Busy Week

Hey everyone!

 This week was alright, kinda crazy though. So we went up to Juneau for zone conference, we left on wednesday and got back on saturday. It was good.  Thursday was the bitter sweet day for me, we used that as our pday. That was when dad gave President (Beasley)  the call about grandpa.  As soon as he got off the phone with dad he pulled me aside and told me the news. {Ashton's Grandpa Roney passed away early Thursday morning.}  We had some training in the morning, then after lunch a bunch of us played rugby with the tongans in Juneau.   After playing rugby we went to the glacier. It was awesome, we walked out on the ocean or a big lake for a while, I'm not sure which,  and got some pictures on icebergs and on the ice as a zone.  The glacier was awesome!   And there was a waterfall close to it, it was super awesome/pretty. Then from there a few of the missionaries went back to play more rugby and the rest of us went to costco with president or ran some errands. Then later that night we all went to dinner at this place called the Booyah grill. It was pretty good I guess.  At the Booyah grill had this food challenge that some of the missionaries tried to do. You could either eat a 5 pound burrito or eat a 2 pound hamburger with 1 pound of fries in 1 hour.  It's a whopping 35 bucks and if you finish you don't have to pay. Some of the missionaries said they would pay for me if I did it, so I did haha.  I got close but didn't finish. I felt like I was gonna die after I was done haha. I ordered the hamburger.  When they brought it out it was alot bigger than I thought and it made me laugh because of how ridiculous it was.   And I definitely paid for it that night and the next day. Our actual zone conference meeting was on Friday.  We started at about 9 and we didn't get out of meetings until about 8 haha.   It was a long day of meetings for sure, but good meetings. Then we got back from zone conference on saturday afternoon, and went back to work. On the way back from zone conference we had a 2 hour delay on our flight so to apologize to us they gave everyone 2000 bonus miles for their mileage plan if they have one.   It was pretty sweet.  So Juneau was good.  And we did start teaching a new investigator last week before we left and we're teaching him again today. So it was a pretty good week overall. And Alyssa got to go to Valdez!   I've only heard good things about that place! It should be fun for her.
 
So in my zone we have 16 normal missionaries and 6 senior couple missionaries. There are no other missionaries in Ketchikan, and we cover 2 islands.  Next week we get to take a float plane over to our other island, Metlakatla, I'm excited for that. Ketchikan is a good size island, but not tons of people.  Theres only about 7,515 people here, so smaller than orem. And Ketchikan is a cruise stop during the summer, so I'll probably see a bunch of cruise ships.  I am still in a car, luckily, we have a malibu.   And Elder Satini has been out a year, hes a pretty fun guy.  As for general conference, I'll probably watch it at the church unless we get invited in by a family. That's awesome that Lanes going to Madagasgar! And same with Taylor!  (two of Ashton's friends have been called to serve in Madagasgar!)  That's so crazy.

I hope you guys had a good week.   It was pretty good here.   I'll send some pictures of zone conference and all the fun up there in Juneau. Love you guys!

Love Elder Roney

TRANSFERS

Hey everyone!
So this week was good, transfers happened and I went down to Ketchikan!  So on the way I stayed in Juneau over night with the zone leaders in their house, Juneau is awesome! Then the next morning I took a flight down to Ketchikan and a short 5 minute ferry ride to the main island of Ketchikan, the airports on a small island. So Ketchikan is a pretty cool place, except for how much rain there is. the weather is alot warmer than Eagle River, theres hardly any snow at all, and if there is the rain makes it go away. It rains every day alot of the day. Yesterday and today are the first somewhat dry days since wednesday. The reason it rains so much is because its an island and a rain forest. Its a super mountainy island, some of the roads where our place is are carved out of the mountains cliffs, its really cool, Ill send some pictures. So my comp is elder Satini, he is from Tonga. The ward is awesome! They all love missionaries and are pretty missionary minded for the most part. And the ward is doing this 40 day fast thing where 40 people have assigned days to fast for missionary work and to break their fast they feed us and hopefully give us referrals. So far its been super good, we havent gotten that many referrals, but its getting everyone thinking of missionary work and how they can help. Its super good. The leaderships good too, theyre missionary minded for sure. Theres not tons of investigators here, we have a couple of invetigators were working with, but other than that its alot of finding. So the work is kinda slow, but its good. Our apt is pretty sweet, we dont have a dishwasher but we have a washer and dryer! Its a big place too. Its a sweet place, and our address is 527 1/2 Revilla Rd haha its a crazy address, I dont know how they got the 1/2, but thats not the address to send stuff to if you send letters directly to me. That one is PO Box 6321 Ketchikan AK 99901. Thats cool that you guys got to go to Cayman! You luckys! It sounds like your week was pretty good. Happy Birthday Uncle Blake!
 
Anyways sorry this emails so short, I didnt have as much time for emails today. Love you all!
Love Elder Roney

Northern Lights

Hey everyone!

So this week was good. we got our transfer calls, I'm leaving Eagle River and going down to Ketchikan!   I'm so stoked, it's in the very south east part of Alaska, right where all the missionaries want to go haha.   So that'll be sweet.   I'm taking 2 plane rides and 1 ferry ride to get there.   Also this week we shoveled off 3 roofs, that was pretty crazy how much snow came down this winter.   Oh and guess what? I saw the NORTHERN LIGHTS!!!   It was insane!  On thursday our mission president sent out a text to all the missionaries and told us all to go out and watch them.   So we were probably out there until 12:30 watching them.  At about midnight they just exploded and were dancing all across the entire sky.  There were purples, yellows, greens, and a little bit of red every now and then, it was sooooo cool!   They looked like the super cool ones you see in pictures.   But we paid for it the next day, we were all super tired all day. But it was awesome!   My little camera couldn't get good pictures but some of the other missonaries got some good pictures.   I'll steal theirs and send them home.  And it was Elder Coombs birthday, he turned 20 on Tuesday.   We barely got something together just in time for his birthday. The sisters went and bought the supplies and then they set it up and we surprised him, so pretty much the sisters did all the work haha.   But it was good, lots of fun. So that was pretty much all the exciting stuff that happened this week. Pretty good week, I went on exchanges too. I went with the zone leaders down into Anchorage, it was pretty crazy.   We were seeing people in the ghetto of Anchorage and saw some pretty interesting people.   I'm glad I didn't get sent to Anchorage.    So this week was good.

 I'm glad everyone's doing so good.   I gotta go, I hope you guys have a good week, love you guys!

Love Elder Roney

Wonderful Temple

Hows it going everyone?!
 So this week was good, it sounds like you all had a pretty good week too. Happy Birthday Dad! Im glad you liked my little box of gifts. Thats sweet that it arrived on the doorstep the day of dads birthday! Perfect timing. Thats awsome that you guys got to go to Jarom and Kendis endowments, that probably was awesome. So many missionaries in the family. Everyones leaving coming and getting their papers in and ready. Definitely let me know where  Lane gets his call too! and same with Ky too. Thats aweosme that OHS was good enough to win state this year! They werent even close to being that good when I went to school there. I havent gotten that letter from his mom or you yet, Ill probably get it today. Hopefully we can pull something together for his birthday. Dad, no we werent able to have that baptism on your birthday, we pushed it back, we still have to set another date, Itll probably be within the month. That would of been so cool to get a baptism for your birthday, but oh well, hes almost ready though. And I did get that box with the proactive stuff in it, and that tie, thank you guys so much! Thats fun that sister Johnson emailed you about us eating over there, theyre a fun family. The people up here definitely take good care of us. And thanks for the idea for district meeting dad, I think Ill use that htis week.
  This week was great though, we helped out with the actual Iditarod start! It was so cool! We didnt do anything super cool as volunteers, we only helped out with the bus stuff, but before that we got to go check everything out.  It was legit! The start we helped out with wasnt the actual start, this was just the celebratory start, the real start was the next day, but since most of the people in AK are in anchorage they do this celabratory start thing in anchorage.  Its really fun though, theres people from all around the world, and we were volunteers so we could walk around on the track and get pictures before it started, I sent some pictures of that. Oh and on Friday it was elder Savaiinaeas birthday! He turned 21, it was fun, we went to coldstones and ate his cake and some ice cream. It was fun, then on thursday at the nature center we played around by the river and got some pictures as a district, it was pretty fun too. So this week was pretty fun overall. Were still working with eric, were still getting him ready so hes still not on date for baptism, but hes close, I can see him being baptized within the month or at the latest the end of this next transfer for sure.  So hes doing good, weve seen him really change since weve taught him. Also, weve found a couple more people to teach, hopefully they turn out to be investigators. Oh, and we get our transfer calls this saturday, Itll be fun to see where everyone goes. But everythings going pretty good here, I might be sending home one of my SD cards today, its all full of pictures. So the pictures I sent, I sent a bunch of the trucks the mushers use to transport their dogs and all that stuff, theres some of the actual iditarod with the dogs running, theres a map of the iditarod and a big list of all the winners of the iditarod, Elder Savaiinaeas rainbow birthday cake that the sisters made for him, me and the district at the first bit of service we did for the iditarod, me standing on a frozen lake in chuguak, and me and the district at the nature center. So theres all the pictures from the other emails. This week was good, Im glad you all had such a good week, sorry this email isnt longer.


Love Elder Roney