Photos: Homer

Kodiak and back..

Hey everyone,

So to start out I’ll answer questions. I have not met Jason Bills yet, Elder Butler hasn’t either. Hopefully well find him. I haven’t gotten winter clothing yet, when we were up in anchorage we didn’t have time because zone conference ended at about 5 or 6, and its a 5 hour drive back to homer so we had to get on the road, so I wasn’t able to go to REI or any stores. So I’m not that prepared for the winter I guess. My health is good, I’m gaining some weight though because the members make sure you’re full before you leave their house, so I’ve gained 5 pounds already. And its getting harder to be able to run in the morning because it rains almost everyday and its getting cooler in the morning. :( Dad, I’m not sure what you meant when you asked, how are you looking your mission pres.? If you meant to say liking your mission pres. I like him alot, he’s way cool and definitely inspired and called of God. I do feel like Im growing and getting a stronger testimony, and I do feel like I’m learning the doctrine more. Teaching’s getting more comfortable for me.  The hardest thing is just figuring out how to teach with your companion, once you get better at that, your teaching gets better. The ward is very accepting of me I think, I feel welcomed by them. The ward is starting to get busier helping us with missionary work.  They’ve given us some names to go see. The bishop and ward mission leader are good. They just called a new mission leader a couple weeks ago.  He was baptized last year some time, so he’s new and hopefully he'll do good, he seems like he will, and the bishops good too. I definitely am glad Im serving a mission, and I know its the right thing to do right now. One of the things I learned in zone conference is that every phone call has to have a precise reason and only that reason to call.   Also, that the mission is like a roller coaster. Then we watched a short video about driving in snow and on ice and just driving conditions in Alaska. There was a bunch of other stuff that was talked about as well.  In the MTC I didn’t know Elder Flynn because he wasn’t in the MTC the same time as me, he’s been out just over a year.  

So this week was good, it was the end of the transfer, and they called and told us that were staying in Homer another transfer, so 6 weeks for me at least. On Wednesday morning at 10, our ferry left to Kodiak. It was a 10 or 11 hour ferry ride. It was fun but way too long to be on a boat.  The ocean was kind of rough, we had like 6ish foot swells and we were going up and down the whole time.  Elder Butler got sea sick haha, he ended up throwing up alot the last 5 hours of the ride. It was a super cool ride though, we saw tons of huge jelly fish and alot of puffins. It was pretty sweet, and it was way pretty too, even though it rained for alot of the ride. Once we got to Kodiak we were only there for an hour or so then we flew to Anchorage.  Kodiak is way cool, I liked it there alot, the elders there live in the church too. They like in this closet thing behind the gym walls, its kinda neat. The flight was fun too. It was probably the shortest take off I’ve ever been on, we were on the runway for maybe 5 minutes total, and from the time we started speeding up to when we got off the runway was probably 10 seconds, it was way fast. The flight from Kodiak to Anchorage was about an hour long, and we flew over Homer too. Unfortunately it was night time when we flew so I couldn’t see the scenery or anything. It took about 30 minutes to get over Homer on the plane and it took us 10 hours on the ferry to go the same distance. But we arrived in Anchorage at around midnight and we got to where we stayed at around 12:30 or almost 1. Then zone conference was at 10.   That was way good. Brother Walker from the Quorum of the 70 was there, zone conference was really good.  Then we drove 5 hours back to Homer. The drive was super pretty too, all the leaves are starting to change color now.  Oh, and we went to a wedding on Saturday.  A member and an investigator got married on the beach/deck of a restaurant on the spit.  {The ‘spit’ is a long, narrow piece of land stretching into the ocean.  There are docks, businesses, etc on it.}  It was way good, so hopefully he starts coming to church now that his wife’s a member.

A lady in the ward made a funny comment that made me laugh this week, she asked me what my name was and looked at my name tag and said " What’s your name again? Jesus (she pronounce it like Hesuse, like the spanish people pronounce it) Christ? haha oh no thats the name of the church! oh your names on top, Elder Roney" It was funny that she mixed it up I thought. 

Ill explain those pictures. Those are our apartments that we live in, the picture dad sent me is the street up from us, a guy named Chuck lives in those blue ones. Then that is a view of Homer right now, super colorful and pretty. And that picture of the ocean was a picture from the ferry dock right before we got on the fairy. Also, thanks for the package!  I got it once I got back from zone conference, it was on the door step, Thanks a bunch for that stuff, its perfect timing for those blankets too. And tell the Voeks thanks for their package!  The work is picking up too. We’ve been having more success tracting around. Yesterday a guy told us that he has company and to come back in a few days. He was way cool, he told us to come back in a few days before we even did our door approach. So this week’s been good. Its good that everyone’s doing good and staying busy at home. But I think thats about it for this week, thanks for everything. Love you guys! 

Love Elder Ashton Roney   

better week in Alaska

Hey everyone!

 

So this weeks been good here. We went on exchanges on Wednesday with the zone leaders. It was great, I went up to Soldatna from tuesday night to wednesday night. It was alot of fun I was with Elder Flynn, it was a super busy day which was great. We gave a lady a blessing in the hospital, it was pretty cool, hopefully she gets better. Im not sure what exactly was wrong with her, it was pretty bad though. We helped move a family, and we saw other missionaries! I love seeing other missionaries because the closest missionaries to us are an hour or two away. When we were moving, Alyssa and her companion helped too. It was fun to see her again. It sounds like shes doing pretty good in Kenai. Also, our investigator Michelle is being baptized on October 22nd! Its gonna be awesome. Yesterday when we were tracting everyone we tracted into was actually nice to us! We got two potential investigators from tracting too, and we picked up an investigator during another lesson yesterday, her name is Lily. Im not sure how far she'll go in the lessons, she asked alot of deep, hard to answer questions and seemed like she didnt want to really accept it that much, but she said we could teach her again on sunday and she told us she would read the book of mormon and pray about it. So hopefully next week will go better with her. Were going to try to teach one of our investigators Amanda Smith more this week and set up more times that we can teach her. She seems pretty solid and receptive to what we teach her. The man in the hospital that we gave to blessings is out of the hospital and recovering now. He and his wife both had pnumonea and another virus that attacked the weakest part of their bodies which was his lungs and his wifes kidney. And it hit them at the same time and went away at the same time too and they had they exact same thing, so theyre kindof a mystery at the hospital. Theyre both back at home and getting better. This week the works been picking up so this last weeks been pretty good. This weeks gonna be pretty good. Tomorrow were going on the fairy {ferry} to Kodiak.   They need our truck for some reason even though they already have trucks. But then on wednesday were flying from Kodiak to Anchorage for zone conference on thursday. Then were driving a different truck back to Homer on thursday or friday, Im not sure which day though.   Im excited for all that.   So this weeks gonna be pretty good. Its no good that BYU lost, they got destroyed. Its good that everyones doing good and staying busy. And its good that the weathers good in Orem, here its rained almost everyday, again, so nothing new there, and its starting to get into the low to mid 50s here, and its gotten into the high 40s. Its good that sister Fields sent you those pictures, they took that like the first week I was in Homer, im pretty sure it was the first time I did any service here. I should be able to get the right coat and boots here before it gets too cold. I know I can get the right boots here, but Im not sure about a good nice coat, I should be able to get one here. But I might be able to get one in Anchorage maybe but if I need help getting a good one ill let you guys know. I think the only way you guys could help me get that stuff is if I cant find a good one for less than $150 Ill have you send me one. For your questions, I have not gotten your package yet, I got the letter on friday though. So I should get it today, or if you sent it to the mission office address they probably kept it and will give it to me when im at zone conference.  It was pretty fun to be up on that ladys roof   The reason you have to get the moss off your roof is that the moss holds all the moisture.  If it gets bad enough, your roof could collapse or be damaged. Shes a member, but shes an older lady so she couldnt really get up there.   It could probably rot the roof too, im not really sure though.  Its good that lady's { a non-member gal in our ward} gonna be taking lessons, having the missionaries will help alot. Anyways, thats about it for this week, well I gotta go, Love you guys! 

Love Elder Roney

Moss!

Here are two photos of Ashton and his companion (?) cleaning moss off of the roof of a Homer, Alaska home. Apparently, the moss gets so bad it needs to be cleaned off before snow comes and causes more problems. What a nice service project!

So Many Ways to Say NO

Hey,

So this week was good, we picked up a new investigator, she's going to be baptized but we just have to set a date. So thats pretty exciting! The work here's still way slow, yesterday when we were tracting a lady said we could come back and talk with her! So that's exciting, and that was the first good thing from tracting in the last week or so. People here are ridiculous and just don't like us.   This week I've gotten all different ways of being rejected, I got I'm not interested please leave, and that was before we even got to her house, we got a guy that yelled we don't f*&%$#@ want any!, he didn't answer the door then when we were walking away from his house he yelled that at us, yesterday we got a lady that said I go to a church here in town, I respect what you guys are doing but I'm not interested, one guy answered the door shirtless and let us say our door approach then said thanks and shut the door, and a ton of other ways to be rejected, it's kind of funny but really annoying. So I'm not sure if very many people would come to any activity at the church, it's a good idea, it might work too, maybe we'll try something like that and see how well it goes. but that's fun the NuSkin party happened, why didn't anyone besides brolin want to go? Did all the cousins show up? And BYU lost, thats no good, are we doing very good this year? And Avery went to homecoming, thats pretty sweet, it sounds like it was pretty fun too.  Britts moving out, sounds like she's not too happy about that, she needs to though, It'll be good for her.  Shanda had her baby, that's pretty sweet.  Who did Orem High beat? Its good that theyre finally winning. But this weeks been pretty rainy, only one or two sunny days this week. Its super crazy that I've already been here a month, time goes by way fast. I've seen lots of moose too. It's getting cooler, it's getting down into the 50s and high 40s.  Last week it was super windy too, the wind was breaking branches and stuff.  It ripped up a roof of a store and we made sand bags to put on the roof so it'll stay down.  Its the roof of a grocery store, so its like a tarp thing that lays flat, but the person who laid it down did a bad job and didn't use enough glue so the glue didnt work.  I ate at the Loflins {this is a cousin of Ashton's paternal grandmother who lives in Homer} house yesterday.  She said I look like grandpa Arden.  And she said that grandpa and grandma couldnt have kids, so they got a blessing in the mesa temple to have kids and were finally able to.   So if what she said is right, we're all products of a blessing, pretty neat.   Participating in those 2 blessings was cool too.   Hopefully he gets better soon. Well, this weeks been pretty good overall. I'm doing good, I love you.

Love Elder Ashton Roney

Elder Roney

Hey,

So first off I'll answer the questions you asked at the end of the email. So the people are pretty weird here, theyre just kind of strange, and there's alot of older people too. The town is small, there's only about 5000 people that live here, and its kind of spread out too. So Homers a big area but only because its all spread out. Our schedules arent too bad, its kind of just how we schedule it for the day. Its definitely not as busy of a schedule as the MTC schedule was. We wake up at 6:30, exercise until about 7, shower, eat, and study until about 10. Then depending on the day we might have a district meeting over the phone at 10:30 or weekly planning or just what ever, then at 12 its lunch time. Then at 1 you do whatever, tract, walk around and talk to whoever you see, maybe service, visiting people or do whatever you plan and then around 6 we usually eat at a members house, then usually if we have enough time we visit a less active or investigator or dinner might end up going til about 8 and depending on where the person lives you won't schedule anything after because they live so far away and you don't have time for anything else. So thats pretty much our schedule, its pretty much whatever you plan. Then we do service at the museum here every wednesday at 10 doing whatever they need, we help people move alot, and just whatever people need help with. And its raining most days, if its not raining its cloudy, and we might have a sunny day once or twice a week. And its getting cooler too. I havent seen the northern lights yet. And I havent really seen too much wildlife, Ive seen a few moose, a baby black bear, some otters, some squirrels, and some bald eagles. I havent seen anything beyond that though. The cool weather's ok, I'm not hating the cooler weather but it could be a little bit warmer. It's been in the 50s and low 60s everyday. Ill make sure to buy another pair of service jeans and warmer socks and everything I need before I need them. There was that earth quake on the islands, I didnt feel that one, but there's little earth quakes everyday here and I've only felt one, it was shaking my bed a little bit and woke me up. I'm actually going up into Anchorage tomorrow, it was something about the zone leader conferences, I'm not really sure though. But I'll get to go through the temple for my first time. But mainly we only travel for transfers because it's a 5 hour drive up to Anchorage. Elder Butler's a pretty cool kid. They did change the training program up here. I'm in the first wave of trainees to be trained in it. Basically we do companion study for about 2 hours throughout the day instead of 1. And they have us study certain things each week, and we do a few other things, we do teach lessons at the very beginning too. We've only done team teaching though. Oh and we do our companion prayers at around 10.

But that's good that youve been catching the raccoons, {We're setting traps for raccoons that keep eating our cat food.} Its funny that you guys caught sneakers. {Sneakers is our cat, who is very curious} Its about time the raccoons went away. I also taught gospel principals yesterday, so I guess it was a teaching day for everyone! I have to go now. But we're able to do emails again on Wednesday, so I'll finish answering this one and dads email as well, and I'll have pictures. I forgot to grab my camera case that has everything. Also, if you could send me a blanket that would be great. I don't want to use the old one that elder Butlers last companion used. You should send that lion face one if you can or just any of them. But I'll give the full update on Wednesday. Love you all! bye!

Love Elder Roney