May 2017 Zone Conference Photos

  Elder Schaff's mission president and wife post many photos on the California Fresno mission blog. I love to see Hayden and the other missionaries learning and having fun together, hope you will too. I copied these photos of the Porterville, Visalia and Hanford Zones from fresnomission.blogspot.com. If you look closely, you will see Hayden below, in a dark suit and bright blue, geometric patterned tie.

Elder Schaff is sitting next to his companion, Elder Ennis in the top photo. He is about 7 in from the left in the middle photo, his suit jacket is being pulled off his shoulders and you can see his white shirt and blue tie.

Elder Schaff is in the middle of the line of missionaries in the top photo.

Elder Schaff, but especially Elder Ennis, are smiling big as they eat at the table in middle left photo, second row down.

Elder Schaff is singing in the back row, 8 in from the left. Elder Ennis is in the front row, 3 to the right from Hayden.

Thumbs up more Elders Schaff and Ennis in the middle right.

Porterville, Visalia and Hanford Zones, Elder Schaff is on the top row, 7 from the right, helping to hold up the missionary.

Porterville, Visalia and Hanford Zones of the California Fresno Mission, May 2017
Elder Schaff is standing in the top row, 8 in from the right.

Week 41 - The Heat is on in Selma

  Since it was a holiday weekend and we were doing other things on Monday morning, I had a hard time sitting down to write to Hayden. When I finally did, I spent a much longer time that I usually do and typed up notes that I had taken during our recent stake conference with a member of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, Elder D. Todd Christofferson. He wrote back a couple of paragraphs about the notes and then sent another email for the mission blog.

   I enjoyed your notes, I printed them off so I can go through them! It's always inspiring to hear the words of the living Apostles and church leaders. I've decided that the more we listen to their counsel, we open our hearts to God's counsel for us. We prepare ourselves to hear when the Lord calls.

   One of the greatest lessons I have learned on my mission, that relates to one of your points, is that Jesus Christ is all the difference. We would naturally be crushed by the demands of justice and receive a just reward--spirit prison. Fortunately, Christ's Atonement allows Him to offer conditions of mercy, through grace, because he paid those demands of justice. Although we are very much imperfect beings, it is by Jesus Christ that we can be made perfect everyday.   ----like a business partnership between a struggling company (us) and a company with infinite assets and power, (Christ) our use of repentance allows us to be joint heirs of that perfection. We don't own it, but we access it. It all comes down to that condition of repentance. If applied constantly, we will return to God's presence perfect. Teach everyone to repent and apply it yourself and you see miracles.

  "It's heating up here in Selma/Parlier, it has been 87-98 degrees all week, and it's only May! July is going to be brutal. Consequently, I have a bad missionary tan- super tan arms, face, and neck, but super white everywhere else. This area is on bikes and it's challenging in the heat.

  Investigators are making their way toward baptism, we had this guy, that knows the Bible super well, come to church. (Enrique) He is a talker. We had to show him a teaching record and explain that we needed to teach certain things, not just talk, and we finally got a lesson in and brought the spirit. He destroyed gospel principles class and did not like it. I was squirming in my seat, trying to keep the peace and the Spirit, because that teacher was clearly not taking it well.

  Then we got him to sacrament meeting and everything got better, so that was good. He wanted to come back at the end of it. (The Branch here does classes first and then sacrament meeting because the English Ward is in the chapel when we start.)

  Our Zone Leaders also did an awesome training about leaving behind all of our "nets" or the distractions of our past life; that really inspired me to go and do more! (see Elder Jeffrey R. Holland's talk...about Peter on the shores of Galilee after the crucifixion.) We were invited to write things down that we want to leave behind on that seashore, so that when we bare that final testimony in front of the mission, "we can be there without purse, nor scrip, nor a fishing net over our shoulder." -Elder Kennick, paraphrased  That really was inspiring to me. I set goals to leave those nets behind and had a better week. There were still trials, but I tried to learn from them!

  I'm blanking on what we did this week with the work! Well Betty has a baptism date set for June, but we were unable to contact her Thursday-Sunday. Hopefully nothing bad happened. As mentioned, Enrique came to church. We'll see how that unfolds. We're striving to teach people to repent more clearly, because there was a point about half-way through the week where we realized we had just taught about 4 "scripted messages" instead of teaching people. (Missionary principle: teach people, not lessons.)

  I've discovered recently that "The fundamentals of missionary work" that are taught to missionaries in the MTC book and "The District" movies are what help missionaries teach effectively. These are: Receiving revelation by: 1) The Holy Ghost 2) Prayer 3) Reading the Book of Mormon 4) Going to church. That's how people get answers!

  President Clark's Book of Mormon challenge has been great for me. (To read it and not leave a page until writing something that was learned.) It has been a slow read-through, but I have pulled more out of the first 4 chapters of 1 Nephi than I ever thought I could. Give it a shot if your read throughs are boring. There is also a talk by Elder David A. Bednar, I think it's "A Reservoir of Living Water," that explains how to effectively study the scriptures. It's a favorite of mine.

  That's all I've got! It's going good, but I intend to get it going great!

--Elder Schaff

Elder David A. Bednar, "A Reservoir of Living Water"

Week 40 - Ecstatic to Serve the Lord

  I had a difficult time even writing to Hayden this week because a horrible stomach virus plagued Michael and me all weekend. I could hardly concentrate to type to him, so he didn't get much from home this week, but this is what he sent for all of us. Enjoy!

  "We're striking the email time early today! The Zone is going to play volleyball and do some fun stuff later, hopefully it works out, but we're trying to do everything in the morning because of that!

    This week was awesome and spiritual, but also boring and annoying at some points.

An excerpt sent to my friends in the field:

*******We had our 2nd to last Zone Conference with President Clark this week, he leaves June 29th...We send our mission President home on my birthday.... He was very excited to be with us again and taught us some incredible things from the heart. Our President is determined that "finding when you teach," (PMG chapter 9, 158) particularly with less-active members, is the greatest way to find "quality investigators," who would actually prepare for baptism. Our Assistants to President trained on this that they called "Baptizing in Bulk!" They just found two families with 4 and 6 unbaptized members through less-actives. They explained one of our goals as missionaries should be to establish the church (PMG page 10). Reactivating less-active members certainly accomplishes this. 

Our President also gave us this little gem:  

Allegory of the Olive Tree - Book of Mormon, Jacob Chapter 5 Definition of Terms:

1. The Vineyard - The world 
2. Master of the vineyard - Jesus Christ
3. Servant - The Lord’s prophets
4. Tame Olive tree - The house of Israel, the Lord’s covenant people
5. Wild Olive Tree - Gentiles, or non-Israel (later in the parable, wild branches are apostate Israel)
6. Branches - Groups of people

7. Roots of the tame olive tree - The gospel covenant and promises made by God that constantly give life and sustenance to the tree
8. Fruit of the Tree - The lives or works of men
9. Digging, pruning, fertilizing - The Lord’s work with his children, which seeks to persuade them to be obedient and produce good fruit 
10. Transplanting the various branches - The scattering of groups throughout the world, or restoring them to their 
original position
11. Grafting - The process of spiritual rebirth wherein one is joined to the covenant
12. Decaying branches - Wickedness and apostasy
13. Casting the branches into the fire - The judgment of God

Read Jacob 5 with that guide and it'll make more sense for sure!*******

I remember reading Jacob 5 as a kid in family scripture study and it was so boring! I was wondering why there was 70 verses talking about trees! Now it's a much more valuable chapter, especially as a missionary.

 Coming off of Zone Conference was a highlight of the week. At the end of it, every missionary was inspired to get out there and baptize some converts! As always with returning to reality, however, there is opposition to overcome before that success can be achieved. This week our area was  giving us a beat-down. We had almost no success and few lessons Tues-Fri. Saturday was also a bit slow, but we found an awesome investigator named Leo. He survived a bad car crash that put him into a coma. During his coma, he explained that he explained that he saw a beautiful place that looked like a paradise, full of happy people. He also saw a dreary, red place that seemed miserable. He described other things, and then said he woke up at that point. The doctor told him it was a miracle he was alive and that he'd been in a coma for 15 days. Since then Leo is trying to follow God and do what is right. He decided to begin a search for something greater because, as he put it: "My Catholic faith was good, but it wasn't enough for my questions." (-L Bautista, quote paraphrased and translated.)    He wanted to go to church but something held him up. Next week? We had a good day Sunday and met a less-active member family, "La familia Leonardo." They were super nice and got excited about starting a study of the Book of Mormon again! 

• Diligence seems to be a key to missionary work. Rejection is inevitable. Some people hear bad things, are misinformed, or plainly don't like us. It's their loss. 
• Nonetheless this is God's marvelous work and glory, bringing to pass the immortality and eternal life of man! 
• Surely His promises to the missionaries and the people we teach will be fulfilled!
• As long as we obey Him and do what He says, we have a promise of success. (D&C 82:10)

That mentality has kept me going this week. I know I'm pretty bad about remarking precisely what's going on in the area, so I'll try to make a summary:

The teaching pool:

Laura -- actually lives in Fresno, but works in Selma. Has family in Parlier

Betty -- Likes listening and understands doctrine super well, but isn't sure about going to church

Leo -- just told his story above

Domingo -- Can only visit on "Domingos," because that's his day off.

Angel -- Wants to find the true church, but has lost hope he could actually do it.

Bella & "Skip" -- Like the blessings of the message but don't like reading too much. Skip works on cars and has a lot of tattoos. If you search "crazy/happy hispano" in google he might come up.

There are others, but those are the ones that really have prospects of progressing. We'll see what happens.

The rest of the teachings of Zone Conference were inspiring. The Holy Ghost was tangible and potent. If there was footage of that room, it would have been a great example of "how different people feel the Holy Ghost," from the tears to the warm smiles, or others humbling staying reverent.

President Clark gave us some of his greatest and heartfelt counsel, as he will be leaving soon. He taught of being "agents unto ourselves," or in other words, using every moment of our lives wisely. He mentioned that this was how he became the CEO of his own company after only 2 years of work after college. He continued, saying that far greater than this was the impact it had on his spiritual life, bringing him closer to his Savior Jesus Christ.

At the very end, the sister missionaries went with Sister Clark and the Elders stayed with President Clark. President taught us many great and marvelous things during this time, and gave us a charge to magnify our Priesthood authority to bless others and follow Christ. He gave us this medallion with Christ on it, and a scene of "The Good Samaritan" on the back. He then charged us to keep that medallion in our pockets EVERY DAY OF OUR LIVES FOR THE REST OF OUR LIVES, as a reminder of what we have accomplished together in the great California Fresno Mission, and that he will always be our friend. I'm not sure that I could get a greater worldly possession than that! That was my week! 

--Elder Schaff! Ecstatic to serve the Lord.

Week 39 - Mother's Day Call Home

  This last Sunday was wonderful, because it was one of only two days a year that Elder Schaff can call home. He was able to Skype with us for 40 minutes around 7:00 pm here in New York. He looked and sounded great, was happy and smiling. Emails are okay each week, but it was great to be face to face with him again. This is what he wrote home on Monday-

  "I always feel tired at the end of preparation day! Also, in the California, Fresno Mission, the use of many slang or abbreviation words is "apostate." The abbreviation of preparation day is one of these things. Hence, I have not used it! Other missionaries may find that strange, but if anything, this mission nets it's success largely from the sheer discipline and obedience the missionaries exert each day. President Clark has constantly commended us on these efforts, but also pleads with us often to not settle where we are but go even further!

   If you ever wonder why we're so focused in this mission that would be it. Exact Obedience brings miracles. We seek miracles. Speaking of miracles, as I briefly mentioned, those two Honduran youth that were at church yesterday were very desirous to progress towards baptism, we anticipate that the Selma Spanish branch will shortly be growing. Elder Ennis and I are seeking to do the best we can to follow suit. We need to shape some investigators into progressing investigators this week.

  I'm going to pause then come back."

  "The events of this week: May 8th to May 14th.  

Tuesday: Elder Ennis wakes up and informs me he didn't sleep. He threw up a lot at 1:00 AM. Stomach problems continued for him that morning, he called in, and was told to spend the day in bed. So as he slept, I spent my time studying and reading everything that sometimes gets neglected. I am well pleased to report I read a lot of "True to the Faith," the entirety of "Our Heritage," organized and updated the entire area book, read about 20 chapters of scripture, and a lot of the Bible Dictionary. I watched all 104 or something Bible Videos. I marked all our investigators on our map. Made some good food. Elder Ennis was incapacitated the majority of this time.

  I was rather surprised about how spiritual and powerful "Our Heritage" was. It particularly strengthened my faith in the principles of revelation and a living prophet in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. My testimony of Joseph Smith was also largely enhanced. I would recommend that book to really anyone that either 1) wants to learn more about "Mormons" or 2) Is a member seeking to strengthen their conversion.

 

Wednesday: Long day. Investigators were taught lessons, but several of them didn't seem to process the teachings too well. We are teaching an elderly gentleman named "G", and he really wants to learn, but he can hardly read and is sick a lot, so he never seems to keep commitments or learn anything for himself. It's hard to watch because he is really kept from the gospel because of his old age and physical limitations....

  

  This day we did find an interesting couple named Bella and Skip and taught them the Restoration. They thought it was possible it could be true and accepted to pray....

 Thursday: Went on exchange with "Selma Spanish" Elders. Worked most of the day in their area. Taught a man named Ralph before going to their area. He loved the Restoration until we got to the part about Joseph Smith getting the Priesthood authority--he misunderstood and thought we put Joseph Smith above God or Jesus Christ and didn't take the rest of the lesson too well. We explained to him that Joseph Smith was an important prophet, but could never be greater than God or Christ but he wasn't having it.

  During the exchange Elder Nielsen and I taught a group of 5 kids just about to light up some cigarettes of marijuana. They knew several Mormons and asked many questions and were sad when we told them we were out of time. Haha, the most interested people are found in the strangest of conditions.

Friday: Personal study was amazing. Read "Rise to Your Call" by President Henry B. Eyring and "The Greatest Among You" by President Dieter F. Uchtdorf. Changed my entire perception of my mission and greatly increased my desire to be much more humble. Anyone looking to serve God more effectively will get something out of that!  We taught a follow-up lesson with Bella and Skip. They didn't read or pray, so we had to read the intro to the Book of Mormon with them. We'll see what happens with them. They like the message, but aren't acting!

Saturday: Struck out all day until "the eleventh hour." (As Christ might say.) At 8:44 PM we ran into Maria and Alfredo, and they accepted our message and became new investigators.

Sunday: Mother's day call. We had to travel far to do the call, and returned to the area at 6:00 PM. All appointments crashed and we street contacted!  

  And that was Elder Schaff's week!

  I really enjoyed studying the doctrine of true discipleship this week. Suddenly, as we all strive to live our missionary purpose here in Selma the time is passing incredibly fast! That's the mission for you--it starts really long and then it goes by so fast that you can't believe it ended and want more. Two years is a short term of service to get acquainted with the God of this world."

--Elder Schaff

Link to "Rise to Your Call" by President Henry B. Eyring

Link to "The Greatest Among You" by President Dieter F. Uchtdorf

Link to "Our Heritage"

Link to "True to the Faith"

Week 38 - Heating up in Parlier

  Since I take our dog on a long morning walk each day, I am in the habit of checking the weather app on my phone to see what the temperature is, then I know how to dress for the weather. I have started looking at Hayden's weather in CA some days and couldn't believe that his area was expected to have high temperatures between 95-99 degrees late last week. We have been stuck in a rainy pattern and it is cold and grey and last week our high's were only in the 40's. So, I asked Hayden about the heat, and this is what he wrote back. Then I will paste his main email.
  We were also able to coordinate his Mother's Day call, I am looking forward to hearing his voice on Sunday and hoping that he will be able to Skype or FaceTime so that we can see him too!

  "Biking has been nice some days but Wednesday and Thursday were miserable. At one o'clock the sun was relentless, and I was completely wet/damp from sweat until 3 or so..... on the flip side, time passes so quickly on a bike. The weeks go by faster than ever!"

  "Well this area is great. But there is much to do, so I'm really trying to improve my skills. Elder Ennis and I are working together on how we can improve our teaching to our investigators. We found another 6 investigators this week. Ask the Orchard Park Missionaries how many they find each week, usually 6 is pretty high! So Parlier is indeed a fruitful field. However, we suffer because we only have a branch. There are not many available members for member-present lessons, which truly do make the difference if an investigator progresses or not!

  Our Zone Leaders gave us a talk last week which Elder Ennis and I have labeled "condensed awesome," but would be called a "Fire!" talk as the kids say these days. It's a general authority visiting a mission and giving them advice. He explains several ways that we can improve our teachings.

  I really don't know what to write. This week has been a lot of focus on improving my abilities! The time goes by so fast on bikes! Elder Ennis has led the charge to stop literally anyone we see on the streets, and I've joined with him on that mentality. We usually make 2 appointments for the next few days just biking to our next lesson! Talking with so many people makes the time fly.

  We had interviews with President Clark this week. He didn't say a whole lot in our interview. He just told me to keep being a good missionary and asked if I missed Echo. I hadn't really thought about it until he mentioned it! I'm focused on Parlier now!

  He trained us that we need to visit Less-Active church members and help them come back, and by doing so they will lead us to their friends who are prepared to receive the restored gospel of Jesus Christ. That was a training he got last week from Elder Nelson, the one in charge of the executive missionary council!!!

  I pondered about Joseph Smith this week and all of his life, what he did to restore the true church, following revelations from God. Finally, he gave his life for the cause, sealing his testimony with his blood. I read Doctrine & Covenants 135 and then the hymn "Praise to the Man" and teared up with the great sacrifices he made. 

  To the family---what is the movie that shows his martyrdom? It ends playing "Praise to the Man" as he runs for the window and gets shot. If it's a short clip, we might show it to select members we teach...

--Elder Schaff, with time up!

  

Week 37 - New Area and New Companion

  Last week Hayden told us that he was going to a new area, but he didn't know anything about it. At that point, it was just the name of a town. This week he had more information to share and also told us about his new companion, Elder Ennis. They seem to be doing okay and I am relieved about that, because change can be bad or good.

  Unfortunately, we have had a very difficult week at home. Hayden's dad came down with pneumonia last week and although the antibiotics and steroids are helping him to heal and to breathe easier, he has been completely exhausted and sleeps most of the time. This has put a lot of stress on the rest of us. Hayden's grandfather, John, was diagnosed with cancer last week. It started as skin cancer, but has spread to his nervous system. He had to undergo surgery last week and starts radiation for 6 weeks this coming Friday. So unfortunately, Hayden was reading about all of this yesterday and taking it in. I never like to write him with bad news, but we feel that it is better that he knows what is happening while he serves, so that we can all be on the same page and pray for each other. Life certainly delivers highs and lows.

  I decided to look up the towns that Hayden mentioned last week, Selma, Kingsburg and Parlier and give him some facts. It helps me to know where he is at. So, I will copy and paste that and then cut and paste several emails from Hayden together for the blog entry for the week-

    I know you are always crazy busy and have no down time, so I thought I would share a few fun facts about the towns of Selma, Kingsburg and Parlier. I hope that you will be able to go and take some pictures of their quirky landmarks on P days.

  Selma, CA has a population of about 24,000 and it is called the "Raisin Capital of the World." The town is about 207 miles north of Los Angeles and 209 miles south of San Francisco. The original crop grown in the area was wheat, but then they started planting peach orchards, but finally grapes/raisins became the main crop.

  Kingsburg, CA- This little town really intrigues me Hayden. It has a population of about 12,000 and was established as a railroad town by Swedish natives. Back in 1921, 94% of the town was Swedish-American! This month, about the third weekend of May, they will hold a huge annual Swedish Festival. I wonder if you can walk it?

  This city is home to the headquarters of Sun Maid Raisins. That is my favorite brand of raisins that comes in a red box. In fact, the engineering students at Cal State University Fresno built the world's largest box of raisins and it is on display outside their headquarters! Talk about photo opp for you and your new companion, btw, who is it!?

  Also, the town's water tower is shaped liked an antique Swedish coffee pot. That is another photo opportunity son.

  Parlier, CA- Population of about 14,000. This city has one of the highest percentages of Latinos in the entire state of CA, so you should have plenty of people to speak to in Spanish. A large majority of the population are seasonal migrant laborers who work the fields. This was also a former railroad town that first grew wheat, then stone fruit crops and finally grapes for raisins.

  So, there you go, fun facts about your new area. You should have lots of grapes and raisins available over the summer! (written by Jen)

  "We cover mostly just Parlier. We have a car but use it solely to travel to Parlier, then we get out on the bikes! Our apartment is 6 minutes into Selma from Parlier.

 

  Our area covers: Selma, Kingsburg, Parlier, Fowler, Caruthers,and Raisin City. Apparently we never visit those other places because there aren't very many Spanish-speakers and even though we cover all that we have the lowest miles you can have in a car: 750. Everyone says we cover that space to visit any members that live there, because that is the extent of the branch right now. So we either need more miles, or more members and more church buildings.

    Anyway, I'm loving Parlier! As you said, there are many Latinos. About 95% of the people speak Spanish anyway, regardless of race. We have been finding people to teach like crazy! It's been fantastic!"

-Elder Schaff

  "Meet Elder Ennis!!!

Elder Schaff's third companion, Elder Ennis

   Elder Ennis has been in Parlier all his mission and came out two transfers after me, in that December 14th transfer. So he has been in Parlier since I've been with Elder Lopez. This Elder is crazy!!! If anyone has mentioned to you about eating a horse or an elephant, hire Elder Ennis. I've never seen somebody eat so much! He says he used to be a food challenge competitor. The first day of the transfer, a member fed us, and we had caldo de res (beef stew). I, and the other 2 Elders had one bowl and one plate of rice. (It was a big bowl too!) Elder Ennis had 4 bowls, 5 plates of rice, and 5 cups of Kool-aid. He's always hungry I guess! He's gained a lot of weight in the mission he says.....

    As naturally expected, being in a small town with a lot of Spanish people Elder Ennis has become quite accomplished at "finding." This is the art of talking to people and actually convincing them to stop whatever it is they were doing in their daily life so they can hear the message of the gospel. Elder Ennis, to be honest, is LEGENDARY at finding. Anything that breathes gets talked to by him! At one point, we were getting in our car to go somewhere, (it was night, and sometimes we get off the bikes and drive at night) and then he saw someone turn the corner behind us. He said, "Elder, it's a beautiful night for that lady to get the gospel." Without further remark, we were out of the car and talking to her about how the teachings of Jesus Christ would bless her life. Just yesterday we talked with our investigators and were heading to the car to go home. Elder Ennis pilots himself into a random driveway, knocks on the door, and suddenly we have an appointment for Tuesday at 7:00!

    So what do I have to offer him? He is still working on his Spanish and his teaching. The first night, Tuesday, we taught our first lesson as a companionship. As we finished I asked how he thought we did, and he just stared at me wide-eyed and said: "Elder I want to punch you right now! Your Spanish is so good! I'm so jealous!" I laughed a little but we set a goal to speak more Spanish so we could improve together. I took it for granted all that time with Elder Lopez, but when I was with Elder Lopez we had some really unified and powerful lessons, and the language was never a problem or a barrier.

   So it appears strengths are complementing weaknesses in this companionship this transfer. Hopefully by the end of it we'll both be effective at the big three: Finding, teaching, and language speaking! We've also bonded very quickly. We established day 1 that we like to sing and belt out "how firm a foundation" with all our might, so we have been singing in the apartment shamelessly. We're loving the work and all is going well. So I guess that's as good as it gets for a new companion I wasn't too sure about!!!"

-Elder Schaff

  "Things are going great in the new area. I hope all is going well in my old area though. We had some people getting ready to be baptized. This new area I'm in is called Parlier, it's a small little Mexican town that touches a city called Selma, 45 minutes away from Fresno. 95% of the people we talk with here speak Spanish, so I'm in Heaven. I can approach anyone and have a potential investigator or even an appointment for the future. It's fantastic. Unfortunately we are only a branch out here. The building is nice though because an English ward also uses it. The Branch goal is to become a ward by 2018. We just need to get some people baptized! We found so many people this week that don't even have religion and want it in their lives! We'll see how it goes, you know it always is harder than it starts off!

    My companion is LEGENDARY at finding. If he sees anything that breathes he talks to it. Sometimes we're just riding our bikes and he'll turn into a driveway and knock the door and suddenly we have an appointment for tomorrow night at 7. His Spanish isn't the best, so I guess that's why I'm here. I didn't realize how good my Spanish has gotten until I lost my native speaking companion.

    We've taught some FIRE lessons and even got a man that proclaimed he was a Catholic and unchanging at the beginning of the lesson to read the Book of Mormon. We found an 82 year old man named "E" that said it was too late for him and all that was left for him to do in life was to waste away and probably end up in hell when he died. We told him he could still change his life by repentance. He asked how he could do that, we explained the process, and he asked: "Can I do that right now?" and he did, and prayed with some soul. Pretty sweet week.

  Hopefully between all the stuff I've sent you, you can make a good blog post! I finally got a virus-free computer and can send some photos! Hope everything will be well at home next week, and that some people still get something out of the blog! Till next week!"

Elder Lopez and Elder Schaff at transfers, you can see Hayden's red bike and his blue luggage.

These two were a great companionship, they spent nearly 5 months together in Fresno.

--Elder Schaff