Of Mice and Missionaries

Friends and Family, 

Transfer calls came this Saturday, and *insert drum roll*

...

I will be staying here in Rocky Reach! I am so excited. I was pretty certain that I would be leaving, because despite the fact that Elder West and I were doubled in here, President Lewis almost always has the new missionary lead the area after two transfers. He is going to be transferred down to Toppenish, serving with my MTC companion Elder Nelson! They are perfect for each other. I will be receiving Elder Aguilar, from Arizona. Already stoked for the adventures to come. 

We've seen a lot of tender mercies this past week. On Tuesday, we had a Zone Training Meeting and one of our Zone Leaders, Elder Tanner, will be going home tomorrow. We decided to throw a surprise funeral for him after our meeting so that we can celebrate with him. As he was sorting out supply orders and everything, we decorated one of the rooms with black balloons and streamers, and as we were doing so one of the Sisters got a call. Apparently a month or so ago, they had placed a pass along card with their phone number on it into a jar at Little Ceaser's to win a free pizza party, and they won! It was such a mini miracle and tender mercy to have a free pizza party on the day when all of our zone was together as we were putting together a 'funeral service' for Elder Tanner. So if anyone of you has been praying or asking that the missionaries serving in the Wenatchee Stake would win a free pizza party, consider your prayer answered! 

Elder West and I have also had a fun experience dealing with mice. Saturday, during our personal study I saw something black whiz by my desk on the left. I looked down to see if I could find anything, and couldn't. I concluded that my mind must have been pulling a trick on me or something. A couple minutes later, Elder West looked at me and asked "Do you hear scratching or something?" We looked down and saw that a mouse had trapped itself on the side of his desk and was scratching at the wall. I lost my cool and jumped up on my chair and tried to figure out what we needed to do. Elder West went and grabbed two glass cups so that we could try and catch the mouse and set it free. We closed the door to our study room, so that there was no way the mouse could escape. We maneuvered around, trying to block off his path so that we could corner him and trap him under a glass to let him out. At one point we lost him, and he ran right by me and I jumped back up onto my chair and while doing so I accidentally hit my glass against the chair, smashing it and sending glass shards everywhere. Elder West looked at me, in all my ridiculousness as a 6' 4" 20 year old guy standing on a chair waving a shattered glass around looking for a mouse the size of a pinkie, and said "Great, now this is ACTUALLY dangerous." 

We kept searching and almost caught the mouse, but then it snuck out and ran into a closet and into a hole we had found in the wall. We were pretty disappointed because now we had to deal with a mouse in the wall, but Elder West said a quick prayer in his heart that we wouldn't have to waste anymore time trying to catch this silly little mouse. After we had picked up more of the glass, we went to throw the shards away and to our amazement we found the mouse, trapped in our garbage can. How he got there? We have no idea. We got it into a little box and then walked up a ways and released him out into a giant field. 

I hope you all haven't had to deal with mice, but I do hope that you've all won free pizza parties. I love and miss you all! 

Con Mucho Amor, 

Elder King

Cheesy Jokes and Cheesy Corn

Friends and family, 

Since spring has fully come, and the blossoms on the cherry and apricot trees are starting to bloom and blossom, the ice cream man has also come. While driving through one of the trailer parks where we do a lot of tracting, I looked out of the car window and what did I see? Not only popcorn, popping on the apricot tree, but a hispanic ice cream truck. He comes and visits all of the hispanic neighborhoods and trailer parks and sells all sorts of goodies. One of the favorites is steamed corn, covered in mayonnaise, cheese, and Tajin, a hispanic salt/seasoning. He also sells sliced mango with Tajin and cream, and it is SO good. All of the children love it when they hear his song as he pulls in, and run up to buy a treat. One of our investigators asked if I would walk their son, Abel Hijo, over to get some ice cream. He is the coolest, funniest, cutest kid. I look at him as my little sidekick. I attached a picture of him waiting for some ice cream, with a big grin on his face. 

Miguel, our recent convert, has been doing great. He has invited so many of his friends to come to church with him, and every time we teach him he asks such great questions and sincerely desires to learn more and grow closer to God. At the end of one of our lessons, he sheepishly asked us if we could teach him to play Texas Hold 'Em. I asked him why he wanted to learn, and he said he wanted to learn because I'm from Texas. I laughed, and gave a quick 5 minute lesson, explaining Texas Hold 'Em, teaching the lesson that sometimes you have to have faith that whatever comes next will be exactly what you need. 

While tracting up in one of the smaller towns half an hour north of where we live and do most of our work, I found a fellow Longhorn! We were out knocking doors, when I saw an orange longhorn bumper sticker on a car. I ran up to the door, leaving my companion in the dust very confused, and knocked the door. The guy who lived there opened the door and was dressed in orange longhorn pajama pants and an orange polo. We spent time sharing stories about the Eyes of Texas and the beauty of Austin, and he made the point that Texas must be the best because you won't find anyone else living up in the middle of nowhere of Washington, boasting about some other University/State! Hook 'em!

On Saturday, this little 90 year old lady named Opal asked if we could help her trim some of her shrubs and her trees. We showed up expecting to just do all of it ourselves, but there she was outside with her work gloves, already started pulling weeds. We pleaded with her that we could just do it all so that she could stay inside and rest, but she insisted on helping out herself. She was out working hard and lugging branches and tools all over the yard! I asked her what the secret was, how she was able to scoot about at the young age of 90, and her reply was "Smile often, work outside, and eat a TON of oatmeal." 

I hope you all had a fun April Fool's Day, I'll leave you with a cheesy joke. 

What did the hat say to the hat rack?

"You stay here, I'll go on a head."

Con Mucho Amor, 

Elder King