Halloween Week!!!!

Hello everyone! I hope your Halloween was awesome. Mine was pretty good. My companion and I went to a total of 5 Halloween parties. haha. yeah, we're party animals. There've been so many great moments and sometimes I forget to say them. Here's one I forgot to say last week: There is a lady in our ward who we didn't normally go see. One night, we didn't have much to do so we decided we'd just stop by her house. We parked outside then said "Well, what are we going to teach?" We knew she had been feeling sick the past couple of weeks, so we said maybe we'll give her a blessing. We went over how to give a blessing and prepared ourselves for that just in case. When we knocked on the door she answered and got very excited. She said she'd been praying today that God would send her someone to give her a blessing because she has a big decision to make for a surgery coming up. It was such a cool experience and God's hand was definitely apparent in that situation. On Sunday, our investigator (Zack) bore his testimony and said he wants to be baptized. We were jumping in our seats. He also has AN AMAZING voice. He played guitar and sang for us and I got the chills. He is so good. My companion has been teaching me guitar. Right now, I can play Hear You Me by Jimmy Eat World and Already Home by A Great Big World. There is a family with a son named Aryan. He is two years old and was born with a crushed windpipe. He can't really talk and has a trake (I don't know how to spell that) but he is a bundle of joy. I love going to meet with him and I've learned quite a bit of sign language. Every time we come to see them he shakes our hand then says "pray" in sign language. I love meeting with them.

I hope everyone is having an awesome week! I miss you all! Have a good one!

Elder Needles

Positive outpouring

Hi Sister Needles,

My name is Donella Younger. I live in Bullard, Texas. Your son is a missionary in our ward. My husband is in the Bishopric and went out with your son this past Tuesday evening. When he returned, he commented that your son has a sweet spirit about him as he teaches the gospel. They were able to visit with several families in our ward and the Whitehouse ward as well. Our oldest son is serving a mission in California and I treasure the messages and pictures that I receive from time to time and thought I would return the favor. He is giving a talk in church this coming Sunday on missionary work. We are looking forward to hearing from him!
Kindest Regards,
Donella

His voice is gone but a delight to see him!

As many of you know Josh loses his voice this time of the year! Every Year! Even though he didn't sing too well it is so good to just hear his voice and see him interacting. How sweet it is!

Kind words from Texas

My name is Hilde Taylor and I had the opportunity to listen to Elder Needles give a most incredible talk today is Sacrament meeting in our Bullard Ward in the Tyler, Texas Stake. Your son told us he had been out on his mission for just about 1 month! Wow! He delivered his message about missionary work in such a dignified way! He talked as if he was about to finish up his mission. He testified with great faith how much he loves his Savior Jesus Christ! The Spirit was so strong! My husband serves in the Tyler Texas Stake Presidency and he was able to hear Elder Needles talk as well! We talked about your faithful and good son over dinner today. Wanted you to know he serves well and is a blessing to us! Thank you!

4 Baptism dates set!

Hello! Well, it's another P-Day and a lot has happened this week! First-- We've set 4 baptism dates.

Wilburn: November 8th

Zack: December 6th

Faye: December 13th

Dustin: December13th

We're hoping to move the december dates sooner, but if we can't I'm still very excited for them and am happy to see people wanting to get baptized. We had 5 investigators at church this week! Oh, and I gave a talk. People were pretty complimentary about it, so you could say that it was a decent Sunday! On Saturday, we went to a Halloween Party at the Robisons. Brother Robison scared the crap out of me. He hid and jumped out in his crazy clown costume. I almost swore. I ALMOST SWORE ON MY MISSION. hahahaha. It was so fun though, their house is so decked out with Halloween stuff it's insane. I loved it though. Yesterday, we didn't have our GPS and we dropped our phone in Dr. Pepper.... so we had to get people to tell us where to go. haha. The phone is currently in a bag of rice hopefully reviving. On Friday, I got two packages and three letters. It was so nice haha. I love getting letters and packages. I think I'm finally used to the Texan Accents, which is good haha. I still don't really have a voice though. It's starting to bother me because I lost my voice in the MTC and still haven't gotten it back. And trust me, I've tried almost everything. I even tried a nebulizer at the Robisons. It helped me breathe better, but still don't have a voice. Hopefully I can figure out something! Well, I hope you all have a great week. I still miss you all, but am pushing through.

 

Elder Needles

Elder Needles and Elder Ezzell got to go to the Movie "Meet the Mormons" with their investigators. I am sure Josh was in Heaven. He loves going to the movie and eating 2 or 3 buckets of popcorn and his big Dr. Pepper!

 Not sure what Josh is suppose to be....... Any guesses????

 Halloween Fun!

Hello! Today is P-Day and I love P-Day because I get to email all of you! Life is okay here in Whitehouse Texas. I'm definitely constantly exhausted, but that's a good thing right? It means I'm working hard. At least I hope so haha. I got sick in the MTC and ever since then I have not had my voice back to its normal state. I'm constantly clearing my throat and I cannot sing as well as I could back at home. It is starting to upset me that my voice won't come back. I've had this problem before, so hopefully things change. I didn't go back to that guys house so don't worry ahaha. We had 4 investigators at church yesterday which was really exciting. The Melton family is so awesome. They made us dinner and got my families recipe for chili. I was so happy ahha. On October 17, I hit my one month mark! My companion and I lit a fire and drank the Martinellis that Bryan gave me before my mission. It was fun! We went to the Fite family and they are awesome. They live on a farm and have pigs. They are another one of my favorite families in my ward. Also, it is very common for people to just burn things they don't want anymore in their front yard. I see it all over the place. I've finally gotten used to the accents and don't notice them as much anymore. I get to go to Dallas tomorrow! I'm excited to see it again. All in all, I love the people here, but still miss all the great people back at home. Have a good week everyone!

Zone Conference Dallas, TX

Celebrating one month!

P-DAY!

It's P-Day again and I'm so excited to email everyone! So much has happened since my last email! After I emailed everyone we went and played disc golf for P-Day. It was really fun! I definitely lost though. I got to go to Dallas on Tuesday! It's huge! I love it! We watched "Meet the Mormons" as a whole mission. It was really good. It made me laugh a lot in the beginning, but also got me homesick at the end when it follows the life of a missionary and his mom. Go see it! I loved watching it. I also got to see all of my MTC friends again which was awesome. Only two people are being trained out east and I'm one of them, and Elder Marshall is the other. Everyone else is close by each other in Dallas. I love it here though. I'm so glad this is my first area. We tracted into quite a few people and they have become incredible investigators! The spirit is SO strong whenever we quote the first vision. On Thursday, I met a man named Michael. It was the scariest night of my mission so far. He twisted my arm and I thought he was going to break it. He mentioned how he can taze me, mace me, break my arm, shoot me with his guns, and beat me up. He also told me I'm going to be a terrible missionary because I have no "skills." He is a very prideful man and I was as nice to him as I could be. At the end of the lesson he told me I have potential unlike other missionaries so that was nice I guess. I just wanted to leave haha. We are going to drop him because he was about to be baptized, but ended up threatening the bishop like he did me. Hopefully I only have to meet with him once more. But, there have been two more huge storms. I wake up in the middle of the night with huge cracks of thunder and it scares me every time haha. I'm really enjoying my mission though. Friday nights suck because it's football night. NOBODY IS HOME THEY ARE ALL AT THE HIGH SCHOOL FOOTBALL GAME. Football is so much bigger here than it is in Idaho. It's awesome haha. I love some of the people here though. The Robisons are still my favorite though haha. We're helping one of our investigators quit smoking. She's been through a lot in her life. Hopefully she can do this, then she'll be able to get baptized like she wants to be. Two of my favorite scriptures I've found recently are Alma 26:12 and 2 Nephi 22:2. Look them up! They're great scriptures! Well I miss you all and hope everything is well! Oh, and they have mcchickens AND spicy mcchickens here. I'm so happy. Have a good week everyone!

 Elder Needles learning

a new sport! Disc Golf!

Go TATER!