIKES!!!



HAPPY BIRTHDAY ELDER BARTLETT!!!!!!!

August 28 ~ HAPPY BIRTHDAY ELDER BARTLETT!!!!!

It just happened that Elder Bartlett and Elder Curl's car got replaced with a brand new one the week of Elder Bartlett's birthday!  HAPPY BIRTHDAY ELDER BARTLETT!!!  hahaha!!!

 

 

Ok, let's get caught up!!!

P-Day and a little much needed recreation - - -

Adrianna's baptism - - -



Elder Bartlett, Adrianna, Elder Huber

Ok, let's get caught up!!!

Elder Bartlett unexpectedly got transferred July 24th.  He was kind of expecteding his companion to get transferred since he had been there longer.  Elder Bartlett got transferred to Wexford and made a Zone Leader.  His new companion ~ Elder Huber.  Chris Hoke, who just retired from the Pittsburgh Steelers, is the 2nd coundelor in the Bishopric.  Also, one of the counselors to the mission president (President Nobbs) is in his ward.  They have a good, strong, supportive ward.  They have about 300 hundred active members.




Elder Huber

Ok, let's get caught up!!!

While in Williamsport Elder Bartlett wrote home, "I LOVE the area, LOVE the people, LOVE my companion and LOVE the Zone Leaders.  I AM A HAPPY BOY!!!"

Service - hahaha - look at that happy face?
 

Sister Kammerer - all of the missionaries LOVE Sister Kammerer!!!  She is so supportive and good to all of them!!!  She is such a blessing in their lives!!!  Thanks Sister Kammerer for all you do!!!





Ok, let's get caught up!!!

More from Williamsport - - -

 

Elder Bartlett's District



Baptisms

 




OK, let's get caught up!!!

It rains back east like we're not used to here in Utah!  Sometimes it rains hard enough to break the umbrellas!  Or, fill your shoes with water while you're walking home!!!  If you're not soaked from the humidity you're soaked from the rain .     .     .      .



But - it does make for a BEAUTIFUL landscape!!!

Ok, let's get caught up!!!

Elder Bartlett, his companion and the Zone Leaders lived on the second floor of an old house and their bedrooms were on the 3rd floor.  He said there was no air conditioning and their bedrooms were like 1000000 degrees (remember the heatwave they had back east this summer???).  The Zone Leaders they lived with had a vehicle.  Elder Bartlett and his companion were in a walking area (remember the heatwave - hahaha).  He said sometimes he felt like he was going to melt!  They also had a problem with BATS in their apartment!!!  Yes, that's Elder Bartlett huddled in the corner - hahaha!!!

Ok, let's get caught up!!!

Elder Bartlett was transferred May 1st to Williamsport.  This was his first transfer in the field so it made him pretty homesick (made him miss home AND his new family in Franklin)!  Williamsport sits right along the Susquehanna River.  If you are a baseball fan, Williamsport is the birthplace of Little League Baseball and where the Little League World Series is held every year.  When he was transferred, he was made District Leader.  He was excited for the new responsibility but also pretty intimidated because the Zone Leaders were in his District.  Turns out, Elder Bartlett and his new companion, Elder Giffin lived with the Zone Leaders and came to love and appreciate them deeply!!!




Elder Bartlett and his companion (Elder Giffin) in the POURING rain!!!






Elder Giffin (American Fork), Elder Bartlett, and the Zone Leaders, Elder Penn (Alpine) and Elder Robbins (Tooele) a bunch of hometown boys!!!  P-day/Memorial Day.

 

 

 

 

 

Ok, let's get caught up!!!

While in Franklin, Elder Bartlett and his companion (Elder Daniels) had another baptism, Merle.  It was the Saturday before he was transferred and just perfect! 
Some of the member of the ward went to a lot of work and made Spence a DVD and scrapbook of this time in Franklin.  It was wonderful (thanks for all your hard work girls!!!)

Elder Bartlett and some members of the ward looking at the AWESOME scrapbook they made him the night before he was transferred.  Thank you Franklin ~ Elder Bartlett LOVES you and will miss you!!!

The people in Franklin really wanted Elder Bartlett to stay longer!!!  (I dare say, there were a few adults that wanted to do this!!!)

This is why I LOVE PA!!!

The view of Oil City as you cross the bridge .   .   .

March 5, 2012

Spencer and Linda - what a great day!!!

So Linda's baptism happened! It was pretty great! Ah haha except like 15 minutes before it was supposed to start I realized I didn't have a change of garments and so we had to rush home! And the Bishop didn't show-up which we thought was SUPER weird! But she looked so happy it was awesome. She couldn't stop telling us thank you! So that was a great day!

Ah i have to tell you something cool that happened, so yesterday I was fasting to find new investigators because we have like 2 now. So we go to church and Marsha comes up to me and tells me that her new bf wants to meet us and be taught! Awesome right? But it gets better, so then we went to this guys house that said we could come back when we were tracting and we talked to him forever...it was tough because he didn't want to believe anything (of course) so we said well read the BOM and pray about it and you will get your answer, so he is going to do that and we are going back in a couple weeks, AND today when we went to Wal-Mart this guy comes up to me and says do you know Mit Romney? And I said I know of him .  .  . and he said is he like the head of your church? hahaha! I said no and then he starts to laugh and said he was a member from Knox and was just giving me a hard time but that there has someone in our area that he wants us to go teach! 3 in two days!! Pretty cool!!!  We have been doing a lot of finding (tracting) lately.  It gets tough.  We were out of miles for our car so we did SO MUCH walking!  Makes me thankful for a car!!!

Franklin On Ice

They had "Franklin On Ice" this last week, which is a ton of ice sculpures in the park!  So, we went and talked to people there, it was SO awesome!
(Franklin has a great web site - http://www.franklinpa.gov/  if you want to check it out!  When Spence first got his call we jumped on the internet to see what was in him mission.  We happened to find this website and spent a ton of time on there looking around and reading about the area.  Now - with him staying in Franklin to train a new missionary (another 12 weeks) it is likely he will spend the most time in Franklin of his whole mission.  Funny how thing things like that happen!   Ü)

This last week was a little bit slow!  Friday we went to Pittsburgh for training.  It was good!  I had to drive though and it was SO scary!  We lived so it was ok!  hahaha!!!  We are running out of people to teach .  .  .  hahaha so we have been knocking a lot of doors lately!  We might have some new investigators from that .   .   .   I'll let you know next week!  Pray for us!!!  We had a lady answer the door this week and tell us she wasn't interested because she has too many dogs .   .   .   hahaha we were laughing so hard!

We are still teaching Linda.  She is SO excited for baptism, she is scheduled to be baptized on Saturday and we are super excited for that!  She was interviewed yesterday and she looked sooo excited after she was done.
(Linda is the lady "the holy spirit" told to come to church.  January 3, 2012)

transfers - new companion - a taste of home!

Transfers were on the 7th.  Spence has kind of been up in the air since his companion as going home and it was time for him to transfer. 

"Thursday we went to district meeting in Meadville.  So, I was having a personal interview with Pres Topham and he says - "well, how would you feel about training a new missionary???"    Of course I said it would be awesome!  I'm a little nervous to train because I still feel so new but I'm super excited!  It will be very tough but I know I will learn so much too! 

So, my new companion is Elder Daniels.  He is the the 7th  missionary in his family, pretty strong family!  I am excited to train!  I'm also excited, because when you come out of the MTC you want to be perfect, which will be awesome!  This last weekend it snowed nonstop!  It is so beautiful here!  But, on Sunday there was no joke 25 - 30 people at church total!  What a first week for Elder Daniels!  hahaha!!!"

One of the members there (Nicole) was going to have Spence and Elder Daniels over for dinner as a welcome to Elder Daneils.  She e-mailed and asked one of Spencer's favorite foods.  Spence loves "Hawaiian Haystacks" so she fixed it for them for dinner.  How sweet was that?  Thank goodness for supportive members in the ward that watch out for our missionaries!!!

Ken and Jen's Baptisms

The baptisms were awesome! It was cool because we asked Ken if he had a preference who baptized him, because he has a close friend in the ward who we thought he would want to do it, and he asked if I would do it. I feel so honored! Ken and Jen both are so excited at the opportunity to start their lives living the gospel standards. Ken texted us and said he feels like a new man, ah it is so amazing to be able to be part of this mom! Such a blessing for sure!





Jen has a little girl, Donna.  I gave Donna her baby blessing on Sunday.  Oh man I was so nervous haha and she kept jumping out of the chair but it was such an awesome opportunity to do that! It feels so good to be able to take part in this work. I can't even explain it actually. I love them so much and am so excited for them!




I found out something awesome - before the 2 baptisms we had in October there had only been 1 baptism in Franklin in a full year.  I feel super blessed, I know people have been prepared for us to teach and I can really feel we have been lead to those people.  Many times I can feel grandma's hand in preparing people for us.  Just like my blessings promised!

Training in Jamestown, NY - "miracle for the week"

Friday we went to Jamestown, NY for training.  On the way home we were driving and the GPS woudn't work . . . which was very bad news because everything home was 2 lane highways, super confusing.  So, we thought we should say a prayer for safety and guidance.  So we did, the GPS started working again (it hasn't worked since).  As we were driving our tire pressure light came on . . . which it always does.  So, we decided to just put air in it in Franklin.  Before we went to put air in it, we went home for lunch . . . so an hour later we went to the gas station and our tire was totally flat!  As we put air in we could hear it shoot out - - - so we put on the spare.  But we were worried we had bent the rim, but when we got it fixed everything was fine.  There was a chunk of something in the tire but everything else was fine!  That is my little miracle for the week.

Prayers are answered!

I just got done e-mailing with Spence.
He said they woke up this morning to 1+ feet of snow!  So they walked
around all day clearing snow for people.  He said "good way to get
them to talk to us".  Here's a excerpt from his e-mail - Sunday we
were sitting up in the front to bless the sacrament and this lady we
have never seen before walked in . . . . so after the meeting ended
the Bishop snagged us and we ran over to talk to her . . . . so we
start talking to her and she starts to get super emotional . . . . so
the Bishop has us all go into his office and talk . . . . she is
getting real emotional now and she starts telling us that "the holy
spirit" told her she needed to come to our church that day! She lives
about a half hour away! So we talked for a bit and we got her number
and we are going to see her on Friday. How cool is that??? I think the
best best part is that Elder Brady had been praying for new
investigators every time we prayed because we haven't really had much
going on, and then this happens! Ah prayers are answered there is no
doubt!