Working

Elders Brady &  Schenk at the Iwo Jima Memorial

     Last Monday we went into DC all day with a member family that is
friends with Elder Schenk's 

family and used to live in California but
now live out here, and a pair of sister missionaries they brought as
well. We went to the Iwo Jima Memorial first and I have to say it's
probably one of my favorites so far. After that we went to the Tomb of
the Unknown Soldier and got to see the changing of the guard, that was
pretty cool. When that was over we went to the Lincoln Memorial
because one of the Sisters had never been to DC yet and wanted to see
that one. Since Elder Schenk and I have seen it multiple times already
we just sat on the stairs and watched everybody go by. This guy and
girl came up to us and the girl was like "my mom loves missionaries!"
So she took a selfie with us to send to her mom so that was fun.

Elder Schenk & Elder Brady at the
Tomb of the Unknown Soldier

     Tuesday we had an interesting District Meeting, Elder Schenk is our District Leader so it's never boring, but this one was awesome. He had
us all stand on the table and do the trust fall. It sure made everyone
lighten up and laugh some. 

     Wednesday I went on an exchange with Elder Falslev in Annandale, he goes home at the end of this transfer. We went and saw this guy they have been seeing and he asked me if I had accepted Jesus yet. Then he said if I 
need any help just come talk to him, he was an interesting guy. After that we went to dinner and then we went around all night seeing people. It was actually a really fun exchange and was better than I thought it was going to be. Plus I got to be in a car for that time so that's always a plus!

Look what I found at the Arlington Cemetery

     On Thursday Brother Carlisle came out with Elder Schenk and I on splits. We went and met with one of Brother Carlisle's home teaching families and taught them, well the kids, a lesson on obedience. Then we went and tried to see one of our investigators, but no one was home and by this time it was almost time for us to be home, but Brother Carlisle said he had something to show us. He took us to this huge oak tree in his neighborhood and it was gigantic! Schenk wrapped his arms around it, but it took him four and half times doing that to get around it. Yeah it was pretty darn big.
     It rained then snowed and then rained again all day Friday. We were pretty wet by the time we got to dinner and then we dried off a little, but dinner happened to be in the very bottom of our area. It takes us about 45 minutes to bike there. So needless to say by the time we got home that night we were drenched and more than a little cold. Our bikes were cleanish though! 
     Saturday we struck out on everybody we tried to see. It was definitely a bummer of a day.
     On Sunday we were at the church for seven and a half hours. We had a couple meetings before church and then after church we had correlation with the Ward Missionaries and the bishop. Oh the bishop is Bishop McConkie and he is related to Bruce R. McConkie! But anyway yeah so Sunday was a long day at the church and we were pretty tired at the end of the day not to mention dying of starvation. Altogether it was a good week and I hope everyone had a good week too! Love you guys! 
     ~ Elder Brady

"Ours is the responsibility to keep our lights bright for others to see and follow."
          - Thomas S. Monson

Stealth Mode‏

     Had a good week this week, we got two new investigators! Monday we went shopping and then emailed. After that we went to the stake center and played some basketball for the rest of Preparation Day. After dinner we walked to the Stake President's house, President Bush, and talked with his family about their personal missionary work goals. They have a dog named Maximus and he ended up laying on my feet and I rubbed his side till he fell asleep. Warmed my feet right up! That was good because it rained all dayyy.     On Tuesday we had District Meetings and it was pretty funny. Elder Schenk is our District Leader so it's always a party. When we were practice teaching he tied his tie around the eyes of one elder and put his backpack on the head of another, it was pretty funny. Later that night Elder Schenk and I helped a guy who was parked on the side of the road with his hazards on. It was a pretty busy road so we decided we would push him down around the corner to get out of the way so we wouldn't die. Got the car working though so it worked out. President Bush came with us on an exchange to see some potentials and none really worked out. Bummer.     Wednesday we met with the Sanchez family, they are a less-active family that came to church for the first time in ten years last week. They're pretty cool and we get to see them every Wednesday. I don't know why but we laughed a lot today, oh well it's good for you.     Thursday our sink broke, and we locked ourselves out of our apartment. Our apartment is a lock out apartment so we can't forget the keys but yep, we forgot them and subsequently we were locked out for the rest of the night. Went stealth mode and got back in though so it's ok. Now for the sink, we think something is wrong with the disposal but Schenk was in looking at it and it like threw up nastiness and almost hit him. He dived out of the kitchen, landed on the ground and army crawled to get further away!      Friday we did a lot of biking but it all worked out. We got a new investigator named Komonte. I'll take all the biking for that.      Saturday we had a Whole Mission Conference, Elder Holstrom and Elder Perkins of the Seventy came and spoke to us. A lot of it was about letting the mission better you for the rest of your life, it was really good. We also got our second new investigator, his name is Clifton. It was another pretty good day.      Sunday was good, we went to church and then came home and got ready to go to dinner. We had dinner at our Ward Mission Leader's house, the Capatingan's. After dinner we went to see some people but yet again nothing seemed to work out. Well I hope everyone has a good week! Love you all and I love hearing from everyone!      ~ Elder Brady

Transfers

     It was transfer week this week and I did get transferred, my new area is the Wakefield A area. My new address is:

9930 Fairfax Square

Apartment #13

Fairfax, VA 22031

     So to start the week last Monday we had a pretty good, relaxing preparation day. We went shopping then emailed and then just hung out at our apartment. At one point we went and played some catch with a football and that was awesome. Boy do I miss that game. I think I'm getting Elder Oyler on the 

football train because now he wants to play catch all the time! Oh yeahhhh mission accomplished! 

     Tuesday something exciting happened.... It SNOWED!!!! Not going to lie I was pretty excited about that ha. Finally got some good ole white covering the ground. (Even if it was only an inch) Tuesday night we also got transfer calls and obviously I ended up leaving The Fort. I was kind of sad about it because I've got some good friends in that ward, plus Elder Oyler. Love that guy. But 

it's time for me to be in a new place and to meet new people.

     Wednesday was my last day in Fort Belvoir so it was a pack/say bye day. I started packing in the morning and that took longer than I expected, I guess I had more junk than I thought....oops. That night we went to the Doyle's and saw them for awhile and said good-bye. We didn't get to stay very long because Jason and Nathaniel had to go to scouts. Then we went to the Kough's and of course Sister Kough had food for us. She always has food ready it's ridiculous, and she always makes us eat a lot of it haha. Anyways so we were there for awhile and I was on the couch and Alma came over and told me to scoot over because she wanted to sit by me. So obviously I scooted on over and she crawled up and sat next to me for the rest of the night. As we were leaving she came up to me and gave me a picture of her, she is so cute.

     Thursday was Transfer day and I was nervous because I wanted to get a good companion. President Riggs must have known I was nervous or something because I was one of the last ones to get called. My new companion is Elder Schenk...score! He is pretty cool and he is from California. It should be another good transfer. He has this remote control car he always plays with and it's pretty entertaining not going to lie.

     Friday night was a tough night. It was pretty cold and the sidewalks here still have iced over snow so it makes biking difficult to say the least. The area is pretty big too it is usually a car area but hasn't been the last transfer or two, another missionary broke his collarbone so he needed the car. Oh well biking in the cold is good for you, builds character I've heard ha. 

     On Saturday we tried to see some potential investigators but no luck. We did find a little stream that was iced over and we had the genius idea of ice skating! Well we tried but I guess you kind of need ice skates or something for that to really work, who knew? We had dinner at a members home, the Atkinson's and it was almost a missionary dinner, we has sub sandwiches! It was pretty funny I thought haha. 

     My first Sunday in the new ward was pretty good, well we got some hot cocoa mix so we got that going for us. After church we went to a dinner/lesson at the William's house. They had invited one of our investigators (Randy) to dinner so we got invited as well. The lesson ended up being like two hours long, Randy can talk. He does know a lot of history about the church and the Book of Mormon and Bible so it's pretty cool to talk with him about those things. He is a very facts/history oriented guy and likes to see things line up on a time line, so teaching him is going to be challenging. We are going to brush up on our history! 

     Altogether it was a pretty good week. Hope everyone had a good week as well and I love you all! New area and new companion = new mission, or so President Riggs says. Let it begin!

     Oh and Happy Birthday to my two little cousins, Olivia Potter and Ella Davis!!

     Love, Elder Brady

Happy New Year 2015!

     Happy New Year everybody! I hope it was a good one and you enjoyed it. I had another great week in The Fort. Monday we went into DC for our preparation day and got a tour of the Air and Space Museum, Brother Paone works there and he gave us a free tour. Just to show you how much he knows and how big the museum is this was my second tour of the Air and Space from Brother Paone and I still saw and learned things I hadn't the first time. It was great! I think my favorite part is the military exhibits though, they really intrigue me. All the stories and information about our military is just amazing and gives me even more respect for them.
     Tuesday was a good day for us. We found two potential investigators. Our first one was at McDonalds, oh yeah! Elder Oyler wanted some food so that's where we went and then he got into a gospel discussion with the girl that was taking his order. We exchanged contact info and as easy as that we had a potential! It was sweet! Then as we were leaving Elder Oyler looked back at me for some reason and smack! He ran straight into the door haha I died! Laughed all the way across the parking lot and that just started the night off great. Then we went to a referral and this guy is so ready for the Gospel. He has been going to a different Ward four weeks already! He said he wants to become a full member by July, I looked at him and said we can help you with that! Haha it was a good night.

Elder Oyler & Elder Brady on New
Year's Eve directing traffic at the
Washington DC Temple Celebration

     On New Years Eve we got to direct traffic at the temple. We rode up there with the other elders in our apartment and another pair of elders from the Mt. Vernon Ward. It wasn't that cold so it was actually pretty fun. A little bit into the night we started playing with the walky-talkies and doing code talk to the other elders just to pass the time along, it was some pretty funny stuff. Don't trust a handful of 19 and 20 year old guys with walkie-talkies I guess haha.     Thursday night we met with Reyna. (Potential we met at McDonalds) She wasn't home yet but there was three guys outside her house that we started talking to. They were high as could be. When Reyna got there Elder Oyler started talking to her and I continued talking with the guys to kind of keep them out of the conversation, we were just trying to make it a little easier on Reyna so she didn't have distractions. Not going to lie I had a pretty... interesting conversation with one of the guys, he jumped all over the place. We talked about hunting and somehow ended up talking about aliens and other things. Oh and we had a push-up contest haha. At 9:00 and in someone's driveway.... It was an interesting night haha.
     Saturday it rained. A lot. We tried to wait it out and it did stop, it stopped just long enough for us to get to one of our appointments. When we came out of that one it was pouring again. We only had to go a short ways to our next one, but by the time we got there we were soaked. It just so happened that the house we were at was the Kough's so we got food like always and got to warm up and dry off. When it was time to go home it was still pouring so Matt gave us a ride home and we just left our bikes there. We went back and got them the next day. Good thing the Kough family is so awesome haha. Well that was pretty much my week. Have a great week everyone!

     ~ Elder Brady

Elder Strawn & Elder Brady

Doing some service by preparing a garden for our ward mission leader 

Elder Oyler's new friend

Funny sign at a church

Christmas Week

     Another good week, but it was also snowless. That was bummer. First 

Christmas without snow. ... I hope you all had better luck haha.     Monday we had a white elephant gift exchange as a zone activity. You pretty much had a bunch of missionaries scrambling around their apartment, looking in the narnia closets trying to find something to take. At least that's what happened in our apartment ha. It was actually a pretty good white elephant given the fact it was all missionaries...and we are all broke.... Whoo! It's all good because we played some basketball too so it wasn't a complete bust of a Monday.     On Tuesday we had yet again another great district meeting. Elder Rothermel (older couple missionary) said something that I thought was pretty significant. He said, "The Lord, when he was in Gethsemane, didn't say nope this isn't for me. He had self-discipline." Thinking about that for awhile I realized he was right. Christ went through so much for me, for all of us, I want to give back the little I can. After district meeting I went on an exchange with Elder Erickson. He is a Spanish elder so that was interesting....I pretty much just   sat there while he went crazy in Spanish woo hoo!

Elder Brady having some fun with Alma

     Wednesday Elder Oyler and I had dinner at the Kough's and it was great! We also went caroling as a district that night and that was awesome. Almost every door we went to and sang at the people were so excited and they all said they've never had Carolers before, that they had only ever seen it on T.V. That blew my face right off! I immediately felt bad for not really wanting to go at the beginning, but it turned out to be a great experience. It was a good Christmas Eve.
     Thursday....CHRISTMAS!!!! It was great we woke up and opened presents haha that was fun! Then we played some games and ate breakfast and just relaxed. The best part was getting to skype home though. I loved seeing them and talking with them was so great.
The rest of the week we have spent trying to get back into the groove of missionary work and oh boy is that tough. Partly because we want it to be Christmas again and partly because everyone is still gone on Christmas vacation. Oh well the work goes on. Hope everyone had a great Christmas and hope everyone has a great New Years!      Love,     Elder Brady

Chillin'

Messing around with our Mike Wozowski

Candy cake Mataia made and sent

Merry Christmas!

     I want to wish everyone a Merry Christmas! Hope it's a great one and we all remember Christ, Our Savior, through the holidays.

     Another good week in Fort Belvoir. On Monday we went with our whole district (two sets of elders, a set of sisters, and a senior missionary couple) to Gunston Hall which was the home of George Mason. It was huge! It was also pretty cool because there was like no one else there so it was a private tour pretty much. After we went through the house we got to walk around the grounds. Behind the house there is hills dropping down into woods on the side of the Potomac. It was a great view. The peace of the outdoors is one of my favorite things ever! Later that night as Elder Oyler and I were biking home we started trying to dance. On our bikes. It was interesting and I'm sure we looked ridiculous but it's ok haha we have done it two or three times since then so obviously we don't care how crazy we look. We look pretty crazy a lot of the time I'm sure. Oh well it makes things fun!

     Tuesday at District Meetings I taught on a Christ-like attribute, I taught about diligence. I made it super easy on myself and showed a video after explaining diligence a little bit. In the video it talks about a lot of great things. (The video is on my Facebook page, so go watch it if you want to). Something I stressed when I was teaching was "Be yourself." Be yourself and don't let the negativity of the world get to you and drag you down. Stay diligent no matter what others think and no matter what they say.

     We had interviews with President Riggs on Thursday and it was great! We get to talk to him about whatever we want to, and if he wants to talk about anything with us. He shared three stories with me that helped me see how I can become a better missionary. It's nice having help sometimes. I know that's true in everyday life as well.     Friday morning we helped a couple move. They don't have very much stuff so we got it all packed and over to their new house fairly quickly, and the unpacking didn't take that long either. It was the couches that took forever to get into their house! Elder Strawn and I got the first (and smallest) couch in the house and it only took us about 15 minutes I'd say. The next couch was the bruiser. It was the last thing we had to get into the house, everything else was done. We took the legs off of it and got it standing up just inside the door which was the only way we could get it in the front door. Once we got it there though we were stuck because we had to go at a right angle through another doorway. We ended up taking the door off and eventually got it though! That one took about a good 45 

Washington DC Temple Lights

minutes. It was nuts. Got it done though. Yeah buddy! Elder Oyler and I also got togo see the temple lights Friday night with a part member family. It was so amazing! There was so many lights and the temple is huge, it was just incredible. I can't wait to go back again.

     Saturday night we did service for an older couple the other Elders are teaching. We got to put up their lights around their house. It was pretty fun even though we did end up doing them in the dark and it was a little chilly. It was nice to see how happy it made them.

     On Sunday it was the Christmas Program at church and it was so good. The choir did the whole thing and there was lots of great songs. After sacrament Elder Oyler and I handed out little gifts to the kids (thanks to our parents) and the kids loved them. It was cool to see how excited they got over just little gifts. Reminded me that presents aren't what it's all about, it's about Christ. 

Elder Brady & Elder Oyler

     MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!!!!!!!!

     ~ Elder Brady

Elder Brady at the Washington DC Temple

Gunston Hall - Home of George Mason

The view behind Gunston Hall

Birthday Week!

So this week started off great! It was my birthday on Monday woo!!
Birthday week! Birthday week! We ended up biking to the Stake Center
and playing basketball all day which was fun. When we got home Elder
Oyler and I had dinner with the Maygren family. It was awesome because
it was their daughter, Lilly's birthday as well and she was turning
10. We had a little party and it was way fun, they are such an awesome
family.

On Tuesday we went to the Kough's house for dinner and had another
birthday party there. Elder Oyler and I both got our own cakes and we
are now fat. No but really it was so much cakeeeeee it was awesome!
After the party we helped them set up their Christmas tree and
decorate it. This whole time Alma was being so cute. She was a ball
full of energy flying around putting ornaments up and singing made-up
Christmas songs. They were pretty good ones too she like needs to make
a CD or something.

Wednesday was another good day. It was Elder Oyler's birthday! He
turned the big 20. For dinner we went to Zohra's house, Zohra was one
of Elder Oyler's investigators when he first got into the mission
field and he got to baptize her. Anyway, we had Afghan food there
because she is from Afghanistan and she is super sweet! The food was
different...but it was good, it was good. She made a pretty good
cheesecake from scratch too.

Friday was the next big day in the weekly line up. We had the Mission
Christmas Concert which was pretty much a giant talent show. There was
a whole bunch of acts that went on and it was really good. After the
talent show part there was a more spiritual part where we had a
speaker come in and talk to us. Something that really stood out to me
was that we can never quit on anyone. We can't ever give up on
someone. Someone needs us and if we don't give our all we will let
them down as well as ourselves.

Saturday morning rolled around and we had service to do, we got to go
to Arlington Cemetery and put wreaths on the graves. It was probably
one of the coolest things I have done so far on my mission. There were
thousands of people there and even with all the commotion of that many
people, there was a peace. I walked out of there with so much respect
for the people who fight for our great country. It was a surprisingly
spiritual experience, such a simple act of service by honoring those
that have gone on with a wreath. It is something I really want to do
again. I can't wait to go back to Arlington, it was just amazing.

Last night we had dinner with the Lyman family. They are a young
family with a little two year old boy named Ethan, and a girl on the
way. We had a great dinner and afterwards we showed them the "He is
the Gift" video. (If you hadn't seen it I highly recommend you watch
it!) During the video I looked at Sister Lyman and saw tears running
down her cheeks. It really made me stop and think about Christ and the
meaning of Christmas. Christ did so much for us we should be able to
give a little back, especially during this holiday season.

Speaking of holidays I wish you all a Merry Christmas! Hope it's a great one!
Remember Christ.

Elder Brady

Happy 19th Birthday, Elder Brady.

Birthday Week for Elder Brady on December 8th,
 and then for Elder Oyler on December 10th.

Sister Kough made me a wonderful ice cream sandwich cake for my birthday,
and then we helped them set up their Christmas tree.

The Finished Product at the Kough Family. 

Mission Christmas 2014 Concert - Dinner & Talent Show
Placing Christmas wreaths on the headstones at Arlington Cemetery.

What a beautiful site.