April 14, 2014

Hey! This week was good. Not a whole lot happened! we didn't get to go tour that gun range, so that was too bad. Hahaha! So, we went to a volunteer appreciation dinner at the retirement home that we play cards at, and they had jars full of the dry ingredients for banana bread for all the volunteers, you know? So anyways, at my table, one lady had opened the jar, had poured some out onto a plate and started eating it with a spoon! It was super funny!! it had dried bananas in it, so it could have been a treat, I guess... but, that being said, we made the bread, and it was awesome! We found out that the chevy cruises have falty axles, so we have to take our car in today and see if it needs to be replaced. It's on recall. But, we will get a rental car if it is bad! That makes us excited, because we are burning through our clicks fast, and they are threatening to park us in may if we go over our limit. We could really use a car with no limit right now. But that's it for our week! 

Elder Oviatt

April 28, 2014

Hey! This week was great! Went and picked up Elder Mataoa, stayed in Ottawa for way to long, and then had a zone meeting. It was decent. Not the best one I've been to, unfortunately. =) Hey, not everything can be better than the last one! Elder Mataoa is hilarious! So far, the members all love him, were going to do some awesome work up here in Petawawa! Today at 3:30 we get to go tour a gun range that a member is about to finish building for the Canadian Special Forces! I'm Excited!! Conference was awesome, I loved Priesthood session!

1. This is Elder Russell. This was at zone meeting, we got a little bored, so we put our tags on him. He's 5 times the missionary I'll ever be! ;)

March 24, 2014

J1. This is Elder Beaumont, and my self and Elder Beaumonts greenie, Elder Soll. This is a three generational picture, taken at Montreal on the day we went to see Elder Neil L Anderson. Cool Day.

2. This is at our Dinner on my birhtday. They set up green decorations! And she made me a pie. Awesomeness.

3. This is a cake that was bought for me for our FHE group. They put the candles right after my name because they actually spelt it wrong. =) 

4. We had ANOTHER birthday party/dinner this week. They bought me a batman birthday cake, and appologized because batman was the closest thing they could get to superman. 

March 17, 2014 (Happy Birthday Austen!)

Hey All! 

This week was crazy! I don't have a whole lot to tell about, but I do have some awesome pictures.

1. This is Calebs Baptism. That was so awesome. That was Saturday. We drove down and I got to baptize him. Then, Sunday we were back down to Ottawa and I was able to confirm him. Next Sunday he is recieving the priesthood, then he wants to go to the temple with us. Crazyness. His parents were at his baptism. I don't know if you all know how big of a deal that is, but it's a huge deal. So we spent most of our week in Ottawa. Not very productive...

2. This is my 21st Birthday Cake. It was bought for me by Sister Cooke. Who also has a birthday today! She came to church with a cake for me. What a sweet lady, I hope to get a card down to her this week, because she lives 45 minutes away. 

3. This is my 12th birthday cake. Everyone wishes they were young again, right? Well, today, I am young again!

March 10, 2014

Hey!! Another week gone. Impossible, but I guess not! 

This week was good! We didn't do to much out of the ordinary, but we had tons of fun anyways! 

We have an investigator, Jennifer, who is so awesome! She has a baptismal date for March 29th, and she is doing so well! We mentioned tithing quickly in a lesson a while ago, and she asked about it, so we did a brief outline of it, explained what it was and all that, and then we moved on. Well, a day or so later, Jennifer texts us and says that she has looked at her finances and will be able to pay titihing and is so excited to be able to join our faith community. It was awesome. Basically floored us, that's certain! And we had another person, Edward, I've talked about him before, text us and tell us that him and his friends who are posted to Petawawa, want to visit all the churches in the area before they leave. So we told him good luck, we hope you find a church. He then texted us back and said "Oh, I've already found a church. Your church. We're just looking for one for my friend now!" We were floored by that text as well!

Lets see... What else... Oh! Saturday night we went way up to Deep River, about 45ish minutes away from Pembroke to visit with a family who has an inactive daughter and a daughter who is engaged to someone who is not a mormon, and we were going to have a game night to get to know her Fiance. We played Clue. I'll be honest. That game is kind of boring. But Elder Losee ended it really quickly, it was great. He made an educated, but lucky guess and won after about 10 minutes. Then we played Quelf. That game is hilarious. There were some great pictures taken. I'll get those sent out next week, because I don't have them myself. I Lost, but I'm pretty sure I had the most fun. =)

This next week should be an amazing week. Caleb is getting baptized on Saturday. at 7:00PM. He may have his friend from Las Vegas baptize him, but that's not even the coolest part. His parents will be coming. That is like, blow your mind awesome. His parents have come a long way since they first learned he went to a Latter-Day Saint church. I'm excited to meet them. So, we will be in Ottawa Wednesday, then halfway to Ottawa Thursday to un-split, then Saturdayfor Calebs Baptism, then Sunday again for Calebs Confirmation and Stake General Priesthood meeting. Lots of driving. Then, the next week, we are going down to Montreal for our big meeting with the general authority, and a temple trip. I'm excited! Anyways, that is is for us. Elder Losee and I are headed out for another adventure filled week!

Love yous!

Elder Oviatt

March 3, 2014

Hey there! 

So, crazy week! we got in a car accident! Woo!! Actually, embarrassing story. we were backing out of our driveway, and it was icy, and slushy and gross. And our land lady was driving INTO the driveway, and in ONtario, they don't like, collect the snow like they do in Alberta (or at least like they do in Sherwood Park.) So every house has this HUGE pile of snow where they toss the snow from their driveways and where the snow from the road is plowed onto the yard. SO anyways, this pile of snow blocked me from seeing her, and blocked her from seeing me. And I have to hit the gas to got moving because of the ice in the driveway, and she saw me coming out, so she slammed on the gas to get passed me, but all the slush on the road caused her traction control to come on, so she actually ended up slowing down, and then bang. A tiny little crash. Nothing serious, but their car definitely got the worst of thedamage. Sorry guys! We got to do some service on Tuesdayat the Old Folks home where we play cards on Friday, and we were waiters during their big annual "Star light dinner" Where they just go all out and super fancy to make the people feel special. And man, that was a blast from the past. carrying in trays of food, and carrying back dishes. Pouring drinks, the whole shebang. It was awesome. Then, we had a cook-off for the young men young women at church, kind of an iron chef night. It was tons of fun! The girls won, but dang, the young men made some delicious tasting chicken! Caleb is getting baptized March 15th. He asked me if I could do the baptism and the Confirmation the Sunday after. I was touched. Caleb is doing so awesome, down in Ottawa, he is working as a door to door bell salesman guy, and we keep on telling him that it is "Good Practice" He hates it, but laughs, because he totally knows it's true. 

That's about it for this week!

Elder Oviatt

February 17, 2014

Hey!!

"Elder Oviatt, are you ready for your transfer call? You're going to..... STAY IN PETAWAWA!!!" 

Another call came and went and Elder Oviatt stands strong in Petawawa. This is now my longest area, having been here for 5 transfers starting Wednesday! So excited. I love this place! 

So, a few weeks ago, Elder Losee and myself went to the dog park with Caleb, and I lost my name tag. Super sad. I have like 10 though, so no big deal. But anyways, Caleb sends us a picture text this week of him holding my name tag. Someone had found it in the dog park, picked it up, and clamped it to the bleachers!! So cool! I love stories of boomerang tags! This week we have been all over the place. Ottawa, 2 hours away from Pembroke. Renfrew, 45 minutes away from Pembroke, heading south. Deep River, 45 minutes away from Pembroke heading north. Renfrew again. Our mission cars have a life of 80 000 kilometers. After that the church sells them because maintanance and up keep become too expensive to viably handle. I got the car we have right now at 37 Kilometers. It's now at 14 500 kilometers. If I stay in Petawawa my whole mission, I could possibly take the car to 25 000 kilometers, meaning, I will have personally driven that car about 1/3rd of its life. That is crazy. We drive way to much.

Caleb is moved off to Ottawa. He has been picked up by the sister missionaries in the YSA ward. He loves it, and is enjoying being taught by sisters. Haha. Boys. He actually came with us this week to teach a lesson to an investigator. He did awesome, he bore his testimony and explained how he is feeling about the Book of Mormon and how he recieved his answer, and how he feels so good about the church. We're going to make a missionary out of him yet! 8] He reads my emails. He is a little in denial about a mission right now, but that will change after he meets so many great missionaries down in Ottawa. 

We are headed down to Renfrew tonight actually. Today all the stores are closed because of Family Day. We will have to do our shopping tomorrow or somethign. =) Or we will starve to death. Two options. =) We have lots of dinner apointmements this week actually. Actually, we have something every day! Woah! Didn;'t even realize that until just now. Anyways.

February 10

Hey everyone!

So, this week... This week was pretty good! Not a ton happened. We had splits, and Elder Messenger and I tore it up here in Petawawa! We had Zone Conference, so the mission president was up, and we got to talk to him a bit. The stake President was there too, and he had some great stuff to say. We had planning on Friday again, but I was totally clothed this time. Elder Losee understood what would happen if we weren't focused, and he wasn't willing to risk it again. 8]Sunday was great though. We had lots of investigators at church! Bonnie was there, Jennifer was there! That was so cool! She is awesome! She has started reading the book of Mormon, came to church and loved it, asked questions, participated, sang, like, just golden! Saturday we had breakfast with Caleb at a place called Janna's (Caleb is the name of the person that had asked me not to use his name. He told me last week that I should just use his name, because it was ridiculous that I was calling him Voldemort and Dumbledore and Gandalf. He is cool.) He may be moving down to Ottawa, which is great for him. Definitely his best option. Sad for us, be we will definitely still see him. We are down in Ottawa often enough. =) Anyways, that is about it for this week! Have a great one, Next Monday I will be telling you what happened during transfer calls! Saturday we get calls again! CRAZY!

Elder Oviatt

1. So this is a chain, carved out of wood! Each link is individually carved, and it's super awesome! probably took hours and hours and hours

"The fierce predator is on the prowl for it's next meal."

This is a leopard baby. Awesome. And apparently hypo-allergenic. And like $1500!

February 3, 2014

Hey! SO COOL!! So, every Monday, we open up our emails and we have the mission newsletter. This week we open it up and what does it say?:

"Dear Elders and Sisters, 

We are pleased to announce that we will have an all-Mission meeting in 

Montreal at 10:00 am on March 22, 2014. One of the Quorum of the 

Twelve will preside. 

More details will follow."

WHAT?!?! YES!!! WE GET TO MEET AN APOSTLE!! Needless to say, my birthday week is going to flipping rock! Anyways...

THis week was good! We didn't do a whole ton. Wednesday we had District meeting, and Elder Pehrson and I did splits. Elder Pehrson started at the same time as myself, he is the Zone leader here for us now. We actually got to do splits a long time ago, back when I was in Alma and we were both in Quebec city for zone meeting. It was a great split back a year ago, and this split was great also! we taught our awesome friend, tried to crash a latino gathering in Pembroke (it was already over though, so no spanish parties for us... =[ ), we ate, we talked, we sang, we laughed, we cried... OK, maybe not cried... We then Un-Split on Thursday and had a great day with Elder Losee! Friday was a great day! We Went to the hospital to meet the Aunt of one of our memebers, who is not a member, and we had a lesson with her, and gave her a book of mormon, then we played Rummy-O, because she was bored to death in the hospital. It was great, she was supposed to come to church SUnday too, but the Doctors had an appointment with her, so she couldn't leave the hospital. Then, We went back and visisted her on Sunday, because our D.A. got cancelled, so we talked with her, and we talked with one of the other womne who was in the hosptal with her, and she asked us which church we were from, and then told us that she had moved to pembroke about 5 years ago (From a town 45 minutes away... not that big of a change), and hadn't decided on a church to go to since then. And the she told us that she would love to meet up with us and talk about Jesus and our church! So, we were like... YES! And then she told us that she lived on Everett street. And then we were like... Uh... WE LIVE ON EVERETT STREET! So, we have a new investigator! She is one of our neighbors! And then, Today, our member went to pick her Aunt up and this woman, Jennifer asked if she could have Bonnie's book of mormon, so they gave it to her and they (the member and Jennifer) exchanged phone numbers and addresses and stuff! It was super cool! We will teacher her as soon as she is out of the hospital! So back to Friday. We then had a bomb lesson with one of our less active members, Cassidy, who wants to come to church, but broke her foot, so she is working on that one, the lesson went so well! Spirit was there, Members were there, all in all, it rocked. Saturday we did our weekly planning. So, Elder Losee is a very visual person. He is very stimulated by colors and patterns and lights and flashy things. And that makes planning very very hard. He is all over the place. We have yet to have a good weekly plan. Until Saturday. So, I realized Elder Losee's visual learning style, so I was trying to think of how I could get him to only look at his planner. I wasn't coming up with any ideas, because everything I could think of was like, build a room, paint it white, put nothing in it, plan in there. Or things like "Blind him" But I don't think my mission president would have appreciate that. Or him... Or his parents... Or anyone. So that option was completly out. But then I remembered! Elder Losee has a huge aversion to seeing me naked (Which is a good thing. If it were any other way, I would be a little bit worried...), and I have a huge love for not wearing clothing, so I decided to plan. Naked. Honestly, that was the best planning session I have EVER had, not just with Elder Losee, but with any of my companions! He didn't take his eyes off his planner ONCE! We were completly done in 2 hours! Most missionaries it takes 3 hours to do, and with Elder Losee it was taking us about 5 hours, broken up over 2 days. And then Boom. Streamlined. I should be a business man or something. Work on Efficency-ing up peoples businesses! Right?! Anyways, We have a zone conference this week, Thursday. That sjhould be great! And then we have splits, and then it will be next week, and next week we get our transfer calls. Insane. Anyways, I shall talk to you later, have a great week!

Elder 'Naked' Oviatt!

January 27, 2013

Gooooood Morning!! 

Actually, you know what, that is a lie. It's 2 PM right now. It isn't morning at all. Let's try this again!

Gooooood Afternoon!!

Much Better!

This week was a great week! Elder Losee and myself were down in Ottawa on Wednesday, and then we did splits with the Fallowfield Elders! Elder Freeze and Elder Messinger. Actually, funny story, Elder Freeze is from Southern Alberta, then moved to Ottawa when he was younger, and lived there for like 6 years, then he moved back to Alberta, and then he got called to serve in the Montreal mission, which includes Ottawa! Not only that, but he lived in the FALLOWFIELD WARD!!! He is serving in his old ward! How crazy is that?! Pretty crazy, believe you me! Anyways, Elder Freeze came up to Petawawa with me, and Elder Losee stayed down in Fallowfield with Elder Messinger. They had a blast, we had a blast, all in all, it was a huge blast! I have decided though that I don't like doing splits up here in Petawawa. We have a two hour drive to Ottawa, which we would do whether we had splits of not, so that's not a big deal. Then, We have district meeting, which is always tons of fun. Then we have a tow hour drive back. Which is the sucky part. Because by the time you are done lunch, it's like 1:30, 2ish, and then you have a 2 hour drive home, so that makes it 4o'clock ish when you are back, and then you only have 4 hours to work together before you have to have supper and be home for planning. Splits is great because you learn new ways to do work, and you learn now things about the work, but if you aren't doing much work, you don't get to learn a whole lot about new ways to do work, do ya now? Sure, you have tons of time to talk with your companion and to get to know him and about him, but that should only be part of the split, not the whole thing. Anyways, that was my rant. THanks for listening. Sad moment. We found out that some of our friends who were pregnant lost their baby. =( Not good.... We went and ate on base, at the military food court saturday, that was super cool! Super cheep!! Haha, we got in trouble there though. We have a member who is a cashier at the foodcourt, and so she invited us to eat there. We were the last ones in line, but apaprently we got in line AFTER 1:00 and the line was supposed to close at 1. So we got yelled at by the kitchen staff, and then they yelled at our member, and then the three of us laughed about it because, honestly, there isn't a whole lot they can do about it. we were sorry that they were mad, but it was kind of funny too. We had lunch this week at our friends house! The one who's name I'm not supposed to say! The one who I called Voldemort before! So, I was thinking about that actually, and our friend it totally the opposite of Voldemort! So, I thought to myself, who is Voldemort's Character foil? And I came up with Dumbledore. Or Gandalf. I know, I know, it's a different story, it can't really be Voldemort's foil, but they are both old, white haired men, so basically the same, right? Anyways, Gan-dore fed us fajitas. they were delicious. And Elder Losee went and jumped on his trampoline, which really didn't work, because there was like 2 feet of snow on it. Dum-alf got a video on his phone, but it was only 8 seconds long because he takes way to many pictures and videos and has no more space on his phone. =) Anyways, that's about it for me! Have a great week, I don't have any pictures again for two reasons. 1, I left my bag with my camera at a members house. Ooops, 2. I haven't taken any more pictures still... =)

Elder Oviatt

Janury 13, 2014

Hello Hello!

So, it has been beautiful up here! Nice warm temperatures, rain, it's been like 2 or 3 degrees up here since we left Ottawa! Which is super nice because... I let my winter coat in Ottawa. =) It's in the apartment that we stayed in while we were down there. I've stuck to wearing a sweater and it has been great! So glad I haven't frozen to death up here. So yes, our week was really long. Not a whole lot of stuff got done, but that is OK! We had our friend at church again on Sunday, and another guy who is 19-22ish at church also. He is actually from St. Albert, but got posted here to the military base. His name is Edward. He is super cool, he told us that he has attended many different churches, and is looking for one that he feels good in. Unfortunately, we had kind of a rough day a church. The things we talked about were great things, but for someone's first time at church, It was probably a little much. Luckily for us, our friend, Not Edward, but maybe I'll call him 'He Who Shall Not Be Named'. OK. So, Voldemort asked us after church if he could have Edwards number so he could go out to lunch or something with him and talk about the church. Uh...  Sounds good to us! So we asked Edward if it was ok if we shared his cell number, and he said yes. Hopefully Voldemort is able to work some magic and help dispel any fears or doubts. If anyone could do it, it's him! 

Uh, OK, so, Elder Losee! His name is Adam Losee. he is from Las Vegas. He is the oldest, and only boy, in a family of 6 kids. He is super awesome, and teaches with a spiritual power that is awesome. But like the literal, almost archaic, meaning. He puts you in awe. It's a great asset to have as a missionary! He is 6' 3" and towers over me. It's going to be a great transfer, that's for sure! Here is a picture of the two of us!

Elder Oviatt

January 6, 2014

Hey! Happy New Years!

This week was New Years Eve! It was... Well, quiet and nice! We had a little "party" thing at the church and there wer some members who had some friends there. We played Rummy-O and ate some DELICIOUS food (P.S. I've eaten way more delicious food in the last few months than normal, and as such, I weigh like, a ton. I've never been this "heavy" in my life. 8] It's redonculous) Anyways, that was Tuesday. Wednesday we went to Ottawa for District meeting. Tursday we ate supper with a member in our branch and our new friend (He asked me not to use his name, because these emails go on the blog). Friday we played cards with our old friends Ernie and Enid. Haha, I missed them! Last week, we don't know what happened, but Enid was a little off her rocker, and totally kept hitting on me. "How old are you?" "20" "Ooh! You're such a good looking Man!" Or, "OK Cutie, It's your lead" Haha, It was awesome, Elder Wright and I were laughing like the whole time. Anyways. Saturday was Transfer calls!! Elder Wright is leaving me. He is headed out to LaSalle, on the Island of Montreal. I'm receiving Elder Losee. I don't know anything about him, like, at all! So this is going to be a fun week! Saturday, we also were able to see our friend again, and talk to him about fasting. He fasted with us and some of his friends in the states on Sunday. It was really cool. He is doing so well. =) 

I'm excited to have some pictures of Myself and Elder Losee next week. 

We're down in Ottawa Tuesday afternoon, and then back Thursday night. It's going to be a long few days!

Elder Oviatt!