Fun Pictures From Elder Hack's Photo Card!

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Cute Cute Children of Ghana!!!

Helllllllllloooooooooooooo to you as well! Thank you for the b-day wishes! The b-day was pretty sweet! I am glad to hear that a cake was enjoyed in my honor! I was hoping you would all go to that fufu place in Salt Lake or something, but cake is good too I guess haha! You know what? Not only was it my b-day, it was also Elder McKeon’s birthday as well! He hit the big 2 1, so that was pretty cool! We went to a restaurant to celebrate the occasion, had some nice Hawaiian style chicken so it was sweet! Sister Stevenson called and sung happy birthday to us as well, so that happened! Yep it is 50% USA up the steps, so that is kinda cool. It was a pretty good b-day! I mean, I got to run around a tro tro station for 5 hours ;) to answer the question you  asked, we begin at 9 and go until usually 12, but we ended about 2 this time because it was a nice big transfer! It went well though, just kind of stressful haha!  We gather all the missionaries being transferred, put their bags in piles according to where they are going, then we have to go and find cars or tros to take them to wherever they are going. We have to pay for them, we have to coordinate because there are two stations and some arrive at one station but need to go to the other, so we are just coordinating everything basically. Kinda interesting haha. I don’t think this is probably how transfers work in other places hahaha! But nothing went wrong luckily; I was pretty worried about that as I had made a few errors when I typed up our transfer plan. But luckily it all worked out well!  Elder McKeon and I shared a good b-day! We went to the restaurant and then we made the cheesecake you sent, lit the trick candles and enjoyed it! Yes E. McKeon is from Oregon, not sure the exact place. He has been out 6 weeks longer than me though. We are getting along just fine. We went and taught a lesson to an investigator that night and found out it was his son’s b-day as well! So we were feeling pretty proud about what a great day the 18th is! The next day we went to go and teach a couple who we just met. Their names are Ebenezer and Bernice. Bernice was pregnant, but it didn’t look like she was way pregnant. Well, when we showed up she was sitting on her bed and we greeted her only to see a baby on the bed next to her...she had literally just come back from the hospital after giving birth haha! ... but yep another Feb 18ther. A little baby boy, I told them to name him Hackmeister. We taught her and she took some pain killers about halfway through the lesson, then about 10 mins later she was falling asleep haha, those drugs worked! Kinda awkward... Transfers are always just kind of an awkward week though when you get a new companion, but it’s all good! E. Odongo went home to Uganda.  Not Liberia luckily. Those from Liberia are just having their missions extended since they cannot go home. That would be interesting I am sure. We do have a sweet apartment now though, we are having fun.

Glad you got the camera card safely! That is so great he was able to take it and deliver it! Sorry to scar everyone with the dog ones, but come on that had to be documented! Haha, sorry....Old Yellers time was up! But I will be sure to take lots of pics and videos as much as I can! That would be so cool to go with Dr. Meier next year or something! I am sure he had a great time! This is a great place for sure! IDK what you would be eating when you come here, I guess fufu is probably gluten free, but IDK if you could eat it with your fingernails hahaha! Oh well, I’m sure you could figure something out! He stayed at a place called Coconut Grove; I have heard it is a really nice hotel. You'll have to look it up! This has been a good week, but it’s really been pretty stressful. I am not a big fan of transfers, just an ordeal haha. I also am not a fan of drama, but its creeping back up again so that is fun...Ah well, it’s all part of life I suppose. We are working to find some new investigators though; hopefully we can work with the members and make it happen. We visited some less actives and we were happy to see one come to church on Sunday, and after church we visited another who left because he was an employee of the church and got laid off. It sounded like he just needed someone to come and show him some love, because he said he and his family will be coming back to church on Sunday so that is exciting! It is so rewarding to see people respond positively to the gospel!

As for the school situation, well I talked to Brayden and he is good with it. So if you could talk to him that would be awesome! I will have to see who else will be going to USU. I am pretty set on aviation. Sometimes I wonder if I should do something else, but then I see a plane flying and remember how great it is. As of now I suppose aviation is still the path! Good luck on the camp planning, sounds like it will be fun, you will think of something awesome I am sure!

Well, it’s pretty much what’s going on. It’s been a pretty stressful week, not too much to report on though haha! I hope this week will be more easy going, but we have to prepare for Elder Dube who is coming on the 12th and then we have zone conference on the 25th so sounds like it will be busy busy busy! But that is good!! I am doing good though, just trying to get into the swing of things with the changes! Life is pretty sweet though! Love you soooo much! Thank you for everything you do for me! You are the BEST!!!!

Transfer Planning!

Happy sunshine week! Looks like you guys are living the high life there in Vegas! I am doing pretty good here in Cape Coast though. I am excited for you guys to get the camera card! You will have fun looking at the pics and watching the videos I hope! Glad it is in a safe place now though, I always hear stories of missionaries getting their card wiped out with all pics, so YAY! Take good care of it! Sooo weird that it is my b-day yet again. I am indeed leaving the teen years, kinda weird. Yep it should be a great birthday of moving people all over the place! And getting a new companion. I will be with Elder McKeon, he is from the US. It will be my 1st American companion in a year so that will be interesting. But it should be sweet! Also Elder Seaman will get a new companion, Elder Joseph from South Africa. We should have a good time in the apartment! Will have to go have a happy birthday pizza after the transfers are done. That sounds fun that you went to the women’s lunch with all the Ghana mammas though. Glad some GCCM mommies were there to represent! 

Well this has been an ok week here! The highlights of the week were Selina's baptism interview with President Stevenson and the baptism itself. She needed to be interviewed by him because of the situation. We did it in the church in Cape and we were just hanging out outside and after about 30 mins she came running out clapping and smiling and jumping up and down! It was like after someone wins the golden ticket on American Idol! She was going to Hollywood!!! Actually she was good to go for baptism! We were soo happy! President said that was the happiest person he has ever seen to be baptized. So cool! Yes the baptism went pretty well. We were planning for 8 between all the Cape Elders but ended up having 4. It was great though. A missionary named Elder Chukwu (Choo Kwoo) baptized her. She was really really excited and happy; it was her dream come true. Oh and a really cool thing is that her son who is Brady's age got baptized in Accra the same day!!! He had been going to church for 2 years but was too afraid to tell his mom. Well, she told him she was getting baptized and he said, guess what me too! So cool! The Lord works in a mysterious way! She has gone through a lot, and it is a big testimony to me to see her baptized! Sooo cool! Yes so that was the big highlight of the week! Ah and transfers, but I told you about that! We had a nice South African soup for dinner with the APs and Pres and Sister Stevenson. It tasted a lot like your beef stew, only it had chicken. We ate it with homemade bread too! Can’t complain about that at all! It was fun! Well, the transfer has come, the transfer has gone! It’s been a bit of a stressful week as I have been killing my companion [his companion is going home, they say they “kill” their companion when they are the last one who serves with them before they go home]. It gets to the point where you kind of have to carry around a dead body and take the responsibility of two. So next week should be a lot more stressless haha! But it’s all cool! I am happy, I am healthy! Pepsi decided to start selling in Ghana again so now a bottle of Pepsi is 1 cedi as a bottle of coke is 2! So I am happy hahahahaha! But really, the Lord is so wonderful! This is His work! I am happy to be a part of it here in good old Ghana! I hope that you enjoy your little getaway in Vegas and you don’t come back to snow! I love you more than anything! I am so thankful I was able to be born to such a remarkable woman! You are the very best in the whole world! I love you sooo much! Take care!!!!! LOVE YOU!!!!!!!!

 Elder Hack with Elder Odongo picking 

up his package at the hospital :)

Thank You Dr. Meier!!!  This is the post I 

put on Instagram that tells about the package:

MLC - Picture courtesy of President Stevenson's blog!

Happy Monday to you all! Well let me just start out by saying WOW! You people are pretty cleaver haha! I got a call on Tuesday night at like 9 by Elder Davies, the area 70. He said something along the lines of, "there’s a man at the hospital from Utah who has a parcel." I had no idea what he was talking about, but I was able to finally get the full details out of him haha! I was definitely not expecting that! Yes I was sad not to be able to meet Bro. Meier but it was cool meeting Jonathan Curtis. I guess he is Elder Curtis' son right? It was kind of awkward meeting him, it was like,"hey there stranger! So I heard you have my package right?" Haha but again THANK YOU!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I am wearing some new socks, new tie, and ring as I am typing this! The sister missionaries stole the candy that was in Susan and Gordies card, so it went to good use I guess. But yeah, after we had MLC we drove to the hospital and located that bad boy! Tell them thanks for me! Oh and I gave them my camera card with my 1000+ pics on it so be sure to follow up on that one haha!  I am glad to hear everyone is doing good back home. Happy to hear you are taking me up on that challenge. How about everyone else? Everyone should do it! Right now I am reading both the BoM and the Old Testament. I am in Alma 6 right now and somewhere in Judges  haha. Let’s just say the BoM is much easier to read than the OT. I LOVE reading the BoM though, those quotes you sent are spot on! There is no greater feeling than reading the BoM! As for me here in my neck of the woods, life is good. I instructed in our district meeting on Tuesday. I instructed on Charity. It is such an interesting topic to me. It is so deep and something we can always work on and should work on. Both Paul
and Mormon really expound on it. I love Moroni 7 where Mormon talks about it. It is wonderful. As followers of Christ we ALL must develop charity. It is a commandment actually. The instruction went well, it was fun. It’s always kind of fun to instruct, but man it would be tiring to be a district leader and do it each week haha! After our meeting though, we took the time to interview each district member individually as there had been a bit of drama going on inside and so we shut that down in a nice way! It’s always something that is going on out here! There is never a dull moment for sure! But it’s fun! I was going back through some of my old journal entries and man I love reading all the crazy stories and all the wonderful stories as well! So I guess all these weird things will make for good stories  hahaha. Well as you know, we had MLC this week! It was really good. We have Elder Dube coming to tour the mission next month and we are also having zone conferences next month as well, so that will be really exciting. We talked about what will happen a little, and at zone conference we will have to present a training instruction so that will be good. Also, we talked a lot about obedience. That is   something President keeps stressing.  It was a good meeting. After, as you know, we went and got the package and then I tore that bad boy open! Again, thank you so much for everything inside, it’s all awesome! We then went to stake PEC and it was a good meeting as well. Those are odd days; literally all day was spent in the AC! Can’t complain at all though hahaha! The week has otherwise been good, we were hoping to have like 5 investigators come to church, but only 2 showed up. Still good, but not quite what we were expecting. We are excited though about Selina's baptism on Saturday though, it will be AWESOME!!!

Today was a good day, we had a zone activity at this place called the FIFA pitch, it is a turf field so we went and played soccer there. It was actually kind of fun! Haha odd considering it was soccer! I got some nice sun though, which is always good! Sounds like you guys will be getting some rays down in Vegas! It is also our subsistence p-day as well, always a plus. Oh and it is my 18 month mark, so some of us who came together went to Hayfords and got pizza! It was sweet! Yeah it’s been a good day for sure!  Well, this should be a good week here in Cape. All is going well, life is good! Thank you for everything though, you are the literal best!!! I love you so much, thank you for all you do for me! Never can EVER say it enough! Love you!

Happy Groundhog Day to you and to Bill Murray! Hope you all have a nice day and that the groundhog sees his shadow! Or not, I really don’t remember which is good. We only have grasscutters here, but I guess they must be cousins so maybe I will go find one and have him take a gander at his shadow (or lack thereof). This has been a good week though, on the news of the WWE in the ward, we had a great day yesterday because the stake pres came and released the bishop and Brother Ewudzie is the new one!!! Yeah I am so excited, it is gonna be sweet!  He is a powerful guy and will lead things forward for sure! That quote from President Hinckley is just wonderful though, thanks for sending it! [I plead with you to control your tempers, to put a smile upon your faces, which will erase anger; speak out with words of love and peace, appreciation, and respect.  If you will do this, your lives will be without regret.] How true it is! I will keep my eye out for Elder Johnson next month. Gotta meet the boy from the home village (Preston) since that is where my blood is from hahahaha. He will have a great mission, how lucky he is to come to this place; we are the luckiest missionaries in the world! 

HOLY COW!!!! I nearly had a heart attack when I read how much gas prices are! That is crazy! Man I could fill the Mazda for like $10 bucks then! Man here they do it by liters and it’s like 3.70 for a liter, so IDK how that really converts haha... Glad to hear that sleepy little Kaysville is getting the all star treatment! Just need an In-N-Out and it will be set! Ah I never got to go to the castle to check on the nativity, P-days are always hectic and every other day is hectic as well...sorry! I will do my best to get around to it one of these days though I promise. So my running shoes literally got stolen by puppies so I don’t have them anymore. I need to go buy a pair haha!

Well, the week has been good. We had the opportunity to watch the film Joseph Smith: Prophet of the Restoration with some of our recent converts. They kind of fell asleep, but I really enjoyed it! The Prophet Joseph had such an amazing life. I always love hearing about him and learning how the Lord restored everything through him. The Church is true and anyone who denies that is missing out on soooo many blessings! I know that Joseph Smith was a prophet because of the fact that I have read and prayed about his life and the Book of Mormon. The Spirit testifies. I don’t know if you are all reading the Book of Mormon regularly back home, but I issue a challenge to all who read this. I challenge you all to begin now to read the Book of Mormon. Read it daily. I have 6 months left; you can finish by the time I get back. I promise that if you begin to do so now, the Lord will open your eyes to so many things. He will pour out His Spirit upon you. You will know it is true. The choice is up to you, you can now choose to receive that blessing or pass it up!

Fun fact, last month the mission baptized 123 people. We get a printout each month as zone leaders and it blew me away when I saw that! Wow that is a whole ward that we are baptizing each month!  See how the work of the Lord moves forward, a stone cut without hands and is filling the whole earth! I am so humbled to be able to take part in this amazing work. Let’s see, this week on Saturday we had the trainers meeting for the Ward Mission Leaders that we were planning and it was great! We all instructed as zone leader companionships and it went well! We ourselves instructed on the importance of developing a ward mission plan and carrying it out with the entire ward! It was great; everyone said they learned a lot from the meeting. That is a problem here in Ghana, the WML's really don’t know what to do and what their duties are. They are usually just called and left with no training. So hopefully it will help them and the work move forward. OH and we had a great miracle happen this week. S, the woman with the debt problem who couldn't be baptized, informed us that she paid it all off!!! So we are planning for her baptism on the 14th! I am so excited, it is a miracle and now the family of the person who cheated her is even paying her the money back! It shows how sometimes the Lord will test our faith and loyalty but if we endure, he will exalt us above our problems! That is the great test! Well, that is basically what is up here! We are doing well though, life is moving onward and it is great! I am happy and healthy! Thanks for everything! I love you sooo much! You are the best!