Where's Waldo??

Hey everyone!!!

So this week has been pretty great so far!! Our zone's goal this week
is to get 150 contacts. A contact is talking to someone new and, at
the very least, giving them a card or a pamphlet. To reach the goal each
companionship has to get 15 each week. So far we have two haha :) it's
just kinda rough for our area in particular because we don't really
have anywhere to walk around and talk to people. Most of the homes are
pretty spread out and no one walks around so it's hard to meet a good
quantity of people. We just gotta get knocking!
To make things fun though, we made up a little game. We called it
"Where's Waldo?" And the point is to contact certain people that meet
some funny standards. For example, the two that we got on Monday was a
guy with a beard (and a turban) and somebody that has a blue front
door. Others are people like pregnant women, people wearing red shoes,
someone missing teeth, etc. It's kinda fun!! We made a list of 20
people and the first to find 15 of them gets a prize!

So because of the whole car "incident", we've got to have a "car fast"
at least once a week. That means that we go without using our car for
the whole day. So after district meeting on Monday, we had the other
elders drop us off at the apartment, we had a little snack, and then
we took off on our trek through "downtown" Bethel. We made a list of
four or so people to go see and it took us about 5 hours to see all of
them. We probably walked like 9+ miles or so. It was really tiring and
scary at times (Connecticut very rarely has sidewalks or even curbs
for the roads...most of the time it's just road and then a row of
trees/bushes running alongside it) and my feet were killing me, but it
was good to get out and feel like a missionary by walking around and
trying to talk to people.

Today we are going to play with some investigators from the Danbury
Spanish branch. We have a few guys from our ward coming so it should
be a lot of fun!! Afterwards we have a dinner with a member in our
ward. She's going to be taking us to Olive Garden (I know we're
spoiled!).

We finally had correlation meeting with our ward mission leader again!
He's been gone for a few weeks so we haven't been able to do it for
awhile. Our bishop has also been gone for a month or so, so the ward
just doesn't do ward council either haha. It's kind of pathetic how
scarce our ward gets in the summer, but it's just what the culture is
out here! You live at home during most of the spring/fall/winter and
then you're gone almost the entire summer on vacation or visiting
family or going to the countless weddings this ward seems to have!

I'm doing really well! I'm still getting more and more happy with
where I'm at. As this cycle is over halfway through, I just keep
feeling like I'm going to leave, but well see what happens! It's not
really up to me...or even the mission president! I just know that the
Lord knows exactly where we need to be. I was so excited for Akayla
when I heard that she is going to be a trainer! She's going to be so
good!

Ummm...let's see...what else....oh haha it's so weird! It's like all
of my clothes and possessions that I use all the time are starting to
fall apart! My poor bag that I love is about to give up the ghost and
my p-day basketball shoes are falling apart a piece at a time (no
surprise there...I play way too much haha). It's nice though...it's
fun, it build friendships (or tears them down depending on whether you
win or not), and it keeps me slim and trim! ;) wouldn't want to get
all chubby would I?

Well...that about sums up the exciting parts of my week! I'll be the
first to tell you when we find someone to teach! ;) please just keep
praying for us and praying for our area. We need as many as we can
get. I love you all so much. Each and every one of you have played
such an important part in my life! Have an awesome week! Stay strong!
:)

-Elder Stafford