Hello Everybody

Well this last week has been great. Rain, then sunshine, then rain, then clouds, then rain again. I mean all this rain is really great but why does it have to be windy as well. So yeah that was this last week. We did a lot of tracting and some great less active work and met with some investigators.Here are some of the less actives we are working with

Brother Grow - Really cool guy. He is a college Chemistry Professor and spend alot of his time doing that. It seems like a lot of work. He is really close to coming back to church. but with midterms happening it has been hard to finish all the stuff he has. but it is happening

Brother Gibbs - He is Part-member convert whose wife is very devout Catholic and he just seems to have lost the desire to Come to church, but he still seems to have a strong testimony of the Church. So that is Great!

Tera - a recent convert baptized for about a Year now, we have been having a really hard time meeting with her. But I have heard that she is interested in meeting with us. So that is a good sign

Brother Thompson - He is a cool guy. He is really interested in gaining his own testimony. He was born into the church but never gained a testimony of his own and He has found all the really old Book of Mormons that he showed us. they are really cool.

Edgar - Edger is another less active who needs to gain his own testimony and seems really willing to change and he is working on his Word of Wisdom problem right now(drinking coffee) We have been helping him every way we can think of and we hope that hes is doing well.

Stacy Harold - another recent convert less active we have been trying to meet with So that is great that she is trying to find time in her busy schedule to meet with us.

We were able to find 2 new investigators this week. and they are pretty cool. One Lady from Egypt and a guy who is really old but really likes to stick to the bible for things. which has made him distance himself from other churches that have supported gays too much because it says it is wrong in the bible. So that was great. Well time is up now. thank you for reading

Elder Stokes

Pics of the inside of my apartment

New Hat and bird picture

Eating at a Thai place with other missionaries in the zone

and A super cool note thing(I really love it)

Castro Valley 1st

Hey all,

this last week has been exhausting, I have been learning a new area and doing alot this week. Tuesday was transfers and then I was off to Castro Valley, It is a really cool place. We have a cool apartment. It is on the third floor, and it is pretty small. butt considering all the time the spend there(which isn't very much) it is definitely good enough for what we. especially since it has a really comfy couch. On the first night I had the chance to meet our Ward Mission Leader and Our Bishop. So besides a lot of tracting(which I have done.) I am going to kind of tell you about some people.

Bro. Barajas - investigator - Bro Barajas is a long time investigator(otherwise known as eternal investigator), you know, the one that come to church all the time because he is in a part member family but hasn't decided to be baptized yet. I got to meet him while on splits with the priests. on my second day in the area. I was also told this is the first time that they had had splits in this area, so that was fun. but Bro. Barajas is cool.

Barbara - investigator - Barbara is a very funny person who is ready to be baptized, but she can't because she is on parole. She does still need to stop smoking. but there is progress in that regard and I think she will be ready when her parole ends. We have been told to treat her like a less active.

Shaion - investigator - Shaion is an teenager. Who has very little knowledge about god. In fact he is atheist. but his dad is catholic so he encourages him to learn about god so he listens to our lessons and tries to follow our commitments. he is really cool.

Robert - investigator - Robert is a teenager who they apparently met tracting and he is really cool and a great guy. I haven't had much time to evaluate my thoughts on him but he says he goes to another church and seems to have only basic knowledge of Jesus Christ.

John - investigator - haven't met him yet. but he has a baptismal date!

Service - for service we have done 2 things. Help mulch trees at this big orchard( this is a lot of work but a good amount of fun. any we have also went to a senior home where we go and hang out with the members. I got to play chess with a guy for 2 hours so that was a lot of fun.

Finding is hard in this area but we are trying a lot.

District - in our district, we are the only ones in the English program, everyone else is Spanish, they are also all in the same ward San Leandro 2nd. So we are kind of the left out ones. but that is cool.

Our Zone is great. there are a lot of cool missionaries in it. And we had a great time at the temple then we got to do a zone sports afterwards which was a lot of fun.

Well that is all for now. More will be told next week.

Elder Stokes

Pics: This is me and my new companion(E. Changchum)

Also the outside of my apartment.